Concessions to Islam

The following is an article from the Washington Post entitled Shut Up And Play Nice: How the Western World is Limiting Free Speech by Jonathan Turley:

Free speech is dying in the Western world. While most people still enjoy considerable freedom of expression, this right, once a near-absolute, has become less defined and less dependable for those espousing controversial social, political or religious views. The decline of free speech has come not from any single blow but rather from thousands of paper cuts of well-intentioned exceptions designed to maintain social harmony.
In the face of the violence that frequently results from anti-religious expression, some world leaders seem to be losing their patience with free speech. After a video called “Innocence of Muslims” appeared on YouTube and sparked violent protests in several Muslim nations last month, U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon warned that “when some people use this freedom of expression to provoke or humiliate some others’ values and beliefs, then this cannot be protected.”
It appears that the one thing modern society can no longer tolerate is intolerance. As Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard put it in her recent speech before the United Nations, “Our tolerance must never extend to tolerating religious hatred.”
A willingness to confine free speech in the name of social pluralism can be seen at various levels of authority and government. In February, for instance, Pennsylvania Judge Mark Martin heard a case in which a Muslim man was charged with attacking an atheist marching in a Halloween parade as a “zombie Muhammed.” Martin castigated not the defendant but the victim, Ernie Perce, lecturing him that “our forefathers intended to use the First Amendment so we can speak with our mind, not to piss off other people and cultures — which is what you did.”
Of course, free speech is often precisely about pissing off other people — challenging social taboos or political values.
This was evident in recent days when courts in Washington and New York ruled that transit authorities could not prevent or delay the posting of a controversial ad that says: “In any war between the civilized man and the savage, support the civilized man. Support Israel. Defeat jihad.”
When U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer said the government could not bar the ad simply because it could upset some Metro riders, the ruling prompted calls for new limits on such speech. And in New York, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority responded by unanimously passing a new regulation banning any message that it considers likely to “incite” others or cause some “other immediate breach of the peace.”
Such efforts focus not on the right to speak but on the possible reaction to speech — a fundamental change in the treatment of free speech in the West. The much-misconstrued statement of Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes that free speech does not give you the right to shout fire in a crowded theatre is now being used to curtail speech that might provoke a violence-prone minority. Our entire society is being treated as a crowded theatre, and talking about whole subjects is now akin to shouting “fire!”
The new restrictions are forcing people to meet the demands of the lowest common denominator of accepted speech, usually using one of four rationales.

Speech is blasphemous

This is the oldest threat to free speech, but it has experienced something of a comeback in the 21st century. After protests erupted throughout the Muslim world in 2005 over Danish cartoons depicting the prophet Muhammad, Western countries publicly professed fealty to free speech, yet quietly cracked down on anti-religious expression. Religious critics in France, Britain, Italy and other countries have found themselves under criminal investigation as threats to public safety. In France, actress and animal rights activist Brigitte Bardot has been fined several times for comments about how Muslims are undermining French culture. And just last month, a Greek atheist was arrested for insulting a famous monk by making his name sound like that of a pasta dish.
Some Western countries have classic blasphemy laws — such as Ireland, which in 2009 criminalized the “publication or utterance of blasphemous matter” deemed “grossly abusive or insulting in relation to matters held sacred by any religion.” The Russian Duma recently proposed a law against “insulting religious beliefs.” Other countries allow the arrest of people who threaten strife by criticizing religions or religious leaders. In Britain, for instance, a 15-year-old girl was arrested two years ago for burning a Koran.
Western governments seem to be sending the message that free speech rights will not protect you — as shown clearly last month by the images of Nakoula Basseley Nakoula, the YouTube filmmaker, being carted away in California on suspicion of probation violations. Dutch politician Geert Wilders went through years of litigation before he was acquitted last year on charges of insulting Islam by voicing anti-Islamic views. In the Netherlands and Italy, cartoonists and comedians have been charged with insulting religion through caricatures or jokes.
Even the Obama administration supported the passage of a resolution in the U.N. Human Rights Council to create an international standard restricting some anti-religious speech (its full name: “Combating Intolerance, Negative Stereotyping and Stigmatization of, and Discrimination, Incitement to Violence and Violence Against, Persons Based on Religion or Belief”). Egypt’s U.N. ambassador heralded the resolution as exposing the “true nature” of free speech and recognizing that “freedom of expression has been sometimes misused” to insult religion.
At a Washington conference last year to implement the resolution, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton declared that it would protect both “the right to practice one’s religion freely and the right to express one’s opinion without fear.” But it isn’t clear how speech can be protected if the yardstick is how people react to speech — particularly in countries where people riot over a single cartoon. Clinton suggested that free speech resulting in “sectarian clashes” or “the destruction or the defacement or the vandalization of religious sites” was not, as she put it, “fair game.”
Given this initiative, President Obama’s U.N. address last month declaring America’s support for free speech, while laudable, seemed confused — even at odds with his administration’s efforts.

Speech is hateful

In the United States, hate speech is presumably protected under the First Amendment. However, hate-crime laws often redefine hateful expression as a criminal act. Thus, in 2003, the Supreme Court addressed the conviction of a Virginia Ku Klux Klan member who burned a cross on private land. The court allowed for criminal penalties so long as the government could show that the act was “intended to intimidate” others. It was a distinction without meaning, since the state can simply cite the intimidating history of that symbol.
Other Western nations routinely bar forms of speech considered hateful. Britain prohibits any “abusive or insulting words” meant “to stir up racial hatred.” Canada outlaws “any writing, sign or visible representation” that “incites hatred against any identifiable group.” These laws ban speech based not only on its content but on the reaction of others. Speakers are often called to answer for their divisive or insulting speech before bodies like the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal.
This month, a Canadian court ruled that Marc Lemire, the webmaster of a far-right political site, could be punished for allowing third parties to leave insulting comments about homosexuals and blacks on the site. Echoing the logic behind blasphemy laws, Federal Court Justice Richard Mosley ruled that “the minimal harm caused . . . to freedom of expression is far outweighed by the benefit it provides to vulnerable groups and to the promotion of equality.”

Speech is discriminatory

Perhaps the most rapidly expanding limitation on speech is found in anti-discrimination laws. Many Western countries have extended such laws to public statements deemed insulting or derogatory to any group, race or gender.
For example, in a closely watched case last year, a French court found fashion designer John Galliano guilty of making discriminatory comments in a Paris bar, where he got into a cursing match with a couple using sexist and anti-Semitic terms. Judge Anne-Marie Sauteraud read a list of the bad words Galliano had used, adding that she found (rather implausibly) he had said “dirty whore” at least 1,000 times. Though he faced up to six months in jail, he was fined.
In Canada, comedian Guy Earle was charged with violating the human rights of a lesbian couple after he got into a trash-talking session with a group of women during an open-mike night at a nightclub. Lorna Pardy said she suffered post-traumatic stress because of Earle’s profane language and derogatory terms for lesbians. The British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal ruled last year that since this was a matter of discrimination, free speech was not a defense, and awarded about $23,000 to the couple.
Ironically, while some religious organizations are pushing blasphemy laws, religious individuals are increasingly targeted under anti-discrimination laws for their criticism of homosexuals and other groups. In 2008, a minister in Canada was not only forced to pay fines for uttering anti-gay sentiments but was also enjoined from expressing such views in the future.

Speech is deceitful

In the United States, where speech is given the most protection among Western countries, there has been a recent effort to carve out a potentially large category to which the First Amendment would not apply. While we have always prosecuted people who lie to achieve financial or other benefits, some argue that the government can outlaw any lie, regardless of whether the liar secured any economic gain.
One such law was the Stolen Valor Act, signed by President George W. Bush in 2006, which made it a crime for people to lie about receiving military honours. The Supreme Court struck it down this year, but at least two liberal justices, Stephen Breyer and Elena Kagan, proposed that such laws should have less of a burden to be upheld as constitutional. The House responded with new legislation that would criminalize lies told with the intent to obtain any undefined “tangible benefit.”
The dangers are obvious. Government officials have long labeled whistle blowers, reporters and critics as “liars” who distort their actions or words. If the government can define what is a lie, it can define what is the truth.
For example, in February the French Supreme Court declared unconstitutional a law that made it a crime to deny the 1915 Armenian genocide by Turkey — a characterization that Turkey steadfastly rejects. Despite the ruling, various French leaders pledged to pass new measures punishing those who deny the Armenians’ historical claims.
The impact of government limits on speech has been magnified by even greater forms of private censorship. For example, most news organizations have stopped showing images of Muhammad, though they seem to have no misgivings about caricatures of other religious figures. The most extreme such example was supplied by Yale University Press, which in 2009 published a book about the Danish cartoons titled “The Cartoons That Shook the World” — but cut all of the cartoons so as not to insult anyone.
The very right that laid the foundation for Western civilization is increasingly viewed as a nuisance, if not a threat. Whether speech is deemed inflammatory or hateful or discriminatory or simply false, society is denying speech rights in the name of tolerance, enforcing mutual respect through categorical censorship.
As in a troubled marriage, the West seems to be falling out of love with free speech. Unable to divorce ourselves from this defining right, we take refuge instead in an awkward and forced silence.

jturley@law.gwu.edu

Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro professor of public interest law at George Washington University.

Concessions to Islam

Australia launches anti-terrorism offensive

Miran Hosny  26 August 2014

New measures needed as dozens of citizens fighting with Islamic State pose home-grown terror threat, PM Abbott says.

Foreign Minister Julie Bishop warned Australians fighting in Syria may comeback and attack the country [Reuters]

Sydney, Australia - Australia's government is bolstering counter-terrorism measures after Prime Minister Tony Abbott warned on Tuesday that dozens of citizens were fighting alongside the Islamic State group in Iraq and Syria and posed a serious threat upon their return.

Abbott said about 100 Australians were also supporting the hard-line group. 

Legislative proposals were put to parliament earlier this month in response to what Abbott and law enforcement agencies termed a "real and growing" threat from Australian nationals fighting in foreign conflicts.

"There are extremists fighting in Syria and in Iraq and that includes Australians," Foreign Minister Julie Bishop said at a press conference.

"We are deeply concerned that this domestic security challenge will mean that Australian citizens fighting in these conflicts overseas will return to this country as hardened, home-grown terrorists who may use their experience, the skills that they have gained, to carry out an attack in this country."

Pledging more than $557m in additional funding to intelligence and border-control agencies over the next four years, the government proposed extending police search powers, lowering thresholds for arrest without warrants, and enabling the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) to suspend passports where appropriate.

While opposition parties have reserved judgment until they see the entire bill, some of the measures outlined by the prime minister's office were drafted into the National Security Legislation Amendment Bill (No 1) 2014 to be presented to parliament this week.

The Muslim community was specifically named in the prime minister's original press release and, so far, it is the only community invited by Abbott and Attorney-General George Brandis to closed-door consultation on the proposals.

ASIO chief David Irvine made a rare appearance last week on community radio station The Voice of Islam to assure Australian Muslims that the planned anti-terror laws do not target their community.

"The Australian government … is not introducing laws that specifically discriminate against members of the Australian Muslim community," Irvine said. "It is introducing laws that will enable the police - and to a certain extent ASIO - to protect the community better against a very small number of people who would do the community harm."

'Muslim problem'

Mohamad Tabbaa, a criminology lecturer at the University of Melbourne, said the campaign conveys a message that these laws are a response to a perceived "Muslim problem".

"In a strictly legal sense, the laws apply to all of us equally as citizens," he said.

"The concrete experience, which is backed by research, is that discrimination occurs and laws are applied unevenly. When they are applied unevenly, regardless of what form of equality we have, substantive inequality ensues, which will mean that certain groups - in this case Muslims - will be targeted much more heavily than other groups."

Despite the heavy focus by politicians and media, the proposals - which lack clarity and detail - could adversely affect several facets of Australian society, according to academics, activists and attorneys.

Islamic State fighters in Raqqa, Syria [Reuters]

One proposed legislative measure is set to make travelling to "terror hotspots" an offence, unless the legitimacy of the trip can be proven, which could burden the logistics of humanitarian aid organisations.

A Sky News report cited a senior intelligence official's advice that it would be prudent of Red Cross workers to consider the kind of evidence they could present to explain what they were doing in those regions.

According to International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) spokesperson Ewan Watson, this contrasts the organisation's ordinary operation.

"To be able to carry out its humanitarian mandate independently, confidentially and efficiently, both the ICRC and its staff enjoy functional immunity from jurisdiction, and also in Australia," he said.

But under the proposed measures, immunity may not be so complete. David Kinley, a professor in human rights law at the University of Sydney, said that protection would end if an ICRC worker is perceived to act outside of their remit.

"The ICRC may be undertaking its humanitarian role of providing [a detainee suspected of terror associations] with food, or information concerning the possibility of them being able to communicate a message to a relative, friend or lawyer. Who's to say that the information that's passed between the ICRC worker and the detainee couldn't be in some way caught up the activities of a terrorist organisation, even if unforeseen and unintended?"

If they're exonerated, they get no recompense, and that will result in enormous injustice.

- Robert Stary, criminal defence lawyer

Hindering aid

Smaller NGOs are not afforded similar protections. Tamer Kahil, president of the Australians for Syria Association, an NGO that's pushing for democracy in Syria, told Al Jazeera these measures may deter aid relief workers.

"What if they feel that the proof we have is not enough?" he asked. "It will definitely hinder every effort to go there because no one wants a finger pointed at them with questions of whether you're a criminal or a terrorist, and having to prove otherwise."

Under these proposed laws, the burden of proof is reversed. Instead of requiring the prosecution to establish guilt, the accused must prove their innocence and is usually denied bail, said criminal defence lawyer Robert Stary.

"You have a great risk of people who travel to any of those locations then being charged with an offence, and then having to establish their innocence, quite probably whilst they are in custody. If they're exonerated, they get no recompense, and that will result in enormous injustice," he said.

Journalists also have cause for concern. Promotion and encouragement of terrorism constitutes an offence under the proposals, but Diaa Hadid, an Australian reporter working in the Middle East, pointed out the need for clearer definitions.

"Is it tweeting and corresponding with suspected terrorists and members of ISIS?" she asked. "Is it conveying their points of views in stories? These are both important parts of my work."

In the Australian state of Victoria, there was an attempt to strengthen a more strict interpretation of the country's counter-terrorism laws. Trying to create a new precedent in common law, prosecutors presented an argument to the Supreme Court of Victoria that painted mere possession of terrorism-related publications as a punishable offence. 

"The Commonwealth, to put it simply, said that it doesn't matter when and where that act takes place; the fact of the possession means that you're subscribing to a 'jihadist' ideology and therefore you're guilty of an offence," said Stary, who has a high profile in defending Australians charged with terrorism offences since the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.

His client, Adnan Karabegovic, was brought before the Supreme Court for possessing an al-Qaeda magazine called Inspire.

The court disagreed with the prosecutors and chose to apply the law as it stands, where a close link must be established between possession of an item and a contemplated terrorist act.   

Compromising computers

One of the proposals could affect every Australian who uses a computer. Currently, ASIO is required to apply for a new warrant per computer it wishes to examine, but the drafted bill would allow one warrant to access multiple computers and computer networks that a user is connected to. One section of the bill even allows ASIO to add, delete or alter data on the third-party's computer in order to reach the target machine.

"The new laws allow spy agencies to interfere with the computer of an innocent party, or even whole networks," said director of Civil Liberties Australia Tim Vines.

"There is no obligation in the law for spy agencies to have to try less invasive methods before applying for a warrant to disrupt an innocent third-party's computer," he added. 

An Australian example is the asylum seeker debate, which is not even entirely an immigration issue any more. It has become a national security issue.

- Mohamad Tabbaa, criminologist

While some Australians argue that innocent parties have no cause for concern, Tabbaa said a decade of "war on terror" rhetoric has blurred the lines between international, national and domestic spheres of crime and control.

"An Australian example is the asylum seeker debate, which is not even entirely an immigration issue any more. It has become a national security issue and is closely linked to the terror threat," he told Al Jazeera.

Some states have already picked up mechanisms meant for counter-terrorism and used those to target organised crime.

"Control orders were introduced into Australian law in 2005 to deal with terrorists. State parliaments looking at how to deal with bikies [gangs] essentially adapted and copied that anti-terror measure," said University of New South Wales' professor George Williams, a constitutional lawyer. "One premier, for example, said that bikies were terrorists in their communities."

Vines expressed concern about more than just the bill's provisions.

"Our rights and freedoms are sliced away, slowly but surely," he said. 

"We think it is time to bring our laws back to some sort of sensible position, with the community to have its say on how we can deal with terrorism while maintaining the rule of law, presumption of innocence, and right to privacy that we hold dear."

Source: Al Jazeera

Australia launches anti-terrorism offensive - Features - Al Jazeera English

MH17: How did the conflict in Ukraine start?

By international correspondent Mark Corcoran Posted 29 Jul 2014

Photo: Ukrainian forces are involved in a stand-off the likes of which have not been seen since the Cold War. (AFP: Genya Savilov)

Map: Ukraine

The region where Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 was shot down is at the heart of a conflict that has been raging for months.

Ukraine has been in turmoil since November 2013, when its Moscow-backed president Viktor Yanukovych walked away from a free-trade deal with the European Union and instead sought closer economic ties with Russia.

His decision triggered huge protests in the capital Kiev that soon turned violent as police attempted to suppress the demonstrators. Following weeks of deadly street clashes, Mr Yanukovych was toppled as president in February 2014.

In response, pro-Russian gunmen seized key installations and airports in Ukraine's predominately Russian-speaking Crimea region.

Russian president Vladimir Putin said the armed men were not Russian troops but "self-defence forces".

Moscow had additional motives in maintaining control of the region.

Crimea is home to the Russian navy's Black Sea Fleet and other military facilities that are permitted under a long-term agreement with the Kiev government. Moscow warned that it had a right to protect its bases.

Seeking to avoid provoking a full-scale military confrontation, Ukraine withdrew its forces from Crimea.

Infographic: A map showing the situation in eastern Ukraine

In late March, separatists declared that 97 per cent of voters in a Crimea regional referendum wanted to join Russia.

The European Union and the US imposed their first range of sanctions, freezing assets and blocking travel of individuals leading the Crimea secessionist movement.

But it proved to little avail, as Mr Putin signed an historic treaty that formally absorbed Crimea into Russia – the first time Moscow had extended its national borders since World War II.

Emboldened by swift victories in the south, separatists in Ukraine's eastern region, bordering Russia, also occupied government buildings in Kharkiv, Donetsk and Luhansk.

Ukraine's government responded by launching an "anti-terrorist operation" against the rebels.

Beyond contested east Ukraine, the diplomatic landscape was soon littered with the wreckage of failure.

The European Union and the United Nations were unable to de-escalate tensions. Phone calls between US president Barack Obama and Mr Putin were tense and inconclusive.

The combatants – and their political and diplomatic proxies - blamed each other.

Photo: Pro-Russian militants take position on the roof of Donetsk international airport in May (AFP: Alexander Khudoteply)

Mr Putin declared Ukraine was on the verge of civil war, while Ukraine's prime minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk warned the Russians were on the brink of triggering "a third World War".

European Union intervention by peace monitors from the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) were intimidated or detained by rebels. When not being harassed, the observers could only watch impotently as the conflict escalated and casualties mounted.

By June, the separatists, who repeatedly denied they were covertly supported by Russian special forces, were displaying a markedly increased sophistication in both the tactics used and the weapons deployed in their war against Ukraine government forces.

The airspace over east Ukraine turned deadly as the rebels began shooting down government military aircraft and helicopters.

Several low-flying helicopters and jets were targeted.

Then ominously on July 14 a Ukraine military transport plane was blown out of the sky by a surface-to-air missile while flying at 21,000 feet.

Three days later MH17 was shot down with the loss of 298 men, women and children.

This deadly regional conflict suddenly accelerated into far more dangerous territory – a potential stand-off between major powers - a political confrontation not seen since the days of the Cold War.

Infographic: Aircraft shot down over eastern Ukraine

MH17: How did the conflict in Ukraine start? - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

Libyan capital under Islamist control after Tripoli airport seized

Chris Stephen, and Anne Penketh The Guardian, Monday 25 August 2014

Operation Dawn captures airport in fierce fighting against pro-government militias after five-week siege in the capital

Link to video: Libya: Islamist-allied fighters celebrate after seizing Tripoli airport

Libya has lurched ever closer to fragmentation and civil war this weekend after Islamist-led militias seized the airport in the capital, Tripoli, proclaimed their own government, and presented the world with yet another crisis.

Operation Dawn, a coalition of Islamist and Misrata forces, captured the airport on Saturday in fierce fighting against pro-government militias after a five-week siege that battered parts of the capital.

Television images from the scene showed jubilant, bearded, militias dancing on wrecked airliners, firing machine guns in the air and chanting "Allah O Akbar" ("God is great").

On Sunday, they set airport buildings ablaze, apparently intending to destroy rather than hold the site.

The victory, which secures Islamist control over Tripoli, was a culmination of weeks of fighting triggered by elections in July, lost by Islamist parties.

Rather than accept the elections result Islamist leaders in Libya accused the new parliament of being dominated by supporters of the former dictator Muammar Gaddafi, and have sought to restore the old national congress.

"The general national congress will hold an emergency meeting in Tripoli to save the country," said Omar Ahmidan, a congress spokesman.

Libya's official parliament, the house of representatives, in the eastern city of Tobruk, denounced the attack as illegal, branding Dawn a "terrorist organisation" and announcing a state of war against the group. The move leaves Libya with two governments, one in Tripoli, and one in the east of the country, each battling for the hearts and minds of the country's myriad militias.

There are few regular forces for the government to call upon. The prime minister, Abdullah al-Thani, needs to persuade nationalist and tribal militias to try to recapture the capital. Dawn militias are consolidating their hold on the capital by rounding up government sympathisers and people from Zintan, whose militia defended the airport.

"Units from Gharyan and Abu Salem are circling the area looking for any Zintani they can find," said one frightened resident hiding at an address in the city.

Fighting is continuing to the west of Tripoli, while Islamist brigades in Benghazi, 400 miles east, are battling with army units and nationalist militias of the former general Khalifa Hiftar.

The weekend's developments threaten to tilt the country across the line from troubled post-Arab spring democracy to outright failed state.

Egypt and Sudan are known to be watching developments closely, and last week the French president, François Hollande, said that despite the crises in Iraq, Syria, Ukraine and Gaza, his "biggest concern at the moment is Libya".

Some officials in neighbouring countries fear militants could use planes at the three airports Dawn now controls for terror attacks on surrounding nations.

Those fears were heightened after Dawn officials vowed retaliation against Egypt and the United Arab Emirates, whom they blame for air strikes by unidentified jets, Saturday morning, which killed 17 Misrata militias.

"The Emirates and Egypt are involved in this cowardly aggression, we reserve the right to respond at the opportune moment," said Ahmed Hadia, a spokesman for Dawn.

Reports from Italy say Rome is working with the US, France and other nearby states to launch precautionary exercises. Algeria has deployed air defence missiles on its border while Egypt and Tunisia have banned flights from west Libya airports.

The security situation has become so parlous in Libya that the nation has been forced to withdraw as host for the African Cup of Nations in 2017.

Libyan officials have arrived in Egypt before a summit in Cairo on Monday at which they are expected to appeal for military support. Libya's foreign minister, Mohamed Abdul Aziz, launched a similar appeal at the UN in July, but found no support, with diplomats wary about new foreign intervention.

Dawn leaders insist they are not extremists, characterising themselves as patriots ensuring that the gains of the 2011 revolution are not lost.

Many Libyans think fragmentation is now inevitable, with Islamist-led forces strong in Tripoli, and tribal and nationalists dominant in the east of the country.

"It's gone into complete madness," said Hassan el Amin, a Libyan politician who fled to Britain after receiving death threats from Misrata militias. "There's another battle coming up, between east and west."

The key to victory could be as much economic as military. Libya's government might have lost control of the capital but for the moment it has international recognition, ensuring access to the country's rich oil reserves and foreign assets, worth an estimated £80bn.

French diplomats say that in the present power struggle involving rival armed factions, the UN security council should take a leading role to forge a political solution and prevent the country from splitting apart.

France sent two frigates to Tripoli to evacuate the remaining French nationals from Libya on 29 July. Forty-seven French nationals and a number of Britons were evacuated secretly in the night-time operation.

But experts say military intervention in Libya, at this time either by France or within a NATO coalition, looks unlikely.

Camille Grand, director of the Fondation pour la Recherche Stratégique, said: "NATO's got its hands busy with Ukraine. And in France, everyone's looking at Iraq, Syria and the Sahel.

"Who would be the driving force? And what would be the trigger now that French nationals have been evacuated? There aren't any volunteers to get involved in a quagmire that looks like Somalia now."

Libyan capital under Islamist control after Tripoli airport seized | World news | The Guardian

Exodus of Christians from the Middle East is a tragedy and a blow to the basic pride of Arab Islamic civilisation

By Robert Fisk – 23 February 2014

 

Egyptian security forces stand guard at a Coptic Christian church in the Waraa neighbourhood of Cairo after gunmen on motorcycles opened fire (AP)

Egyptian Christians chant anti-Muslim Brotherhood slogans during the funeral service in Cairo (AP)

 

Tarif Khalidi is a big, bearded bear of a man, the kind you would always choose to play Father Christmas, or perhaps a Cossack leader sweeping across the Russian steppe, reins in one hand, sword in the other.

But Tarif – or Uncle Tarif as I invariably call him – is an Islamic scholar, the most recent translator of the Koran and author of a wonderful book of Muslim stories about Jesus. I am thus surprised – but after a few seconds not at all surprised – to hear how well this Palestinian from Jerusalem got on with the Imam Musa Sadr, the Shia leader in southern Lebanon who did more to lift his people from squalor than any I can think of – until Colonel Muammar Gaddafi had him murdered in Libya in 1978.

“He took on the Christians of Lebanon in an extraordinary manner,” Tarif says. “He revived Islamic interest in Jesus and Mary. He was an extraordinary performer. He almost embraced Christian theology. He would lecture in churches with the cross right behind him!” But as we weave our way between religions, I realise what is grieving this most burly of professors – he teaches at the American University of Beirut – as he speaks slowly and eloquently of the almost biblical exodus of Christians from the Middle East.

“It is a tragedy and a blow to the basic pride of Arab Islamic civilisation. It is one of the most horrific developments of recent years. If Islamic civilisation has anything to show for itself, it is its record of pluralism and coexistence. I said the other day that if the Nobel Peace Prize had existed hundreds of years ago, it would be awarded to Islamic civilisation. But now the barbarians are at the gates, Christians are killed, nuns are kidnapped” – Tarif is referring to the nuns taken from the Christian Syrian town of Maaloula – “and bishops disappear. This strikes at the very heart of what we stood for.”

I ask him an obvious question. What did it feel like to translate the Koran? The answer comes straight from the shoulder. “I feel a big difference in rhetoric and eloquence. Some parts of it are very moving, very poetical. Other parts are humdrum, prosaic, repetitive. It’s an uneven text.” He pauses, and then says  that “there has not yet been a higher criticism of the Koran. It may happen, but it hasn’t. Christians indulged in this higher criticism of the Bible at the end of the 19th century. We need, for example, very seriously to re-examine things between men and women. The implication of these things have not been fully explored. Veiling, for instance. You need to re-think basic human rights issues. And what does ‘revelation’ really mean?”

Tarif is not criticising the Koran and he doesn’t use the word ‘re-interpretation’ – although I do, and he agrees this is what he is talking about. Islamic scholars have endured much harassment in the past for suggesting that it is time for Muslims to re-interpret their holy book. I suggest – with some hesitation – that I find Shia Muslims readier to discuss the meaning of the Koran than Sunni Muslims, and Tarif Khalidi agrees at once.

“Shiite clerics get a far more rigorous education than Sunni clerics. They have a solid education in the theological sciences. They learn Aristotelian logic before the Koran. I think theology is much more alive in the Shia community. Shiites are more theological, Sunnis are legalistic. And the Shiites have their ‘passion story’ about Hussein and Ali. It is an invitation to reflect on the need for justice.”

It is almost a relief to turn to the Middle East today, although Tarif’s response is unexpected. “I think the Middle East is part of a more general epidemic – it’s happening in the Ukraine, in north Africa. It could be a kind of contamination that runs through unstable societies. It’s extremely difficult to differentiate what in each case is going to happen. It’s very sad, the cost is very high in human life. And do you notice how these leaders haven’t said a single word about the casualties among their own people? They talk about reform, elections, a new constitution, but not a word about their own people’s suffering.

“Syria began as a legitimate war but now it’s a kind of melee, one side infecting the other with its fanaticism.”

Of Egypt, Tarif is a little unkind, especially towards Mohamed Morsi, Egypt’s first elected president who could be “described as a clown”. Morsi “was like a man who felt himself parachuted into a job he had only dreamed about. He had been in opposition so long, he didn’t know what to do when he got to power.” Every Egyptian, Tarif suspects, wishes to be a Nasser. Tarif doesn’t name names but I can certainly think of one army officer who would like to try on Nasser’s clothes.

Tarif, I should add, doesn’t buy my line about Christianity dying out in the West. He talks about Americans in the Mid-West and churches filling up because of Pope Francis. Asked by another journalist whether he has taken heat from extremists, Tarif replied that “nobody has challenged me, because most of these fundamentalists are illiterate – so that’s a mercy”.

Not so illiterate, however, that they would have missed Beirut’s most famous faux pas of recent years. The avuncular Tarif was lecturing at the American University about the Koran and the hoarding advertising his talk read: “The Koran, by Tarif al-Khalidi.” Mobiles rang at once and the offending advertisement was swiftly taken down before anyone had time to point out that the author of the Koran was God.

Meddling with medals and other fine nouns

I have always hated sport, ever since a nasty little prefect beat me with a cane at school for reading a book on Czech history at a football match. I was far more interested in the defenestration of Masaryk in Prague than exhorting a bunch of blue-and-black dressed clods with the immortal words: “Come ON, Sutton!” So it befell a colleague watching the Sochi Olympics to inform me that “medal” – like other perfectly decent nouns – has been turned into a verb.

Athletes are now en route “to medal”. I suppose we’ve had ‘be-medalled’ with us for years although it’s often employed a bit derisively. I used it about the UN commander in ex-Yugoslavia who had more medals on his chest than Dwight D Eisenhower wore when he was Supreme Allied Commander in the Second World War. In any event, “to medal” must join “conflict” – which has now become a verb for people who are confused about their aims. Such folk, as you know, are now ‘conflicted’.

Another howler passed my way the other day: “to evidence” as in “to evidence the assertion”. In my day, evidence was something you gave in court – or tampered with if you were a bent copper – but “to evidence” must now take its place beside “to incentivise” and “to prioritise”. I’m still trying not to grind my teeth when I hear from someone who promises to “revert”. What’s wrong with “reply”? It could make you commit murder. Which, I fear is both a noun and a verb. But what happened to the wonderful word for a person likely to be murdered? He or she was once called, according to my Webster’s, a “murderee”. Murderees now include those who would “medal” or “revert”. We should bring “murderee” back to normal usage.

Exodus of Christians from the Middle East is a tragedy and a blow to the basic pride of Arab Islamic civilisation - BelfastTelegraph.co.uk

Why the global 'war on terror' went wrong

BY PATRICK COCKBURN – 18 March 2014

 

Rebels from al Qaida affiliated group Jabhat al-Nusra at Taftanaz air base in Idlib province, northern Syria (ENN/AP)

 

It is now 12-and-a-half years since the September 11 attacks that put al-Qa’ida firmly on the map of global terrorism. The US has spent billions of dollars on its ‘war on terror’ to counter the threat and succeeded in killing Osama bin Laden three years ago.

And yet al-Qa’ida-type groups are arguably stronger than ever now, especially in Syria and Iraq where they control an area the size of Britain, but also in Libya, Lebanon, Egypt and beyond.

Al-Qa’ida-type organisations, with beliefs and methods of operating similar to those who carried out the 9/11 attacks, have become a lethally powerful force from the Tigris to the Mediterranean in the past three years.

Since the start of 2014, they have held Fallujah, 40 miles west of Baghdad, much of the upper Euphrates valley, and exert increasing control over the Sunni heartlands of northern Iraq. In Syria, their fighters occupy villages and towns from the outskirts of Damascus to the border with Turkey, including the oilfields in the north-east of the country. Overall, they are now the most powerful military force in an area the size of Britain.

The spectacular resurgence of al-Qa’ida and its offshoots has happened despite the huge expansion of American and British intelligence services and their budgets after 9/11. Since then, the US, closely followed by Britain, has fought wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and adopted procedures formerly associated with police states, such as imprisonment without trial, rendition, torture and domestic espionage. Governments justify this as necessary to wage the “war on terror”, claiming that the rights of individual citizens must be sacrificed to secure the safety of all.

Despite these controversial security measures, the movements against which they are aimed have not only not been defeated but have grown stronger. At the time of 9/11, al-Qa’ida was a very small organisation, but in 2014 al-Qa’ida-type groups are numerous and powerful. In other words, the “war on terror”, the waging of which determined the politics of so much of the world since 2001, has demonstrably failed.

How this failure happened is perhaps the most extraordinary development of the 21st century. Politicians were happy to use the threat of al-Qa’ida to persuade people that their civil liberties should be restricted and state power expanded, but they spent surprisingly little time calculating the most effective practical means to combat the movement. They have been able to get away with this by giving a misleading definition of al-Qa’ida, which varied according to what was politically convenient at the time.

Jihadi groups ideologically identical to al-Qa’ida are relabelled as moderate if their actions are deemed supportive of US policy aims. In Syria, the US is backing a plan by Saudi Arabia to build up a “Southern Front” based in Jordan against the Assad government in Damascus, but also hostile to al-Qa’ida-type rebels in the north and east. The powerful but supposedly “moderate” Yarmouk Brigade, which is reportedly to receive anti-aircraft missiles from Saudi Arabia, will be the leading element in this new formation. But numerous videos show that the Yarmouk Brigade has frequently fought in collaboration with Jabhat al-Nusra (JAN), the official al-Qa’ida affiliate. Since it is likely that, in the midst of battle, these two groups will share their munitions, Washington will be permitting advanced weaponry to be handed over to its deadliest enemy.

This episode helps explain why al-Qa’ida and its offshoots have been able to survive and flourish. The “war on terror” has failed because it did not target the jihadi movement as a whole and, above all, was not aimed at Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, the two countries that had fostered jihadism as a creed and a movement. The US did not do so because they were important American allies whom it did not want to offend. Saudi Arabia is an enormous market for American arms, and the Saudis have cultivated and, on occasion bought up, influential members of the American political establishment.

A measure of the seriousness of the present situation is that, in recent weeks, Saudi Arabia has for the first time been urgently seeking to stop jihadi fighters, whom it previously allowed to join the war in Syria, from returning home and turning their weapons against the rulers of the Saudi kingdom. This is an abrupt reversal of previous Saudi policy, which tolerated or privately encouraged Saudi citizens going to Syria to take part in a holy war to overthrow President Bashar al-Assad and combat Shia Muslims on behalf of Sunni Islam.

In recent weeks, Saudi Arabia has called on all foreign fighters to leave Syria, and King Abdullah has decreed it a crime for Saudis to fight in foreign conflicts. The Saudi intelligence chief, Prince Bandar bin Sultan, who had been in charge of organising, funding and supplying jihadi groups fighting in Syria, has been unexpectedly removed from overseeing Saudi policy towards Syria, and replaced by a prince who has led a security clampdown against al-Qa’ida inside Saudi Arabia.

The US is increasingly fearful that support for the Syrian rebels by the West and the Sunni monarchies of the Gulf has created a similar situation to that in Afghanistan in the 1980s, when indiscriminate backing for insurgents ultimately produced al-Qa’ida, the Taliban and jihadi warlords. The US Under-Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence, David Cohen, warned this month that “terrorist” movements, such as JAN  and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isis), were not only destabilising Syria but “these well-funded and well-equipped groups may soon turn their attention to attacks outside of Syria, particularly as scores of newly radicalised and freshly trained foreign recruits return from Syria to their home countries”. The number of foreign fighters that Mr Cohen gives is a significant underestimate, since the head of US intelligence, James Clapper, estimates foreign fighters in Syria to number about 7,000, mostly from the Arab world, but also from countries such as Chechnya, France and Britain.

Al-Qa’ida has always been a convenient enemy. In Iraq, in 2003 and 2004, as armed Iraqi opposition to the American and British-led occupation mounted, US spokesmen attributed most attacks to al-Qa’ida, though many were carried out by nationalist and Baathist groups. According to a poll by the Pew Group, this persuaded 57 per cent of US voters before the Iraq invasion to believe that there was a connection between Saddam Hussein and those responsible for 9/11, despite a complete absence of evidence for this. In Iraq itself, indeed the whole Muslim world, these accusations benefited al-Qa’ida by exaggerating its role in the resistance to the US and British occupation.

Precisely the opposite PR tactics were employed by Western governments in 2011 in Libya, where they played down any similarity between al-Qa’ida and the NATO backed rebels fighting to overthrow the Libyan leader, Muammar Gaddafi. This was done by describing as dangerous only those jihadists who had a direct operational link to the al-Qa’ida “core” of Osama bin Laden. The falsity of the pretence that the anti-Gaddafi jihadists in Libya were less threatening than those in contact with al-Qa’ida was forcefully, if tragically, exposed when US ambassador Chris Stevens was killed by jihadi fighters in Benghazi in September 2012. These were the same fighters lauded by governments and media for their role in the anti-Gaddafi uprising.

Al-Qa’ida is an idea rather than an organisation, and this has long been so. For a five-year period after 1996, it did have cadres, resources and camps in Afghanistan, but these were eliminated after the overthrow of the Taliban in 2001. Subsequently, al-Qa’ida’s name was a rallying cry, a set of Islamic beliefs such as the creation of an Islamic state, the imposition of sharia, a return to Islamic customs, the subjugation of women and waging holy war against other Muslims, notably the Shia, as heretics worthy of death. At the centre of this doctrine for making war is an emphasis on self-sacrifice and martyrdom as a symbol of religious faith and commitment. This has turned out to be a way of using untrained but fanatical believers to devastating effect as suicide bombers.

It has always been in the interests of the US and other governments that al-Qa’ida should be viewed as having a command-and-control structure like a mini-Pentagon, or the Mafia in America as shown in the Godfather films. This is a comforting image for the public because  organised groups, however demonic, can be tracked down and eliminated through imprisonment or death. More alarming is the reality of a movement whose adherents are self-recruited and may spring up anywhere.

Osama bin Laden’s gathering of militants, which he did not call al-Qa’ida until after 9/11, was just one of many jihadi groups 12 years ago. But today its ideas and methods are predominant among jihadists because of the prestige and publicity it gained through the destruction of the twin towers, the war in Iraq and its demonisation by Washington as the source of all anti-American evil. These days, there is a decreasing difference in the beliefs of jihadists, regardless of whether or not they are formally linked to al-Qa’ida central, now headed by Ayman al-Zawahiri. An observer in southern Turkey discussing 9/11 with a range of Syrian jihadi rebels earlier this year found that “without exception they all expressed enthusiasm for the 9/11 attacks and hoped the same thing would happen in Europe as well as the US”.

Unsurprisingly, governments prefer the fantasy picture of al-Qa’ida because it enables them to claim a series of victories by killing its better-known members and allies. Often, those eliminated are given quasi-military ranks, such as “head of operations”, to enhance the significance of their demise. The culmination of this most publicised but largely irrelevant aspect of the “war on terror” was the killing of Bin Laden in Abbottabad in Pakistan in 2011. This enabled President Obama to grandstand before the American public as the man who had presided over the hunting down of al-Qa’ida’s leader. In practice, his death had no impact on al-Qa’ida-type jihadi groups, whose greatest expansion has been since 2011.

The resurgence of these jihadists is most striking on the ground in Iraq and Syria, but is evident in Afghanistan, Libya, Somalia and, in recent months, Lebanon and Egypt. In Iraq, it was a final humiliation for the US, after losing 4,500 soldiers, that al-Qa’ida’s black flag should once again fly in Fallujah, captured with much self-congratulatory rhetoric by US Marines in 2004. Aside from Fallujah, Isis, the premier jihadi movement in the country, has rapidly expanded its influence in all parts of Sunni Iraq in the past three years. It levies local taxes and protection money in Mosul, Iraq’s third largest city, estimated to bring in $8m (£4.8m) a month.

It has been able to capitalise on two factors: the Sunni revolt in Syria and the alienation of the Iraqi Sunni by a Shia-led government. Peaceful protests by Sunni started in December 2012, but a lack of concessions by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and a massacre at a peace camp at Hawijah last April is transmuting peaceful protest into armed resistance.

Last summer, Isis freed hundreds of its leaders and experienced militants in a spectacular raid on Abu Ghraib prison. Its stepped-up bombing campaign killed 9,500 people, mostly Shia civilians, in the course of last year, the heaviest casualties since 2008. But there is a crucial difference between then and now. Even at the previous peak of its influence in 2004-06, al-Qa’ida in Iraq did not enjoy as strong a position in the Sunni armed opposition as it does today.

Jessica D Lewis, of the Institute for the Study of War, commented in a study of the movement at the end of 2013 that al-Qa’ida in Iraq “is an extremely vigorous, resilient and capable organisation that can operate from Basra to coastal Syria”.

In Syria, Isis was the original founder in early 2012 of JAN, sending it money, arms and experienced fighters. A year later, it tried to reassert its authority over JAN by folding it into a broader organisation covering both Syria and Iraq. The two are now involved in a complicated intra-jihadi civil war that began at the start of the year, pitting Isis, notorious for its cruelty and determination to monopolise power, against the other jihadi groups. The more secular Free Syrian Army (FSA), once designated along with its political wing by the West as the next rulers of Syria, has collapsed and been marginalised.

The armed opposition is now dominated by jihadists who wish to establish an Islamic state, accept foreign fighters, and have a vicious record of massacring Syria’s minorities, notably the Alawites and the Christians. The Islamic Front, for instance, a newly established and powerful alliance of opposition brigades backed by Turkey and Qatar, is fighting Isis. But that does not mean that it is not complicit in sectarian killings, and it insists on strict imposition of sharia, including the public flogging of those who do not attend Friday prayers. The Syrian jihadists rule most of north-east Syria aside from that part of it held by the Kurds. The government clings to a few outposts in this vast area, but does not have the forces to recapture it. 

The decisions that enabled al-Qa’ida to avoid elimination, and later to expand, were made in the hours immediately after 9/11. Almost every significant element in the project to crash planes into the twin towers and other iconic American buildings led back to Saudi Arabia. Bin laden was a member of the Saudi elite, whose father had been a close associate of the Saudi monarch.

Of the 19 hijackers on 9/11, 15 were Saudi nationals. Citing a CIA report of 2002, the official 9/11 report says that al-Qa’ida relied for its financing on “a variety of donors and fundraisers, primarily in the Gulf countries and particularly in Saudi Arabia”.

The report’s investigators repeatedly found their access limited or denied when seeking information in Saudi Arabia. Yet President George W Bush never considered holding the Saudis in any way responsible for what had happened. The exit of senior Saudis, including Bin Laden relatives, from the US was facilitated by the government in the days after 9/11. Most significantly, 28 pages of the 9/11 Commission Report about the relationship between the attackers and Saudi Arabia was cut and never published – despite a promise by President Obama to do so – on the grounds of national security.

Nothing much changed in Saudi Arabia until recent months. In 2009, eight years after 9/11, a cable from the US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, revealed by WikiLeaks, complains that “donors in Saudi Arabia constitute the most significant source of funding to Sunni terrorist groups worldwide”.

Moreover, the US and the west Europeans showed themselves indifferent to Saudi preachers, their message spread to millions by satellite TV, YouTube and Twitter, calling for the killing of Shia as heretics. These calls came as al-Qa’ida bombs were slaughtering people in Shia neighbourhoods in Iraq. A sub-headline in another State Department cable in the same year reads: “Saudi Arabia: Anti-Shi’ism As Foreign Policy?” Five years later, Saudi-supported groups have a record of extreme sectarianism against non-Sunni Muslims.

Pakistan, or rather Pakistani military intelligence in the shape of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), was the other parent of al-Qa’ida, the Taliban and jihadi movements in general. When the Taliban was disintegrating under the weight of US bombing in 2001, its forces in northern Afghanistan were trapped by anti-Taliban forces. Before they surrendered, hundreds of ISI members, military trainers and advisers were hastily evacuated by air. Despite the clearest evidence of ISI’s sponsorship of the Taliban and jihadists in general, Washington refused to confront Pakistan, and thereby opened the way for the resurgence of the Taliban after 2003, which neither the US nor NATO has been able to reverse.

Al-Qa’ida, the Taliban and other jihadi groups are the offspring of America’s strange alliance with Saudi Arabia, a theocratic absolute monarchy, and Pakistani military intelligence. If this alliance had not existed, then 9/11 would not have happened. And because the US, with Britain never far behind, refused to break with these two Sunni powers, jihadism survived and prospered after 9/11.

Following a brief retreat, it took advantage of the turmoil created by wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and, later, by the Arab uprisings of 2011, to expand explosively. Twelve years after the “war on terror” was launched it has visibly failed and al-Qa’ida-type jihadists, once confined to a few camps in Afghanistan, today rule whole provinces in the heart of the Middle East.

Further reading

Is Saudi Arabia regretting its support for al-Qa’ida groups?

Why the global 'war on terror' went wrong - BelfastTelegraph.co.uk

US journalist Theo Curtis freed in Syria as Britain closes in on James Foley's killer

By North America correspondent Ben Knight, Monday 25 August 2014

Photo: Journalist Peter Theo Curtis was freed by militants in Syria after 22 months in captivity. (ABC: Al Jazeera)

Related Story: UN official warns of possible massacre in Iraq

Related Story: More than 70 killed in attack on Sunni mosque in Iraq

Map: Syrian Arab Republic

Kidnappers in Syria have freed a US journalist missing since 2012, as authorities say they are closing in on the Islamic State militant who executed reporter James Foley last week.

Peter Theo Curtis was handed over to UN representatives late on Sunday and is now in the hands of American officials.

The 45-year-old had been missing since October 2012 when he was last seen in the Turkish city of Antakya, apparently intending to enter Syria through the nearby border.

There are grave concerns for journalists being held captive in the region after video emerged last week of American James Foley, who was also captured in 2012, being beheaded.

That video, together with a threat to kill another US journalist being held hostage, Steven Sotloff, inspired widespread revulsion and an effort to hunt down Foley's killer, who spoke with a London accent.

The US-based Committee to Protect Journalists estimates that about 20 journalists are missing in Syria. Many of them are believed to be held by Islamic State.

A source in Qatar told Reuters he did not know if the Gulf Arab state was involved in seeking to free other journalists, but added that "any captives with (Islamic State) will be very difficult for Qatar to free, while others with different groups would be easier".

US secretary of state John Kerry confirmed the release saying the US was using "every diplomatic, intelligence and military tool" at its disposal to secure the release of other Americans held hostage in Syria. It is not known if a ransom was paid.

It is believed Curtis, who is fluent in Arabic, had been kidnapped by Al Qaeda offshoot the Nusrah Front, and in a video shot in captivity a few months ago he described himself as a journalist and said he was being treated well.

But a fellow prisoner who escaped last year said the group tortured and starved its prisoners.

White House national security adviser Susan Rice said Curtis was "safe outside of Syria, and we expect he will be reunited with his family shortly".

The journalist's family said it was not privy to the terms of his release but were "deeply grateful to the governments of the United States and Qatar and to the many individuals, private and public, who helped negotiate the release of our son, brother and cousin".

"We are also deeply saddened by the terrible, unjustified killing last week of (Curtis's) fellow journalist, Jim Foley," the family said in a statement, appealing for the release of other hostages.

"My heart is full at the extraordinary, dedicated, incredible people, too many to name individually, who have become my friends and have tirelessly helped us over these many months," said Curtis's mother, Nancy Curtis, of Cambridge, Massachusetts. "Please know that we will be eternally grateful."

Authorities close in on 'Jihadi John'

A day after the beheading of Foley, the Pentagon confirmed it had launched a secret mission to rescue Foley and others held captive but failed to find them.

Britain's ambassador to the US, Peter Westmacott, told CNN that British intelligence was putting a great deal of resources into identifying the suspect in Foley's killing, including the use of voice-recognition technology.

Photo: British media have identified James Foley's suspected killer as former London rapper Abdel-Majed Abdel Bary. (Supplied)

Former hostages of IS have suggested the man in the video is one of a group of British Islamists assigned to guard foreign prisoners.

They have been dubbed John, Paul and Ringo, of the Beatles, because of their British accents, and British media say the suspect is "Jihadi John" who they have identified as former London rapper Abdel-Majed Abdel Bary.

However, Mr Westmacott said he could not give official details of the killer's identity, but added: "I do know from my colleagues at home that we are close."

"We're not yet in a position to say exactly who this is, but there is some very sophisticated voice identification technology and other measures we've got that should allow us to be very clear about who this person is," he said.

IS militants take control of Syrian air base

News of Curtis's release came as hundreds of IS fighters wrested control of the north-eastern Syria Tabqa air base after days of fighting more which cost than 500 lives, a monitoring group said.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least 346 IS fighters were killed and more than 170 members of government forces had died since fighting broke out last Tuesday, making it one of the deadliest confrontations between the two groups since the start of Syria's war.

The air base at Tabqa, 40 kilometres east of Raqqa, was the Syrian army's last foothold in an area otherwise controlled by IS.

Syrian state television said that after fierce battles, the military was "regrouping". Citing a military source, it said there was a "successful evacuation of the airport" and that the army was continuing strikes on "terrorist groups" in the area, which it said had suffered heavy losses.

To the west, IS forces withdrew from areas it controlled outside Homs and retreated east after coming under attack from rival Islamist fighters with the Al Nusra Front, the Observatory said.

As well as Nusra Front, Western-backed rebels have fought IS in Syria but have regularly been defeated by the group, which in June declared an Islamic caliphate in the territory it controls.

Iran, Iraq say global effort needed to defeat IS

Meanwhile, Iraqi prime minister-designate Dr Haider al-Abadi and Iran's foreign minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said an international effort was needed to destroy IS.

During talks in Baghdad with Iraqi officials, Mr Zarif reaffirmed Tehran's support for Iraq's territorial unity and its fight against militants.

Photo: Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif (L) has backed the Iraqi al-Abadi government in its fight against Islamic State (Reuters: Ahmed Saad)

"We feel very comfortable about the democratic process in Iraq which has reached to a logical result through selecting prime minister-designate Haider al-Abadi to form an inclusive government that comprises all Iraqi sects," Mr Zarif said.

"The Islamic Republic of Iran will keep standing by your side. Iran backs the unity of Iraq and the stabilising of security and considers that as a priority in its foreign policy."

However, Mr Zarif denied reports Iranian soldiers were fighting with Iraqis against IS.

The advance of IS through northern Iraq has alarmed the Baghdad government and its Western allies, prompting the first US air strikes in Iraq since US occupation forces pulled out in 2011.

Although the US air campaign launched this month has caused some setbacks for IS, they do not address the deeper problem of sectarian warfare which the group has fuelled with its attacks on Shiites.

ABC/Reuters

US journalist Theo Curtis freed in Syria as Britain closes in on James Foley's killer - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

Famagusta, the ghost town at the heart of Cyprus

By Victoria Hislop 17 August 2014

Forty years ago, Turkish troops invaded Famagusta, leaving the once thriving resort a symbol of the divided land

The resort that time forgot: Victoria Hislop stands before the netting that seals off the hotels and apartment blocks in the tourist heart of Famagusta Photo: Paul Grover

Famagusta, on the east coast of Cyprus, was once one of the most glamorous resorts in the Mediterranean. Its miles of pale sand and clear turquoise sea made it a destination for the Seventies jet-set, attracting thousands of visitors each year.

Along with the tourists, the 40,000-strong population enjoyed a life rich in culture, with art, music and theatre that was the best on the island. With the deepest port in Cyprus, Famagusta handled more than 80 per cent of the island’s cargo, much of which comprised a vast tonnage of citrus fruit picked from the local orchards.

The modern district, where the luxury hotels and apartments were situated, was inhabited mostly by Greek Cypriots, while the walled city that contained the historical treasures of Famagusta – including numerous Byzantine churches and a spectacular 14th-century cathedral from the Frankish period – was lived in by Turkish Cypriots.

But 40 years ago this month, Famagusta’s reign as a paradise for islanders and tourists came to an abrupt and untimely end.

Following a Greek military coup in July 1974, Turkish forces invaded, ostensibly to restore constitutional order and to protect the Turkish Cypriot minority. After a brief period of ceasefire, Famagusta was bombarded and Turkish tanks then advanced.

Related Articles

• Cyprus back from dead after banking collapse 22 Feb 2014

• 'Our money is still trapped in Cyprus' 29 May 2014

• British tourists in Cyprus protest over death of stray puppy 13 Jul 2014

On August 14, the Greek Cypriot population fled in terror, in cars, on buses, by foot, taking nothing but the clothes they stood up in. They expected help from a foreign power, but none came, and their evacuation turned into weeks, then months, then decades.

My first visit to Cyprus was four summers after the war. I had answered a small ad in Time Out for an overland trip to Cyprus, not realising that I was going to an area under army occupation. I was 18 and very naïve. It took the sight of buildings pockmarked with bullets to tell me that this was going to be a strange holiday. There are 40,000 Turkish soldiers in the north of Cyprus today, but back in 1978 there were considerably more.

I found myself on an island where the Turks had effectively drawn a line across Cyprus dividing north from south, cutting off Famagusta and other towns from their Greek Cypriot populations. On one of my trips around the north of the island with some soldiers who were on leave, I remember seeing a big modern city in the distance and being told that was where the best beaches were. I asked if we could go. “No,” they said. “It’s out of bounds.”

That city was Famagusta, a city that had become a symbol for the island’s division.

The year of my first visit, the border was entirely sealed, and it remained so for another 25 years. Then, in 2003, the Turkish authorities opened it to allow people to visit their old homes . Many found them occupied by Turkish Cypriots or settlers from Turkey. It was a traumatic experience in every way, many finding their houses had been destroyed or altered beyond recognition.

Today, one part of Famagusta still remains entirely sealed off by rusting barbed wire, fiercely guarded by Turkish troops. Known as Varosha, it represents about 20 per cent of Famagusta and was the prime tourist area, comprising the stretch of golden sand, behind which stand skeletons of bombed and abandoned hotels and apartments, and streets of looted shops, restaurants, mansions.

The ghost town is heavily guarded by soldiers, and aggressive signs make it clear that this is a no-go area. Through huge holes in the plastic netting there is a provocatively clear view of the dereliction that lies behind. Weeds sprout between the paving stones, window panes are broken, the atmosphere eerie and sinister.

For the past two years, I have been visiting the north and south of Cyprus regularly to research a novel. In that time, I have seen extensive building work taking place in the area surrounding Varosha, making it unrecognisable to former inhabitants. A large population of settlers from the Turkish mainland live there, their lifestyle and culture very different even from that of the Turkish Cypriots.

It is painful for Greek Cypriots to see their city being reconstructed. There is plenty of anger about this situation, but also sadness. The greatest sadness, of course, is that tens of thousands of people have lost everything they had. But there is also regret that the harmony in which Greek and Turkish Cypriots lived has been destroyed. Erato Kantouna, daughter of the city’s former harbour master, recalls that her father was good friends with many Turkish Cypriots. They were colleagues, she tells me. “And some of them only spoke Greek.”

Many of the Turkish Cypriots I’ve met have expressed similar frustration. Serdar Atai, who is part of a joint civic society that encourages co-operation between the two communities, told me how it feels to live in Famagusta. “We are in captivity, like hostages,” he says. “They promised everything would be OK, but our future is captive. Can you imagine this trauma? It’s a big load for people who live here. They wake up to a dark horizon.”

We went to Serdar’s shop to collect the key to the beautiful 14th-century church of Agios Georgios Exorinos. Inside, several things caught my attention – most obviously the defaced frescos, with the faces and the cross crudely scratched out. There have been numerous cases of cultural vandalism in the Greek Orthodox churches of the north.

But something else stood out: in the corner was an “epitafios”, a flower-decked bier that is carried through the streets on Good Friday. This year, for the first time since 1958, a Greek Orthodox service was held in the church. Thousands of Greek Cypriots crossed the border to take part in this deeply symbolic moment.

Last weekend, I attended a rally that marked 40 years since the people of Famagusta lost their homes. To reach the event, I travelled along a road that runs parallel to the demarcation line dividing Cyprus. Every few kilometres there was a sentry post on a hill, from which Turkish soldiers looked down at us.

A similar occasion has been held each year since the division of the island and takes place in Dherynia, a village in the district of Famagusta close to the “border”. From here, the ghost town is clearly visible in daylight, its multi‑storey hotels stark against the skyline. At night, it disappears. There are no lights inside those buildings.

On the night of Famagusta Remembrance Day, I walked alongside a crowd of several hundred people from the cultural centre of occupied Famagusta through the village to present a declaration at the United Nations checkpoint. A letter, addressed to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, requested the return of Famagusta to its lawful inhabitants. With their flags waving in the breeze, they sang songs about their lost city to the UN troops on duty. It was a peaceful demonstration, but beneath it simmered bitterness and grief.

Back at the cultural centre, 1,200 of us (including a number of Turkish Cypriots and three members of the British-Cyprus all-party parliamentary group) listened to speeches from, among others, the president of Cyprus, Nicos Anastasiades. He welcomed the Turkish Cypriots at the event and said that a solution to the Cyprus issue should have no winners or losers, only happy European citizens. He asked them to work with the Greek Cypriots in order to have a free country.

“Time is against us,” he said. “Not only for the Greek Cypriots but for the Turkish Cypriots.” The latter are now a minority compared to the settlers from Turkey.

Cynical bystanders told me that the same things are said each year, and negotiations have certainly been continuing for a long while. The discovery of vast gas reserves in the waters around Cyprus might, however, prove a catalyst for some kind of settlement.

As the evening continued, with hugely emotional songs about the city silhouetted beneath the moonlight, I wondered if the amplifiers carried them as far as the soldiers guarding the city.

“We left with the certainty that we would soon return, believing that the civilised world would never accept this crime against Cyprus,” Alexis Galanos, who is effectively the mayor in exile, tells me. “We were wrong.”

Famagusta is known to the Greeks as Ammohostos, meaning “buried in the sand”. I hope that the issue of its rightful return will not meet this fate.

Victoria Hislop’s novel, 'The Sunrise’, is published on September 25 by Headline (£19.99)

Famagusta, the ghost town at the heart of Cyprus - Telegraph

Islamic State releases video which it claims shows beheading of American journalist James Foley

By North America correspondent Ben Knight and staff Wednesday 20 August 2014

 

Photo: Islamic State claims to have beheaded American journalist James Foley. (Twitter)

Video: Ben Knight talks to News Breakfast from Washington (ABC News)

Map: Iraq

A video showing the beheading of an American journalist has been posted online, purporting to be a message to America from the terrorist group Islamic State (IS).

The high-resolution video shows a man believed to be James Foley, a freelance American journalist who has been missing since being kidnapped in Syria in 2012.

The video, titled "A message to America", shows the captive on his knees, dressed in an orange jumpsuit, next to a militant clad completely in black with his face covered.

In what appears to be a pre-prepared statement, Foley calls on his family to rise up against the United States, who he calls his "real killers".

"I call on my friends, family, and loved ones to rise up against my real killers, the US government, for what will happen to me is only a result of their complacency and criminality," he said.

"My message to my beloved parents, save me some dignity and don't accept any meagre compensation for my death from the same people who effectively hit the last nail in my coffin from their recent aerial campaign in Iraq."

He is then murdered by the militant clad in black, who, speaking in English with an English accent, warns the US to stop intervening in Iraq.

Since August 8, the US has launched about 70 air strikes targeting IS positions in northern Iraq.

The White House said it was working to verify the authenticity of the video and said that, if genuine, the US was "appalled".

Photo: James Foley went missing in Syria in 2012. (AFP: Nicole Tung)

A second prisoner, believed to be another American journalist, Steven Sotloff, also appears in the video, with a warning that he will be the next to die.

"The life of this American citizen, Obama, depends on your next decision," the masked man said.

The video appeared briefly on YouTube before it was removed and has not yet been verified.

An update on the Free James Foley Facebook page after the video was posted says: "We know that many of you are looking for confirmation or answers. Please be patient until we all have more information and keep the Foleys in your thoughts and prayers."

Foley, an experienced war reporter, was on his second trip to rebel-held Syria when he was seized by armed men on November 22, 2012.

He was travelling with another Western journalist and a Syrian assistant when they were intercepted near the town of Taftanaz in Idlib province.

In May 2013, GlobalPost, one of the news organisations Foley had worked for, reported he was being held in a Damascus prison run by Syrian Air Force Intelligence.

His parents, John and Diane Foley, of Rochester, New Hampshire, marked Foley's 40th birthday last year with a prayer vigil.

Islamic State releases video which it claims shows beheading of American journalist James Foley - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

Islamic State explained: Jihadist group fighting in Iraq, Syria

By Mark Corcoran and Freya Petersen, additional reporting from Reuters

Updated 11 Aug 2014

 

Photo: An image grab taken from a propaganda video uploaded on June 11, 2014 allegedly shows ISIS militants at an undisclosed location in Iraq's Nineveh province. (AFP: Ho/ISIS)

Related Story: Leader of Iraq insurgents is jihad's rising star

Related Story: ISIS militants expand across northern Iraq, seize Tikrit

Related Story: Ex-adviser says strength of ISIS militants underestimated

Related Story: Thousands flee as insurgents seize Iraq's second largest city

Map: Iraq

"We are fighting devils, not ordinary people" an Iraqi police captain told Reuters after fleeing from the rebels who swept into Tikrit, home town of former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.

After a series of stunning victories, the black battle flags of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) also fly over Iraq's second city Mosul and the Sunni strongholds of Fallujah and Ramadi that were captured in January.

More than 500,000 Mosul residents have now fled the city.

Rolling in from the desert in convoys of pick-up trucks, ISIS fighters, now going by the name of the Islamic State after declaring a caliphate, have outsmarted and outfought Iraq's 1 million strong security forces, trained and equipped by the US at a cost of $US25 billion.

The Islamic State swiftly consolidated the shock value of its battlefield victories with a dark propaganda blow; releasing appalling pictures that purported to show the massacre of large numbers of Shiah government soldiers who had been captured by the militants.

So what exactly is the Islamic State?

Video: Explained: The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) (Scott Bevan)

The Sunni Islamist militant group or Islamic State, was known as ISIS and also as Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), and is considered so extreme, it has been disavowed by its original sponsor, Al Qaeda.

The jihadist group has mounted hundreds of attacks in Syria since the start of the civil war in 2011.

But the ambitions of the Islamic State stretch far beyond deposing president Bashar al-Assad. The ultimate objective is the establishment of an extremist Islamic caliphate across the region, incorporating Syria, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Israel and the Palestinian Territories.

Other Islamist rebels have accused the Islamic State of being "worse than the Assad regime".

In 2013, German newspaper Der Spiegel reported that the group had kidnapped hundreds of people, including activists, politicians, Christian priests and several foreign journalists, adding that "anyone who opposes the Islamic State fighters, or who is simply considered an unbeliever, disappears".

Der Spiegel cited an engineer who fled Syria after threats he said he received from the group as saying: "We call them the Army of Masks, because their men rarely show their faces. They dress in black, with their faces covered."

Photo: An image taken from an ISIS propaganda video purports to show militants driving near the central Iraqi city of Tikrit. (AFP/ISIS)

Human rights abuses and the Islamic State's vision of creating an Islamic extremist state led to tensions with other Syrian rebel groups that soon escalated into open warfare.

The Islamic State suffered setbacks after clashes with more moderate anti-government militias, but still controls an arc of territory across the north-east of Syria, stretching from the Turkish border across to the frontier with Iraq.

The Syrian enclave, based around the northern city of Raqqa, provided the jumping off point for attacks into western Iraq.

In January 2014, the Islamic State captured the city of Fallujah and large tracts of the surrounding Anbar province.

Coming home - from Iraq to Syria and back again

This latest campaign represents a kind of homecoming for the group that can trace its origins to the anarchy of the Iraq conflict.

The Islamic State is led by a veteran Iraqi militant, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who formed the Al Qaeda-affiliated Islamic State in Iraq in 2010.

As the uprising against Syria's president escalated into civil war in 2011, Baghdadi sent trusted aide Abu Mohammad al-Golani across the border to establish another Al Qaeda affiliate, the Jabhat al-Nusra Front, recruiting members from rival militant groups.

But as the popularity and influence of al-Golani's al-Nusra Front grew, Bagdhadi demanded the Syrian group merge back under his command. Al-Golani refused and the two sides clashed. Al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahri sided with the Syrian faction, casting the Islamic State and Bagdhadi out of the Al Qaeda fold.

Undeterred, the Islamic State quickly expanded operations into Syria in 2012-13. Fighting not only Assad's army but other anti-government militia groups, the Islamic State soon developed a reputation for extreme brutality.

Despite presenting itself as a paragon of strict Islamic virtue, the bulk of the group's financing, experts say, comes from illegal black market activities in Iraq, including robbery, arms trafficking, kidnapping and extortion, and even drug smuggling.

In 2013, when Mosul was still nominally under the control of Iraq's government, the Islamic State was netting upwards of $8 million a month by extorting taxes from local businesses, according to the US-based Council on Foreign Relations (CFR).

It'll be interesting to see what happens in Mosul over the next weeks. If they're pushed out in the next day or two, then that has much less strategic significance than if they're able to actually hold it.

Former White House adviser Douglas Ollivant

In capturing Mosul, the Islamic State freed hundreds of prisoners, seized an arsenal Western-supplied weaponry, and also struck it rich.

The Guardian's Baghdad correspondent Martin Chulov told the ABC that Iraqi intelligence officers in the capital seized a trove of computer disks detailing the extent of the new Islamic State's wealth.

"It's about $2 billion in cash and assets according to Iraqi officials," Chulov said.

"To put that into perspective, before the events in Mosul last week, in which ISIS stormed the city, they had around $875 million in cash.

"Since then they've seized around $1 billion in weaponry from the Iraqi military, and around $500 million from banks in Mosul and Tikrit alone. And these figures are found in intelligence documents which were seized from a slain ISIS [commander], head of the military council, a very, very important figure. They've been downloaded and decrypted over the past week and have laid bare the group's accounts over two countries."

The Islamic State's finances may soon be further bolstered, as the militants now occupy territory surrounding Iraq's largest oil refinery at Baiji, which is capable of producing 300,000 barrels a day.

All factions in Iraq's long-running sectarian conflict are highly experienced in the lucrative oil smuggling trade.

But it was the Islamic State's tactical skill and speed in storming Mosul, Iraq's second city, that stunned many seasoned Iraq watchers.

Douglas Ollivant, a former US army officer and adviser on Iraq to both presidents George W Bush and Barack Obama, told the ABC that the critical question now is how long the militants can hold Mosul.

"It'll be interesting to see what happens in Mosul over the next weeks," he said.

"If they're pushed out in the next day or two, then that has much less strategic significance than if they're able to actually hold it."

Islamic State fighting force numbers unclear

Photo: ISIS militants show off their weapons in the Iraqi desert in a video released on June 11 (AFP: Ho/ISIS)

The Islamic State has a reputation as a tough, experienced guerrilla force, but the group's exact combat strength remains unclear.

Video released by the militants show convoys of fast-moving, lightly armed fighters in pickup trucks, reminiscent of the Taliban when they swept to power in Afghanistan in the mid-1990s.

"We don't know how many jihadists are coming into ISIS from outside of country," Mr Ollivant said.

"We don't know how many of the former insurgent groups have essentially joined ISIS, either formally or as their auxiliaries.

"But if they have the combat power to push into Mosul, I think they have more strength than most outside analysts thought they had."

The Islamic State victories may also be in part due to a failure of Iraqi and Western intelligence agencies to gather information on the group's capabilities and intentions.

The Guardian's Martin Chulov says the Islamic State zone of northern Syria is an intelligence "black hole".

"I think it is an organisational failure," he told the ABC.

"Let's not forget that ISIS does most of its business away from the internet - it's handwritten notes delivered by couriers. They are very hard to get on top of.

"They're a very tough nut to crack. There are large numbers of foreign jihadists in their ranks. And that, you would think, would present an opportunity in terms of infiltration, but it seems to be that those who travel the world to join them are diehard, they are battle-hardened, they are committed, and they're very, very hard to penetrate.

"I can't get too close to them. If I did, it would be lethal. I would almost certainly end up in a kidnapping and me in a dungeon for a long, long time."

Chulov estimates that there are 45 Western hostages - non-governmental organisation workers and freelance reporters - being held in the northern city of Raqqa.

"There are many hundreds, if not thousands more Syrians who are being held, and also Iraqis," he added.

The Islamic State claims to have recruited militants from across the Middle East, Europe, the UK , the US and south-east Asia, although it is impossible to confirm exactly how many are now in Iraq.

International terrorist with $10m price on his head

In October 2011 Washington declared the Islamic State supremo al-Baghdadi a leader of a terrorist organisation, offering a $10m bounty on his head.

Who is Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi?

Read more on the rising star of global jihad, the commanding leader of the Islamic State

The group has been similarly proscribed by the United Nations Security Council and the governments of Canada and New Zealand.

In December 2013, the Australian Government declared the Islamic State to be "one of the world's deadliest and most active terrorist organisations".

The Government said the militant group "conducts daily, often indiscriminate attacks" and "targets crowds and public gatherings during holidays and religious festivals to maximize casualties and publicity".

The Islamic State has displaced its predecessor Al Qaeda in Iraq on Canberra's terrorism list to reflect "the expansion of its operating area to include both Iraq and Syria".

The December 2013 listing cited an estimated strength of around 2,500 mostly young Sunnis in Iraq, with the ranks bolstered by "a prison break at Abu Ghraib in July 2013 that freed hundreds of Islamic State members, many of whom are still at large".

The Australian Government estimated the Islamic State had another 5,000 fighters, including foreigners, in Syria, although "due to the Islamic State's Iraqi origins, a large number of its Syria-based senior operatives and leadership are Iraqi nationals".

In April 2014, the head of Australia's domestic intelligence agency ASIO confirmed it was investigating hundreds of young Australian-Lebanese men who had joined the fighting in Syria.

The ABC reported that the majority of the young fighters had family ties in the north of Lebanon, reaching across the border into Syria. 

"We continue to be concerned about young Australians going overseas to fight on battlefields that don't necessarily have a lot to do with Australia," ASIO director-general David Irvine said.

"We are also concerned that young Australians go overseas and become quite severely radicalised in the extremist Al Qaeda-type doctrines."

The ABC understands as many as 200 Australians may have joined the Al Qaeda-affiliated Jabhat al-Nusra Front or its deadly rival the Islamic State.

Among those encouraging young Australians to join the conflict has been an influential Australia-based Islamic State supporter, radical preacher Musa Cerantonio.

ABC's 7.30 reported on the Melbourne-born convert to Islam who has emerged as an influential backer of the Islamic State cause, calling on young Australians to join the ranks of the formidable militant group.

Islamic State explained: Jihadist group fighting in Iraq, Syria - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)