THE DAILY BLADE: What’s Wrong With This Picture?
On the one hand, the Bush administration can cite numerous instances of Saudi Arabia sabotaging our success in prosecuting the Iraq war and leaving behind an orderly, functioning society, including: Undermining prime minister Nuri al-Maliki by giving financial assistance to his political opponents, as well as to Sunni tribes; waging a months-long campaign to recruit other Persian Gulf countries to give financial aid to Sunni tribal groups; and looking the other way as some 60 to 80 foreign insurgents from Saudi Arabia enter the fray in Iraq each month.
On the other hand, the Bush administration plans to reward the duplicitous Saudis – as well as other Persian Gulf states that may be in cahoots with them - with a massive package of arms deals worth some $20 billion.
The Washington Post reports:
U.S. officials said the arms sales to Saudi Arabia are expected to include air-to-air missiles as well as Joint Direct Attack Munitions, which turn standard bombs into "smart" precision-guided bombs. Most, but not all, of the arms sales to the six Gulf Cooperation Council countries - Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain and Oman - will be defensive, the officials said
According to The New York Times, the package may be too much for Congress to swallow:
The proposed package of advanced weaponry for Saudi Arabia, which includes advanced satellite-guided bombs, upgrades to its fighters and new naval vessels, has made Israel and some of its supporters in Congress nervous. Senior officials who described the package on Friday said they believed that the administration had resolved those concerns, in part by promising Israel $30.4 billion in military aid over the next decade, a significant increase over what Israel has received in the past 10 years.
But administration officials remained concerned that the size of the package and the advanced weaponry it contains, as well as broader concerns about Saudi Arabia’s role in Iraq, could prompt Saudi critics in Congress to oppose the package when Congress is formally notified about the deal this fall.
Unnamed senior Bush administration officials tell The New York Times that the arms package to the six Persian Gulf nations is meant to counter the growing strength of Iran, and that the U.S. has not attached any conditions to the deal - not even specific assurances that recipients will support, not subvert, our mission in Iraq. The Bush administration is concerned that Saudi Arabia and the others will get this equipment elsewhere, reducing U.S. influence in the region.
These developments suggest that the U.S. doesn’t have much influence in the region – none of the Arab nations are even bothering with the usual doublespeak and politesse anymore.
Turkish Elections Show Shift Towards Islamism, Nationalism
Last week’s elections in Turkey prompted New York Sun contributing editor Hillel Halkin to recall an article he wrote for the Forward a dozen years ago about evidence he uncovered that Kemal Atatürk, the founder of modern Turkey, was half Jewish (his father being Doenmeh):
Who but a member of a religious minority would want so badly to eliminate religion from the identity of a Muslim majority that, after the genocide of Turkey's Christian Armenians in World War I and the expulsion of nearly all of its Christian Greeks in the early 1920s, was 99% of Turkey's population? …
Halkin was fearful his discovery would cause a popular uprising that would Islamicize the country for good and all:
I could have spared myself the anxiety … As far as I knew, not a single Turk even read what I wrote. And then, a few months ago, I received an e-mail from someone who … had come across my article in the Forward and had decided to do some historical research …
The email concluded with the sentence: "I now know - know (and I haven't a shred of doubt) - that Ataturk's father's family was indeed of Jewish stock."
I haven't a shred of doubt either. I just have, this time, less trepidation, not only because I no longer suffer from delusions of grandeur regarding the possible effects of my columns, but because there's no need to fear toppling the secular establishment of Kemalist Turkey.
It toppled for good in the Turkish elections … when the Islamic Justice and Development Party was returned to power with so overwhelming a victory over its rivals that it seems safe to say that secular Turkey, at least as Ataturk envisioned it, is a thing of the past. …
In Halkin’s view, "[t]he Islamic counterrevolution has won the day in Turkey."
The New York Times also notes ominous gains by the Nationalist Action Party:
The election … gave a substantial victory in Parliament to the governing Muslim pro-Western party, which promised more moderation and prosperity.
But on the margins, more hard-line sentiments surfaced, posing a potential obstacle to this country’s progress.
The Nationalist Action Party, which appeals to voters on the far right, who fiercely defend the integrity of Turkey’s borders, received 14 percent of the vote, enough to enter Parliament after failing in the past election.
The party plays on fears, which reach back to the fall of the Ottoman Empire, that Western powers seek to carve up the country. It gained momentum in recent months when militant Kurdish separatists stepped up killings of Turkish soldiers in the country’s southeast. The recent surge in foreign investment into Turkey’s growing economy is also cause for alarm among its supporters.
"Our country is about to be broken into pieces, and we need to prevent it," said a textile worker, wearing a button-down black shirt in the style of Italian Fascists often worn by hard-line nationalists here. "There are three things — my country, my flag, my prayer. I can’t let anyone touch any of them."
The killings of an Armenian journalist and of three Christian evangelists this year were both nationalist-driven crimes.
But for some unfathomable reason, The Wall Street Journal appears to believe that Turkey can stand to become more Islamic – and even offers Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan advice on how to ease the country’s women back into headscarves:
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) won 46.6% of the vote, up 14 percentage points from the 2002 poll. In its wisdom, however, the electorate also put a check on the majority by denying the AKP a two-thirds majority to change the constitution. …
Turkey's secular traditions are strong and Kemal Atatürk remains a revered founding father. To be able to tinker with that legacy - say, by lifting the ban on the wearing of headscarves in public buildings - the AKP needs to move gingerly and first build legitimacy and support. …
Turkey is undergoing a political transition that has produced strains with its traditional friends in Europe and the U.S. But thanks to the wisdom of Turkish voters, Ankara's politicians have a mandate for compromise and moderate reform.
So the Islamists are back in power with an even larger margin of victory than before, and Nationalists have gained strength as well. As Turkey gingerly backs away from any pretense of secular democracy, the country’s tiny Christian population will be even more imperiled (second item) than they ever were.
States’ Rights Vs. The Feds: Part II
The colorful and controversial Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County, AZ, is striking a blow for states’ rights with two new illegal immigration initiatives that may be beyond the reach of the federal government – and the courts – to quash.
Sheriff's deputies will begin performing background checks on anyone who wants to visit an inmate incarcerated in one of the jails under the jurisdiction of the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office. The plan is to obtain a person’s ID at the first visit, and having the background check completed by the second visit to weed out both people who have felony criminal histories and illegal aliens; anyone who cannot prove citizenship will also be subject to arrest.
Arpaio tells Phoenix radio station KTAR: "I run the jail. I decide who goes in there. "I run the jail and I have to be careful for security reasons." Since 2004, more than 1,600 people have been barred from entering a penal facility when felony convictions turned up in their background checks.
The no-nonsense sheriff has also set up a hot line people can use to report information about illegal immigrants. The hot line has received several hundred tips including those "about family and friends, employment, day laborers, houses where smugglers drop illegal immigrants," according to the Chandler News-Dispatch – plus a few crank calls.
Pointing to similar tiplines used by federal immigration officials, Arpaio says, "[t]here‘s nothing unconstitutional about putting up a hotline."
Gov. Janet Napolitano – who used to be the state’s Attorney General – tells KTVK-TV in Phoenix that, "Reporting those who are breaking the law is one thing, using a hotline to harass people is another. Only time will tell whether the hotline is used properly or improperly."
Sheriff’s deputies are busily checking out all the tips received thus far, and have not announced any arrests.
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