Armenia, Azerbaijan, Accusations and Denials As They Battle Over Nagorno-Karabakh

"I heavily doubt [the involvement of Syrian mercenaries on behalf of the Azerbaijani side, since those reported to have been sent were Sunni]."

"The deployment of Sunni Syrian fighters in Azerbaijan, a borderland of Russia's predominantly Sunni regions of Dagestan and Chechnya, would never [be] tolerated by Moscow [or] by Iran."

"Even hypothetically, that would enable their further penetration into Russia's southern regions. The same goes [for Iran, which ] opposes Sultan Murad's and Hamza Brigade's activity in Syria."

Zaur Gasimov, senior research fellow, University of Bonn

 

"[Turkey is responsible for sending up to 1,000 Syrian fighters to Azerbaijan so far]. It is clear to me that Turkey is trying to create quite large groups of jihadists controlled by it for them to help their ally Azerbaijan."

Turkish studies specialist Ruben Safrastian, Armenia's National Academy of Sciences

 

"When we first started being offered work abroad in Libya, people were afraid to go there, but now there are definitely thousands of us who are willing to go to either Libya or Azerbaijan."  

"There is nothing for us here."

Anonymous Syrian fighter

 

"I didn't want to go, but I don't have any money."

"Life is very hard and poor."

Fighter who belongs to the Turkish-backed rebel group Ahrar al-Sham

As Armenian and Azerbaijani forces fight in and around the disputed territory of Nagorno-Karabakh, the two sides are lobbing accusations over Turkey reportedly deploying Syrian rebels to help its Muslim-majority ally, Baku.

"[There are reports of Syrian fighters being sent to Azerbaijan] to take part in these combat activities."
"By the way, there already is information that clashes have already taken place among these mercenaries and local Azerbaijanis, because these mercenaries are trying to impose Shari'a law in these villages, they go to local shops demanding that they stop selling alcoholic beverages, etc."

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian

 

"[According to] information that is coming in, fighters from illegal armed formations are being sent to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict zone, including from Syria and Libya, to participate directly in the military action." 

"[Moscow is] deeply concerned about these processes [which would] lead to further escalation of tension in the conflict zone [and] create long-term threats to the security of all countries in the region."
"[Governments must] take effective steps to prevent the use of terrorists and mercenaries in the conflict [and to] withdraw them from the region without delay."

Russian Foreign Ministry 

Screenshot from video titled "The annihalation of Azerbaijani tanks and manpower" (Credit: Armenian Ministry of Defense -- YouTube)

 

Accusations and denials. And gross interference. Where near-abroad powers should be making every effort to calm the relations once again between the two bitter enemies, Turkey has chosen to assure Azerbaijan that its claim to Nagorno-Karabakh is just and Recep Tayyip Erdogan's government is prepared to aid them in achieving the objective of reunification. The majority Armenian population of the disputed territory will just have to adjust to the new reality being imposed upon it. And Armenia will pay a heavy price in Turkish involvement should it continue to resist.

It is precisely Turkey's involvement that represents an impediment to the warring parties coming to their senses by rejecting the violence of conflict and agreeing to diplomatic means instead. Turkey has had ample experience in vigorously forcing its view of sovereignty on Greece, when it illegally invaded Cyprus, a gross insult to the lawful order of the international community. And since Turkey's heavy hand is involved in every area surrounding its geographic sovereignty, yet another one further identifies the Islamofascism of Erdogan's Turkey.

Turkey reiterates that is is "fully committed" to helping Azerbaijan recover its "occupied" lands to return it to the Azeris who were driven out in the civil war of the early '90s. Turkey's support of the Palestinian-Arab claim "from the river to the sea" where it insists Israel is squatting on traditional Palestinian Arab land, and not Biblical Judean heritage, resonates with Turkey which aligns itself readily with another Muslim Sunni country against the Armenians who sullied the reputation of the Ottoman Empire with its plaints of genocide.

Ruins of the town of Agdam, controlled by Nagorno-Karabakh, completely destroyed during the fighting between Karabakh and Azerbaijan forces in the 1990s. David Mdzinarishvili, Reuters

 

All eyes swivel toward Azerbaijan in the convincing speculation that it plans to launch a full-scale military incursion into Nagorno-Karabakh, with the considerable assistance of its estimable protector boasting the second largest army in the NATO alliance. Armenia's claims that a Turkish fighter jet had shot down one of its warplanes is denied vigorously by Azerbaijan as "propaganda". Armenian border towns have been bombed by Azeri warplanes which haven't been averse to flying beyond Nagorno-Karabakh into Armenian sovereign territory, a notable escalation.

In Nagorno-Karabakh local officials  count their dead servicemen to 85. "This is a life-and-death war" Arayik Harutyunyan, president of the Nagorno-Karabakh region stated. World powers appeal for calm while both Armenia's and Azerbaijan's leaders continue to exchange insults, each painting the other as tyrants eager to lead their nations into a conflict that may accomplish nothing of human value.  "If the international community is not capable of stopping Armenia's reckless dictator, then Azerbaijan will do it", Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev announced.

In response, Aliyev is accused of operating a dictatorship feeding on "Armenophobia", according to Nikol Pashinyan, Armenia's prime minister. When Nagorno-Karabakh separated from Azerbaijan in the early 1990s, the conflict that ensued saw 30,000 people dying. That oil-rich Azerbaijan now in possession of drone weaponry able to knock out Armenian tank units defending Nagorno-Karabakh's mountainous geology, leads UN diplomats to fear a repeat of the earlier bloodshed.

Both countries are in possession of long-range missiles capable of striking each other's major cities. But Azerbaijan clearly has the advantage of leaning on the active military involvement of bellicose Turkey whose actions find great disfavour with Moscow whose interests lie in efforts to restrain the violence from spreading regionally, apart from the fact that Russia is an ally of Armenia, equipped with Soviet-era armoured vehicles, destroyed by Azeri drones. 

 

Should Turkey continue to press so avidly, all eyes should be on Vladimir Putin's response. Turkey is elevating the conflict, Russia attempts to mediate between the two warring states.

 

 

 

Superpower Status Nuclear-Powered Competition

"China now has the capability to directly threaten our homeland from a ballistic missile submarine. That's a pretty watershed moment."

"China is on a trajectory to be a strategic peer to us by the end of the decade. So, for the first time ever the U.S. is going to face two peer-capable nuclear competitors in Russia and China who are different, who you have to deter differently."

"We have never faced that before."

Admiral Charles Richard, Commander, U.S. Strategic Command

"The U.S. armed forces are now preparing for an age of great-power competition and rightly so. The 2018 National Defense Strategy shows the Defense Department is focused on the threats posed by Russia and especially China to U.S. interests, allies, and established partners such as Taiwan."

?For now, U.S. forces appear poorly postured to meet these challenges. That’s because both Russia and China have developed formidable networks of missiles, radars, electronic warfare systems, and the like to degrade and potentially even block U.S. forces’ ability to operate in the Western Pacific and Eastern Europe to defend allies and partners in those regions. China in particular is developing increasingly impressive capabilities to project military farther afield, including through systems such as aircraft carriers, long-range aviation, and nuclear-powered submarines. Together, these forces have tilted the military balance over places such as Taiwan and the Baltic states from unquestioned U.S. dominance to something much more competitive."

Elbridge Colby, David Ochmanek, Foreign Policy.com

Three Chinese warships are seen docked at Garden Island naval base in Sydney on June 3, 2019. - Australians were surprised by the sight at Sydney Harbour, forcing the prime minister to reassure jittery residents. (PETER PARKS/AFP/Getty Images)

China has been busy the world over, for it's an all-consuming target they have set for themselves to change the world order of influence and military strength and dominance in every sphere of human activity that matters. There is one dominant world power at the present time. And another that at one time in recent history shared world dominance with the United States. Now, the long-range plans of the world's most populous nation, the country with the second-largest economy, is to rival and then overtake the United States as sole global superpower. 

 

In expanding in so rapid a manner, the scope and scale of its geography, its maritime and air sovereignty -- despite disputed claims -- through territorial aggression, it has become a formidable competitor to reckon with. China's diplomacy too has turned to bellicose aggression. It uses the power of its trade supremacy as a cudgel to beat other nations into a state of submission. Its tentacles are long and its aspirations as wide as the globe. And nor has it forgotten that space and extraterritorial visions of 'might is right' also beckon.

 

Admiral Richard, speaking before Congress in September, addressed China's nuclear capability of some 200 nuclear warheads which will double in short order. The U.S. itself has a massive nuclear arsenal of 3,800 warheads. China is intent on moving steadily forward, reality to match aspirations. Its next generation nuclear missile submarines and advanced missiles they are meant to carry could target the U.S. coastline from China's, simplifying moves without advance warning.

 

The US is facing a more robust Chinese presence in the South China Sea  Getty Images

 

The Pentagon has reported that China has placed silos south of Mongolia whose intended use could be the development of new, solid-fuelled intercontinental ballistic missiles even while it may be constructing new silos in Henan province for liquid-fuelled missiles. All of which are potentials of concern to the United States. Which is pursuing a new arms-control approach for the purpose of establishing a broad "framework" agreement with Russia, hoping to persuade China to join.

For the time being China appears indifferent to negotiations. Its economy is steadily expanding, as is its outreach around the world. The hope, needless to say is that arms-control negotiations may succeed in limiting the world's current superpower and its two competitors' plans to continue investing in military armaments such as maritime hypersonic missiles. In the world's favour is that these huge economies have, through trade established economic interdependent links difficult to extricate themselves from, and useful to preserve.

What the U.S. faces, however, is an undeniable threat, one that regional allies such as Japan, South Korea, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore and India have long recognized in China's ambitious declarations of sovereignty over disputed regions on land and sea and air. Its recent Himalayan dust-up with India, one such adventure. They are each, in turn and comprehensively vulnerable to China's expanding nuclear threat. 

 

Both Russia and China  have a practical view of their geopolitics, to enhance their presence in the world order as superpowers. They are impatient to see the U.S. shift over and make room. Russia longs for a return of the 'respect' and recognition it basked in when the USSR was just such a world superpower. China, however, sees its world dominance as merely a matter of time it is swiftly compressing into reality, for this is their destiny. 

• Russian state media has announced the first test of the Zircon hypersonic missile.
  
• Zircon is a ship-launched anti-ship and land attack missile system.   Peter Kovalev : Getty Images

Armenia and Azerbaijan at War Again Over Nagorno-Karabakh

"The settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh issue is our historical mission."

"We must resolve this so that historical justice can be restored. We must do so to restore the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan."

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev 

 

"What we're seeing after the first day of escalation is that armor, aviation, heavy artillery and drones are being used, which suggests that this wasn't spontaneous but a well-planned operation. "

"If this conflict isn't stopped through serious outside pressure, then war will come, which would be a catastrophe."

"It would send ripples through the entire North Caucasus region and affect all major players, including Russia and Turkey."

Vadim Mukhanov, Caucasus expert, Moscow State Institute of International Relations

Fighting between Azerbaijani and Armenian forces in the Caucasus escalated on Monday, with fresh casualties reported in the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region.

 

Martial law was declared by Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, as he ordered a general mobilization in the face of "preplanned aggression" by Azerbaijan. For his part, Azeri President Ilham Aliyev, himself declaring martial law, informed his people in a state television address that Armenian forces were inside Azerbaijan territory and his response to that aggression, he promised his home audience, was that "we'll put an end to this occupation."

"The Armenian people are ready for that war ... a war against our independence, freedom and dignity", Prime Minister Pashinyan announced, addressing his nation on television. And in his speech, President Aliyev responded by pointing out that Azeri forces are "fighting on our soil, and have no claim to anyone's land. We'll win because our cause is just". This is a conflict that arrives on the tail of tensions that arose last week when Aliyev claimed Armenia was massing forces near Nagorno-Karabak in readiness for a new war.

The two countries sit on a tinderbox of recrimination and accusation, ever since Armenia gained control of Nagorno-Karabakh along with seven surrounding districts from Azerbaijan in war, post the 1991-collapse of the Soviet Union, of which they were both part of. In 2016, Russia stopped a deadly conflict between the two, pressuring both side to respect the 1994 ceasefire Moscow had arranged. Russia enjoys a mutual-defence pact with Armenia and has a military base in the republic.

Azerbaijan has a mutual-pact relationship with Turkey, with whom it hosted large-scale joint military exercises just last month. "Turkey stands by its Azeri brothers, with all its means", declared Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdgan. "Serious concerns about the renewal of large-scale military conflict" was expressed by Russian President Vladimir Putin, calling for a halt to hostilities. Which didn't preclude Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov discussing the fighting with Mevlut Cavusoghlu, his Turkish counterpart.

 

A howitzer fires munitions toward Armenian positions Monday. Violence between Armenia and Azerbaijan erupted Sunday in the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh. Azerbaijan's Ministry of Defense/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images

Decades of mediation on the part of the United States, France and Russia have failed to move the two sides closer to signing a peace agreement. Armenia remains adamant that the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic has the right to self-determination, even as Azerbaijan claims its territorial integrity which includes Nagorno-Karabakh must be upheld. The people of Nagorno-Karabakh have taken to air raid shelters in the face of ongoing conflict, its population comprised of majority Armenians.

Azerbaijan maintains it had raised a "counterattack" following Armenians firing on its military positions and civilian settlements near the border. An assertion rejected by Armenia, which counters that Azerbaijan had begun alone bombarding the contact line separating the two forces, shelling civilians including the region's capital, Stepanakert. 

 

Armenia has refrained from recognizing Nagorno-Karabakh's independence in talks led by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe in an effort to negotiate a conflict settlement.

And while the OSCE called for a ceasefire leading to the resumption of negotiations, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization positioned itself as being "deeply concerned" by the fighting. Even Pope Francis had his say, calling on the two leaders to resolve the crisis "not through the use of force and arms but through the means of dialogue and negotiation", speaking from the Vatican.

Tanks, artillery, missile systems and aircraft are being used by the Azeri army against Armenian positions at the front line and into Armenian-held territory where up to a dozen Armenian anti-aircraft systems were destroyed, and an Azeri helicopter was shot down, according to the Baku-based Defence Ministry. In exchange, Armenian forces struck four Azeri helicopters, ten tanks and roughly15 drones, according to the Nagorno-Karabakh Deputy Defence Minister.

 

Brazil, a Sad Tale of Government Failure

"Every shift it was like that [a lack of ventilators forcing doctors to choose who might survive and whose condition was so dire they might not, to decide who would get the ventilator and the opportunity to survive COVID-19]."

"Sometimes, I would give them [seriously ill patients] sedatives just so that they didn't suffer. Eventually, they would pass away." 

"It's very difficult to accept things you know are wrong."

Dr.Pedro Archer, surgeon, municipal hospital, Rio de Janeiro

"It ended up creating a perfect storm for corruption."

"The pandemic allowed governments to spend significant resources very quickly while internal controls were relaxed due to the emergency."

Guilherme France, research director, Transparency International, Brazil

The Maracana campaign hospital is seen next to the Maracana stadium amid the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil September 16, 2020. REUTERS/Pilar Olivares

 

 

In Brazil the public health system was quickly flooded with COVID-19 patients, where people struggling to breathe were mentally divided into two groups; the health-impaired elderly who might not survive even if heroic efforts were made on their behalf, and the others who were though ill with the virus, in superior physical shape who were more likely to survive with the use of a ventilator. Ventilators in such short supply that doctors had little option but to quickly gauge such situations and come to a reluctant determination that some would live and others would not.

This is a scenario that played out elsewhere, not just in hard-hit Brazil. Italy and Spain too were overwhelmed by COVID cases, their hospitals stretched to their limits and beyond. Ventilators were in short supply everywhere. Even in Canada where the first wave of COVID cases failed to inundate hospitals as expected with more patients than they could care for, those very same scenarios of choosing who would survive played out beforehand as a potential scene that thankfully failed to materialize.

The deaths in Brazil are now viewed as entirely avoidable in theory though practise and reality made it otherwise. Federal and state prosecutors allege top officials in the country were more fixated on enriching themselves personally than planning for legitimate, trustworthy contracts to provide the badly needed health supplies and personal protection equipment, which resulted in the critical shortage of medical devices to face the emergency of respiratory distress due to COVID.

Top officials in the country saw $72.2 million ending up in their bank accounts thanks to corrupt schemes to steer inflated state contracts to allies in self-serving plots to defraud the country and deny it the equipment to leverage control over the virus and save Brazilian lives, according to prosecutors. Three contracts for a thousand ventilators, claim the prosecutors, were signed with the intention of favouring corrupt officials' bank accounts, and in the event most of the ventilators were never received.

In July, Rio state Health Secretary Edmar Santos was arrested, charged with corruption related to those contracts. Rio state Governor Wilson Witzel was suspended from office in August, reflecting concern he could interfere with the investigations, even while he is facing impeachment proceedings over alleged graft. Even as Latin America as a whole has been stunned by the ferocity of the pandemic, with 8.9 million cases by September 24, over 139,000 COVID deaths have been registered in Brazil alone.

Bolsonaro greets supporters upon arrival at Planalto Palace in Brasilia, on May 24, 2020, amid the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic.

 

Over ten thousand people have perished from COVID-19 in the city of Rio itself; 18,000 in the state of Rio de Janeiro. Poverty and crowded urban conditions are partially to blame for the situation. And it has been anything but helpful that Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro has minimized the severity of the epidemic; infamously he has compared the disease to a common cold. Perhaps he feels differently now that he has the experience of recovering from the virus.

Brazilian prosecutors have zeroed in on what they describe as a series of interrelated criminal enterprises where contracts for masks, coronavirus tests and hand gel sanitizers have all been rigged, expressing the opportunistic corruption so irresistible to those in authority who feel they will be able to mask their corrupt plans for enriching themselves, robbing the population of the necessary safety equipment to see them safely through the pandemic.

 

As Latin American countries cope with the pandemic, investigators are probing whether funds to pay for protective equipment, medicine and other essentials are being misused © AFP via Getty Images

 

The state called for seven field hospitals to be built for the treatment of COVID-19 patients, where the state health ministry -- SES -- awarded contracts to the value of $151 million to a non-profit health group, IABAS was directed to construct the structures to open by the end of April. Of the seven, two were opened to date, one in May, the other June, long after the first surge of COVID-19. These contracts are seen to comprise a portion of a kickback racket managed by a local entrepreneur.

That man, Mario Peixoto, had been arrested in May on charges of defrauding the Rio state health system, federal court documents describing a complex scheme where Peixoto's associates arranged for bribes routed to government officials in the interests of securing public health contracts, among them for the field hospitals. IABAS had drafted its winning proposal prior to the SES having solicited offers. Four of the seven field hospitals were incomplete in early June when Rio state cancelled the contract with IABAS and took control of all project sites.

A little-known company, Arc Fontoura, was awarded a contract worth $12.3 million  for 400 ventilators to be delivered immediately, toward the end of March. The health ministry, according to state auditors, paid close to a 200 percent markup from the market price for the ventilators, only a small batch of which had been received from the company, leaving hospital workers complaining the machines that were delivered were lacking key components.

Two additional firms were awarded contracts to the value of $20.9 million to supply 300 ventilators each. According to court documents, these shady enterprises submitted their proposals less than an hour after SES opened the tender, though it hadn't been advertised beforehand; clearly indicating the companies had inside knowledge, according to prosecutors. Of the one thousand ventilators Rio's state health department had ordered, a mere 52 had been delivered, all from the original firm.

Leading the SES to cancel its contract with one of the companies reflecting "the company's inability to deliver" the ventilators. Dr.Archer, the surgeon in Rio de Janeiro, is beyond bitter over his experience leaving him helpless to give needed medical assistance to patients during the peak of the pandemic in April and May when as many as 30 of his patients were left waiting for the arrival of the machines. Many of those patients too unstable to move to hospitals elsewhere and who ended up dying.

"It gives you a feeling of impotence and anger to know that you could have saved more lives and helped more people if resources were not diverted, if supplies were not overpriced,."

"The pandemic comes to expose all these dirty politics and its schemes -- and we are the ones who are the frontline suffering from their actions."

Micaella Melo de Paula, respiratory physiotherapist in a Rio de Janeiro public hospital

Military police walk outside the official residence of Rio de Janeiro Gov. Wilson Witzel on May 26 after a raid by Federal Police as part of an investigation into the alleged embezzlement of public resources.

Delivering Another Message of Indelibly Violent Hatred in Paris

A victim being treated  EVN David Cohen

"Two colleagues were smoking a cigarette outside the building, in the street. I heard shouting."

"I went to the window and saw one of my colleagues, covered in blood, being chased by a man with a machete in the street."

Staff member, Premières Lignes production firm

 

"Through this highly symbolic place, it is once again freedom of expression that is targeted." 

"We must remain vigilant and mobilized to defend this pillar of our Republic and protect our citizens."

Anne Hidalgo, Paris Mayor

 

"The government is ... determined with all its means to fight terrorism."

"[The attack took place at a] symbolic place [coinciding with the start of the trial of 14 Islamist accomplices in the 2015 attack on the offices of satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo]."

Prime Minister Jean Castex

"Once again, hatred, gratuitous hatred. I was here five  years ago."

"Five years later, we're here again. I don't know when this is going to end."

Dr.Nathan Messas, resident, 11th arrondissement, eastern Paris

 

"It's somebody who was in the road with a meat cleaver who attacked them in front of our offices."

"[Two of my colleagues wounded]. It was chilling."

Paul Moreira, journalist, Premieres Lignes

The public has been told to avoid the area in Paris's 11th arrondissement  Reuters

Friday, close to the former offices of the Charlie Hebdo satirical magazine saw an Islamist terrorist strike again, stabbing two journalists, in an echo of the 2015 attack that killed twelve people and injured another 11. The main attacker, an 18-year-old man of Pakistani origin is under arrest. The two people he attacked were treated for their injuries and will survive the attack. Another person, an Algerian, was placed in custody soon after the attack. Further investigation led to the arrest of an additional six people as accomplices.

Witnesses reported seeing a meat cleaver or butcher's knife used as the attacking weapon. A local resident spoke of hearing a long, deathly shout from "a person who was screaming and screaming".

Another neighbour saw people with a wounded woman, bundling her into a building housing a news agency. Outside, the ground was covered with blood. Workers who had been repairing the road informed that "a dark-skinned man randomly hit a lady with a big butcher's knife".

The attack had taken place adjacent to a mural placed in memory of the victims of the 2015 deadly Charlie Hebdo attack. The weapon, seen to be a meat cleaver covered in blood, was discovered on the ground close to a metro station near the Boulevard Richard-Lenoir. The main suspect had been arrested by the metro station; easily identifiable since he was covered in blood. A man known previously to security services. 

The trial of those associated with the 2015 attack at the Charlie Hebdo offices saw the court hearing that all 14 on trial had acted for the purpose of avenging the Prophet Mohammad. This conspiratorial act of terrorism took place ten years following the publication of cartoons mocking Mohammad by the satirical magazine. Al-Qaeda at the time had claimed responsibility for the 2015 attack, and threatened to replay the scenario, when the magazine had once again published the cartoons in September 2020.

 

At the trial the defendants are facing accusations of having aided another jihadist in his terrorism attack where he shot a policewoman dead, and followed that up by attacking a Jewish market, killing four people in the process. It was over a period of three days of violence that the entire 17 victims were killed by the three attackers who were themselves killed by police. Those chilling killing episodes were just the start of a wave of jihadist attacks to strike across France, ultimately leaving over 250 people dead.

That last threat by al-Qaeda, to return to new attacks after Charlie Hebdo had re-published the Mohammad cartoons when the current trial began, led to police moving the head of human resources for Charlie Hebdo from her home this week, following threats received against her life.

 

Heavily-armed police quickly sealed off the area   Reuters

In God They Trust

"Throughout this pandemic, infection rates in Haredi [Ultra-Orthodox Jewish communities] and some Arab towns have been more than double the rate of the wider population. Encouraged by their religious leaders, who they revere and follow unquestioningly, they have resisted adhering to many public health measures intended to manage the contagion rate and have insisted that continued prayer will do more to contain the virus than masks or social distancing."

Vivian Bercovici, Journalist, Tel Aviv

In the United States Evangelical churches have resisted public health and government instructions to close to normal activities during the pandemic. Drive-in services were put in place in many churches to allow congregations to meet in smaller, socially distanced numbers in church parking lots. In some churches built to accommodate huge memberships, there was resistance to mandated closures. Large church gatherings of fundamentalists in Korea and elsewhere were found to be responsible for massive COVID outbreaks.

SAUL LOEB via Getty Images

Supporters listen as President Donald Trump speaks at a Students for Trump event at the Dream City Church in Phoenix.

 

In Montreal in the early stages of the novel coronavirus, Hasidic communities with their large families and penchant for socializing, alongside congregations packed into limited interiors, cases of COVID rose quickly, particularly when congregation members travelled to synagogues in New York to meet with their American counterparts and brought infections back with them that spread in the community. Government and health authorities had little option but to impose 14-day lockdowns on a number of Hasidic communities in the Montreal area to control the outbreaks.

The Tash community, in Boisbriand, north of Montreal, has a population of roughly 4,000. (Ryan Remiorz/The Canadian Press)

 

 

In many areas of the world religious fundamentals declared themselves protected from harm by their faith. That it was far more important to continue attendance at their places of worship to fervently pray and that those of faith could depend upon the protection that faith conferred on them. Nothing untoward could occur to these believers because a force more powerful than any mere virus would keep them safe from harm. It is as though religious fervour robs people of common sense. Their faith so intense no room is left for critical thinking.

 

And norsis the the Islamic world free of fundamentalist Islmists who refuse the majority consensus of closing down mosques during the pandemic. From Cairo to Mogadishu, the risks of contagion were ignored in many mosques: "I am not telling you to reject the preventive measures, but there is too much exaggeration of coronavirus", Sheikh Abdi Hayi in Mogadishu said in his sermon, as people prayed on the street, the packed interior of the mosque now allowing them to enter.

Faisal mosque in Islamabad during Jummah prayer  Photo Shazziya Mehmood: "Kindly arrest all of them, they put everyone at risk"

In Karachi, Pakistan’s biggest city, mosques were intensely crowded as the faithful flocked to hear a religious scholar inform his congregation via loudspeaker: "We are not too weak to let this one virus empty our mosques." And in the town of Depok, south of Jakarta, Inonesia, Aswin Jusar 76, stated "Allah is protecting those who abide by their obligations", as he prepared to attend a Friday prayer despite a call from the mayor for religious activities to be suspended.

Muslim faithfuls attend Friday prayers at the National Mosque in Abuja, Nigeria [Afolabi Sotunde/Reuters]

 

The religious communities in New York hosted an uncommonly high number of COVID cases throughout the pandemic, earning criticism from health and government authorities for their insistence on the vital importance in their lives of attendance at synagogue. In Brooklyn Orthodox Jews were preparing to mark Yom Kippur, the most sober, important day in the Jewish holidays calendar, raising the concern that praying in numbers would expose more people to infection in an area where community transmission is already much above the average.

Illustrative. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.

In Israel, with its nine million population, another lockdown, more strict than the original has been imposed on the entire country. It is not, however, the entire country where COVID cases have risen and continue to rise steeply, and for this reason alone, many Israelis are enraged at once again having their lives disrupted without sound purpose but to satisfy the demands of he ultra-Orthodox whose political wing holds the balance of power in the Knesset. Though small in numbers, by supporting the Likud and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, they are able to exert outsized influence in government decisions.

The Israel Democracy Institute, a non-partisan think-tank, released a poll report that 25 percent of the Israeli public have no trust now in the prime minister's management of the nation's COVID situation. In early April that number was 60 percent approval, reflecting trust in the ability of Prime Minister Netanyahu to act expeditiously and carefully to gain control of the virus's impact and its spread. Their trust was rewarded when case numbers plunged close to zero. The public was awarded an exhortation to relax and enjoy themselves; restrictions lifted.

Like publics everywhere in the world, released from the bondage of unnatural social life, evading all human contact, focusing on hygiene to an uncommon degree, and remaining socially isolated, the opportunity to break  free led people to behave recklessly and the predictable resulted with a steadily increasing case rise. This time the government was not as quick to take remedial, protective action. Its focus was on exterior politics and diplomacy, along with controversial plans of note drawing international concern.

As another crisis with an expanding case load loomed, the public became distrustful of their government and protests began mounting in numbers and frequency. Israel now posts one of the highest daily per capita infection rates globally. That has resulted in large numbers of Israelis testing positive and being seriously ill with hospitalizations so great in number hospital capacity and ability to care for the sick are near to collapse. The military has been tasked with setting up field hospitals for the overflow.

Closer inspection to numbers and locations demonstrate that it is the Haredi and some Arab towns responsible for the greater rise in infections. When the former director of the ministry of health, epidemiologist Ronnie Gamzu was appointed to manage the response to the pandemic, his expertise and initiatives have been knocked back by the prime minister when they focus on the number of cases in the Haredi community. A very small proportion of Israeli Jews belong to the ultra-Orthodox community, about 12 percent in total.

Yet that 12 percent wields hugely disproportionate influence, thanks to its role as Likud support in a minority government. Not just this time around, but following most elections when, small in number as they are, they end up holding the balance of power through their conditional support of the government. Conditioned on government listening carefully to their exhortations, and demands under threat of removal of support and the fall of the government.

In this instance, it is the coronavirus that the tail wags the dog over. Their insistence that should prayer and study halls close, outdoor political demonstrations must also be shut down. They demanded that the entire country, irrespective of many parts of the country having little reason to shut down, with low case loads -- be shut down, not only the Haredi communities where most of the cases arise. This is a situation that has enraged most Israelis, most of whom are not particularly religious, and many of whom are secular Jews.

Many Haredi during the first lockdown refused adamantly to follow government recommendations. Self isolation and mask-wearing was not for them, much less social distancing. this is an attitude that still prevails in many of the areas Haredis congregate within. The broader Israeli public is irate over this, bringing ever greater numbers of Israelis out to the protests. An effect of the latest, strict lockdown will be the death of many small and mid-size business interests.

Ultimately, fundamentalists anywhere and everywhere seek guidance from a mystical, mythical figure above, scorning and belittling the authority of elected governments dedicated to serve the best interests of everyone they represent. The loyalty of these people of hyper-faith beliefs is to their vision of an almighty spirit, never to the nations in which they are citizens. Their care and concern goes no further than their fellow congregants; none others need apply.

Ultra-Orthodox Jews in a Jerusalem synagogue September 9, 2020, Photo: Ohad Zwogemberg

The Abraham Accords

"I was born and raised in Pakistan, a Muslim country that has stamped on its passport, "valid for every country in the world except Israel'. It was something that bothered me because I couldn't quite fathom what the fuss was about, and I had read in the Qur'an that Jews were considered 'People of the book' and therefore our cousins in the Abrahamic tradition. There wasn't much information or chatter about Israel. However, I had a curiosity about the people after reading The Diary of Anne Frank and Exodus from our local library."

"We later lived for eight years in Dubai [United Arab Emirates], where there was absolutely no mention of Israel, good or bad. We had a chance to travel to many countries in the Middle East including Saudi Arabia, Oman and Bahrain."

Raheel Raza, Pakistani-Canadian journalist and president of the Council for Muslims Facing Tomorrow

 

"Israel is a reality and the sooner everyone accepts that, the easier it would be to resolve the unnecessary conflict between Jews and Arabs in Palestine."

"The leaders of the UAE have shown courage. Let us hope other Muslim countries follow suit."

Husain Haqqani, former Pakistani ambassador to the U.S., scholar, Hudson Institute

 

"Israel has been the perennial 'what about' excuse used by Arab despots seeking to silence their domestic opponents as 'Zionist collaborators'."

"A universal peace between Israel and these Arab regimes would finally do away with this. A critical mass of Arabs, Muslims and leftists still struggle with Israel’s historic legitimacy, leading us all to constantly overplay our hand in peace negotiations."'

"The Saudis desperately need regional allies against their main foe Iran.They need economic trade and diversification  and they need military alliances to contain Iran.  Israel’s economic and military assets and interests meet these needs perfectly."

"In return, Israel gains legal regional recognition from the custodians of the Prophet’s mosque, and a Sunni Arab consensus over the protection of its West Bank border, policed perhaps by Arab League, Egyptian, Jordanian or UN forces."

Maajid Nawaz, founding chairman Quilliam, counter-extremism think-tank, U.K.

Left to Right: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, US President Donald Trump, Bahrain Foreign Minister Abdullatif al-Zayani, and UAE Foreign Minister Abdullah bin Zayed Al-Nahyan wave from the Truman Balcony at the White House in Washington, DC, after the signing of the Abraham Accords, on September 15, 2020. Photo: AFP

Finally, a glimmer of hope has matured into a celebration of peacemaking in the Middle East. By no means the entire Middle East, where war still rips countries apart in tribal, sectarian animosities and where in many quarters the word 'Israel' remains a violent epithet. Last week, years of warming relations between two Gulf states that had never gone to war with Israel, that had maintained the citizenship of their Jewish residents, signed peace agreements with the Jewish state, brokered by U.S.President Donald Trump, working to bring the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain peace with Israel.

 

The situation which gained approval leavened in many quarters by surprise at an event predicted never to happen until 'Palestinians had their state', was placed in sobering perspective, however, by Gilead Sher who had served as chief peace negotiator for Israel in the Camp David Accords, along with the Oslo Accords of the 1990s. Big deal? Yes. "But there was never a real conflict here. There were no combat zones, no territorial disputes, no violence. This isn't a historic breakthrough after a long, drawn-out negotiation, but merely a normalization of relations already over 25 years old."

 

Having said which, apart from the peace agreement with Egypt and then with Jordan, there has been no forward movement of other Arab Muslim countries in the Middle East or North Africa, to formally recognize -- or even wish to -- the presence of the Jewish state in their midst. Its presence seen to be an affront to Islam in the sense that land once consecrated to Islam, must never revert to or in any sense host the presence of  another religion, other than in a position subservient to Islam. This is the 21st Century. It is long past time for Arab regimes to face the reality of the present.

 

That an ancient people once vanquished for the second time and banished from their heritage geography had re-established itself as a Judean presence reflecting its origins. That it did so after a diaspora of millennia had flagellated Jews wherever they settled as migrants and citizens with vicious discrimination as lesser-entitled beings where pogroms and humiliations marked their passage from the past to the present, culminating in a wholly effective horrific genocide. If that experience couldn't persuade any group that it was past time for a defensive homeland to preserve what was left of world Jewry, nothing would. 

In most of the world community's efforts to reconcile the Arab-Muslim world with the final collective presence of Jews returning en masse to the Biblical geography of their heritage foundation, it has been the United States and its various presidents that have concentrated thought and effort to varying degrees of near-success. On each such occasion, the Palestinians, viewing themselves as displaced victims of Jewish return to a homeland Arab Palestinians claimed for themselves, refused to accommodate the equal presence of Jews and Arabs each in their own parcel of land diminished in size from the mid-20h Century British 'partition' plan, handing much of it to the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan.

The Arab League nations, simply put, which had initially supported the 'Palestinian cause' -- and even actually, initiated it in defiance of the prospect of a Jewish state in perpetuity -- has become wearied of the Palestinian cause, and for which its leaders consistently and with pre-determination, turn away the prospect of peace between its two major Palestinian terrorist groups, Fatah and Hamas, and the State of Israel. Finding it in their own best interests to take the opportunity to benefit from a neighbour's military and technical superiority when the Sunni-dominated region itself feels under siege by the Aryan Shiite Islamic Republic of Iran.

 

Not for ever could the situation carry on, where one nation among 22 others would be ostracized and continually threatened, its borders violated its people under constant duress. Not for ever should one country among 22 others be forced to build its military for defence while the others did so for offensive purposes. It is quite simply logical and makes sound political and diplomatic and trade sense for nations that have much in common to favour sound relations between themselves. Particularly in the face of ongoing destabilization and threats by a regional terror state.

 

And so, the Treaty of Peace, Diplomatic Relations and Full Normalization, otherwise known as the Abraham Accords made history. More history in the making is in the wings of this theatrical stage the world knows as corroborative neighbourliness. 

 

"Israeli officials intimately involved in the UAE deal privately say that the Emiratis were emphatic about focusing on interfaith understanding and religious tolerance. As the treaty itself notes, 'The Parties undertake to foster mutual understanding, respect, co-existence, and a culture of peace between their societies in the spirit of their common ancestor, Abraham, and the new era of peace and friendly relations ushered in by this Treaty, including by cultivating people-to-people programs, interfaith dialogue, and cultural, academic, youth, scientific, and other exchanges between their peoples'. Indeed, the agreement holds substantial promise precisely because both parties recognize the need to reach out on a societal level, not just a governmental level."

David Makovsky, The Washington Institute

Honouring the Exploits of a Celebrated Terrorist

PFLP hijacker Leila Khaled. Photo: Sebastian Baryli

"Zoom is committed to supporting the open exchange of ideas and conversations, subject to certain limitations contained in our Terms of Service, including those related to user compliance with applicable US export control, sanctions, and anti-terrorism laws."

"In light of the speaker’s reported affiliation or membership in a US-designated foreign terrorist organization, and SFSU’s inability to confirm otherwise, we determined the meeting is in violation of Zoom’s Terms of Service and told SFSU they may not use Zoom for this particular event."

Zoom’s deputy general counsel, Lynn Haaland

"SFSU cannot provide support to a member of a US-designated Foreign Terrorist Organization. Full stop. To do so will expose them to liability under federal criminal law, and the very severe associated penalties, and should certainly run afoul of university leaders’ consciences."

"We urge SFSU, in the strongest possible terms, to take its cues from Zoom and prevent this event from happening. There should be no scenario where an American university has any engagement with a notorious leader of a designated terror group (the PFLP) — who also happens to be a virulent antisemite and two-time plane hijacker."

Benjamin Ryberg, chief operating officer, director of research, Lawfare Project

 

"We hope Zoom’s de-platforming sends an important message to SFSU that Professor Rabab Abdulhadi’s repeated attempts to indoctrinate students with her hatred of Israel and condoning of terrorism is a dangerous abuse of her faculty position, and it has dangerous consequences, including the inevitable targeting of Jewish students at SFSU."

"Unfortunately, though, SFSU continues to provide a daily platform for Abdulhadi to exploit in order to achieve her hateful political ends. And Zoom’s canceling of this event only addresses a symptom of a much larger problem — faculty being permitted to use their academic positions and classrooms to indoctrinate students under the guise of education — which is why we asked SFSU’s president to vigorously address this abuse, but President Mahoney hid, once again, behind a mistaken understanding of academic freedom."

"Academic freedom does not protect faculty when their clear intent is to use the classroom or other academic spaces for promoting their own political causes, and the responsibility for preventing this ongoing abuse lies with universities."

Tammi Rossman-Benjamin, director, AMCHA Initiative

A San Francisco State University seminar titled “Whose Narratives? Gender, Justice and Resistance: A Conversation with Leila Khaled” organized by Professor Rabab Abdulhadi of the Arab and Muslim Ethnicities and Diasporas program, had invited the 76-year-old Palestinian Leila Khaled to be the featured speaker of the seminar. An event that did not go unnoticed by Jewish groups who protested the appearance at an American university of a member of the U.S.-outlawed terrorist group the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. 

 

Khaled graffiti on the Israeli West Bank Barrier near Bethlehem 

Leila Khaled had been involved in two separate incidents of plane hijacking on behalf of the PFLP, an organization she remains connected to. She is a known terrorist, one glorified by the Palestinian Authority for her engagement in violent exploits against Jewish Israel. Dr.Abdulhadi of SFSU had assigned her students to produce signs and tee-shirts glorifying those exploits synonymous with murder, terrorism and violence. The Arab and Muslim Ethnicities and Diasporas Facebook page was posted by her with messages demonizing Israel and supporters of the Jewish state. 

As seminar organizer she had arranged with Zoom, Facebook and YouTube to broadcast the event to a wider audience. The activists and supporters of the Jewish state that the  seminar and its organizer slandered went into action, pointing out to the social media platforms that the PFLP is a terrorist organization outlawed in the U.S. by law, that Leila Khaled is a convicted terrorist. Her message and that of the seminar itself is one of victimhood, hatred and vengeance, the declaration that Israel's very existence represents a crime against Palestinian aspirations for statehood, the solution to which is the destruction of the Jewish state.

 

She was tasked by the PFLP as part of a team to hijack TWA Flight 840 from Rome to Tel Aviv, in August of 1969, diverting the Boeing 707 to Damascus in the belief that the-then Israeli ambassador to the United States, Yitzhak Rabin, would be on the flight. A photograph of Khaled (now a resident of Amman, Jordan} holding an AK-47 rifle while wearing a kaffiyeh became a popular reproduction, following the hijacking, during which no one was hurt, but the plane was blown up once everyone disembarked.

A year later, Khaled with another PFLP member, a Nicaraguan-American, went aboard El Al Flight 219 from Amsterdam to New York. Their hijacking effort failed when Israeli sky marshals went into action, overpowering Khaled and killing her partner, Patrick Arguello. She had two hand grenades in her possession at the time, and Arguello had shot a member of the flight crew during their attempt at hijacking the plane. She was arrested and imprisoned in Britain, later released in a hostage exchange.

PFPL plane hijacker Leila Khaled in South Africa

(photo credit: AFP PHOTO/GIANLUIGI GUERCIA)

The seminar was refused hosting by both Zoom and Facebook. The event was broadcast live on You Tube on Wednesday, 23 September, but twenty minutes into the seminar, the feed was cut by YouTube and the video removed on the basis that it was violating the YouTube Terms of Service. Khaled had not had the chance to speak when the event was dropped. Last week, SFSU President Mahoney published an opinion piece, to appear in The Jewish News of Northern California, citing academic freedom and diversity as justification for proceeding with the seminar and Khaled as featured speaker.  

United States ... The Most COVID-Suffused Nation on Earth

"I do think that we're going to have a third act of this virus in the fall and the winter and it's likely to be a more pervasive spread in a broader part of the country."

"Hopefully this virus will start to dissipate in the summer [next year, so that the timing of vaccine availability] isn't going to make that much of a difference because the virus won't be transferring as readily by then."

(former) U.S. Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Scott Gottlieb 

"We need to hunker down and get through this fall and winter, because it's not going to be easy."

"The idea of 200,000 deaths is really very sobering, and in some respects, stunning. We do have within our capability -- even before we get a vaccine, which we will get reasonably soon -- we have the capability by doing things that we have been speaking about for so long, that could prevent the transmission, and by preventing transmission, ultimately preventing the morbidity and mortality that we see."

Dr.Anthony Fauci, immunologist, director, National Institutes of Health

 

"[Americans are in for] the worst fall, from a public health perspective, we've ever had [amidst concerns over a possible] twindemic [of COVID-19 cases alongside the seasonal flu overwhelming hospitals]."

Robert Redfield, director, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

A healthcare worker interacts with motorists at a drive-thru COVID-19 testing facility in Dallas.  (Smiley N. Pool/The Dallas Morning News via AP)

The dismally expected mark of 200,000 Americans struck down by COVID-19 seemed to take no time at all from the time the SARS-CoV-2 virus arrived with a roar, plunging the United States into lockdown, devastating its economy, and necessitating closed borders in a hapless, too-late effort to control a disease whose course puzzled and continues to puzzle, the global medical community. Just as the stride and affect of the novel coronavirus has impacted the global community on a sweeping scale, the variations and complications of the hugely contagious virus grows more venomously intriguing the more that is discovered about its trajectory and outcomes.

From its initial impact centering on a handful of epicentres it has continued to travel and to grow without restraint as the medical community tries to second-guess its unfolding variations in symptoms and after-effects. Every time there seems to be a diminishing effect and hope grows that a level of control has been achieved, it flares anew, dashing hopes of recovery. Its impact and its spread continues unabated and while it smoulders and flares, thoughts turn to impending winter when people will be forced by weather conditions into interiors, leaving the relative safety of the outdoors.

An average of over 800 people daily succumb to the effects of the virus at the present time in the United States. In Australia, fewer than 15 cases are seen daily as is the case in Canada, Germany, Israel, Italy and the United Kingdom. All of whom have their own concerns at steadily rising cases of COVID. The U.S. reports close to 40,000 new infections dailym representing the highest case number in the developed world for the third-most-populous country in the world, even though new cases represent a 50 percent reduction from the July infection peak.

 

 

The novel coronavirus has infected over 30.98 million people worldwide and of that number 958,453 have perished from its deadly effects. Over 210 countries and territories have reported infections in their populations since December 2019 when the first reports of mysterious respiratory cases were identified in Wuhan, China. In about 20 out of 50 states in the U.S. cases are on an upward trend. Former epicentres of New Jersey and New York where cases have declined for months are now reporting an increase in cases.

Former Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Scott Gottlieb speaks of his concerns over a third wave which might be more diffused and begin to spread in a wider swath across the country. And while he doesn't believe there will be a vaccine available until the end of the second quarter or the third quarter of 2021 for general inoculation, his professional experience clashes with that of the country's president who boasts with confidence that the nation will have a vaccine before year's end, things under control by April 2021, with an effective vaccination in wide use.

In Britain, the British government's chief scientific adviser Patrick Vallance, and Chris Whitty, chief medical officer for England have stated that the number of COVID-19 cases is doubling every seven days. "If, and that's quite a big if, but if that continues unabated ... you would end up with something like 50,000 cases in the middle of October, per day", warned Dr.Vallance. These numbers could result in over 200 deaths daily.