Tunisian Revolution and the Middle East--And Now, The Withdrawal From Afghanistan (M.E.T.)

[visionary]

Tunisia still seems to be doing the best, though I haven't heard much news from there recently (which might be a good sign...).  

[visionary]

http://www.melty.fr/game-of-thrones-saison-6-liam-cunningham-a449124.html

US military launches strike on Afghan city taken by Taliban

 

The U.S. military says it has carried out an airstrike on the northern Afghan city of Kunduz that was captured by the Taliban the previous day.

 

U.S. Army Col. Brian Tribus, spokesman for the U.S. and NATO missions in Afghanistan, says the airstrike early Tuesday was conducted "in order to eliminate a threat to the force."

 

The city fell Monday with the Taliban overrunning government buildings and hoisting their flag in the city square.

 

Sarwar Hussaini, a provincial police spokesman, says Afghan forces have launched an operation on several fronts around Kunduz to try and retake the city.

 

Kunduz is the first city seized by the Taliban since their regime was overthrown in a U.S.-led invasion in 2001. The city's fall comes as President Ashraf Ghani marks one year office.

Edited September 29, 2015 by visionary

[visionary]

https://twitter.com/bashirgwakh

Kunduz Airport: NATO fresh air strikes have caused heavy casualties to Taliban.Taliban shadow governor reportedly killed too. Afghanistan
2:33 PM

 

Kunduz update:Taliban shadow governor, Mullah Salam along his deputy Mullah Zabuhulah reportedly killed in fresh air strikes. Afghanistan
2:50 PM

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/30/world/asia/afghan-forces-seek-to-regain-kunduz-city-from-taliban.html?smid=tw-nytimesworld&smtyp=cur

Afghan Crisis Grows as Push to Retake Kunduz from Taliban Fails

 

Afghanistan was plunged deeper into crisis a day after the Taliban seized the northern city of Kunduz, as the insurgents on Tuesday kept assaulting the reeling Afghan security forces and the government struggled to mount a credible response.

 

Not only did a promised government counteroffensive on Kunduz not make headway during heavy fighting on Tuesday, but the day ended with yet another aggressive Taliban advance, with insurgents surrounding the airport to which hundreds of Afghan forces and at least as many civilians had retreated, thinking it would be safe.

 

After more than a day of relative silence as the situation worsened around Kunduz, the American military showed the first signs of increased involvement in what the Pentagon called “a setback,” conducting at least two airstrikes, and reportedly more as attacks continued at the airport late Tuesday.

 

Beyond the Taliban’s gains in Kunduz, there was evidence that the insurgents were also pushing a broader offensive in northern Afghanistan, officials said. One particular point of concern was Takhar Province, just east of Kunduz, where the insurgents were said to be heavily assaulting military checkpoints and government facilities in several districts over the past two days.

Questions about how thousands of army, police and militia defenders could continue to fare so poorly against a Taliban force that most local and military officials put in the hundreds hung over President Ashraf Ghani’s government and its American allies.

 

In the hours after Kunduz’s fall, Afghan officials said an overwhelming Afghan Army force was on its way to retake the city. But by the end of the day on Tuesday, only a few hundred had materialized at the airport — a small fraction of the number who had fled the city the day before. Many more traveling by road were said to have been slowed by ambushes and roadside bombs, in another sign of growing Taliban control in Kunduz Province and nearby areas.

Edited September 30, 2015 by visionary

[visionary]

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/01/world/middleeast/mahmoud-abbaspalestinian-president-promises-bombshell-in-his-un-speech.html?smid=tw-bna&_r=0

Mahmoud Abbas, Palestinian Authority President, Says He’s No Longer Bound by Oslo Accords

 

Demonstrating a new level of tension with Israel, President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority declared Wednesday that it was no longer bound by the 1995 Oslo Accords that formed the basis for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

 

Mourners at the funeral on Tuesday for Diyaa Talahmeh, 21, a Palestinian man who died in an explosion near the West Bank city of Hebron. The Israeli military described Mr. Talahmeh's death as an accident, saying it appeared that he had been trying to throw an explosive device that detonated prematurely.2 Are Killed in West Bank as Jewish and Muslim Holidays Approach

 

In his annual General Assembly speech, Mr. Abbas accused Israel of having violated the accords and subsequent agreements, saying “we cannot be the only party” that remains faithful to them.

 

Mr. Abbas delivered his speech against a backdrop of growing frustration among many Palestinians over the paralysis in peace negotiations with Israel, the most protracted conflict vexing the United Nations since its founding 70 years ago.

 

 

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2015/09/palestinian-flag-raising-symbolic-step-150930124248791.html

Palestinian flag raised at UN

 

The Palestinian flag for the first time has been raised at the United Nations following an address delivered by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to the UN General Assembly.

 

The flag was raised in the rose garden at 1:00pm local time (6:00pm GMT) on Wednesday as a large crowd of diplomats and reporters watched on.

 

Speaking to the crowd, Abbas dedicated the ceremony to "the martyrs, the prisoners and the wounded, and to those who gave their lives while trying to raise this flag".

 

Hundreds of Palestinians assembled in the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah, where they watched the flag-raising on a large screen set up in Yasser Arafat Square.

"The mood is festive," reported Al Jazeera's Imtiaz Tyab, adding that "families sang along to nationalistic songs and waved the Palestinian flag".

 

Having been strongly criticised by Israel, the move was also opposed by the United States.

Edited September 30, 2015 by visionary

[Kilmer17]

Yep.  It's about that time for this to get fired up again.

[visionary]

 

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/01/world/a-taliban-prize-won-in-a-few-hours-after-years-of-strategy.html?smid=tw-nytimesworld&smtyp=cur&_r=0

A Taliban Prize, Won in a Few Hours After Years of Strategy

 

https://twitter.com/AFP

BREAKING Afghan forces have retaken control of northern city of Kunduz from Taliban insurgents after fierce fighting overnight: government
11:02 PM     

Edited October 1, 2015 by visionary

[visionary]

http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2015/09/tunisia-official-promises-economy-security-reforms.html

Tunisian prime minister promises economic, security reforms

 

Tunisian Prime Minister Habib Essid said Sept. 30 that his country will have a new investment code by the end of the year and will implement other reforms to overcome deep economic and security crises.

 

“We have many challenges,” Essid, a US-educated economist, told an audience at the Council on Foreign Relations. “We need to have important reforms in many domains.”

 

Once the darling of democracy advocates for its inclusive political process following the overthrow of dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali in 2011, Tunisia has lately lost a bit of its luster.

 

Tunisian President Beji Caid Essebsi responded to two gruesome terrorist attacks directed against foreign tourists earlier this year by declaring a state of emergency and implementing a draconian new law that prescribes the death penalty for vaguely defined terrorist crimes.

 

In addition, Essebsi is trying to push a law through parliament that would allow corrupt businessmen to admit guilt and pay compensation rather than face imprisonment. Critics say the law — which has provoked protests, including street demonstrations, from civil society activists — would undercut what had been seen as a promising truth and reconciliation process. The law is meant to encourage more investment in the Tunisian economy, which is struggling.

 

A new report on Tunisia to be issued soon by the Atlantic Council and shared with Al-Monitor in advance warns, “Unless the Tunisian government moves rapidly to turn the economy around, Tunisia could well turn out to be the country where the Arab Spring both was born and died.”

 

Asked about these challenges by Al-Monitor, Essid said that security sector reform is “one of our priorities” but that “it is not an easy job” because of the legacy of impunity left by the Ben Ali regime.

 

Regarding the corruption law, Essid said the democratically elected parliament “can refuse the proposal of the president of the republic. There are institutional safeguards” that did not exist earlier.

[visionary]

http://news.yahoo.com/tunisia-lifts-state-emergency-imposed-tourist-massacre-172838974.html

Tunisia lifts state of emergency imposed after tourist massacre

 

A state of emergency imposed in Tunisia after a jihadist gunman massacred 38 foreign tourists in June is set to be lifted, the president's office announced Friday.

 

"The state of emergency announced on July 4 and extended on July 31 ends today, October 2," Beji Caid Essebsi's office said.

 

"It had been extended for two months and this period ends" at midnight, presidency spokesman Moez Sinaoui told AFP, without elaborating.

 

On July 4, eight days after the shooting spree at the Mediterranean resort of Port El Kantaoui north of Sousse, Essebsi ordered a state of emergency for an initial 30 days.

 

On July 31, the president's office announced the measure would be extended for two months.

 

The state of emergency was one of a raft of measures introduced by the authorities after the seaside massacre, which dealt a heavy blow to Tunisia's key tourism industry.

 

The June 26 attack killed 30 Britons, three Irish, two Germans, one Belgian, one Portuguese and a Russian.

 

Afterwards, the government began arming tourism police for the first time and reinforced them with troops in an attempt to reassure foreign governments.

 

A state of emergency, granting special powers to the police and army, was in force for three years up until March 2014, following longtime secular president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali's ouster in a 2011 revolution.

 

Apart from allowing the barring of strike action, the measure authorised the authorities to raid homes at any time of the day and to keep tabs on the media.

[visionary]

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/10/03/us-afghanistan-attack-idUSKCN0RW0HC20151003?feedType=RSS&feedName=worldNews

Hospital hit, three staff killed in bombing of Afghan city: Medecins sans Frontieres

 

Medical aid group Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) said on Saturday its hospital in the Afghan city of Kunduz was partially destroyed, three staff were killed and 30 staff were unaccounted for after overnight bombing.Fighting has raged around the northern provincial capital for the last six days after Taliban militants captured the city in their biggest victory of a nearly 14-year insurgency.

 

"We are deeply shocked by the attack, the killing of our staff and patients and the heavy toll it has inflicted on healthcare in Kunduz," MSF said in a statement.The group described the incident as an "aerial attack", but it was unclear if the bombing was carried out by Afghan forces or U.S. military.

 

https://twitter.com/AFP

BREAKING: NATO says US air strike 'may have' hit Kunduz MSF hospital
12:27 AM

 

 

https://twitter.com/danielle_jenni

Tragic news from Kunduz, the @MSF hospital hit several times during bombing last night. 3 MSF staff killed, 30 unaccounted for.
11:42 PM

 

Kunduz residents describe harrowing scenes at @MSF hospital bombing, saying scores were trapped inside burning building.
12:57 AM

 

Kunduz police spox confirms MSF bombing a US airstrike. US confirmed their hit caused collateral damage but still investigating
2:01 AM

Edited October 3, 2015 by visionary

[visionary]

https://twitter.com/WilliamsJon

MSF: Bombs hit & we heard plane circle round. Then more bombs hit. Happened again & again.
12:35 PM

 

 

http://www.breakingnews.com/topic/war-in-afghanistan-2015/

6h Bombing of Kunduz hospital continued for 30 minutes even after MSF alerted US and Afghan officials - @MSF

4h 10-15 'terrorists' killed in airstrike on MSF hospital after hiding there, Afghan interior ministry says - @samgadjones

1h In a phone call with President Ashraf Ghani, commander of US-led coalition in Afghanistan apologies for airstrike on MSF hospital in Kunduz - @euamiri

1h UN human rights chief says bombing of MSF hospital in Kunduz was 'utterly tragic, inexcusable, and possibly even criminal'; calls for investigation - @Reuters

15m Death toll in Afghanistan hospital airstrike rises to at least 19, including 12 MSF staffers and 7 patients - @MSF

Edited October 3, 2015 by visionary

[visionary]

https://theintercept.com/2015/10/05/the-radically-changing-story-of-the-u-s-airstrike-on-afghan-hospital-from-mistake-to-justification/?comments=1#comments

The Radically Changing Story of the U.S. Airstrike on Afghan Hospital: From Mistake to Justification

 

http://www.vox.com/2015/10/5/9454575/kunduz-us-bombing

Bombing a hospital in Afghanistan is the modern American way of war

 

Over the weekend, a United States AC-130 military aircraft targeted a Doctors Without Borders hospital in Afghanistan, killing 22 innocent people and forcing the humanitarian group to withdraw from the city.

 

The incident, on its face, was surely the result of some terrible human error, whether it was the Americans who launched the strike, the Afghans who reportedly called it in, or the many people involved who did not realize what they were doing, though Doctors Without Borders had alerted the US to their presence.

 

But regardless of any human error, there is a deeper and not-at-all accidental cause to blame, and it is the same thing that has contributed to the American bombing of so many wedding parties and innocent villages before: This is how a bombing war works. This is what a bombing war does. It is the war we've chosen in Afghanistan, the war we've chosen in Syria and Iraq, and the war that, if history is any guide, the United States will continue to choose over and over. When we treat it as mainly an accident or an aberration, we obfuscate that fact and ignore what makes this incident truly terrible.

 

In the twilight between Friday night and Saturday morning, in the northern Afghan town of Kunduz, Lajos Zoltan Jecs, a nurse with Doctors Without Borders, was shaken awake by an explosion. At first, as he wrote on his NGO's website, all he knew was that the blast had been very close — much closer than the usual background noise of war.

 

Jecs stumbled into the hospital to look for survivors. He found one patient killed on the operating table and another six "burning in their beds" in the intensive care unit. "I cannot describe what was inside. There are no words for how terrible it was," he wrote. The bombing continued for half an hour. By the end, at least 22 people were dead: 12 Doctors Without Borders staffers and 10 patients, three of them children.

 

The town of Kunduz had, just a few days earlier, been overrun by the Taliban. It was the group's biggest military victory in 14 years and the beginning of what many Afghans fear will be the Taliban's reconquest of their country, now that the American-led force is leaving. But this was not Doctors Without Borders' first war, and the group had made sure all parties in the war knew their facility's precise location.

 

Jecs could not know it at the time, but he and his colleagues were being bombed not by the Taliban or the Afghan military, but by the United States government. An American AC-130 ground-attack aircraft, which can function as a kind of flying artillery platform, had pounded the hospital from above.

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/05/world/asia/kunduz-fall-validates-mullah-akhtar-muhammad-mansour-talibans-new-leader.html

Taliban’s New Leader Strengthens His Hold With Intrigue and Battlefield Victory

 

If ever there was a Taliban bureaucrat who seemed set on a less than stellar career path, it was Mullah Akhtar Muhammad Mansour.

 

In the 1990s, he was the Taliban government’s chief of aviation while Afghanistan had few planes in the air. He also oversaw the tourism department for what was one of the world’s most sealed-off countries at the time.

 

In short, there was little hint back then that he would someday emerge as the Taliban’s supreme commander, and the successor to the group’s legendary founder, Mullah Muhammad Omar.

 

But in the years since the Taliban leadership was driven into exile in Pakistan in 2001, Mullah Mansour became central to the group’s reincarnation as a powerful insurgency that survived NATO offensives to pose a grave threat now to the Western-backed Afghan government.

 

The insurgent assault that has swept across northern Afghanistan in recent weeks and for the first time in 14 years planted the Taliban flag in a major city, Kunduz, has cemented Mullah Mansour’s status as one of the canniest enemies of American interests in decades. Yet he has remained largely a mystery to American and Afghan officials.

Edited October 5, 2015 by visionary

[visionary]

http://www.cnn.com/2015/10/05/politics/obama-afghanistan-strategy-kunduz-airstrike/index.html

Obama can't stay in Afghanistan, but he can't leave

 

It took a horrific tragedy to remind the nation that its longest war, though often forgotten, is by no means gone.

 

Outrage over the bombing of a Doctors Without Borders hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan, by an American gunship Saturday focused increasingly rare media scrutiny on a conflict in which U.S. combat officially ended last year -- but where fighting still rages.

 

The immediate question is who bears responsibility for a strike in which 22 civilians, including doctors and patients, were killed in what the Nobel prize-winning NGO branded a war crime. But the disaster also raises a list of troublesome tactical questions for Washington.

 

It will renew serious doubts about the limits of cooperation between the U.S. and the Afghan units that apparently called in the strike, as well as the basic quality of that American-trained force. Pentagon strategists are also puzzling over how the resurgent Taliban was able to capture Kunduz in the first place.

 

Those questions could not come at a worse time for President Barack Obama, who is facing a much wider strategic dilemma over a war that as a candidate he termed "the right battlefield" for America but that has haunted his entire presidency.

 

Heading into his final year in office, Obama is weighing whether to go ahead with his plan to bring home almost all U.S. troops in Afghanistan next year to honor a political promise to end the wars he inherited. He may instead opt to leave behind a reduced, but still considerable, U.S. force to boost the country's vulnerable military forces amid fears that they could eventually collapse under Taliban pressure.

Edited October 6, 2015 by visionary

[visionary]

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2015/10/egypt-court-orders-release-hosni-mubarak-sons-151012134842899.html

Egypt court orders release of Hosni Mubarak's sons

 

A court has ordered the release of the two sons of former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, taking into account they have completed their three-year sentences on corruption convictions.

 

The brothers are expected to walk free later today or tomorrow after the Cairo Criminal Court announced its verdict in the multi-million dollar embezzlement case on Monday.

 

Alaa and Gamal Mubarak were convicted of embezzling state funds allocated for the renovation of Egypt's presidential palaces.

 

The brothers still face trial on insider trading charges, however, with the next hearing due October 17.

 

Their release is likely to present a dilemma for President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, a former army chief whom opponents accuse of reviving Mubarak-era autocratic practices.

 

Sisi took power after ousting the country's first democratically elected President Mohamed Morsi in 2013, and won a landslide victory in last year's presidential election.

 

"The perception is that those who were responsible for major economic crimes and human rights violations under Mubarak's dictatorship are being slapped on the hand," said Sahar Aziz, professor of law at Texas A&M School of Law, speaking to Al Jazeera, "whereas those who attempted to overthrow the regime...are being heavily penalised.

 

"The Egyptian revolution is yet to come, hopefully it will be a nonviolent revolution. The Egyptian people's hope to have a democratic state is yet to be realised."

 

Former President Mubarak, who ruled Egypt for 30 years, was convicted in the same case, in which the trio was charged with spending more than 100 million Egyptian pounds ($12.8m) of state money on their private residences.

 

Mubarak was ousted from power in February 2011 after 18 days of nationwide protests demanding his removal. Two months later, his sons were detained.

The brothers were released in January this year after the initial verdict was overturned. They were jailed again after the conviction was reinstated on retrial in May.

 

http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/1/64/153778/Egypt/Politics-/Egyptian-court-overturns--death-sentences-for-Kerd.aspx

Egyptian court overturns 5 death sentences for Kerdasa police killings

 

Egypt’s Court of Cassation overturned the convictions of five men who were sentenced to death for storming a police station and killing 11 policemen in the town of Kerdasa in 2013.

 

In its Monday verdict the court ordered the men's death sentenced be overturned and they be retried for the offences.

 

Eleven police officers were killed during an attack on Kerdasa police station in August 2013, following the dispersal of two large sit-ins in Cairo supporting ousted Islamist president Mohamed Morsi.

 

A total of 183 defendants were originally sentenced to death in February by Giza’s Criminal Court headed by Judge Mohamed Nagy Shehata. Thirty-four of those were sentenced in absentia.

 

The five defendants whose sentences were overturned on Monday were initially sentenced to death in absentia in February, but were subsequently arrested, retried and sentenced to death in a May verdict.

 

The Court of Cassation is expected to consider the appeals of another 138 defendants in the same case on 6 January.

 

Defence lawyers for the five men argued that they are not affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood and were not caught in the act committing the crimes they are accused of.

 

Hundreds of defendants have been sentenced to death in cases related to violence since the ouster of Morsi in 2013.

 

Of the defendants sentenced to death, seven have been executed; many others have filed appeals, are facing retrials, or were sentenced in absentia.

Edited October 13, 2015 by visionary

[visionary]

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/14/world/asia/taliban-afghanistan-kunduz.html?smid=tw-bna

Taliban Withdraw From Kunduz After Days of Fighting

 

The Taliban announced that they had withdrawn completely from the northern city of Kunduz on Tuesday, ending their first takeover of any Afghan city during the last 14 years of war.

 

After overrunning the city on Sept. 28, the insurgents held onto it long enough to destroy government offices and facilities, hunt down opponents and allow prisoners to escape the city’s two prisons. But in the end, the Taliban abandoned their efforts to retain control after just 15 days.

 

In taking over Kunduz, the insurgents delivered a shock to hopes that the Afghan security forces could dependably defend the country’s most important cities. In Kunduz, several hundred Taliban fighters all but routed as many as 7,000 Afghan government defenders. The insurgents success there, and their advances across multiple provinces in recent weeks, have caused panic in other parts of the country.

 

Kunduz is now nominally within government hands, though the shift comes days after the government first claimed it had retaken the city. At several points of seeming government success, the Taliban surged back as fighting seesawed between neighborhoods in the northern provincial capital.

 

In recent days, the Taliban did appear to have been mostly pushed out of the city, at least during the day, and Kunduz government officials and some residents began returning to assess the damage, although few residents returned to their homes. As recently as Monday those officials were leaving the city at night to take refuge in the military base at the Kunduz airport.

 

On Monday night, according to Afghan officials, the insurgents made several attempts to destroy strategic bridges on the outskirts of the city, the Chardara Bridge and the Alchin Bridge, which would have isolated Kunduz, Afghanistan’s fifth-largest city, from surrounding districts and highways to other parts of the country. The officials said Afghan forces managed to save the bridges from destruction.

 

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/afghanistan-pakistan/nobodys-been-held-accountable-for-wasteful-spending-in-afghanistan-says-u-s-watchdog/

“Nobody’s Been Held Accountable” for Wasteful Spending in Afghanistan, says U.S. Watchdog

 

The war in Afghanistan marked a grim milestone this week — its 14th anniversary — making it America’s longest war by nearly half a decade. And it’s back in the spotlight for the wrong reasons: a resurgent Taliban seized a major Afghan city for the first time in 14 years in late September, and a U.S. airstrike coming to the aid of Afghan forces hit a hospital run by the aid group Doctors Without Borders, killing 22 patients and doctors, and leaving 24 missing and feared dead.

 

Afghan security forces have struggled to maintain any gains they’ve made in retaking the city of Kunduz, with territory changing hands daily. And with international aid organizations now gone from the city in the aftermath of the hospital bombing, civilians who are caught in the crossfire have nowhere to turn for help.

 

Meanwhile the U.S. reconstruction effort — which has cost taxpayers $110 billion since the war began — continues to be hampered by allegations of waste, fraud and mismanagement. In just one of the war’s numerous examples, a $500,000 training center for Afghan police began “melting” within four months of completion.

 

To take stock of the United States’ costly reconstruction efforts, FRONTLINE spoke recently with John Sopko, the U.S. Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction. Since Sopko took the job in 2012, he and his team at SIGAR have called attention to repeated missteps in the reconstruction, leading to high-profile coverage of waste in Afghanistan, and fueling criticism for their aggressive approach from the departments they audit. Sopko now warns that the few gains the U.S. and its Afghan partners have made may be lost.

Edited October 13, 2015 by visionary

[visionary]

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/10/15/us-afghanistan-usa-idUSKCN0S910M20151015?utm_source=twitter

In policy reversal, Obama slows pace of U.S. troop withdrawal in Afghanistan

 

Reversing policy on Afghanistan, President Barack Obama announced on Thursday he will prolong the 14-year-old U.S. military engagement there, effectively handing off the task of pulling out troops to his successor.

 

Calling it a "modest but meaningful" adjustment to winding down the American presence in Afghanistan, Obama said the United States will maintain a force of 9,800 through most of 2016.

 

Obama had previously aimed to withdraw all but a small U.S.-embassy based force in the capital, Kabul, before he leaves office in January 2017. Under the new plan, troops will be drawn down to 5,500 starting sometime in 2017 and will be based at four locations - Kabul, Bagram, Jalalabad and Kandahar.

 

Afghanistan's stability is vital to the United States and Afghan troops who are now in charge of security are not yet as strong as they need to be, Obama said, adding, "If they were to fail, it would endanger the security of us all."

 

Asked by a reporter if he was disappointed in having to make the decision, Obama said he was not and added, "This isn't the first time those adjustments have been made. This probably won't be the last."

 

"I suspect that we will continue to evaluate this going forward, as will the next president," he said.

 

The U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan ended its combat mission after 13 years of war at the end of 2014, and Afghan troops have since been in charge of the country's security, with help from U.S. and NATO troops.

 

But Afghan forces have struggled in assaults from Taliban militants, who briefly took over the northern city of Kunduz. Obama acknowledged militants are still capable of launching deadly attacks on cities including Kabul.

 

U.S. troops will remain out of combat roles, training and advising Afghan forces, and ensuring that any al Qaeda remnants do not pose a threat to U.S. security, Obama said.

 

http://bigstory.ap.org/article/5e20fcd92aee49e699149aef93595e49/apnewsbreak-us-spec-ops-knew-afghan-site-was-hospital

APNewsBreak: US analysts knew Afghan site was hospital

 

Days before the Oct. 3 U.S. air attack on a hospital in Afghanistan, American special operations analysts were gathering intelligence on the facility — which they knew was a protected medical site — because they believed it was being used by a Pakistani operative to coordinate Taliban activity, The Associated Press has learned.

 

It's unclear whether commanders who unleashed the AC-130 gunship on the hospital — killing at least 22 patients and hospital staff — were aware that the site was a hospital or knew about the allegations of possible enemy activity. The Pentagon initially said the attack was to protect U.S. troops engaged in a firefight and has since said it was a mistake.

 

The special operations analysts had assembled a dossier that included maps with the hospital circled, along with indications that intelligence agencies were tracking the location of the Pakistani operative and activity reports based on overhead surveillance, according to a former intelligence official familiar with the material. The intelligence suggested the hospital was being used as a Taliban command and control center and may have housed heavy weapons.

 

After the attack — which came amidst a battle to retake the northern Afghan city of Kunduz from the Taliban — some U.S. analysts assessed that the strike had been justified, the former officer says. They concluded that the Pakistani, believed to have been working for his country's Inter-Service Intelligence directorate, had been killed.

 

No evidence has surfaced publicly to support those conclusions about the Pakistani's connections or his demise. The former intelligence official was not authorized to comment publicly and spoke only on condition of anonymity.

 

The top U.S. officer in Afghanistan, Gen. John Campbell, has said the strike was a mistake, but he has not explained exactly how it happened or who granted final approval. He also told Congress he was ordering all personnel in Afghanistan to be retrained on the rules governing the circumstances under which strikes are acceptable.

 

The new details about the military's suspicions that the hospital was being misused complicate an already murky picture and add to the unanswered questions about one of the worst civilian casualty incidents of the Afghan war. They also raise the possibility of a breakdown in intelligence sharing and communication across the military chain of command.

 

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/10/15/iranian-american-businessman-jailed-in-tehran.html

Iranian-American Businessman Jailed in Tehran

 

Security agents have arrested an Iranian-American businessman in Tehran, IranWire has learned.

 

A dozen plainclothes agents raided the family home of the businessman, who was visiting Iran, earlier this week. According to IranWire’s source, they ransacked the house, confiscated property, and took the dual national to Evin Prison.

 

The news coincided with reports of Iranian-Americans being hacked.  Several Iranian-Americans and US-based Iranian experts reported that they received suspicious emails sent from the businessman’s account. This follows similar attacks on associates of a European-based Iranian businessman who had traveled to Iran to visit family and look into possible business opportunities as Iran and the P5+1 move toward finalizing the nuclear deal approved in July.

 

“I’m usually very careful about the emails I open, because so many of my friends have been hacked,” said a prominent Iranian-American scholar whose account was hacked after he received a phishing email. “But I trust my friend [the arrested Iranian-American businessman], so I opened his email. And then I realized that my whole system had been hacked.”

 

On Monday, October 12, Iran’s judiciary passed a verdict on the case of Jason Rezaian, the jailed Washington Post correspondent, without releasing specific details about the case. News also emerged on October 15 that Kamal Fouraghi, an Iranian-Briton, has been held in Evin Prison since 2011. His family, who has until now been silent about Fouraghi’s imprisonment, decided to go public because of the 76-year-old’s failing health. Both Rezaian and Fouraghi face charges of espionage.

Edited October 15, 2015 by visionary

[visionary]

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/10/18/us-israel-palestinians-idUSKCN0SC0JO20151018

Palestinian gunman kills one, wounds 11 in Israeli city of Beersheba

 

A Palestinian gunman went on a shooting rampage at the central bus station in the southern Israeli city of Beersheba on Sunday, killing a soldier and wounding 11 other people, police said.

 

In one of the most serious Palestinian attacks against Israelis during this month's upsurge of violence, police said the attacker was shot dead after a protracted gun battle, police said.

 

Palestinian media outlets named the attacker as Asam al-Araj from Shuafat, on the outskirts of Jerusalem.

 

A number of the wounded were police officers. Hospital officials said two people were in critical condition.

 

Initial reports had said two attackers were involved but the regional police commander said investigators later believed there was only one.

 

Police commander Yoram Halevy said the gunman had entered the secured bus station and used a pistol to kill the soldier and grab his assault rifle, which he then used to shoot others.

 

Forty-two Palestinians and eight Israelis have died in the recent violence, which was in part triggered by Palestinians' anger over what they see as increased Jewish encroachment on Jerusalem's al-Aqsa mosque compound.

Earlier on Sunday, Israel erected a short concrete barrier along a street that borders the Palestinian neighbourhood of Jabel Mukabar and a Jewish neighbourhood that Israel has built in annexed East Jerusalem.

 

Police said the wall, about 10 metres in length, was placed temporarily at a flashpoint of the recent flare-up of violence in the city and was intended to stop petrol bombs and other missiles being thrown at the Jewish apartments.

 

Israel, which has poured hundreds of troops into its cities and set up roadblocks in Palestinian neighbourhoods of East Jerusalem, said that on Saturday four Palestinians were shot dead and a fifth seriously injured in thwarted knife attacks.

 

The Islamist Hamas group which controls the Gaza Strip said the Beersheba attack was a "natural response to Israel field executions of Palestinians".

 

https://twitter.com/SkyNewsBreak

Update - Two people killed and at least eight other people wounded in shooting attack at bus station in southern Israeli city of Beersheba
4:23 PM

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/18/world/middleeast/in-east-jerusalem-palestinians-are-seething-after-years-of-neglect.html?smid=tw-nytimes&smtyp=cur&_r=0

East Jerusalem, Bubbling Over With Despair

 

East Jerusalem, long the emotional heart of Palestinian life, is now the fiery soul of its discontent.

 

It is not just that most of the young people suspected in this month’s spate of stabbing attacks came from within the city borders, like the 18-year-old college student whose residency is being revoked by Israel after the police said she stabbed a Jewish man in the back.

 

It is that her neighborhood of 18,000, Sur Baher, is also home to people like Fuad Abu Hamed, a successful businessman who condemns the wave of violence but shares the frustration and alienation underlying this new uprising.

 

Mr. Abu Hamed, 44, is a lecturer at Hebrew University who runs two clinics in Israel’s health system, and lives in a comfortable home among Sur Baher’s tangle of crowded hills. The view from his balcony is of sprawling Jewish enclaves that he said were “built on our lands,” and the ugly barrier Israel erected that splits Sur Baher from the occupied West Bank.

 

These days, he can also see the Israeli soldiers who have blocked two of the neighborhood’s exits and set up a checkpoint to search cars at the third, making the city’s psychic division all the more concrete.

 

“You have a lot of evidence that you are not a human being,” Mr. Abu Hamed said. “The problem is the policy, because all the time as a Palestinian here you feel that they want to take you out of the city, you have a lot of problems that do not allow you to feel that you are part of the city. It’s killing from inside all the time.”

 

In East Jerusalem, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is most personal and most profound.

 

For Israeli Jews, the outbreak of seemingly random attacks by Palestinians is both a vexing challenge to contain and a reminder of the inherent conundrum in their vision of a united Jerusalem.

 

For many of the 320,000 Arab residents, the violence is a consequence of years of feeling like the neglected stepchildren of both City Hall and the Palestinian Authority, which is headquartered in the West Bank and is barred from operating in Jerusalem. They do not feel wanted here, or part of what is happening there.

The uptick in aggression did not begin with the two dozen attacks that have killed seven Israeli Jews, five of them in Jerusalem, since Oct. 1. (At least 16 suspected assailants have been shot dead by Israelis, including four Saturday, along with more than 20 other Palestinians in clashes with security forces). East Jerusalem has been a hotbed since July 2014, when Jewish extremists kidnapped and murdered Muhammad Abu Khdeir, a 16-year-old from the Shuafat neighborhood. The police reported 1,594 stone-throwing incidents in East Jerusalem over the next three months, up from 1,216 during 10 months of 2013; more than 700 people were arrested for rioting in Jerusalem during that period in 2014. The police said they had detained 380 between Sept. 13 and Oct. 15 of this year, 171 of them minors.

 

An Israeli policeman stood guard in Jerusalem's Old City. The area has been eerily empty since the stabbings. Credit Uriel Sinai for The New York Times
Yehuda Yemini, who spent 15 years working in East Jerusalem for Israel’s Shin Bet security agency, blamed “toxic incitement” that riddled textbooks in local schools until a few years ago.

 

“You get a generation that has grown up with the messages that a Jew is someone who comes to harm us, and endangers our religion,” he said. “Even those who define themselves as secular have a lot of religious motifs. And there is a conflict between the modern, dynamic Israel they see and the narrative of the evil Israel that won’t succeed.”

 

Arab East Jerusalem is not a single place but a series of some two dozen disparate satellites. There are isolated villages like Sur Baher, Jabel Mukhaber and Issawiya, where Israelis rarely venture, but also relatively upscale and accessible Beit Hanina, where international aid workers and diplomats live and Israelis flock for hummus. There is the restive, drug-ridden Shuafat refugee camp, one of several hamlets officially part of Jerusalem but left on the West Bank side of the concrete barrier. And there is the Old City itself, where the cobblestone streets have been eerily empty since the stabbings.

Edited October 18, 2015 by visionary

[visionary]

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2015/10/israel-attack-beersheeba-151018173020191.html

Deadly attack hits bus station in southern Israel

Following the attack on Sunday evening, police opened fire on two people at the station in Beersheba, killing an alleged Palestinian attacker and injuring a man of Eritrean origin.

 

It was not immediately clear whether both of those shot were involved in the attack. Israeli media reported that security forces mistook the Eritrean for an attacker and shot him.

 

According to the police, the attacker stabbed a soldier and stole his weapon, opening fire on the crowds at the bus terminal. The soldier died at the hospital.

The Israeli IBA network posted footage purportedly recorded by a surveillance camera of the attack.

 

In other video circulated online, a man, said to be the Eritrean, is seen being kicked by several people as he lied bleeding on the ground. [The graphic footage - which could be disturbing to some viewers - can be found here.]

 

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4712997,00.html

At first, it was believed there were two attackers, but it later transpired that the second man who was gunned down was an Eritrean man. He was shot in his lower extremities by the bus terminal's head of security, who thought him to be a terrorist, as the Eritrean was fleeing the ensuring gun fight.

While lying wounded on the floor, passersby who also thought him to be a terrorist beat him up - throwing benches and chairs at him, kicking him, spitting on him and cursing at him. Police officers on the scene, as well as some civilians, were trying to keep the attacking passersby at bay.

Paramedics trying to evacuate the Eritrean, who was critically wounded, to the hospital ran into objection from the crowds at the scene, who blocked their way and called out "Death to Arabs," "Arabs out!" and "Am Israel Hai" ("The people of Israel still live").

 

https://twitter.com/i24news_EN

BREAKING Eritrean national mistaken for terrorist and shot in Beersheba attack succumbs to wounds
6:29 PM

Edited October 18, 2015 by visionary

[visionary]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/obamas-baffling-passivity-on-jason-rezaian/2015/10/16/14126822-7403-11e5-8d93-0af317ed58c9_story.html

Obama’s baffling passivity on Jason Rezaian
Dana Milbank

 

The consequences of President Obama’s passive foreign policy came close to home this week.

 

My Post colleague Jason Rezaian, the paper’s Tehran bureau chief, has been languishing in an Iranian jail for 15 months on bogus charges of espionage. He was put on secret trial by a kangaroo court. On Sunday, Iranian state TV reported that he had been convicted.

 

And Obama said . . . nothing. He didn’t go to the briefing room and make a statement. He didn’t even release a written statement. On Tuesday, his press secretary, in response to a reporter’s question at the briefing, responded with what might have been described as minor annoyance with the Iranian regime.

 

“We’ve got a number of concerns,” the spokesman said, mentioning the “unjust” detention and “opaque” process.

 

Where was the demand that Iran immediately release Rezaian and the two or three other Americans it is effectively holding hostage? Where was the threat of consequences if Tehran refused? How about some righteous outrage condemning Iran for locking up an American journalist for doing his job? Even if Obama’s outrage came to nothing, it would be salutary to hear the president defend the core American value of free speech.

 

Officials who defend Obama’s detached approach say this is an example of his patient diplomacy, his belief in playing the long game. If the president were to speak out passionately about Rezaian, they argue, Obama would only make Rezaian more valuable to the Iranians as a bargaining chit. That’s why a demand for his (and the others’) release wasn’t a condition of the nuclear deal.

 

But at some point patience becomes passivity; Obama’s game is so long that it often appears he isn’t playing at all. In my colleague’s case, it’s baffling that the administration won’t use the considerable leverage it has. With sanctions easing because of the nuclear deal, Iran is hungry for U.S. investment. Would it really hurt the president to warn — accurately — that U.S. businesses will be reluctant to set up shop in a country that kidnaps and locks up Americans for no reason? Perhaps the Europeans, eager to invest in Iran, could use a reminder of this, too; British and Canadian nationals have been treated similarly.

[visionary]

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/10/21/us-israel-netanyahu-hitler-idUSKCN0SF15120151021?utm_source=twitter

Israel's Netanyahu stirs trouble by linking late Muslim leader to Holocaust

 

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu provoked a Holocaust controversy on Wednesday, hours before a visit to Germany, by saying that the Muslim elder in Jerusalem during the 1940s convinced Adolf Hitler to exterminate the Jews.

 

In a speech to the Zionist Congress late on Tuesday, Netanyahu referred to a series of Muslim attacks on Jews in Palestine during the 1920s that he said were instigated by the then-Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin al-Husseini.

 

Husseini famously flew to visit Hitler in Berlin in 1941, and Netanyahu said that meeting was instrumental in the Nazi leader's decision to launch a campaign to annihilate the Jews.

 

"Hitler didn't want to exterminate the Jews at the time, he wanted to expel the Jews," Netanyahu said in the speech. "And Haj Amin al-Husseini went to Hitler and said, 'If you expel them, they'll all come here (Palestine).'

 

"'So what should I do with them?'" Netanyahu said Hitler asked the mufti, who responded: "Burn them."

 

Netanyahu, whose father was an eminent historian, was quickly harangued by opposition politicians and experts on the Holocaust who said he was distorting the historical record.

 

They noted the meeting between Husseini and Hitler took place on November 28, 1941. More than two years earlier, in January 1939, Hitler had addressed the Reichstag, Nazi Germany's parliament, and spoke clearly about his determination to exterminate the "Jewish race".

[visionary]

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/24/opinion/forget-benghazi-what-about-libya.html?_r=0

Forget Benghazi. What About Libya?

 

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2015/10/deadly-rocket-attack-hits-protest-libya-benghazi-151023182909784.html

Deadly rocket attack hits protest in Libya's Benghazi

 

At least five people have been killed and 30 others wounded in Benghazi when rockets hit protesters who gathered in Libya's second largest city to demonstrate against a United Nations-proposed peace deal, medics said.

 

Hundreds of people had gathered in the centre of the eastern city on Friday to protest against a power-sharing agreement proposed by UN envoy Bernardino Leon.

A volley of shells hit the rally "killing at least five people and wounding 30 others", a medic said.

 

"The exact toll could be much higher as medics are still trying to collect human remains from the site".

 

The Benghazi Medical Centre said on its official Facebook page that it had received two bodies and treated 30 wounded.

 

Another hospital in the city, al-Jalaa, also said on Facebook that it had received three bodies and had treated 10 wounded.

No group has taken credit for the attack.

 

Libya descended into chaos after the October 2011 ouster and killing of longtime ruler Muammar Gaddafi, with two governments vying for power and armed groups battling for control of its vast energy resources.

 

A militia alliance including Islamists overran Tripoli in August 2014, establishing a rival government and a parliament that forced the internationally recognised administration to flee to the country's remote east.

 

On October 8, after almost a year of arduous negotiations, Leon put forward a list of names to head a power-sharing government, but both sides rejected the proposed appointments.

 

Friday's shelling comes two days after Leon insisted he would press on with efforts to clinch a political deal.

"The process goes on. There is no chance for small groups or personalities to hijack this process," Leon said.

"The political solution is the only real alternative," he said, adding that further meetings would be held in the coming days.

On Monday, Western and Arab states urged rival sides to accept the UN plan "immediately".

Leon isn't too popular in Libya right now though.  I see a lot of complaints that he isn't listening to either side and is trying to force them to accept members of the proposed government that they did not discuss or agree to.  

Edited October 24, 2015 by visionary

[visionary]

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/10/21/us-egypt-election-outcome-idUSKCN0SF2OS20151021?mc_cid=5a02e8086a&mc_eid=07a15830e2

Egypt loyalists take the lead in parliament elections

 

A political alliance loyal to Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has scooped all 60 list seats up for grabs in the first round of a parliamentary election in which opposition parties were all but absent, official results showed on Wednesday.

 

The initial round of voting for what will be Egypt's first parliament in three years was held on Sunday and Monday, with turnout at just over a quarter of the electorate and images of empty polling stations splashed across local media.

 

The vote has been hailed by Sisi as the final step in a political transition that is meant to lead Egypt to democracy but critics say it has been undermined by widespread repression.

 

The main opposition Muslim Brotherhood, which won almost half the seats in 2011-12, has been banned and declared a terrorist group. Thousands of its members are behind bars and its supporters boycotted the vote.

 

A list of socialist and liberal parties which would have therefore presented the main opposition choice on ballot papers eventually withdrew, leaving the field dominated by Sisi supporters, former apparatchiks of ousted president Hosni Mubarak, provincial notables and wealthy businessmen.

 

The High Election Committee announced a turnout of 26.56 percent over the two days, lower than the 2014 presidential election won by former military chief Sisi and much lower than the 2011-12 parliamentary election held just months after a popular uprising ended Mubarak's 30-year rule.

 

The new parliament will comprise 568 members - 448 elected on an individual basis and 120 through winner-takes-all lists.

 

All but four of the 226 individual seats up for grabs in round one will be contested in run-offs between leading candidates to take place on Oct. 26-27 after none of those running clinched more than 50 percent of the vote.

 

Three of those four seats were won by former members of Mubarak's ruling party, the National Democratic Party (NDP), which was disbanded in the wake of the 2011 Tahrir Square revolt that inspired hopes of sweeping democratic and economic reform.

 

The fourth seat was won by a Sisi supporter.

 

"For the Love of Egypt", a coalition of parties led by former intelligence officer and military general Sameh Seif Elyazal, won all 60 list-based seats contested in round one and is expected to secure the remaining 60 seats in the next voting round on Nov. 22-23.

[visionary]

https://www.libyaherald.com/2015/10/23/kish-square-massacre-toll-rises-to-nine/

Kish Square massacre toll rises to nine

 

The death toll from the mortar attack on demonstrators in Benghazi’s Kish Square today has risen to nine with 35 people injured, some of them seriously.

 

The United Nations Support Mission in Libya, the main focus of the protest, has tonight condemned the murders and reiterated its message that only political unity will enable Libya to tackle terrorism.

 

British ambassador Peter Millett  described the terrorist assault as “heinous”.  He added “ Such vicious and repellent attacks underline the urgent need for peace in Libya. By working towards Libyan unity, terrorism can be confronted and violence brought to an end”.

 

Even as the dead and wounded were being removed by ambulances which had already been standing by, the now furious crowd of maybe up to two thousand, continued to chant against UNSMIL which it accused of backing the Muslim Brotherhood and by extension, terrorism. One refrain was “Today, Today, Leon go away”. The cry also went up for the removal of the UN arms embargo so that the army could have the means to take on the terrorists.

 

Police are claiming that the mortar rounds were fired from districts still held by IS terrorists in the south west of the city.  Russian-built 88mm mortars have a range of over four kilometres though an army source has suggested that the deadly blasts were caused by the more powerful 120mm M-43 mortars.

Edited October 25, 2015 by visionary

[visionary]

Iran seems to be getting worse and worse.

 

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/11/03/us-iran-arrests-usa-lebanon-idUSKCN0SS1IR20151103?feedType=RSS&feedName=topNews&utm_source=twitter

Iran arrests U.S.-Lebanese man in espionage probe: state TV, citing sources

 

Iranian authorities have arrested an American-Lebanese man who they said was linked to the U.S. military and intelligence agencies, state broadcaster IRIB said on Tuesday.

 

It named the man as Nizar Zakka, an IT expert who Lebanese media reported last week had disappeared on Sept. 18 after attending a conference in Tehran.

The report, which cited informed sources, is the first official confirmation of his arrest.

 

"Nizar Zakka has deep ties to the U.S. intelligence and military establishment," IRIB quoted an unnamed source as saying.

 

Iranian authorities also arrested U.S.-Iranian businessman Siamak Namazi in October while he was visiting family in Iran, a source said last week.

 

Intelligence Minister Mahmoud Alavi said on Monday the ministry had been discussing ways to combat foreign influence in the country as Tehran begins to implement a nuclear deal that will lift sanctions and open Iran to foreign businesses.

 

The authorities also arrested two Iranian journalists on Monday. The head of the judiciary dismissed international condemnation of what appears to be a crackdown on local writers and artists.

 

http://mashable.com/2015/11/03/kfc-in-iran/?utm_cid=mash-com-Tw-main-link#oIsfWqNhIgqw

First 'KFC' to open in Iran shut down after just 24 hours

 

A KFC-branded fried chicken restaurant that opened its doors Sunday night in Iran's capital city of Tehran was shut down after just one day in operation.

 

The restaurant, KFC Halal, which Iranian news agency Tasnim called "the first American branch" of its kind, had set up shop in West Tehran after seemingly obtaining approval from the country's Ministry of Industry, Trade and Mines, and showed happy customers lining up for chicken on its website and Instagram page.

 

But by Tuesday, Iranian police had shut it down. A sign posted on its door read it was "closed until further notice." The reason given: Its decor too closely resembles the U.S. flag, and its presence "can be seen as a part of American influence into Iranian culture," the agency says. "The U.S. is one of Iran's major enemies and this will have grave dangers for the country."

[visionary]

http://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/u-s-plane-shot-victims-fleeing-doctors-without-borders-hospital-n457871

U.S. Plane Shot Victims Fleeing Doctors Without Borders Hospital: Charity

 

A U.S. warplane shot people trying to flee a burning hospital destroyed in airstrikes last month, according to the charity that ran the facility.

 

"Thirty of our patients and medical staff died [in the bombing]," Doctors Without Borders General Director Christopher Stokes said during a speech in Kabul unveiling a report on the incident. "Some of them lost their limbs and were decapitated in the explosions. Others were shot by the circling gunship while fleeing the burning building."

 

The hospital in Kunduz was bombed on Oct. 3 as Afghan government forces fought to regain control of the city from Taliban insurgents.

 

After the U.S. gave shifting explanations for the incident — which Doctors Without Borders has called a war crime — President Barack Obama apologized to the charity. The U.S. and Afghan governments have launched three separate investigations but the charity, which is also known as Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), is calling for an international inquiry.

 

Thursday's report added: "Patients burned in their beds, medical staff were decapitated and lost limbs, and others were shot by the circling AC-130 gunship while fleeing the burning building."

 

It also detailed operations in the hospital in the days leading up to the bombing, and said staff had noticed that more Taliban fighters were arriving for treatment.

"In the week starting September 28, [the majority of the wounded fighters] shifted to primarily wounded Taliban combatants," according to the report.

 

On Oct. 1, the group "received a question from a U.S. government official in Washington, D.C., asking whether the hospital or any other of MSF's locations had a large number of Taliban 'holed up'," the report said. "MSF also expressed that we were very clear with both sides to the conflict about the need to respect medical structures as a condition to our ability to continue working."

 

The charity does not ask which armed group patients belong to as a matter of policy. Fighters are also prohibited from bringing weapons into the hospital, according to MSF.

[visionary]

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/04/world/middleeast/backlash-against-us-in-iran-seems-to-gather-force-after-nuclear-deal.html?smprod=nytcore-iphone&smid=nytcore-iphone-share

Backlash Against U.S. in Iran Seems to Gather Force After Nuclear Deal

 

Anyone who hoped that Iran’s nuclear agreement with the United States and other powers portended a new era of openness with the West has been jolted with a series of increasingly rude awakenings over the past few weeks.

 

On Tuesday, the eve of the 36th anniversary of the student takeover of the American Embassy in Tehran, state television announced the arrest of a Lebanese-American missing for weeks — after he had been invited here by the government. He has been accused of spying.

 

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader, said the “Death to America” slogan is eternal. New anti-American billboards in Tehran include a mockery of the Iwo Jima flag-raising photograph that symbolized Marine sacrifice in World War II. And an Iranian knockoff version of K.F.C., the chicken chain widely associated with the United States, was summarily closed after two days.

 

“It feels like a witch hunt,” said one Iranian-American businessman in Tehran, who dared not speak for attribution over fear for his safety. “It’s pretty scary.”

Ever since the nuclear accord was reached in mid-July and endorsed by Ayatollah Khamenei, he has been insisting it did not signal rapprochement with the United States — although some tacit improvements have emerged.

 

Military forces of Iran and the United States have avoided each other in fighting Islamic State militants in Iraq. Last week, Iran participated for the first time in international talks aimed at resolving the Syria conflict.

 

Many proponents of the nuclear accord, in both countries, have suggested that a gradual improvement in relations was inevitable. Some even foresaw a shift in the region, shaped by collaboration between the United States and Iran to bring peace, coupled with an eased enmity that could embolden President Hassan Rouhani to open up the country.

 

While Mr. Rouhani promised more freedoms when he was elected two years ago, he has taken only a few cosmetic steps.

 

Now, as the autumn leaves are falling in Tehran, there are no signs that bolder changes are coming. On the contrary, a backlash appears to be underway, promoted by Mr. Rouhani’s hard-line adversaries in the government who are deeply skeptical of the United States and its allies.

 

The backlash comes as Iran is preparing for parliamentary elections in February that constitute a litmus test of Mr. Rouhani’s policies. It seems that hard-liners, using the intelligence unit of the Revolutionary Guards Corps, have started rounding up journalists, activists and cultural figures, as a warning that the post nuclear-deal period cannot lead to further relaxation or political demands.