Middle East updates

Three items in today’s media reports caught my attention, each relating to previous entries in this blog. First, the U.N. has appealed for $613 million in aid for Gaza to avoid a humanitarian crisis there. The U.N. humanitarian coordinator, John Holmes, plead with Israel to open all of the border crossings. Otherwise, sufficient aid will never arrive in time. Hamas has released Palestinian casualty figures from the recent Israeli incursion into Gaza: 1330 people killed and another 5450 wounded; about half were civilians. Medical facilities, housing, crops, and critical infrastructure all suffered substantial destruction. (“UN asks for $600m to avert new humanitarian crisis in Gaza,” The Times Online, January 29, 2009.)

Israel will never achieve security for itself without regional stability, which is dependent upon security, survival, sufficient succor for the Palestinians. Clearly, the recent incursion into Gaza at best resulted in a temporary diminution of Hamas missile attacks on Israel but at the considerable cost of increased animosity by Palestinians toward Israel and increased regional instability. Terrorism demands new, more moral, more efficacious responses.

Second, Afghanistan delayed its presidential election scheduled for April until August 2009 because too many regions are now too unsafe and unstable to conduct the election. This contravenes Afghanistan’s constitution and raises serious questions about the continuing legitimacy of President Hamid Karzai’s government. (Dexter Filkins, “Afghan Presidential Election Delayed,” New York Times, January 29, 2009.)

The delay highlights both the reality behind the myth of Afghanistan functioning as a unified democratic nation and the challenges that the pending NATO troop surge faces. Expecting thirty thousand additional U.S. troops to enable Afghanistan’s central government to establish the rule of law and order throughout that mountainous country in which ethnicity, tribe, and religion have divided the people for millennia seems an impossible dream.

Third, provincial elections in Iraq are proving more problematic than the initial optimistic reports suggested. In much of Iraq, the election prognosis appears good. But in places like Mosul in which violence continues between Kurds and Arabs and the rule of law is not yet established, the election outcome seems unlikely to reflect the actual political sentiments of the residents. (Ian Fisher, “In Violent Mosul, a Test for Iraq’s Democracy,” New York Times, January 29, 2009.)

The troubling aspect of this report is that it unfortunately confirms the deep fault lines that divide Iraq still need bridging. Until people adopt a sense of national identity that they value more than their other loyalties (tribe, ethnicity, religion) democracy will not long survive the withdrawal of U.S. forces.