Racist attacks on black Africans - they're not just for Libyans.

Demonstrators have attacked African migrants in Tel Aviv in a protest against refugees and asylum-seekers that indicates an increasingly volatile mood in Israel over what it terms as "infiltrators".

Miri Regev, a member of the Israeli parliament, told the crowd "the Sudanese are a cancer in our body". The vast majority of asylum-seekers in Israel are from Sudan and Eritrea.

Around 1,000 demonstrators took part in the demonstration on Wednesday night, waving signs saying: "Infiltrators, get out of our homes" and "Our streets are no longer safe for our children." A car containing Africans was attacked and shops serving the refugee community were looted. Seventeen people were arrested.

A reporter for the Israeli daily Maariv described it as an "unbridled rampage" and explosion of "pent-up rage".

Seems to me everyone in the North has it in for sub-Saharans. But I do wonder whether the Israeli bigots have a heirarchy of racism which ranks Arabs and black Africans on a scale of hateability. The bigots would doubtless complain that their hate is also about "infiltrators" taking jobs and causing crime. As Ta-Nehisi Coates notes today though, "Complicating racism with other factors doesn't make it any better. It just makes it racism. Again." That's as true in Israel as it is anywhere else.

David D. Kirkpatrick & Alan Cowell | Cairo | May 23

NYT - After weeks of fevered debate, speculation and argument, Egyptians went to the polls on Wednesday in the Arab world’s first competitive presidential election, choosing between a dozen candidates spanning the nation’s secular and Islamist traditions after decades of authoritarian rule.

With the skies clear and the weather warm, long lines of people queued at polling stations to vote in an election cast as a watershed in their political history.

Chris Stephen/ Tripoli, James Meikle & Matt Williams | May 20

The Guardian - Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, the former Libyan intelligence officer convicted of the 1988 Lockerbie bombing that killed 270 people, has died, his brother has said.

Abdelbaset's brother, Abdelnasser al-Megrahi, confirmed reports that he had died aged 60 after a long battle with cancer. Abdelnasser, who was at the house in Tripoli where his dead brother lay on Sunday, told the Guardian: "I don't want to talk right now, I am very upset, I don't really feel like talking. He's dead, that's it, what more do you have to know?"

In an interview with the Guardian earlier this year, Abdelnasser said that his brother, who had moved to the secret address from his large home in Tripoli, was innocent. "He really is ill, he is too ill to even change the channel on the TV, he is lying down all day."

The Scottish government and East Renfrewshire council are investigating the claims of Megrahi's death. The Foreign Office is awaiting their confirmation. Megrahi was the only man convicted of the bombing, which killed 270 people, including 11 on the ground, when Pan Am Flight 103 blew up over Lockerbie four days before Christmas in 1988.

There was no immediate reaction from the Libyan government.

Tina posted earlier today about the HRW report on NATO-caused civilain deaths in Libya. Here's more,from the Guardian. I can't help but feel this is just another sign that universal law is a joke and that what really operates is privilege in it's original meaning of "private law":

At least 72 civilians, including 24 children, were killed by Nato air strikes during the alliance's military campaign in Libya last year. Human Rights Watch has issued a report, based on extensive on-the-ground research and multiple visits to bombing sites where civilians died, in which no clear evidence of a legitimate military target was found. Nato and the nations that participated in the air campaign – including the UK government – have refused even to acknowledge these fatalities, to provide specific information on the military target or to conduct a field investigation into the incident. No compensation has been provided to any of the families of the dead and the wounded.

Nato's claim that it cannot investigate civilian casualties because it has no mandate to be in Libya is feeble and disingenuous. If Human Rights Watch can visit each of the sites – to inspect weapons debris, interview witnesses and examine medical records and deaths certificates, alongside reviewing satellite imagery and photographic evidence – Nato should certainly ask the Libyans for access to the sites to do the same. It has not done so.

Without investigations, Nato is saying it won't provide compensation to the victims of unlawful strikes, as required by the laws of war. Nor has it considered providing compensation for all civilian victims of Nato strikes, as it has done in Afghanistan. Many of the same countries that participated in the Libyan campaign make compensation payments in Afghanistan to families harmed by international military action without any claim of a laws-of-war violation. In a curious piece of logic, Nato's spokeswoman, Oana Lungescu, said this morning that Nato was not obliged to pay compensation to affected Libyans because the international military operation was conducted from the air, without any international troops on the ground.

Brussels | May 14

Reuters - Alliance called on to compensate survivors and victims' families and explain attacks on 'military' sites that killed civilians

Nato air strikes killed 72 civilians in Libya last year, Human Rights Watch has said, accusing the western alliance of failing to acknowledge the scope of collateral damage it caused during the campaign that helped to oust Muammar Gaddafi.

In a report based on investigations at bombing sites during and after the conflict, the New York-based HRW said Nato strikes killed 20 women and 24 children. It called on the alliance to compensate civilian victims and investigate attacks that may have been unlawful.

"Attacks are allowed only on military targets, and serious questions remain in some incidents about what exactly Nato forces were striking," Fred Abrahams, special adviser at HRW, said in a statement.

The report claims to be the most extensive investigation to date of civilian casualties from Nato's air campaign and presents a higher death toll estimate than a March paper by Amnesty International which documented 55 civilian deaths, including 16 children and 14 women.

Nato considers its Libya operation highly successful, illustrating the allies' ability to work well together in a limited campaign. Nato carried out 26,000 sorties including some 9,600 strike missions and destroyed about 5,900 targets before operations ended on 31 October 2011.

Two quick snippets:

Human Rights watch flags up a new law against dissent in Libya that's a direct copy of the old one, just swapping Gadaffi for the NTC. Just like the old one, the new law allows sentences of life imprisonment for "offensive statements".

Egypt has imposed an overnight curfew and deployed soldiers around the Defence Ministry after protests against the army's handling of transition to civilian rule turned violent, continuing the meltdown after many candidates were banned from taking part in elections on various pretexts.

Scenes of troops beating protesters with sticks in anti-army demonstrations in recent months have angered many Egyptians, who expect the generals to wield their influence from behind the scenes even after a formal handover.

...The presidential race broadly pits Islamists against more liberal candidates who at one time or another served in Mubarak's administration.

Do we get an Arab Summer or will Spring give Summer a miss and go straight into Fall?

Edmund Blair & Sherine El Madany | Cairo | Apr 30

Reuters - Egypt enters the last stage of its first democratic presidential race on Monday with its field narrowing to a two-horse race between the urbane former head of the Arab League and a charismatic Islamist medic jailed for years under Hosni Mubarak.

A poll published in state-run al-Ahram daily on Monday showed veteran diplomat Amr Moussa in the lead, followed by Abdel Moneim Abol Fotouh, who has emerged in recent days as the leading Islamist candidate after securing the support of the ultra-conservative Salafist movement.

Both men are well ahead of 11 other candidates and, for now, look the most likely to face each other in a second round. That would give Egyptians a stark choice about the future of the Arab world's most populous state.

Moussa, 75, served for a decade as Mubarak's foreign minister before taking over the leadership of the Arab League, and must win over voters skeptical of the old elite.

Abol Fotouh, 60, grew to prominence in the 1970s as a student activist opposing Egypt's military rulers and was jailed in the 1990s as a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, which he split from last year. He needs to maintain the support of Islamists, while reassuring secular Egytians he will not impose a radical transformation on society.

Tom Pfeiffer & Tom Perry | Cairo | April 29

Reuters - Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood said on Sunday the ruling generals planned to reshuffle the government in an apparent attempt to defuse a political feud overshadowing a presidential election campaign that gets under way on Monday.

The Brotherhood has pushed for more say in the government for months since sweeping to a dominant role in parliament in an election marathon that ended in February this year.

Essam el-Erian, a senior Brotherhood lawmaker, told Reuters the generals would initiate talks over the reshuffle but army officials did not immediately confirm any plans to do so.

Apr 28

BBC - The Saudi ambassador to Egypt had also been recalled, the Saudi state news agency said.

Egyptian protesters have demanded the release of human rights lawyer Ahmed al-Gizawi.

He was detained earlier this month on arrival in Saudi Arabia and accused of insulting King Abdullah.

Egyptian activists say the lawyer was held after lodging a complaint against Saudi Arabia for its treatment of Egyptians in its prisons.

His family say he had gone to perform a minor pilgrimage - a detail which has angered many Egyptians who feel resentment at the kingdom's treatment of Egyptians.

But Saudi authorities say Mr al-Gizawi was found by airport officials to be carrying drugs - allegedly more than 20,000 anti-anxiety pills - in his luggage.

They say they doubt Mr al-Gizawi was on a pilgrimage, as he was not wearing white pilgrims' clothes.

** ahram online

Apr 25

BBC - Libyan authorities have banned the formation of political parties based on religious principles ahead of elections scheduled to take place in June.

Parties based on faith, tribe or ethnicity will not be eligible to take part, a government spokesman said.

The National Transitional Council said the law, passed on Tuesday, was designed to preserve "national unity".

But analysts say it is likely to infuriate religious parties such as the Muslim Brotherhood.

"Parties are not allowed to be based on religion or ethnicity or tribe," National Transitional Council spokesman Mohammed al-Harizy told Reuters.

He did not clarify how this would affect a political party formed in March by Libya's Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamists.

Cairo | April 22

Al Jazeera - Top official insists decision was not political as Israel says it overshadows peace agreement between the two countries.

The head of the Egyptian Natural Gas Holding Company has said it has terminated its contract to ship gas to Israel because of violations of contractual obligations, a decision Israel said overshadowed the peace agreement between the two countries.

Mohamed Shoeb, the gas company's top official, said Sunday's decision was not political. "This has nothing to do with anything outside of the commercial relations,'' Shoeb said.

Apr 22

BBC - Egyptian officials say they have scrapped an agreement to supply Israel with natural gas.

Israel received around 40% of its gas supplies from Egypt and uses it to generate electricity.

The announcement comes after the cross-border pipeline suffered numerous sabotage attacks which cut supplies.

The Israeli Finance Minister, Yuval Steinitz, said the move was of "great concern", and overshadowed peace agreements between the countries.

Egypt was the first Middle East country to sign a peace accord with Israel, in 1979, and the deal to supply energy has been a key part of agreements between the two states.

Tripoli | Apr 17

AFP - Libya's interim government is heading towards a no-confidence vote due to its failure to organise the army and establish security, an official of the ruling National Transitional Council said Monday.

Fathi Baja, who heads the political affairs committee, said 54 out of 73 active NTC members were ready to cast a no-confidence vote against interim Prime Minister Abdel Rahim al-Kib and his cabinet.

"They represent the majority and therefore the government could fall due to its failure to resolve important and outstanding issues," Baja told AFP.

Eric Schmitt | Washington | Apr 15

NYT - Despite widespread praise in Western capitals for NATO’s leadership of the air campaign in Libya, a confidential NATO assessment paints a sobering portrait of the alliance’s ability to carry out such campaigns without significant support from the United States.

The report concluded that the allies struggled to share crucial target information, lacked specialized planners and analysts, and overly relied on the United States for reconnaissance and refueling aircraft.

The findings undercut the idea that the intervention was a model operation and that NATO could effectively carry out a more complicated campaign in Syria without relying disproportionately on the United States military. Even with the American help in Libya, NATO had only about 40 percent of the aircraft needed to intercept electronic communications, a shortage that hindered the operation’s effectiveness, the report said.

Mohamed Fadel Fahmy | Apr 13

CNN - Egypt's Parliament unanimously passed a bill Thursday that aims to ban former members of ousted leader Hosni Mubarak's regime from running for president for 10 years.

If approved, the measure would mean that one of the most controversial contenders in the nation's upcoming presidential election would be ineligible.

The nation's constitutional court will have the final say.

Ex-spy chief Omar Suleiman is among the candidates vying for the presidency in two-day elections that start May 23.

Suleiman entered the race just hours before the Sunday deadline, said Hatem Bjato, who heads the nation's election committee.

Suleiman, who also served as vice president under Mubarak, had initially said he would not seek the presidency. But on Friday, he did an about-face, saying he felt obliged to supporters.

His candidacy has sparked controversy.

The Muslim Brotherhood has called for a "million-man" protest in Tahrir Square on Friday against the nomination of former members of Mubarak's regime, including Suleiman and Ahmed Shafiq, the former prime minister.

Apr 8

The Guardian - In 2004, Fatima Bouchar and her husband, Abdel Hakim Belhaj, were detained en route to the UK, and rendered to Libya. This is the story of their imprisonment, and the trail of evidence that reveals the involvement of the British government

Just when Fatima Bouchar thought it couldn't get any worse, the Americans forced her to lie on a stretcher and began wrapping tape around her feet. They moved upwards, she says, along her legs, winding the tape around and around, binding her to the stretcher. They taped her stomach, her arms and then her chest. She was bound tight, unable to move.(they knew she was 4 1/2 months pregnant)

By Michael Collins

Foreign Policy just published a roundup of weapons contributed to the Libyan rebels in the regime change effort. The e-Journal is a publication of the Washington Post. Colum Lynch's April 4 article relies on the March 20 UN report to the UN Security Council by a panel of experts appointed to track the UN resolutions and responses from the start of the conflict.

These two paragraphs, noncontroversial in establishment world, outline clear violations of Principle VI (a), (b), and (c), of the Nuremburg Principles, affirmed by the United Nations General Assembly.

"As the late Col. Muammar al-Qaddafi's forces prepared to crush the Libyan uprising last summer in Benghazi, Britain, France, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, the United States, and other allies moved quickly to reinforce the beleaguered rebel forces.

"With military supplies, training, advice -- and of course the backing of NATO war planes -- this coalition of governments provided critical support to change the course of the conflict, ultimately leading to Qaddafi's downfall. " Colum Lynch, Foreign Policy, March 4

It's right there. The rebels were getting their clock cleaned by the legal government of Libya. The UN Security Council approved a humanitarian mission run by NATO to protect Libyan civilians based almost exclusively on evidence from one questionable source, an activist who was part of the Libyan rebels group.

NATO, Qatar, and the UAE supplied tons of cash and material, plus an air force, to the rebels. Through Qatari troops on the ground, the NATO air force was able coordinate air strikes that, in effect, dragged the Libyan rebels across the finish line. In that process, a sovereign nation was attacked without provocation. Thousands were slaughtered, many more maimed, with incidents of ethnic cleansing documented.

It is considered common wisdom among Western analysts that Muslim countries are plagued with large families and ever-swelling masses of young people are a threat to stability. Only problem is all the hard evidence to the contrary.

Le Temps/Worldcrunch, By Anna Lietti, March 31

This story starts with a myth. It is the myth that the Muslim world is uniformly dedicated to making many (too many) babies, and that this has gone on for centuries.

This mythology also has its very own Bible: “Factors Affecting Muslim Natality,” by Dudley Kirk, an American professor of Population Studies. Published in 1965, this study embodied, scientifically speaking, the notion of a demography unique to Muslim countries that won’t transition to a family model with two children, as it did in the Western world.

Kirk’s theories have influenced this debate in a lasting way. Thirty years later, they were still inspiring Samuel Huntington in his work “The Clash of Civilizations,” where he presents his theory of an eternal conflict between the West and Islam. The demographic threat plays a central role in his thesis.

However, today Kirk’s point of view has been spectacularly disproved by science. In recent decades, the Muslim world has experienced a demographic transition that was as acute as it was late: in 30 years, the number of children per woman has dropped by more than 50%. In Iran, the drop represents 75%; in North Africa it is 70%. Once you realize that it took Europe two centuries to go from 5 to 2 children per woman, you can appreciate the severity of this collapse in birth rates.

Kristen Chick | Cairo | Mar 29

CSM - Of the 100-member assembly elected this weekend to craft Egypt's new constitution, about a fifth resigned before the group met today to begin writing.

A process that was supposed to be one of the crowning achievements of Egypt’s uprising – the writing of a new constitution – began today amid controversy over the heavily Islamist makeup of the assembly chosen to craft the document.

A quarter of the 100-member constituent assembly did not attend the first session today, including about 20 mostly liberals and leftist figures who resigned from the body in protest (the reason for the other absences wasn't immediately clear). They complained that the Muslim Brotherhood’s party, along with the ultraconservative Islamist Nour Party, rushed the assembly’s election process to push through their own candidates, resulting in an Islamist-dominated assembly they say does not adequately represent minority groups and political ideologies.

Mohannad Sabry | Cairo | March 27

McClatchy - A standoff between Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood and the country's military rulers deepened Tuesday as dozens of non-Islamist politicians said they would boycott the writing of a new constitution because Islamists dominate the panel selected to draft the document.

Some politicians called for the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, Egypt's ruling authority, to dissolve the panel, a move that would be certain to exacerbate tension between the Muslim Brotherhood, which dominates the country's new Parliament, and the military, which already has rejected Brotherhood efforts to dissolve the military-appointed Cabinet.

The Brotherhood and its conservative allies in Parliament last week selected a largely Islamist bloc to write the constitution.

Jeffrey Fleishman | Cairo | Mar 25

LA Times - As a power transition looms in Egypt, the military bargains with the Muslim Brotherhood to protect its widespread but murky business dealings

The Egyptian military stamps itself as protector of the nation, but behind this carefully tended mythology the army controls a multibillion-dollar business empire that trades in products not normally associated with men in uniform: olive oil, fertilizer, televisions, laptops, cigarettes, mineral water, poultry, bread and underwear.

Estimates suggest that military-connected enterprises account for 10% to 40% of the Egyptian economy. It is an opaque realm of foreign investments, inside deals and privilege that has grown quietly for decades, employing thousands of workers and operating parallel to the army's defense industries.

The coming weeks will reveal how the military will maneuver to protect its authority and financial holdings as it prepares to hand power to a new president and civilian government in June. The transition is a key test in the unfinished revolution that toppled President Hosni Mubarak, a career military man, and led to the political ascension of the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamists.

The military's future role is often framed in the context of Turkey, where the Islamist-dominated government has curtailed the reach of the once-unassailable Turkish army. The more drastic flip-side scenario is thatEgypt's military, fearful of infringement, veers more toward the Pakistani army, never bashful about sidelining the country's elected officials in moments of crises.

Matthew Lee | Mar 23 | The Guardian

The Obama administration told Congress on Thursday it will waive democracy requirements to release up to $1.5 billion in aid to Egypt despite concerns that the country is backsliding on commitments it made to democratic governance and rule of law.
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U.5 officials and lawmakers said Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton has determined that it was in the U.S. national interest to allow $1.3 billion in military assistance to flow. She also certified that Egypt is meeting its obligations to the Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty, which frees up an additional $200 million in economic aid, they said.
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A senior State Department official said the decisions "reflect our overarching goal: to maintain our strategic partnership with an Egypt made stronger and more stable by a successful transition to democracy."

Democracy and human rights be damned, the beast must be fed:

All of the $1.3 billion in foreign military financing is obligated to pay U.S. defense and security companies for contracts they have to supply equipment and support for the Egyptian military.

Nora Fakim | Rabat | March 17

BBC - Several hundred women's rights activists have demonstrated outside Morocco's parliament to demand the repeal of a law on sexual violence.

Morocco's penal code allows a rapist to marry his victim if she is a minor as a way of avoiding prosecution.

A 16-year-old girl, Amina Filali, killed herself a week ago after being severely beaten during a forced marriage to her rapist.

Steven Lee Meyers | Washington | Mar 16

NYT - The Obama administration plans to resume military aid to Egypt, American officials said on Thursday, signaling its willingness to remain deeply engaged with the generals now running the country despite concerns over abuses and a still-uncertain transition to democracy.

To restart the aid, which has been a cornerstone of American relations with Egypt for more than three decades, the administration plans on sidestepping a new Congressional requirement that for the first time directly links military assistance to the protection of basic freedoms.

So says the Head of the Middle East and North Africa Program at the Geneva Center for Security Policy, Mohammad-Mahmoud Ould Mohamedou, in a sobering assessment. (H/t Joshua Foust)