WASHINGTON: Iran’s attack on Israel gives Joe Biden a familiar dilemma, but on steroids — how to balance support for a difficult ally while preventing the nightmare scenario of a wider war?
Tensions with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over Israel’s war on Gaza were papered over as the US president offered “ironclad” support, including shooting down Iranian drones.
But the White House said it would not support an Israeli counterattack and warned Israel to “think carefully” about escalation that could trigger a full-blown regional conflict.
The question then for Biden, who is facing a tough reelection battle against Donald Trump in November, is what if Netanyahu goes ahead anyway, as he has done in Gaza?
“It puts him in a very tough spot” Colin Clarke, Director of Research at the Soufan Group, told AFP.
“I think he’s suspicious of Netanyahu’s motives here... that Netanyahu is attempting to broaden the war throughout the region to deflect from how poorly the war is going for him in Gaza.”
Biden has been trying to avoid a regional war that could suck the United States back into the Middle East ever since Hamas’s October 7 attack and Israel’s offensive on the Gaza Strip.
The 81-year-old has, however, struggled to use the leverage provided by the United States being Israel’s main military supplier, especially given a long history of tense relations with Netanyahu.
Biden has been increasingly critical of the death toll in the Palestinian territory and even went as far as suggesting the US could limit military aid, but so far to little effect.
Iran’s attack has seen Biden go back to showing overt support — but at the same time scrambling to stop the crisis spiraling.
White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said Netanyahu was “well aware” that Biden did not want a “wider war.”
Biden himself warned Netanyahu of the potential dangers in a call on Saturday night at a time of “heightened emotion.”
“The president had a discussion about trying to slow things down, think through things,” a US official said.
The hope was that “in the light of day” Israel would see it had had a “spectacular success” against Iran’s attack, added the official.
Washington’s calculus looks to be that Iran also got what it wanted, with a show of force in retaliation for Israel’s strike in Damascus earlier this month that killed a key Iranian general, but with minimal damage.
“However, I fear the status quo will be short-lived,” said James Ryan, Executive Director of the Middle East Research and Information Project, warning of a “dangerous spiral.”
“I expect Biden to attempt to restrain Israeli responses, but Netanyahu has already shown a willingness to test any kind of limit Biden wishes to impose,” he added.
“It’s all very cynical now, unfortunately.”
Biden’s options for restraining Israel are likely to be limited at this stage to tough language in private and making threats in public.
“They’ve got themselves into a corner in many ways,” said Clarke.
“I think they’ve overplayed their hand a little bit by saying the administration is considering cutting off weapons to the Israelis. It’s never going to happen — I think it’s an empty threat, especially in an election year.”
The US presidential election in November comes as Biden faces domestic political pressure on all sides when it comes to Israel.
Trump has led a chorus of Republicans accusing Biden of being weak on the issue — while young and left-wing voters in particular are angered by his failure to stop the bloodshed in Gaza.
Netanyahu, facing his own political and legal issues at home, would now be able to use the Iran attacks to “paper over the very real rifts that exist” with Washington on Gaza, said Clarke.
“If he can drag this out until November, he’s hoping for a Trump victory” when he would have “carte blanche” to act however he wanted in the region, said Clarke.
Another possibility, however, is that Netanyahu may decide to “accede to American urgings” for now on Iran — but with a cost, said Paul Salem, President and CEO of the Middle East Institute.
“Politically, I think they can cash in on saying, ‘okay, America, we won’t do anything, we’re being good. But in exchange, you have to, you know, give us more of a free hand in Gaza,’” he said.
Biden in ‘very tough spot’ trying to stop Middle East escalation
https://arab.news/2yf4n
Biden in ‘very tough spot’ trying to stop Middle East escalation
- Biden has been trying to avoid a regional war that could suck the United States back into the Middle East ever since Hamas’s October 7 attack
Greece rescues 42 migrants off Crete, searches for three missing
It was not clear what happened to their boat
ATHENS: Greece rescued 42 migrants off the island of Crete and was looking for three believed to be missing after their boat sent a distress signal while at sea, the Greek coast guard said on Thursday.
A coast guard official said the migrants were rescued by commercial vessels and a Greek navy helicopter some 27 nautical miles southwest of Crete.
It was not clear what happened to their boat, the official told Reuters on condition of anonymity, adding that a search and rescue operation for the missing was under way.
The island of Crete and its tiny neighbor Gavdos, Europe’s southernmost tip, have seen a surge in arrivals of migrants looking to cross to Europe from Libya in recent months.
The Greek government has pledged money and staff to help the ill-equipped islands handle the situation.
Greece has been a favored gateway to the European Union for migrants and refugees from the Middle East, Africa and Asia since 2015 when nearly 1 million people landed on its islands, causing an unprecedented humanitarian crisis. Thousands of others have died at sea.
Until recently, migrants had preferred islands further east near Turkiye over Crete and Gavdos.
Slovakia PM Fico’s fate remains in balance after surgery, deputy PM says
- The shooting was the first major assassination attempt on a European political leader for more than 20 years
- "Unfortunately, I cannot say yet that we are winning (the battle to save Fico) or that the prognosis is positive," Deputy Prime Minister Robert Kalinak said
BRATISLAVA: Slovakia’s Prime Minister Robert Fico remains in a serious condition and it is too soon to say whether he will recover, a deputy prime minister said on Thursday, a day after an assassination attempt that has sent shock waves across Europe.
The shooting was the first major assassination attempt on a European political leader for more than 20 years, and has drawn international condemnation. Political analysts and lawmakers say it has exposed an increasingly febrile and polarized political climate both in Slovakia and across Europe.
“Unfortunately, I cannot say yet that we are winning (the battle to save Fico) or that the prognosis is positive because the extent of the injuries caused by four gunshot wounds is so extensive that the body’s response will still be very difficult,” Deputy Prime Minister Robert Kalinak said.
Interior Minister Matus Sutaj Estok, speaking at the same news conference, said the shooter — whom police have charged with attempted murder — had acted alone and had previously taken part in anti-government protests.
“This is a lone wolf who had radicalized himself in the latest period after the presidential election (in April),” Sutaj Estok said.
The suspect listed government policies on Ukraine and its plans to reform the country’s public broadcaster and dismantle the special prosecutor’s office as reasons for the attack, the interior minister added.
Miriam Lapunikova, director of the F.D. Roosevelt University Hospital in Banska Bystrica where Fico is being treated, said the 59-year-old prime minister had undergone five hours of surgery with two teams to treat multiple gunshot wounds.
“At this point his condition is stabilized but is truly very serious, he will be in the intensive care unit,” she told reporters.
Slovak President Zuzana Caputova called for a calming of political tensions. Fico ally and President-elect Peter Pellegrini urged parties to suspend or tone down their campaigning for next month’s European Parliament elections.
“If there is anything the people of Slovakia urgently need today, it is at least a basic consensus and unity among Slovaks’ political representatives,” said Pellegrini, who won an April election for the mainly ceremonial post of president.
VETERAN LEADER
Fico has dominated Slovak politics for much of the past two decades, winning re-election last October for a fourth stint as premier.
He has fused left-leaning economic views with nationalism, tapping into widespread discontent over living standards, but has also proved a divisive figure. His critics say new reforms threaten the rule of law and media freedoms in Slovakia, a member state of the European Union and NATO.
Fico’s calls for ending sanctions on Russia and halting arms supplies to Ukraine have endeared him to Moscow, and President Vladimir Putin and other Russian politicians have been prominent among those condemning Wednesday’s assassination attempt.
Fico was shot while greeting supporters in the street after chairing a government meeting in the central town of Handlova.
Slovak news media reported that the 71-year-old gunman was a former security guard at a shopping mall, the author of three collections of poetry and a member of the Slovak Society of Writers. News outlet Aktuality.sk cited the suspect’s son as saying his father was the legal holder of a gun license.
There has been no official confirmation of the gunman’s identity and background.
The incident raised questions over Fico’s security arrangements, as the attacker managed to fire five shots at point blank range despite the prime minister being accompanied by several bodyguards.
In an undated video posted on Facebook, the alleged attacker was seen saying: “I do not agree with government policy” and criticizing government plans to revamp the public broadcaster.
Reuters verified the person in the video matched images of the man arrested after Fico’s shooting.
Fico and his government coalition allies have criticized sections of the media and the opposition, saying they had inflamed tensions in the central European state.
Slovakia’s biggest opposition party, the liberal, pro-Western Progressive Slovakia, was quick to condemn the shooting and called off a protest rally planned for Wednesday evening. It has also urged all politicians to avoid stoking tensions.
Russian tycoon Deripaska calls latest US sanctions ‘balderdash’
- “I strongly believe that we need to do everything we can to establish peace, not serve the interests of warmongers,” Deripaska said
- Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Deripaska has been sanctioned by Britain for his alleged ties to Putin
FRANKFURT: Russian tycoon Oleg Deripaska dismissed the latest US sanctions on a series of companies that the US Treasury said were connected to a scheme to evade sanctions and unlock frozen shares as nonsense.
“This balderdash isn’t worth the time,” Deripaska said by message via a spokesperson in response a Reuters request for comment about the latest US sanctions.
“While the horrific war in Europe claims hundreds of thousands of lives every year, politicians continue to engage in their dirty games. I strongly believe that we need to do everything we can to establish peace, not serve the interests of warmongers,” he said.
The US Treasury on Tuesday announced it had sanctioned a web of Russian companies it said were being used to disguise ownership of a $1.6 billion industrial stake controlled by Deripaska.
Austria’s Raiffeisen Bank International was planning to buy the stake and dropped the transaction following mounting US pressure to abort the bid.
In its sanctions announcement, the US Treasury alleged it was an “attempted sanctions evasion scheme” to unfreeze a stake using “an opaque and complex supposed divestment.”
Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Deripaska has been sanctioned by Britain for his alleged ties to Putin. He has mounted a legal challenge against the sanctions which he says are based on false information and ride roughshod over the basic principles of law and justice.
Deripaska, who made his fortune by buying up stakes in aluminum factories has also been subjected to sanctions by the United States, which in 2018 took measures against him and other influential Russians.
Those sanctions were “groundless, ridiculous and absurd,” Deripaska has previously said.
Outrage grows in India after Israel kills Indian army veteran
- Col. Waibhav Anil Kale was working for the UN Department of Safety and Security
- More than 190 UN staff killed since the beginning of Israel’s onslaught on Gaza
NEW DELHI: The killing of an Indian army veteran serving as a UN staffer in Gaza has stirred outrage in India and prompted calls for the government to hold Israel accountable.
Col. Waibhav Anil Kale was on duty with the UN Department of Safety and Security when his UN-marked vehicle was targeted in southern Gaza on Monday.
A former peacekeeper, he was hit on the way to the European Hospital in Rafah by what the UN said it had no doubt was Israeli tank fire.
The Indian Ministry of External Affairs issued a statement on Wednesday in response, saying it was “deeply saddened by the death” and that it was “in touch with relevant authorities” regarding an investigation into the incident.
The statement did not contain condemnation, unlike in July 2022, when two Indian peacekeepers were killed in an attack on a UN Organization Stabilization Mission base in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
At that time, India’s foreign minister said the perpetrators “must be held accountable and brought to justice” and convened a special meeting of the UN Security Council to discuss the attack.
Talmiz Ahmad, former Indian ambassador to Saudi Arabia, told Arab News on Thursday that the government’s response was “grossly inadequate” given it was a “calculated killing” of an Indian army officer and UN staffer.
“The Indian government can hold Israel accountable. India is a sponsor of a resolution related to the protection of the UN personnel,” he said.
“This particular killing of a UN officer is a targeted killing because it was very obvious to Israelis that this was a UN vehicle, and it was on an official UN mission. A tank deliberately targeted this vehicle.”
New Delhi has always been sensitive to assaults on UN personnel given that it is one of the largest contributors of the organization’s peacekeepers.
The reaction to Kale’s killing was insufficient, according to Kavita Krishnan, a women’s rights activist.
“If a person is a UN employee, he is entitled to protection,” she said.
“The Indian government should specifically hold Israel accountable for this killing. They cannot treat it just as a casualty of war or collateral damage.”
Israel’s deadly siege and bombardment of Gaza has since October killed over 35,000 people, wounded 70,000, and left most of the enclave’s population starving and with no access to medical, food and water supplies.
The UN estimates that more than 190 of its staff members have also been killed in the ongoing onslaught. Kale was the first international UN employee to be killed.
“It’s condemnable that India does not name the fact of assassination. It’s not death. He did not die of illness. He was killed by Israel,” said Apoorvanand Jha, a public intellectual and professor at the University of Delhi.
“Israel kills people who are involved in the health services … kills journalists, aid workers and kills workers involved in the peacekeeping forces. So, it does it knowingly. It is not a collateral damage. Israel does it knowingly — this is what has been recorded many times. Israel needs to be held accountable for all the individual crimes of assassinations and the collective crimes, mass deaths.”
The killing of UN personnel goes against international humanitarian law.
“New Delhi should tell Tel Aviv that it should respect international law,” said Anwar Sadat, senior assistant professor at the Indian Society of International Law.
“The Indian government should issue a diplomatic demarche to the Israeli government.”
The government’s reaction was also seen as not boding well for the safety of Indian workers whom New Delhi has agreed to send to Israel.
Since the beginning of its invasion of Gaza, Israel has revoked work permits for tens of thousands of Palestinian laborers and sought to facilitate their replacement with manpower from South Asia.
In November, the Indian government signed a three-year agreement with Tel Aviv on the “temporary employment” of workers in the construction and caregiving sector.
“If this is the statement that the Indian government can bring for an official who works with the UN, imagine what if it happens with any of the workers. No one is going to speak,” said N. Sai Balaji, assistant professor at Jawaharlal Nehru University.
“This seriously compromises India’s super-power ambitions; it seriously compromises India’s own foreign policy.”
Nigeria mosque attack leaves 8 people dead, police say motive was family dispute
- Four children were among the injured worshippers
- The incident caused panic in Kano, northern Nigeria’s largest state, where periodic religion-related unrest has occurred over the years
ABUJA: At least eight worshippers were killed and 16 others injured early Wednesday morning after a man attacked a mosque with a locally made explosive in northern Nigeria’s Kano state, resulting in a fire outbreak, the police said.
The suspect, a 38-year-old local resident, confessed that he attacked the mosque in Kano’s remote Gadan village “purely in hostility following (a) prolonged family disagreement,” police spokesman Abdullahi Haruna said in a statement on Wednesday.
Eight of those injured died later in a hospital, Haruna later told local Channels Television on Thursday. Four children were among the injured worshippers, although it was not clear if any of the children died.
The incident caused panic in Kano, northern Nigeria’s largest state, where periodic religion-related unrest has occurred over the years, sometimes resulting in violence.
The suspect invaded the mosque with “a locally prepared bomb and exploded it,” local police chief Umar Sanda told reporters. “It has nothing to do with terrorism.”
Footage broadcast by the local TVC station showed charred walls and burned furniture in the mosque, the main place of worship for Gadan village in Muslim-dominated Kano state.
Local media also reported the worshippers were locked inside the mosque, making it difficult for them to escape.
“Some children ran for their lives with fire all over them. We had to put water to quench it,” Hussaini Adamu, a resident, told TVC.
The police cordoned off the scene while the injured were rushed to a hospital in the state capital.
“The disagreement (was) over sharing of inheritance of which those that (the attacker) alleged to have cheated on him were in the mosque at that moment and he did that for his voice to be heard,” the police statement said.
