Does the US Have Leverage Over the PLO? (BLOG/REPORT)

By Gregg Carlstrom in the Middle East

Mahmoud Abbas (photo credit: Olivier Pacteau via flicker) The Palestine Liberation Organisation seems to have passed the point of no return in its bid for full membership at the United Nations. Mahmoud Abbas could still abandon the bid - he will not formally submit the PLO's request until later this week - but that would be a politically ruinous move after his speech on Friday night.

Nonetheless, the United States and the European Union are still trying to convince Abbas to back down. There will be a few frantic meetings in New York this week ahead of Abbas' speech to the UN General Assembly on Friday.

The carrot they are offering him is the prospect of renewed negotiations with Israel, possibly with a timer attached: If talks do not go anywhere after, say, six months, the so-called Quartet would then endorse the PLO's bid for UN membership.

Abbas does not seem interested. As we reported on Saturday, it was one of these US proposals for renewed talks (which Nabil Shaath described as "useless") that convinced Abbas he needed to go to the Security Council.

That leaves sticks. The most compelling one, you would think, is the possibility that US lawmakers will slash aid to the Palestinian Authority, which depends heavily on foreign aid.

The US gave the PA roughly $470m last year, more than 10 per cent of the authority's budget. Various lawmakers, Republican and Democrat, have suggested cutting that aid after the UN vote. At a congressional hearing last week, Steve Chabot, a Republican congressman from Ohio, said "the question before this Congress will not be what portion of our aid will be cut, but rather what portion will remain".

But would Washington follow through on that threat?

Israel, after all, does not really want to undermine the Palestinian Authority, which provides security and basic services in the Palestinian-controlled parts of the occupied West Bank. If the sulta (as it is known) went bankrupt, the Israeli government would be responsible for those functions, something it cannot afford - especially now with hundreds of thousands of Israelis protesting in the streets over socioeconomic problems.

Indeed, a number of high-ranking Israeli ministers, including defence minister Ehud Barak, have warned against punitive measures for exactly that reason. As Ha'aretz reported yesterday:

[Barak and others] warn that it could lead to violence and the cessation of security cooperation between the PA and Israel, and could, under certain circumstances, lead to the total collapse of the PA, throwing responsibility for all of the West Bank's inhabitants back on Israel.

Congress is usually quite responsive to Israeli concerns (to say the least). And even if Congress cuts aid to the PA, US President Barack Obama could reinstate it with an executive order.

So cutting aid to the PA seems like an empty threat. What does that leave? Not much, according to a summary of last week's congressional hearing, which was dominated by conservative and "pro-Israel" witnesses.

The most popular ideas were shutting the PLO's mission in Washington and auditing Abbas' personal finances, neither of which seems very compelling.

Abbas could still back down at the 11th hour. I have spoken with quite a few Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip who expect that he will. But - in the absence of any compelling proposals from the Quartet and any real pressure from the US - it is hard to see why he would.

Originally published by Al Jazeera under Creative Commons Licensing 

Tajikistan: The Changing Insurgent Threats (ANALYSIS)

Photo courtesy of ICGby The International Crisis Group

Tajikistan, by most measures Central Asia’s poorest and most vulnerable state, is now facing yet another major problem: the growing security threat from both local and external insurgencies.

After his security forces failed to bring warlords and a small group of young insurgents to heel in the eastern region of Rasht in 2010-2011, President Emomali Rakhmon did a deal to bring a temporary peace to the area. But he may soon face a tougher challenge from the resurgent Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU), a group with a vision of an Islamist caliphate that is fighting in Afghanistan alongside the Taliban.

That conflict is moving closer to the 1,400km Afghan-Tajik border. Many anti-government guerrillas operating in northern Afghanistan are of Central Asian origin and are largely affiliated with the IMU, which seems to be focusing on its fight against the government in Kabul but may at some stage turn its attention northwards. Tajikistan has almost no capacity to tackle a dedicated insurgent force; its efforts to quell problems in Rasht have left its only well-trained counter-insurgency unit with just over 30 fighters.

A decade of increased international attention and aid has failed to make Tajikistan more secure or prosperous. A kleptocracy centred on the presidential family has taken much of the money from assistance and aluminium. Popular discontent over poverty and failing services has been kept in check by repression and an exodus of the dissatisfied as migrant workers. All institutions have been hollowed out, leaving a state with no resilience to cope with natural disasters, economic crises or political shocks.

A new generation of guerrillas is emerging, both within Tajikistan and in the IMU. They are mostly men in their twenties with little memory of the Tajik civil war of 1992-1997. This development has punctured two comfortable assumptions: that the IMU was a forlorn rump of ageing jihadists and that Tajiks were too scarred by the memory of the brutal civil war to turn on the regime. The latter has long been central to the analyses of both the Tajik leadership and many foreign governments.

The secular, Soviet-trained leadership that emerged from the civil war now finds itself dealing with a society increasingly drawn to observant Islam. The regime’s response to this is as inept as its efforts to bring Rasht to heel. Tajiks studying in foreign Islamic institutions have been called home; the government is trying to control the content of Friday sermons and prevent young people from visiting mosques; it has also dismissed some clerics. Officials allege that the main opposition party, the Islamic Renaissance Party, is becoming increasingly radicalised. Clumsy policies may make this a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Jihadist groups, too, are paying more attention to Tajikistan. Limited infiltration of armed guerrillas from Afghanistan has been taking place for several years. The numbers seem relatively small and their intent unknown. Many pass through to other countries – notably Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan. Some, however, are probably probing for government vulnerabilities. A small number of fighters from the North Caucasus have also been active in Tajikistan in recent years.

Radicalization by osmosis is growing: Tajikistan is gradually becoming part of the virtual jihad. Islamist websites are paying increasing attention to events in the country. Islamic militants in Tajikistan are adopting tactics already well known in other jihadist struggles, notably in the North Caucasus. In September 2010 the country witnessed what was described as its first suicide bombing. And while most military attention is focused on Rasht, the northern border area of Isfara, not far from Khujand, is developing the reputation of a safe haven for armed militants.

Billions of dollars of drugs pass through Tajikistan en route to Russia and China every year. There is a strong suspicion within the international community that senior members of the ruling elite are protecting the transit of narcotics from Afghanistan. High-level protection is almost certainly undermining international organisations’ attempts to control the border with Afghanistan – efforts that officials involved admit have had very little effect. At a time of growing menace from Afghanistan, the first line of defence is being kept artificially weak.

With the IMU engaged, for now, in Afghanistan, it would be advisable to use whatever breathing space is available to re-evaluate security and aid policies.

China, a silent but crucial player in the region with vital security interests, could usefully be drawn into joint consultations, along with the U.S., Russia and others, on measures to assess the security problems and possible responses.

Bilateral and multilateral donors should examine the utility of providing assistance to a regime that cannot prevent a very significant proportion being lost to corruption. Conditionality should be adopted as the norm. The Tajik government should be put on notice that a failure to address support for the narcotics trade within its own elite will seriously damage its credibility and outside support.

President Rakhmon denies that the North African scenario of popular unrest and revolt could happen in Tajikistan; despite the different circumstances, such confidence is questionable.

Tajikistan is so vulnerable that a small, localised problem could quickly spiral into a threat to the regime’s existence. The speed with which the popular mood can move from passivity to anger was demonstrated not just in the Middle East, but much closer to home, in Kyrgyzstan, in April 2010. Tajikistan is not immune.

- The International Crisis Group is an independent, non-profit, non-governmental organisation committed to preventing and resolving deadly conflict. The recommendations by ICG on the above topic can be found  here.

(FEATURE) Kids Helping Kids Around the World For 60 Years: Trick-or-Treat for UNICEF

The iconic UNICEF Trick-or-Treat box (CREDIT: US Fund for UNICEF)

(HN, October 28, 2010) -- This weekend marks the 60th anniversary of UNICEF's `Trick-or-Treat’ campaign, symbolized by the iconic orange collection box that millions of school children in the US carry around each Halloween.

The campaign - where children go door-to-door to collect sweets and donations - has raised $160 million over the past 60 years, averaging about $4 million-a-year.

Trick-or-Treat for UNICEF started as an ad hoc fundraising effort by a group of kids in Philadelphia in 1950, who wanted to raise money for children suffering from the after-effects of World War II. That year, $17 was collected in home-decorated milk cartons, and earmarked for powdered milk for European children.

That initiative turned into one of America's longest-running youth initiatives, raising donations for UNICEF's work in more than 150 countries for items ranging from water purification tablets and insecticide-treated bednets,  to high nutrition biscuits and vaccines.

In 2005, in response to the Asian tsunami and Hurricane Katrina, the campaign raised a record $18.25 million.

Today, at the Silver Oak Elementary School in San Jose, CA, Michael Bociurkiw, who has worked for UNICEF in several regions of the world, and most recently in Lesotho, addressed 400 children in grades fourth to sixth about UNICEF and his work in the field. He described carrying the Trick-or-Treat box as a child, and what it's like to work in the field, in often the most challenging and inhospitable conditions.

Silver Oak Elementary School in San Jose, CA; grades 4-6. (CREDIT: HUMNEWS)

Silver Oak raised more than $4,300 in donations last year - and about $30,600 since 1999.

Bociurkiw spoke about Lesotho in southern Africa, and how UNICEF is helping children there battle the HIV and AIDS epidemic; and, about efforts to keep children, especially orphans, in school. The mountain kingdom of 2-million people has the third-highest HIV infection rate in the world and suffers from poverty, malnutrition and joblessness.

Bociurkiw also cited recent success in battling polio in Nigeria, where according to UNICEF the number of cases has plummeted this year by more than 90 percent, compared to last year. 

This year, UNICEF has recruited its youngest Goodwill Ambassador, teen sensation Selena Gomez, to promote UNICEF's Trick-or-Treat campaign.

HALLOWEEN ORIGINS:

Halloween is an annual holiday observed on October 31, primarily in the United States, Canada, Ireland, and the United Kingdom.  Today the celebration is largely a secular one.

Historian Nicholas Rogers, exploring the origins of Halloween, notes that while "some folklorists have placed its origins in the Roman feast of Pomona, (the goddess of fruits and seeds), or in the Festival of the Dead called Parentalia, it is more typically linked to the Celtic festival of Samhain. The name is derived from Old Irish and means roughly "summer's end".

The word Halloween is first noted in the 16th century and represents a Scottish variant of the fuller All-Hallows-Even ("evening"), that is, the night before All Hallows Day. Up through the early 20th century, the spelling "Hallowe'en" was frequently used, eliding the "v" and shortening the word.Assembling UNICEF boxes in a combined class of Grades 2 nd 3 at Silver Oak

Halloween is not celebrated in all countries and regions of the world, and among those that do the traditions and importance of the celebration vary significantly. Celebration in the United States and Canada has had a significant impact on how the holiday is observed in other nations,  particularly the commercial elements which have extended Halloween to places such as South America, Australia, Europe, and Japan as well as to other parts of East Asia.  (VIA WIKIPEDIA)

---- HUMNEWS staff