Iraq preserves traumatic memories of Daesh reign

Iraq preserves traumatic memories of Daesh reign
Iraqis who volunteered to share their memories of what they endured under Daesh group, gather with members of the Mosul Eye project, before being interviewed in Mosul, on February 27, 2023. (AFP)
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Updated 30 March 2023

Iraq preserves traumatic memories of Daesh reign

Iraq preserves traumatic memories of Daesh reign

MOSUL: The horrors they endured under the Daesh group may be in the past for the people of Iraq, but the traumatic memories remain.

Now a research project is recording their witness testimonies for posterity. Omar Mohammed, founder of the Mosul Eye project, rose to prominence during the Daesh reign by bravely sharing news via Twitter from inside the city under jihadist rule.

Years later, he wants to make sure nothing is forgotten.

“When I was in Mosul recording everything myself, I felt the need to include all the people, to record our history in their own voice,” he said.

Bereaved mother Umm Mohammed, 55, is among those who have shared their memories of terror, suffering and loss with the non-governmental group.

The extremists came for her family one night in 2015 and took away her son Ahmed, then a 27-year-old construction worker. His brother Mohammed, 10 years younger, then made a fateful choice: he decided to join the ranks of Daesh, with a daring plan to find and liberate Ahmed.

“I told him: ‘My son, don’t join them’,” recounted Umm Mohammed, her hair under a dark scarf.

“He said: ‘It’s none of your business. I’m going to get my brother. I’ll go into the prisons.’“

The elderly woman said, with sadness in her voice, that Mohammed left “and never came back.”

And neither did Ahmed.

Both are presumed to be among the many killed under the group’s self-declared “caliphate” that cut across swathes of Iraq and Syria.

Umm Mohammed said she suspects the jihadists felt that Mohammed “was not one of them. They must have thought he was a spy.”

Speaking about those dark days years later for the Mosul Eye project has brought up a storm of emotions, but ultimately had a cathartic effect for Umm Mohammed.

Mosul Eye, with funding from the US Agency for International Development, has trained 10 students to conduct and film interviews, mostly in Mosul but testimonies have also been collected from people hailing from elsewhere in Iraq.

The youngest of the 70 witnesses are barely 10 years old. Others are in their 80s. The oldest is 104.

The footage will be kept at the group’s archives at Mosul University, and George Washington University in the US capital, for use by researchers and for future generations.

“We wanted to show the world how the people of Mosul overcame this experience,” said a spokesman for Mosul Eye, Mohannad Ammar.

Another witness is Muslim Hmeid, a 27-year-old law student whose Sunni Arab family endured five months of Daesh rule in Sinjar in 2014 before fleeing.

Seared in his mind especially is the “bloody first week, impossible to erase from memory.”

He relived with pain how Daesh targeted the local Yazidi minority, whose non-Muslim faith the extremists considered heretical.

Hmeid remembered watching helplessly as the jihadists came and loaded Yazidi girls and women into lorries.

“Once I saw two or three trucks full of women,” he said. “And a few men, but mostly young women, aged 17 to 30, maybe.”

Entire Yazidi villages were emptied and many fell victim to crimes since recognized as genocide by the United Nations and courts in several countries.

Women were forced into sexual slavery and the men were killed, while “those who could fled into the mountains,” Hmeid said.

“Witnessing such a catastrophe happen to your neighbors and not being able to help ... We were heartbroken,” said Hmeid. “Psychologically, we were devastated.”

With three of his brothers in the military and on the Daesh kill list, the family fled to Turkiye but later returned to Iraq.

“By talking about these topics, we reopen wounds,” said Hmeid. But, added the father of two, “the next generations must know exactly what happened.”


Sudan battle rages as Saudi Arabia, US urge new truce talks

Sudan battle rages as Saudi Arabia, US urge new truce talks
Updated 05 June 2023

Sudan battle rages as Saudi Arabia, US urge new truce talks

Sudan battle rages as Saudi Arabia, US urge new truce talks

JEDDAH: Saudi Arabia and the US on Sunday made a renewed push for truce talks between Sudan’s warring generals as deadly fighting raged into its eighth week.

Envoys of Sudan’s regular army and paramilitary Rapid Support Forces or RSF have remained in Jeddah despite the earlier collapse of ceasefire talks, the Kingdom’s Foreign Ministry said.

The foreign mediators called for “the parties to agree to and effectively implement a new ceasefire, with the aim of building to a permanent cessation of hostilities,” it said.

Saudi Arabia and the US are keen to resume formal talks between the delegations, the ministry said.

Saudi Arabia and the US remain steadfast in their commitment to the people of Sudan, the statement added.

The Sudanese delegations in Jeddah continue to engage in daily negotiations, the ministry said.

“Those discussions are focused on facilitating humanitarian assistance and reaching agreement on near term steps the party must take before the Jeddah talks resume,” according to the statement.

It added: “Facilitators stand ready to resume formal talks and remind parties that they must implement their obligations under the May 11 Jeddah Declaration of Commitment to protect the civilians of Sudan.”

A five-day extension of a truce formally expired on Saturday with no signs of the conflict abating.

Upwards of 1,800 people have been killed, according to the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project, and the UN says 1.2 million have been displaced with more than 425,000 fleeing abroad.

The RSF on Sunday claimed it had shot down a fighter jet after the army “launched an audacious airborne assault upon our forces’ positions” in northern Khartoum.

A military source told AFP a Chinese-made jet crashed near Wadi Seidna base north of Khartoum because of a “technical malfunction.”

Witnesses said they saw an aircraft traveling from the south to the north of the capital with flames erupting from it.

Other witnesses spoke of airstrikes on RSF positions in the east of the city, with some civilian casualties reported.

Fighting in the capital has led to widespread damage and looting, a collapse in health services, power and water cuts, and dwindling food supplies.

Beyond the capital, deadly fighting has also broken out in the remote western region of Darfur, already grappling with long-running unrest and huge humanitarian challenges.


US, UK navies say they responded to distress call as Iran’s Revolutionary Guard ‘harassed’ ship

US, UK navies say they responded to distress call as Iran’s Revolutionary Guard ‘harassed’ ship
Updated 05 June 2023

US, UK navies say they responded to distress call as Iran’s Revolutionary Guard ‘harassed’ ship

US, UK navies say they responded to distress call as Iran’s Revolutionary Guard ‘harassed’ ship
  • The recent seizures have put new pressure on the US, long the security guarantor for Gulf Arab nations

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates: The US Navy said Monday its sailors and the United Kingdom Royal Navy came to the aid of a ship in the crucial Strait of Hormuz after Iran’s Revolutionary Guard “harassed” it.
Three fast-attack Guard vessels with armed troops aboard approached the merchant ship at a close distance Sunday afternoon, the US Navy said in a statement. It offered black-and-white images it said came from a US Navy Boeing P-8 Poseidon overhead, which showed three small ships close to the commercial ship.
The US Navy’s guided-missile destroyer USS McFaul and the Royal Navy’s frigate HMS Lancaster responded to the incident, with the Lancaster launching a helicopter.
“The situation deescalated approximately an hour later when the merchant vessel confirmed the fast-attack craft departed the scene,” the Navy said. “The merchant ship continued transiting the Strait of Hormuz without further incident.”
The Strait of Hormuz, the narrow mouth of the Arabian Gulf, sees 20 percent of the world’s oil pass through it.
While the Navy did not identify the vessel involved, ship-tracking data from MarineTraffic.com analyzed by The Associated Press showed the Marshall Islands-flagged bulk carrier Venture erratically changed course as it traveled through the strait at the time of the incident. Its location also matched information about the incident given by the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations, a British military operation overseeing traffic in the region. The vessel also resembled the images released by the Navy.
The ship’s registered manager, Trust Bulkers of Athens, Greece, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Iranian state media and the Revolutionary Guard did not immediately acknowledge the incident. Iran’s mission to the United Nations did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
This latest incident comes after a series of maritime incidents involving Iran following the US unilaterally withdrawing from Tehran’s nuclear deal with world powers in 2018.
The suspected American seizure of the Suez Rajan, a tanker linked to a US private equity firm believed to have been carrying sanctioned Iranian crude oil off Singapore, likely sparked Tehran to recently take the Marshall Islands-flagged tanker Advantage Sweet. That ship carried Kuwaiti crude oil for energy firm Chevron Corp. of San Ramon, California.
While authorities have not acknowledged the Suez Rajan’s seizure, the vessel is now off the coast of Galveston, Texas, according to ship-tracking data analyzed by the AP.
Meanwhile, Iran separately seized the Niovi, a Panama-flagged tanker, as it left a dry dock in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, bound for Fujairah on the UAE’s eastern coast. While not carrying any cargo, data from S&P Global Market Intelligence seen by the AP showed the Niovi in July 2020 received oil from a ship known then as the Oman Pride.
The US Treasury in August 2021 sanctioned the Oman Pride and others associated with the vessel over it being “involved in an international oil smuggling network” that supported the Quds Force, the expeditionary unit of the Guard that operates across the Mideast. Purported emails published online by Wikiran, a website that solicits leaked documents from the Islamic Republic, suggest that cargo carried by the Niovi was sold on to firms in China without permission.
Satellite images analyzed by the AP show those two vessels anchored off Bandar Abbas, Iran.
The recent seizures have put new pressure on the US, long the security guarantor for Gulf Arab nations. The United Arab Emirates claimed last week it earlier “withdrew its participation” from a joint naval command called the Combined Maritime Forces though the US Navy said it was still in the group. Meanwhile, the US military’s Central Command said Saturday its chief visited the region, met with Emirati leader Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan and “discussed shared regional security concerns as well as US and UAE security partnerships.”
The Mideast-based commanders of the US, British and French navies last month also transited the Strait of Hormuz on Friday aboard an American warship, a sign of their unified approach to keep the crucial waterway open after Iran seized the two oil tankers.
 

 


Netanyahu convenes Iran war drill, scorns UN nuclear watchdog

Netanyahu convenes Iran war drill, scorns UN nuclear watchdog
Updated 05 June 2023

Netanyahu convenes Iran war drill, scorns UN nuclear watchdog

Netanyahu convenes Iran war drill, scorns UN nuclear watchdog
  • Iran had provided a satisfactory answer on one case of suspect uranium particles and re-installed some monitoring equipment originally put in place under a now-defunct 2015 nuclear deal

JERUSALEM: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ramped up threats to attack Iranian nuclear facilities on Sunday, convening a rare cabinet war drill after he accused UN inspectors of failing to confront Tehran.
With Iran having enriched enough uranium to 60 percent fissile purity for two nuclear bombs, if refined further — something it denies wanting or planning — Israel has redoubled threats to launch preemptive military strikes if international diplomacy fails. Israel has long maintained that for diplomacy to succeed, Iran must be faced with a credible military threat.
“We are committed to acting against Iran’s nuclear (drive), against missile attacks on Israel and the possibility of these fronts joining up,” Netanyahu said in a video statement from Israel’s underground command bunker at its military headquarters in Tel Aviv.
The possibility of multiple fronts, Netanyahu said while surrounded by security cabinet ministers and defense chiefs, requires Israel’s leadership “consider, if possible consider ahead of time,” its major decisions.
Netanyahu’s office issued footage of the drill. The publicity around the preparations appeared to depart from Israel’s 1981 strike on an Iraqi nuclear reactor and a similar sortie in Syria in 2007, carried out without forewarning.

UN WATCHDOG SAID IRAN PROVIDED SATISFACTORY ANSWER
Earlier, Netanyahu levelled sharp criticism of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), following a report last week by the UN watchdog that Iran had provided a satisfactory answer on one case of suspect uranium particles and re-installed some monitoring equipment originally put in place under a now-defunct 2015 nuclear deal.
“Iran is continuing to lie to the International Atomic Energy Agency. The agency’s capitulation to Iranian pressure is a black stain on its record,” Netanyahu told his cabinet in televised remarks. The watchdog risked politicization that would lose it its significance on Iran, he said.
The IAEA declined to comment.
On Wednesday, the agency reported that after years of investigation and lack of progress, Iran had given a satisfactory answer to explain one of three sites at which uranium particles had been detected.
Those particles could be explained by the presence of a onetime Soviet-operated mine and lab there and the IAEA had no further questions, a senior diplomat in Vienna said.
In an apparent reference to this, Netanyahu said Iran’s explanations were “technically impossible.”
However, the Vienna diplomat also said the IAEA’s assessment remained that Iran carried out explosives testing there decades ago that was relevant to nuclear weapons.
After then US President Donald Trump quit the Iran nuclear deal in 2018, Tehran ramped up uranium enrichment. Israeli and Western officials say it could switch from enrichment at 60 percent fissile purity to 90 percent — weapons-grade — within a few weeks.
In a 2012 UN speech, Netanyahu deemed 90 percent enrichment by Iran a “red line” that could trigger preemptive strikes.
Military experts are divided, however, on whether Israel — whose advanced military is believed to be nuclear-armed — has the conventional clout to deliver lasting damage to Iranian targets that are distant, dispersed and well-defended.
Focussing domestic attention on Iran might provide Netanyahu with respite from a months-long crisis over his proposals to overhaul Israel’s judiciary. But opinion polls showed that both those concerns are trumped, for Israelis, by high living costs.

 


Kuwaiti, UN official discuss global food security 

Kuwaiti, UN official discuss global food security 
Updated 04 June 2023

Kuwaiti, UN official discuss global food security 

Kuwaiti, UN official discuss global food security 
  • Kuwaiti deputy FM received UN Coordinator for the Black Sea Grain Initiative

KUWAIT: Mansour Alotaibi, Kuwait’s deputy foreign minister, met on Sunday with  Abdullah Dashti, UN Coordinator for the Black Sea Grain Initiative, Kuwait News Agency reported. 

During the meeting, the two discussed issues relating to global food security.

The UN and Turkey brokered the Black Sea Grain Initiative between Moscow and Kyiv last July to help tackle a global food crisis aggravated by Russia’s February 2022 invasion of Ukraine, a leading global grain exporter.

Ukraine would be ready to continue exporting grain across the Black Sea as part of a “plan B” without Russian backing if Moscow pulls the plug on the current grain export deal and it collapses, Ukraine’s farm minister said on Friday.
 


Palestinian residents ‘in constant fear’ over eviction threat

Palestinian residents ‘in constant fear’ over eviction threat
Updated 04 June 2023

Palestinian residents ‘in constant fear’ over eviction threat

Palestinian residents ‘in constant fear’ over eviction threat
  • Israeli Supreme Court has approved the expulsion of Palestinians from Masafer Yatta, claiming the area is a “firing zone”

RAMALLAH: Residents of Masafer Yatta, south of Hebron in the West Bank, are living in constant fear they will be forced from their homes by Israeli troops. 

The Israeli Supreme Court has approved the expulsion of Palestinians from Masafer Yatta, claiming the area is a “firing zone.”

Most roads leading to the collection of villages have been closed by the Israeli army, residents said, while Israel has also allowed the establishment of six settlement outposts in the area.

About 3,000 people live in Masafer Yatta, spread over 14 villages.

Residents, many living in tin-roofed dwellings and in caves, say they will not leave whatever the cost.

The Palestinians say they could be evicted at any time amid an escalation of the Israeli army’s campaign to demolish homes in Area C in the West Bank.

Palestinians’ fears are growing following a rise in the number of violent settler attacks against them and the establishment of settlement outposts on their land.

Settlers also burn residents’ crops, and prevent livestock from reaching pastures or water springs.

Grazing areas have been seized, and residential caves and Palestinian farms destroyed.

There are also concerns over what the Palestinians see as a decline in popular and international pressure on the Israeli government to back down from implementing the court’s decision to evict them.

Masafer Yatta residents on Friday called for urgent action to protect them from attacks and attempts to expel them.

Nidal Younis, head of the Masafer Yatta Village Council, told Arab News that settler attacks on residents have increased dramatically in recent weeks.

The Israeli army tolerates the violence, he said.

Residents have filed complaints with the Israeli police, but to no avail.

Shawan Jabarin, director general of the Palestinian Al-Haq Association for Human Rights, told Arab News that European and international diplomatic pressure on the Israeli government had eased, which may embolden the Israeli authorities to implement the court’s decision to evict the residents.

Palestinian sources believe Israel’s right-wing parties will push to have the West Bank annexed before the fall of the current regime, he said.

Jabarin said the International Criminal Court should pressure the Israeli government to back down on the eviction plan.

Settlers have become “tools used by the Israeli army to seize large areas of Palestinian land, from Masafer Yatta in the south to the northern West Bank,” he said.

Younis Arar, head of the International Relations Unit in the Settlement and Wall Resistance Commission, told Arab News that he feared Israeli military authorities could deport the residents of Masafer Yatta at any moment.

He described any deportation attempt as “a new catastrophe,” and said there was no European, international or even Arab pressure on the Israeli government to discourage it from taking such a step.

The Palestinian National Initiative movement described the Israeli court’s approval of the expulsion plan as ethnic cleansing committed by Israel against the Palestinian people.

“The successive Israeli occupation governments have been seeking for several years, through their arbitrary measures and continuous repression of our people in Masafer Yatta, to uproot and expel them to implement their settlement expansion plans,” it said.