World roundup: April 2 2024

Stories from Israel-Palestine, Senegal, Russia, and elsewhere

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TODAY IN HISTORY

April 2, 1917: US President Woodrow Wilson speaks to a joint session of Congress to ask for a declaration of war against Germany. Wilson made his case for war by appealing to idealistic notions of spreading democracy along with anger over German u-boat attacks on US shipping and fears provoked by the discovery of the Zimmerman Telegram. Congress declared war on April 6.

Wilson’s address (Library of Congress via Wikimedia Commons)

April 2, 1930: Following the death of Ethiopian Empress Zewditu, her regent and designated heir, Ras Tafari Makonnen, assumes the throne under the regal name Haile Selassie. Over the next 44 years, among other things Haile Selassie oversaw the adoption of Ethiopia’s first and second constitutions, abolished slavery, and made Ethiopia a charter member of the Organization of African Unity (precursor to the African Union) and the United Nations. He also oversaw a failed effort to integrate Eritrea that sparked a 30 year war of independence. And he’s the central figure in the Rastafari movement. Haile Selassie was overthrown in a military coup in September 1974 and was executed (though the subsequent Derg government claimed he died of natural causes) about a year later.

MIDDLE EAST

ISRAEL-PALESTINE

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu acknowledged on Tuesday that an Israeli drone strike the previous day had targeted an aid convoy belonging to the World Central Kitchen NGO in central Gaza’s Deir al-Balah region, killing seven WCK workers including five foreign nationals and two Palestinian dual nationals. WCK has announced that it is suspending its operations in Gaza as a result. Netanyahu described the attack as “a tragic event” and insisted that the convoy had been targeted “unintentionally.” None of that comports very well with accounts of the incident.

According to Haaretz, the Israeli military (IDF) very intentionally targeted the convoy because Israeli personnel had detected the presence of an “armed man” on an aid truck and decided (based on what I don’t know) that said man was a “terrorist.” Several cars in the convoy had escorted that truck to a warehouse and had just left that facility (without the truck and, apparently, without the allegedly armed man) when the IDF attacked. Those cars were clearly marked as WCK vehicles and were on a route that the aid group had previously cleared with the IDF. The drone operators targeted three cars in succession, methodically waiting for survivors of the first missile to evacuate to a second car, then hitting that car, then repeating that pattern the third time. They continued even though personnel in the convoy reportedly notified their Israeli military contacts that they were under attack. This seems obviously deliberate, Netanyahu’s rhetoric notwithstanding.

The Israeli government, responding to international pressure, says it intends to investigate the incident, and given how high profile this story is there might even be a few wrists slapped over it. Israeli officials will never admit to any intentionality, of course, even if the facts strongly lean in that direction. The WCK was one of the few outfits active in food distribution in Gaza and had been intimately involved in efforts to bring humanitarian aid into Gaza by sea, so its decision to suspend operations means that Gaza’s famine is likely to get worse. Far be it from me to suggest that this is the outcome Israeli officials wanted to achieve.

Catching up on things that happened while I was away:

• The IDF finally pulled out of al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City on Monday after a sustained two week operation in and around the facility, ostensibly because of a militant presence there. Israeli officials claim their forces killed some 200 militants in this operation and arrested some 900 more. Gazan officials say the IDF killed at least 400 people over those two weeks, including civilians. Israeli forces also appear to have heavily damaged the already damaged facility, which had started to treat patients again prior to the operation.

• Haaretz reported over the weekend that the IDF’s estimate that it’s killed some 9000 militants (among the 32,000-plus people it’s killed in Gaza since October 7) is based in part on its own designation of “kill zones” inside Gaza. Anyone killed in those zones is ipso facto regarded as a militant. The zones are determined by IDF units on the ground and civilians would have no way to know where they are in order to avoid them. I assume I don’t need to explain why that fundamentally calls those IDF figures into question.

• Last week the United Nations Security Council voted for the first time since October 7 to call for a ceasefire in Gaza, after the Biden administration unexpectedly opted to abstain rather than veto. The vote is technically binding but practically unenforceable and thus as you’ve no doubt noticed the IDF has carried on as though the vote never happened. In fact the Biden administration quickly asserted that the vote was “nonbinding,” which is unfounded and strips yet another Rule out of the vaunted Rules-Based Order. Nevertheless, Israeli officials were angry enough about the abstention to cancel a planned discussion with US officials on their forthcoming Rafah operation, though they backtracked a few days later and the chat session did take place (likely without effect) on Monday. At this point the Rafah operation is likely to begin after the upcoming Eid al-Fitr holiday (next week) and there’s no reason to think the IDF will take any particular care regarding the threat to civilians.

• The International Court of Justice last week responded to a request from the South African government by ordering the Israeli government to ensure adequate provision of humanitarian aid in Gaza. The ruling noted that the territory has tipped over the brink into famine. So far the only thing the Israelis have done that could be construed as a response to the ruling is the attack on the WCK convoy I outlined above, though again far be it from me to suggest any sort of linkage there.

• The Only Democracy In The Middle East™ is going to ban Al Jazeera, claiming that its coverage of the situation in Gaza amounts to “incitement.” When the Biden administration talks about how the US-Israel relationship rests on a “bedrock of shared values,” you can safely assume that freedom of the press is not one of those values.

• Lest you think any of the above has given the Biden administration even a second’s pause about its blanket support for Israel, the administration has reportedly approved a major new Israeli arms shipment that includes 1800 of the massive 2000 pound unguided bombs that have been used in a number of large casualty incidents in Gaza since October 7. The package includes 25 F-35 aircraft. The administration is also considering a whopping $18 billion arms deal that would include the transfer of 50 F-15EX fighters to Israel, though assuming it’s approved that shipment would likely be months away. Ostensibly these arms shipments are meant to help Israel defend itself in the event of a regional war that the Israeli government seems hell-bound to provoke (more on that below).

TURKEY

Turkey’s opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) dealt the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan a number of significant defeats in local elections on Sunday. In the two most watched races, Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoğlu and Ankara Mayor Mansur Yavaş both won reelection despite concerted AKP efforts to unseat them. This newsletter doesn’t spend much time dwelling on local elections but Imamoğlu’s win is significant inasmuch as Istanbul is an absolutely massive city that’s home to a sizable percentage of the Turkish population and inasmuch as Erdoğan, himself a former Istanbul mayor, clearly wanted to see Imamoğlu off and yet the incumbent won by more than 10 points. The result positions Imamoğlu once again as Erdoğan’s strongest potential rival nationally.

IRAQ

An apparent Turkish drone strike in the Sinjar region of northern Iraq’s Nineveh province on Tuesday killed a man identified by Iraqi Kurdish authorities as “a senior military commander” in the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). Two other PKK fighters were wounded in the attack.

SYRIA

An IDF airstrike hit the Iranian embassy in Damascus on Monday, killing at least 13 people including seven members of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. A senior IRGC officer, Mohammad Reza Zahedi, was among the dead and is the highest ranking IRGC officer to be killed since a US drone strike assassinated Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani back in January 2020. This is easily the most provocative escalation the Israelis have made in their low-level conflict with Iran and its various regional proxies, effectively an attack on Iranian soil given how embassies are regarded under international law. Continuing with tonight’s refrain, far be it from me to suggest that the Israeli government is intentionally trying to provoke a full-blown regional war, but this is certainly the kind of thing that one might do if one were trying to provoke such a war.

The Iranian government has pledged to retaliate for the attack but it’s shown over and over again since October 7 that it does not want to take Israel’s bait. The retaliation may come in the form of renewed attacks not against Israel but against US military positions in the Middle East, counting on the fact that the Biden administration also does not seem to want a war (its continued armament of the Israel military notwithstanding). Indeed, an apparent attempted drone strike on the US military base at Tanf in southern Syria on Monday afternoon may indicate that it’s open season on US personnel again.

I know there are people wondering about whether this embassy strike was permissible under international law, and I understand the impulse. But it’s so well established at this point that Israel is shielded from any international legal concerns that I don’t see any reason to dwell on the issue.

ASIA

CHINA

Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping spoke by phone on Tuesday, the first time they’ve talked directly since their big summit in California back in November. According to the White House they “held a candid and constructive discussion on a range of bilateral, regional, and global issues, including areas of cooperation and areas of difference.” Hopefully the discussion was more constructive than that description. The Washington Post reported that they talked about “military-to-military cooperation, counternarcotics efforts, Taiwan and China’s relationship with Russia,” among other topics, while Xi focused particularly on “reducing risk” in the US-Chinese relationship. Apparently they talked about TikTok as well. Overall it seems the positive feelings that emerged from that November summit are more or less still there, though they have yet to translate into anything substantive in the bilateral relationship.

NORTH KOREA

North Korean state media is reporting that the country’s military successfully tested its new “hypersonic” intermediate-range missile on Tuesday. Regular readers may recall that the North Koreans claimed to have tested a second-stage, solid fueled engine for such a device a couple of weeks ago, so in that light this test is not terribly surprising. If all of this is accurate, the missile would have a range capable of striking US military targets throughout the Pacific and potentially reaching Alaska. Hypersonic missiles are in theory difficult to intercept because of their combination of speed and maneuverability, and solid fueled weapons can be launched on short notice because it’s safe to store them with the fuel already loaded.

AFRICA

SUDAN

An apparent drone strike killed at least 12 people in the northeastern Sudanese city of Atbara on Tuesday. The target was a base used by a militia aligned with the Sudanese military, so it’s probably reasonable to assume that the Rapid Support Forces group was responsible though its closest forces are positioned some 250 kilometers away.

Elsewhere, the Sudanese military announced on Tuesday that it’s banning two Saudi-owned media outlets, al-Arabiya and al-Hadath, as well as the UAE-owned Sky News Arabia, from operating in Sudan. The UAE is by all accounts backing the RSF so the decision to target Sky News Arabia is not surprising even if it is troubling. I can only speculate that the two Saudi outlets have not covered the war against the RSF to the military’s satisfaction.

SENEGAL

Bassirou Diomaye Faye became Senegal’s new president on Tuesday, concluding a remarkable rise given that he was in prison as recently as March 13. Senegalese authorities released Faye, along with his political patron Ousmane Sonko, from prison on March 14 as part of a wider amnesty ahead of the March 24 election. We’ve covered the drama surrounding this election and if you need a recap you can find it in Alex Thurston’s most recent FX column, but Faye’s win could be regarded as voters’ final rejection of former President Macky Sall’s various attempts to hang on to power over the past few weeks. Faye first major act in office has reportedly been naming Sonko as prime minister.

DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF THE CONGO

Congolese President Félix Tshisekedi named former planning minister Judith Tuluka as his new prime minister on Monday, making her the first woman to hold that post in Congolese history. Tshisekedi had reportedly promised to appoint a woman as PM during his reelection campaign last year. It’s unclear when Tuluka will actually take office, as the parliamentary alignment is still very much in flux after December’s election and it could be months before she’s in a position to roll out a new cabinet.

EUROPE

RUSSIA

An apparent Ukrainian drone strike hit an oil refinery in Russia’s Tatarstan republic on Tuesday. There’s no indication of serious damage or casualties, but the attack is nevertheless noteworthy given the sheer distance it covered—the target is located some 1300 kilometers from the front line in Ukraine. It’s unclear whether the drone traveled that entire distance but if it did that would indicate that the Ukrainian military is increasing its long-range strike capabilities.

Elsewhere, perhaps the most significant non-Gaza related story that caught my attention while I was away was unsurprisingly the March 22 terrorist attack on the Crocus City Hall concert venue in Moscow, the death toll from which now stands at 144. Islamic State’s “Khorasan” affiliate claimed responsibility for the attack, and while the Russian government seems to have accepted that the group played some role it has repeatedly suggested that the Ukrainian and/or US governments were also involved. With the proviso that an IS claim of responsibility doesn’t rule out the involvement of additional parties, to my knowledge there’s still no substantive evidence that points anywhere else (that includes the theorized “false flag” scenario, which while not out of the question does not have any evidence to support it that I have seen). The Tajik government has reportedly arrested several people in connection with the attack, allegedly over their IS links.

The Russian military appointed Sergei Pinchuk as the new commander of its Black Sea fleet on Tuesday, confirming weeks of speculation that Moscow had canned the previous commander due to the significant losses the fleet has suffered at the hands of the Ukrainian military. Those losses may be thwarting Russian designs on the remainder of Ukraine’s Black Sea coast, including the port city of Odesa.

UKRAINE

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Tuesday signed into law a measure lowering Ukraine’s military conscription age from 27 to 25, part of an effort to mobilize upwards of 500,000 additional soldiers to help stem recent Russian gains. Ukraine is desperately short of manpower as compared with Russia and will remain so even if this conscription effort is successful. It’s unclear at this point how the Ukrainians intend to train and/or equip such a large influx of new soldiers.

BULGARIA

Bulgarian Prime Minister-designate Mariya Gabriel abandoned her efforts to form a new government last week, potentially triggering a snap election that would be Bulgaria’s sixth parliamentary vote since April 2021. Gabriel was supposed to take office as part of a power-sharing arrangement between her GERB party and the We Continue the Change party, which surrendered the premiership on March 6. Apparently the erstwhile coalition partners were unable to finalize the terms of their swap, though it’s unclear what ultimately caused things to break down. It’s possible GERB could still come back to the table though at this point there’s no way to know.

PORTUGAL

Portugal’s Democratic Alliance-led government officially took office on Tuesday, under new Prime Minister Luís Montenegro. Portuguese President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa appointed Montenegro last month even though his party alliance only controls 80 seats in Portugal’s 230 seat parliament. Portuguese parliamentary rules do allow for minority government control but Montenegro will have to rely on ad hoc coalitions to try to pass any legislation and expectations for his government’s stability are low.

AMERICAS

PERU

Peruvian prosecutors are investigating President Dina Boluarte over corruption allegations related to her ownership of some $500,000 in “fine jewelry” as well as some $400,000 in unspecified “money transactions.” This brewing scandal apparently started a couple of weeks ago over Boluarte’s alleged ownership of three Rolex watches that she opted not to declare alongside her other assets. It’s since spiraled into something much bigger, including a police raid on her home on Friday in a failed attempt to confiscate the watches. There’s a new movement afoot in parliament to remove her from office, though whether that will gain any traction won’t be apparent until later this week.

HAITI

Violence in Port-au-Prince displaced more than 53,000 people between March 8 and March 27, according to new data from the UN International Organization for Migration. Most of the violence remains concentrated in the capital, but these people are fleeing to parts of Haiti that lack the capacity to accommodate or even track them effectively. With the Caribbean Community’s proposed “transitional council” still taking shape, a new round of heavy fighting between insurgents and police was reported in the vicinity of the capital’s National Palace on Monday. The UN says the violence has killed over 1500 people in the city since late February.

UNITED STATES

Finally, scholar Annelle Sheline—who has appeared in the past on both the Foreign Exchanges and American Prestige podcasts—resigned her State Department fellowship last month. She wrote a piece for CNN about her decision:

For the past year, I worked for the office devoted to promoting human rights in the Middle East. I believe strongly in the mission and in the important work of that office. However, as a representative of a government that is directly enabling what the International Court of Justice has said could plausibly be a genocide in Gaza, such work has become almost impossible. Unable to serve an administration that enables such atrocities, I have decided to resign from my position at the Department of State.

Whatever credibility the United States had as an advocate for human rights has almost entirely vanished since the war began. Members of civil society have refused to respond to my efforts to contact them. Our office seeks to support journalists in the Middle East; yet when asked by NGOs if the US can help when Palestinian journalists are detained or killed in Gaza, I was disappointed that my government didn’t do more to protect them. Ninety Palestinian journalists in Gaza have been killed in the last five months, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. That is the most recorded in any single conflict since the CPJ started collecting data in 1992.

By resigning publicly, I am saddened by the knowledge that I likely foreclose a future at the State Department. I had not initially planned a public resignation. Because my time at State had been so short — I was hired on a two-year contract — I did not think I mattered enough to announce my resignation publicly. However, when I started to tell colleagues of my decision to resign, the response I heard repeatedly was, “Please speak for us.”