TODAY IN HISTORY
January 30, 1959: After more than four years, the Sultan of Muscat and Oman, Said bin Taimur, defeats a rebellion by the elected Imam of Oman, Ghalib Alhinai, that is known as the Jebel Akhdar War. The war ended the split between the coastal sultanate and the Ibadi Imamate, which controlled the interior of Oman and had been nominally but not really practically subject to the sultan in Muscat. It also ensured that Said would control Oman’s oil reserves, most of which were in the Imamate’s territory. That in turn meant that Britain, as Said’s benevolent great power patron, would actually control the oil. So it really worked out well for everybody.
January 30, 1969: The Beatles give their last public concert, an unannounced affair on the rooftop of their Apple Corp (no, not that Apple) headquarters on Savile Row in London. The band played a 42 minute set before police shut them down. The Beatles broke up that September.
MIDDLE EAST
SYRIA
The Syrian government and the Syrian Democratic Forces group announced on Friday that they’ve reached a new “comprehensive” agreement on integrating the latter into the Syrian state, averting a resumption of their conflict. The deal extends, indefinitely, their current ceasefire and establishes a “gradual integration” process for the SDF’s military and political arms. It stipulates that national security forces will not enter “any Kurdish city or town” and apparently suggests the future deployment of Kurdish military units in those Kurdish areas. The integration of whole SDF units had previously been rejected by Damascus. Still missing are fine-grain details as to how the integration will be managed and the future political status of Kurdish regions (i.e., how much autonomy they will or won’t have from Damascus).
