World roundup: September 12 2024

Stories from Israel-Palestine, Ethiopia, Ukraine, and elsewhere

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TODAY IN HISTORY

September 12, 1683: In the first major engagement of the 1683-1699 Great Turkish War, an army led by Polish King Jan III Sobieski defeats the Ottomans at the Battle of Vienna and thereby breaks up the in-progress siege of that city. The Ottomans retreated in disarray, allowing the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and the Habsburgs to take advantage and grab chunks of formerly Ottoman territory. By 1687 they’d been driven out of Hungary and were well on their way to the first major military defeat the empire had suffered in centuries.

Austrian painter August Querfurt’s The Turkish Siege of Vienna, painted in the 1750s (Wikimedia Commons)

September 12, 1974: A committee of Ethiopian military officers, called the “Derg,” overthrows Emperor Haile Selassie in a coup amid mass unrest caused in part by a serious famine. The Derg, which refashioned itself as the “Provisional Military Government of Socialist Ethiopia,” ruled the country until 1987, when it further transformed itself into the People’s Democratic Republic of Ethiopia.

MIDDLE EAST

ISRAEL-PALESTINE

Hamas’s lead negotiator, Khalil al-Hayya, met with Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani and Egyptian General Intelligence Directorate boss Abbas Kamel in Doha on Wednesday to discuss the status of Gaza ceasefire talks. Afterward Hamas issued a statement saying that the group is prepared to accept the ceasefire framework proposed by Joe Biden back in May without “any new conditions.” This is significant in that it responds to a recent claim from the Biden administration that Hamas is blocking a deal by introducing new demands around the prisoner exchange piece. The public disavowal of “any new conditions” may force the administration to once again confront the fact that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been the single biggest obstacle to a deal.

Elsewhere:

• The United Nations and aid groups are once again warning of a collapse in the amount of humanitarian relief getting into Gaza. UN data shows that an average of 100 trucks per day (itself not enough to meet the need) entered the territory in July but just half that number in August. Just 147 trucks have entered the territory in total over the first 12 days of September. The Israeli government’s data shows a larger number of trucks approaching Gaza from Israel, but its figures include smaller trucks than what the UN uses inside Gaza, don’t differentiate between humanitarian and commercial shipments, and ignore the fact that Israeli authorities require the trucks to be partially empty to facilitate inspections.

• On a more upbeat note, the UN was scheduled to wrap up its first round of polio vaccinations in Gaza on Thursday and officials seem pleased with how it went. The plan is to inoculate some 640,000 children in order to prevent a widespread polio outbreak and by Wednesday some 530,000 had received their first dose. It’s important to note that the effort is only at the halfway point—a second round of vaccinations still needs to be completed.

• The Israeli military’s (IDF) airstrike on a school-turned-shelter in central Gaza’s Nuseirat refugee camp on Wednesday killed at least 18 people, including six UN Relief and Works Agency workers. The strike drew sharp criticism from the UN and brings the number of aid workers the IDF has killed since October 7 to at least 284, more than three-quarters of all aid worker killings around the world in that time span. Some of these may be chalked up to collateral damage, but Responsible Statecraft’s Stephen Semler has compiled a list of at least 14 instances in which the IDF surely knew it was attacking aid workers.

• The Washington Post has published the results of its investigation into the IDF’s killing of US citizen Ayşenur Eygi that picks apart the narrative Israeli officials have advanced to excuse it. Where the IDF claims its sniper “most likely” shot Eygi in the midst of a protest-turned-riot while they were aiming for the person identified as the instigator of the violence, the Post finds that Eygi was shot some 30 minutes after the incident and 20 minutes after the main body of protesters had moved away from her position. As often happens in these types of cases, if the Post story is accurate one is forced to conclude that either the Israelis murdered Eygi with intent or their personnel are so incompetent that they shouldn’t be trusted with NERF guns, let alone sniper rifles.

SYRIA

An IDF airstrike in southern Syria’s Quneitra province killed two people with ties to Hezbollah on Thursday, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. Syrian media referred to the victims as “citizens” without offering additional detail. The IDF has acknowledged carrying out two strikes in Quneitra, including one in al-Rafid that they say killed an unspecified “terrorist.”

The New York Times is reporting that an incident in Syria’s Hama province a few days ago that was previously identified as an airstrike also involved a “commando raid” on the Scientific Studies and Research Center near Masyaf. The attack targeted a part of that facility focused on missile research, and special forces were deployed to ensure the facility’s destruction and to “recover information” from the site.

YEMEN

Reuters is reporting that salvage workers will make another attempt to recover the Sounion this week. A previous attempt to tow that oil tanker, which was attacked and left adrift and on fire by the Houthis last month, had to be abandoned earlier this month due to unsafe conditions. The vessel is carrying around 1 million barrels of oil and if it ruptures the spill could be catastrophic to the Red Sea environment. There are concerns that the tugboats involved in the salvage operation may come under Houthi attack, though the group has said it will allow the operation to proceed.

IRAN

Gunmen killed three border guards and wounded one civilian in southeastern Iran’s Sistan and Baluchistan province on Thursday. The Baluch jihadist group Jaish ul-Adl claimed responsibility for the attack.

The Iranian Foreign Ministry on Thursday summoned diplomats from France, Germany, the Netherlands, and the UK to deny claims that Tehran has begun providing missiles to Russia and to protest new sanctions imposed by European governments over said claims. It may have been responding to similar moves from the UK and Dutch governments, both of which summoned Iran’s representatives on Wednesday to protest the alleged missile shipment.

ASIA

AFGHANISTAN

Islamic State has claimed responsibility for an attack in central Afghanistan’s Daykundi province on Thursday that killed at least 14 people. The victims were Shiʿa reportedly gathered to welcome back a group of people returning from the recent Arbaʿin pilgrimage to Iraq. IS frequently targets Shiʿa for ideological reasons and also in an effort to discredit and destabilize the Afghan government.

PAKISTAN

Gunmen in northern Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province attacked yet another polio vaccination team on Thursday, marking the second attack on a vaccination team in that province in as many days and the third this week. They killed one police officer serving as security for the team. Vaccine teams are frequently targeted by jihadist militants, though such attacks don’t usually happen with this frequency. Islamic State claimed responsibility for Monday’s bombing but no group has yet claimed Wednesday’s or Thursday’s incidents.

Also on Thursday, the Biden administration blacklisted five entities and one Chinese individual for allegedly assisting in Pakistan’s ballistic missile program. The main target was the Beijing Research Institute of Automation for Machine Building Industry, accused of helping Islamabad to obtain equipment for testing rocket engines. Three Chinese companies and one Pakistani company were also designated.

CAMBODIA

The Biden administration on Thursday also blacklisted a Cambodian senator named Ly Yong Phat along with several entities connected to him. US officials are accusing Ly of operating a number of online scam operations—particularly in the area of cryptocurrency fraud—and of human trafficking with respect to his workforce. The administration had apparently been holding off on issuing these sanctions so as not to disrupt its New Cold War-related outreach to the Cambodian government, but it hasn’t been making much headway in that diplomatic effort.

AFRICA

SUDAN

A UN Security Council meeting on the conflict in Sudan reportedly devolved into a shouting match between representatives of the nominal Sudanese government and the United Arab Emirates, with the former accusing the latter of supporting the Rapid Support Forces paramilitary group and the latter accusing the former of lacking the “political courage” to negotiate an end to the war. It’s pretty well established at this point that the UAE has been arming the RSF, despite Emirati denials. On Wednesday the Sudanese delegation alleged that the UAE has been “profiting” from gold mined by the RSF, based on information from European sources. The council voted to extend the UN’s current embargo on arms going to the Darfur region, but it did not agree to expand that embargo to the entire country as a UN panel had recommended last week.

SENEGAL

As expected, Senegalese President Bassirou Diomaye Faye dissolved the country’s parliament on Thursday, forcing a snap election that by law must take place within 90 days. The now-former legislature was elected in 2022 and was controlled by opposition parties, which made it an obstacle to Faye’s agenda. He moved to dissolve it at the earliest possible opportunity (Senegalese law permits presidents to dissolve parliament starting two years after an election) and it’s almost certain that the election will produce a parliament that is far more amenable to his plans.

GUINEA-BISSAU

In something of a surprise, Guinea-Bissau President Umaro Sissoco Embaló announced on Thursday that he will not run for reelection in November. Apparently his wife talked him into bowing out, perhaps because of the two coup attempts that have been made against him over the past three years. Frustrations over dealing with an opposition-controlled parliament may also have played a role in his decision.

ETHIOPIA

At World Politics Review, journalist Fred Harter reports on the dismal situation in Ethiopia’s still war torn Tigray region:

Although aid can now reach much of Tigray, the humanitarian situation remains dire. Plentiful rain fell during this summer’s rainy season, but parts of the region are still reeling from a historic drought. In some areas, farmers have not been able to harvest for years. Many others lost their agricultural equipment to rampant looting during the war.

A nine-month aid suspension by the U.N. and the U.S. over widespread corruption in 2023 deepened the impact of the drought. With their coping mechanisms already exhausted by the war, many farming communities are resorting to eating wild berries and roots to survive.

At the beginning of this year, regional officials were warning of famine unless aid was urgently scaled up. The federal government in Addis Ababa accused them of politicizing the crisis, although its own ombudsman said in January it had verified the starvation deaths of 351 people in Tigray. The same agency reported another 44 hunger deaths in the neighboring Amhara region.

Thanks to the recent rains, the situation should improve once farmers can bring in the harvest, starting this month. And emergency grain is now reaching remote villages since aid deliveries were resumed in the first months of 2024. Yet the humanitarian response is plagued by funding shortfalls. So far, the U.N. has received just 21 percent of the $3.2 billion it needs to feed hungry people in Ethiopia in 2024.

Moreover, the western part of Tigray remains under the control of Amhara forces and is still cut off from aid deliveries. This area is known for producing sesame, a valuable cash crop, as well as for its deposits of gold. When the war broke out in November 2020, Amhara militia seized the region, claiming it was rightfully theirs. They forcibly evicted hundreds of thousands of Tigrayans in a brutal campaign characterized by massacres, sexual violence, torture and arbitrary detention, drawing condemnations of “ethnic cleansing” from the U.S. State Department.

DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF THE CONGO

Allied Democratic Forces jihadists are believed to have been responsible for an attack on multiple villages in the eastern DRC’s Ituri province on Tuesday that left at least 20 people dead. The victims were reportedly decapitated, which is ADF’s stock in trade.

EUROPE

RUSSIA

Russian President Vladimir Putin warned on Thursday that if, as expected, Western governments give Ukraine permission to use their long-range weapons to attack targets inside Russia freely, they will be “at war with Russia.” Leaving aside the question of whether or not he’s technically correct, this is a threat that on its face doesn’t have any teeth to it. I’ve lost track of the number of times Putin has suggested that the latest Western concession to Kyiv would fundamentally change the nature of the war in Ukraine, but suffice to say that if he actually wanted a direct shooting war with the West he’d have opted into it by now.

It’s unclear when the long-range permission will come, but the UK government has by some reports already decided to grant it and is simply waiting for the time to announce that. The Biden administration may be lagging a bit behind London, but probably not by much.

UKRAINE

In Ukraine, meanwhile, The New York Times reports on the dismal situation in the heavily threatened city of Pokrovsk:

Russian forces have stepped up their assault on the strategic Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk, cutting off water supplies and destroying a key overpass in a grim urban enclave already short on natural gas and electricity, Ukrainian officials said on Thursday.

Warning that Russian troops are now on the city’s doorstep, about five miles away, officials renewed calls for all residents to evacuate. The city’s population has dwindled from about 62,000 at the beginning of August to 18,000 people by Wednesday, local and regional authorities said.

AMERICAS

ORGANIZATION OF AMERICAN STATES

At Foreign Policy, CEPR’s Francesca Emanuele argues that the OAS’s stance on Gaza undermines the organization’s principles and threatens to weaken its cohesion:

On Oct. 7, 2023, OAS Secretary-General Luis Almagro condemned the killing of about 1,200 people in southern Israel by Hamas militants, labeling the attack as an act of terrorism and affirming that “Israel has the right to defend itself.”

Since then, as the death toll of Palestinians in Gaza has risen to more than 40,000 people, Almagro has said nothing about the need to protect the human rights of Palestinian civilians. He has been silent about the loss of thousands of Palestinian children’s lives, Israel’s siege of the Gaza Strip, the enclave’s worsening starvation, and reports of torture by Israeli forces against Palestinian prisoners. This stands in sharp contrast to his counterpart at the United Nations, António Guterres, who has also repeatedly called for an immediate cease-fire in Gaza.

Almagro’s exclusive support for Israel’s self-defense not only clashes with one of the OAS’s proclaimed principles of defending human rights. It also highlights a significant disconnect between the organization’s leadership and the voting positions held by the majority of its member countries. Of the three resolutions on Israel-Palestine considered at the U.N. General Assembly in the past 11 months—one for a humanitarian truce, another for a cease-fire, and a third backing Palestine’s bid for full U.N. membership—only three OAS nations opposed the first two, and two opposed the third. The United States was the only OAS member to oppose all three resolutions.

VENEZUELA

The US Treasury Department on Thursday blacklisted 16 Venezuelan officials in connection with July’s Venezuelan presidential election, and the alleged fraud involved in incumbent Nicolás Maduro’s heavily disputed victory, as well as the crackdown against opposition politicians that has ensued in its wake. According to AFP they “include senior figures in the National Electoral Council (CNE) and the Supreme Tribunal of Justice (TSJ)” who the department says “impeded a transparent electoral process and the release of accurate election results.”

MEXICO

Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said on Thursday that his judicial reform plan, which won approval in the Mexican Senate the previous day, had garnered enough support in state legislatures to become law. AMLO is pushing for the plan, which critics deride for introducing elections for all judicial offices in the country, to be entered in the government registry (which would officially make it law) on Sunday, one day before Mexico’s independence day.

UNITED STATES

Finally, Foreign Policy in Focus’s Warren Bello wonders why the “Global South” should care who wins November’s US presidential election:

In sum, what we have in contention on November 5 are two paradigms of empire. One is the old Democratic/Republican expansionist vision of empire that seeks to make the world safe for American capital and American hegemony.  The opposing view, that of Trump and JD Vance, his vice presidential pick, considers the empire overextended and proposes an “aggressive defensive” posture appropriate to a superpower in decline. The MAGA approach would disengage from what Trump has called “shithole countries”—meaning most of us in the Global South—and focus more on walling off the core of the empire, North America, from the outside world by radically restricting migration and trade, bringing prodigal American capital back, dispensing with what Trump considers the hypocritical exercise of extending foreign aid and exporting democracy, and abandoning with a vengeance all efforts to address the accelerating global climate crisis (preoccupation with which he considers a fetish of effete liberalism).

As far as the exercise of force is concerned, the MAGA approach would most likely be in the Israeli style of periodic unilateral strikes against selected enemies outside the wall to keep them off balance, without consulting any allies or giving a damn for whatever havoc they cause.

If these are what are on offer in the November 5 elections, then it would be foolish for us in the Global South to take sides since both paradigms are detrimental to our interests.