RUTHFULLY YOURS

Snapshots of a changing world:

~There she is, Miss Saudi Arabia:

Beauty season is in full swing and 30,000 camels have gathered for the second annual King Abdulaziz Camel Festival, the largest pageant in the Gulf.

Yes, indeed. One of the benefits of keeping all your womenfolk in head-to-toe body bags is that it frees up all the botox for your camel:

Twelve camels have been disqualified from Saudi Arabia’s annual camel beauty contest after receiving botulinum toxin injections to make their pouts look more alluring.

When it comes to camels, I don’t mind the Meg Ryan lips, but I draw the line at silicone humps. No word yet on whether this trend has spread to Saudi Arabia’s Most Beautiful Goat pageant.

~The Oscar nominations are out. Jorge Ramos complains there are no Latinos, and Constance Wu that there are no Asians. If it adds to the gaiety, as a Canadian, I’m outraged by the lack of Canadians, considering that all these “American” movies are filmed north of the border. Maybe the media can find a Saudi to complain that there are no camels.

Meanwhile, Scaramouche identifies a more basic problem with the Oscar itself: He’s a naked man, albeit glittering enough to see your reflection in – like Harvey Weinstein slathered in massage oil opening his hotel room door to Ashley Judd and demanding a rubdown.

~I heard this report on the BBC yesterday, and was profoundly depressed – not merely by the news story itself, but by the antiseptic way it was presented:

British mum Sally Evans had been worried about her teenage son, Thomas, as he was getting involved in petty crime. So when he converted to Islam and cleaned up his act she was relieved. However as she and her other son Micheal recount, they didn’t realise he was getting radicalised until it was way too late. We hear how Sally and Micheal coped when they found out Thomas had joined Islamist militant group al-Shabab.

Germany’s new law requires social media platforms, such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, to censor their users on behalf of the government. Social media companies are obliged to delete or block any online “criminal offenses” within 24 hours of receipt of a user complaint — regardless of whether the content is accurate or not.

Social media platforms now have the power to shape the form of current political and cultural discourse by deciding who will speak and what they will say.

Notice the ease with which the police chief mentioned that he had filed charges to silence a leading political opponent of the government. That is what authorities do in police states: Through censorship and criminal charges, they silence outspoken critics and political opponents of government policies, such as Beatrix von Storch, who has sharply criticized Chancellor Angela Merkel’s migration policies.

While such policies would doubtless have earned the German authorities many points with the old Stasi regime of East Germany, they more than likely contravene the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR) to which Germany is a party, as well as the case law of the European Court of Human Rights.

Germany’s new censorship law, which has introduced state censorship on social media platforms, came into effect on October 1, 2017. The new law requires social media platforms, such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, to censor their users on behalf of the German state. Social media companies are obliged to delete or block any online “criminal offenses” such as libel, slander, defamation or incitement, within 24 hours of receipt of a user complaint — regardless of whether the content is accurate or not. Social media companies are permitted seven days for more complicated cases. If they fail to do so, the German government can fine them up to 50 million euros for failing to comply with the law.

The new censorship law, however, was not fully enforced until January 1, 2018, in order to give the social media platforms time to prepare for their new role as the privatized thought police of the German state. Social media platforms now have the power to shape the form of current political and cultural discourse by deciding who will speak and what they will say.

“Operation Olive Branch,” the ironic code name the Turkish military has chosen for its incursion into northern Syria, has catered well to the Turkish psyche that craves shows of force of every possible flavor.

In practice, ironically, NATO member Turkey’s Operation Olive Branch targets the main ground force allies of its NATO ally, the U.S.

The area Erdogan targets is effectively home to most of Syria’s two million or so Kurds, who seek an autonomous entity that Turkey fears may further provoke separatist Kurdish sentiments among Turkey’s 10 million to 15 million Kurds.

In Turkey these days, there is every sign of collective hysteria in a once glorious nation that fell from grace, then longed for power and grandeur for nearly a century. Turks are dizzy with joy over their army’s incursion into Afrin, a Kurdish enclave in neighboring Syria.

It is almost a sin not to join the celebrations: “We are witnessing the lynching of anyone who dares to speak against it. Opposing the operation has become a death wish,” Nevsin Mengu, a prominent Turkish journalist, wrote in Sigma Turkey, an independent news outlet.

Leader and chief beneficiary of Harare’s “velvet coup” Emmerson Mnangagwa has made the right noises, wooing investors with budgetary reforms and promising democratic elections. As the path he must follow is both winding and treacherous, optimism must necessarily be guarded.

By the standards of modern Africa, indeed of the modern world, the Zimbabwean Army coup that overthrew Robert Mugabe in mid-November was unusual. For a start it was bloodless: the Army moved into the capital, Harare, disarmed Mugabe loyalists in the security forces, confined the President and his wife to a luxurious house arrest, and urged him to step down. It was also organised efficiently and discreetly, up to a point anyway: only the coup plotters seem to have known about it in Zimbabwe, but the Chinese government was informed in advance by the man who emerged soon afterwards as the new president. Apparently Beijing raised no serious objection. Above all, however, almost everyone involved in these revolutionary events, except perhaps Mugabe and his wife, “Gucci Grace”, was anxious that they should be scrupulously conducted in line with proper constitutional forms.

Mugabe’s eventual resignation—after a brief hitch in which he failed to deliver the key sentence in a televised speech—was purchased with guarantees that he would be allowed to remain living comfortably and un-prosecuted in one of his well-appointed residences. Mugabe’s former deputy, Emmerson Mnangagwa, back from a brief visit to Beijing, was duly sworn in as the new Zimbabwean president by a Supreme Court justice in red robes, and promptly began his acceptance speech by declaring proudly that Mugabe was and would always remain his leader and mentor. That greatly comforted the leaders of surrounding countries in the African Union who, being leaders, are highly disapproving of unconstitutional challenges such as tanks on their lawns.

So it was all very Westminster, right down to suave hypocrisy. Constitutionally it invited comparisons with Britain’s Glorious Revolution of 1688 in which the successful plotters had to turn two blind eyes to allow the King, James II, to “escape”, after which they were able to declare the throne vacant. And when Tory purists objected that the throne should be occupied not jointly by the revolutionary royals, the Dutchman William of Orange and his ex-Catholic Stuart wife Mary, but by James’s rightful heir, the lawyer-like reply was “a living man can have no heir”. Owing in part to such subtleties, 1688 gave Britain three hundred years of stable government and growing world power. We cannot quite expect Zimbabwe’s velvet coup to make the country an empire on which the sun never sets but it has a decent chance of fostering political stability and economic recovery that in turn may help restore democracy there.

Hezbollah is the most powerful terrorist organisation in the world. Yet Britain has proscribed only part of it: its military wing. This Thursday the MP Joan Ryan will lead a parliamentary debate aimed at designating the whole organisation, as the US, Canada and the Netherlands already do. Her chances are slim. The film Darkest Hour has reminded us of British ministers’ penchant for appeasement and, like Churchill, that is what she’s up against.

Hezbollah, the creation of Iran, emerged onto the world stage in Beirut in 1983, killing 241 US Marines and 58 French paratroopers in the most devastating terrorist attack before 9/11. Since then it has attacked in Latin America, Europe and the Middle East and planned strikes from Cyprus to Singapore. Last summer US authorities charged two Hezbollah terrorists with planning attacks in New York and Panama. Hezbollah is fighting to keep Assad in power in Syria and maintains an arsenal of 100,000 rockets in Lebanon, pointed at Israel.

During the campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan, Hezbollah was involved in Iranian-directed bombings that killed well over 1,000 British and US servicemen. Despite this, in Britain and elsewhere in Europe Hezbollah can freely raise funds for terrorism. Its supporters flaunt their assault rifle-emblazoned flags on our streets. They maintain sleeper cells in this country: planning, preparing and lying in wait for orders to attack.

When I worked for the Joint Intelligence Committee I monitored Hezbollah’s activities. I knew there was no division into peaceful and warlike elements. The regional states don’t buy it either; the Arab League designates the entire organisation. Even Hezbollah’s leaders don’t make any such pretence. In 2009 its deputy secretary-general confirmed that it was one unified organisation.

Nothing we’re saying is news to anyone who comes from these places.

People in Haiti are not under the impression that they’re living in a place that’s better than America. Or that its problems are purely coincidental. It’s only American lefties who get all worked up over it. The President of Uganda certainly isn’t in denial.

Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni on Tuesday hailed Donald Trump for speaking “frankly” to Africans, after the US president unleashed a storm by reportedly describing African nations as “sh*thole countries.”

“I love Trump because he speaks to Africans frankly. I don’t know if he was misquoted or whatever. He talks about Africans’ weaknesses frankly,” Museveni said in the capital Kampala to members of the East African Legislative Assembly (EALA).

No stranger to controversy, on Monday he described Uganda as a “pre-industrial society” and said he regretted removing the death sentence, saying the move had been “a recipe for chaos”.

This isn’t an endorsement of Museveni, but frankly some frank talk is long overdue. Diplomacy is overall a good thing. And that comes with discretion. But at some point, enough is really enough.

“The regime wants you to think that either there are no protests, or that the protests are solely about the economy. But I am not protesting the economy. Women are protesting the repressive Islamist laws. I am sick of Hijab, Sharia law and Sharia police. Women are sick of the Sharia police monitoring them constantly for what they wear, what they say, what they drink, where they go, and what kind of relationships they have”. – Leila, a young Iranian woman.

What now is the fate of these women? The history of the Islamist Republic of Iran shows us that arrested women are faced with atrocities such as rape, torture or execution. Some die in detention surreptitiously.

Feminists claim to be champions of women rights around the world. They argue that “universality” is a key component of their cause.

Perhaps it is worthwhile, though, to examine their nice slogans against reality.

Women took to the street recently in the front lines of protests in the Islamic Republic of Iran. The demands of the women were clear: Remove Sharia law, eliminate the obligatory hijab, improve the rights of women, and not to treat women as slaves and second-class citizens. Simple.

Many women demonstrated their resistance by bravely removing their hijab, thereby violating the Islamist law of the land. One photograph that has become a symbol of the protests on social media, is of an Iranian woman raising her fist in the air while she goes walks through tear gas. A video and pictures that also have become a symbol of the protests, show an unidentified woman removing her hijab, placing it on a stick and waving it. She was reportedly arrested shortly after her act of defiance.

In a video, a woman protesting in the streets is seen saying, “You raised your fists and ruined our lives. Now we raise our fists. Be men, join us. I, as a woman, will stand in front and protect you. Come represent your country.” Another woman, in a crime punishable by death, courageously chanted against the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Her chants encouraged and prompted men behind her to chant also. These women can be labeled true heroes.