With friends like these: Abusive frenemies & US West Asia policy

The US regime is known to be a bad decision-maker and always supports the wrong party, with its tendency towards promoting tyrannical rulers, no matter how badly Washington’s credibility is undermined.

Stay with us for an analysis in this regard for the ‘Antiwar’ site by retired American Major Danny Sjursen, who served combat tours with reconnaissance units in Iraq and Afghanistan and later taught history at his alma mater, West Point.

The article is titled: “With Friends Like These: Abusive Frenemies & US Mideast Policy”.

Pop quiz: Name the two largest (by far) recipients of US foreign military aid and one other country which recently negotiated the biggest American arms sale deal in world history.

Let’s call them the Big three (beneficiaries of largesse, that is). Need some hints? One is ruled by a dictatorial general who came to power in a coup and subsequently ordered the slaughter of some one thousand civilian protesters. Another regularly defies international law, has annexed conquered territory, and boasts a military that has shot to death 250 civilian protesters over just the last year. Finally, the last country fatally starved upwards of 85,000 foreign children and still decapitates women for the crimes of "witchcraft" and "sorcery."

By the way, all three are rather tight with old Uncle Sam – regularly described as "partners" in Washington. Which reminds me of the old saying: with friends like these, who needs…well, you get it.

Are you ready for the (not-so) shocking answers?

So, the military dictatorship is Egypt – recipient of $1.3 billion in military aid per annum.

The regime that conquered and annexed adjacent territory is Israel – the recipient of some $3.1 billion in military aid each year; and, ironically, the state that US leaders regularly (if incorrectly) tout as the “only democracy in the West Asia-North Africa region.”

And the charming, child-starving, woman-beheading regime: that’s the absolute monarchy of Saudi Arabia – future owner (maybe) of a record $110 billion in US military equipment. Now that’s a proud lot!

By backing this core of abusive regimes, Washington only rewards and encourages bad behavior. If the US didn’t cut funding when Egypt gunned down protesters, and Trump praises its President General Sisi as doing a "tremendous job," what’s to stop repeat human rights abuses?

If Washington barely blushed when the Saudis killed and dismembered a Washington Post journalist, and refuses to shutdown the Saudi terror war in Yemen, why should the Heir Apparent Mohamed bin Salman (MBS) – and Jared Kushner bro – behave? And, if Egypt and Saudi Arabia can commit crimes at will, can the US really criticize Chinese human rights abuses of dissidents or Uighur Muslims?

Finally, if the US unilaterally moves (as it did) its embassy to a Jerusalem (actually the occupied Islamic city of Bayt al-Moqaddas) and then recognize Israel’s illegal annexation of the Syria’s Golan Heights, how can Washington protest Russia’s interference in Eastern Ukraine?

Now there are different ways to view these staggering disconnects – perhaps even cognitive dissonances – between Washington’s public values and its (not-quite) private policy. Some view it as proof of US hypocrisy in the world – and it is that. Others see this as the realist nature of doing business in a complex, nasty world – perhaps this is also true; thought it rests on the assumption that the US should be meddling in the region to begin with, which seems to have less and less efficacy. Finally, another group of US imperial apologists trade in what-about-ism – pointing to (ostensibly) worse regimes in the Mideast to mitigate the ugly nature of America’s partners.

On and on the arguments – which are as old as the US republic itself – go as each side retreats into its comfortable ideological corner. Still, as a former devotee and servant of the American empire, and a reformed/concerned citizen, let me propose one rarely noted addition: that backing authoritarian and/or abusive regimes often proves both ethically and strategically destructive to US standing in the world, and, by extension, to the safety of otherwise disengaged American civilians.

Values, so to speak, cannot be separated from and are inextricably linked to strategy. As such, over the last 18 years the combination of American military hyper-interventionism and nefarious alliances has been utterly counterproductive – destabilizing the region, emboldening terrorists, and endangering the Homeland.

And make no mistake: libertarians, "realists," progressives, and (believe it or not) conventional national security hawks, should ultimately agree with this proposition; if, that is, each could set aside partisan tribal affiliations and do what’s right for the country they purport to love. So don’t bet on it.

Nevertheless, consider an historical analogy. In the Cold War – for which, oddly, many hawkish observers seem to pine – the United States set aside its values of liberty and democracy in favor of reflexive anti-communism. Thus, Washington would back, aid, fund, or place in power right-wing dictatorial regimes that abused their citizens and (sometimes) regional neighbors. The priority became promoting capitalism and (superficially) decreasing the zero-sum global influence of the Soviet Union.

All this, of course, was based on the false assumption that worldwide communism was a monolith intent on world conquest. It wasn’t. The major communist powers – think Russia and China – went to war with each other just as often.

Worse still, the outcome of these odious partnerships was usually “blowback”– unintended consequences that left the world a more unstable and dangerous place. CIA-instigated coups and surreptitious military backing of autocracies increased the amount of intra-state and regional wars, ethnic cleansing, and terrorism worldwide – from South America to Africa and Asia. In North Africa and Southwest Asia in particular, the US backed (and in a sense birthed) insurgencies and terrorists, who, conveniently, were also anti-communist and anti-Soviet. Of course, once victorious, such groups turned their ire onto the United States and the rest, so they say, is history.

In the 21st century, the US strategic paradigm has shifted but remains equally obtuse and deficient. In place of anti-communism, the new enemy "monolith" is Islam. And, true to its antiquated Cold War-thinking, Washington now backs anyone in the region that purports to fight so-called "terror."

See there’s no room for nuance, for complexity, for parsing out the differences between local nationalists and so-called global jihadists, internal and international threats, or manageable versus existential threats to the US. So here we go again. The answer to all vaguely challenges is always the same: US military intervention, raids, or foreign training; plus American support and arms for faintly anti-terror (but abusive) regimes.

The formula has never worked as designed – then or now. Cast aside delusions: there will be "Blowback" 2.0 as a result of American support for the Big Three and other vile regimes. It will go something like this: backing authoritarian Arab or apartheid Israeli leaders will radicalize regional (and international) Muslims against not only their governments but the West, more generally. Civilians will be wantonly slaughtered in the ensuing local wars – further substantiating the so-called Jihadist narrative and grievances. Global terror attacks will rise – as they have since 9/11 – and some of these horrific events will target the West, mainly the US In response to the ensuing public outrage, Washington will feel obliged (and pleased anyway) to militarily intervene and throw more cash at local strongmen "partners." Which, ever so absurdly, serves to repeat the whole cycle of forever war.

Where does it all end? Violence begets violence. More arms don’t decrease conflict – they fuel it. Still the lumbering American hegemon either never learns, or, more disturbingly, craves a system that feeds the military-industrial corporate beast.

Hypocrisy can be contra-strategic in addition to ethically unseemly. Throwing arms, cash, support, and the American name behind a military dictatorship, a theocratic absolute monarchy, and a corrupt, apartheid-like government, shames our nation and subverts safety. It is as indefensible as it is counterproductive. That Washington is able to do so demonstrates that either the public is utterly apathetic or completely powerless in the face of the corporate arm’s industry.

It’s hard to say which is worse: a people who don’t care about their broken democracy or one that hardly exists at all.

Mercenary Arabs giving Quds lands to Zionists

Palestine's orthodox bishop:

Ramallah, Oct 21, IRNA - Attallah Hanna, the orthodox bishop of Palestine, reiterated that some of the personalities and Arab countries in an evident treason would sell the Palestinian lands in Quds to the Zionists and transfer their property to settlers in evident treason.

The suspicious transactions of the Aqaba Darwish lands in the occupied Quds and the transfer of ownership to the Zionist settlers in early October once again raised the Palestinian land crisis, a subject many people suspect because the Palestinians are neglecting and selling their lands to Jews.

Hanna, in a exclusive interview with the Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA), called the Palestinian situation in Quds critical, saying that Arab countries are involved in crisis of Palestine's real estate and lands in Guds.

The orthodox bishop of Palestine said this matter was a very suspicious thing and said that there are some mercenaries, dealers and traitors who have sold themselves and their faith and identity to a handful of dollars.

He added that these mercenaries and traitors had existed from 1948 and 1967 and that they always played a devastating role in the city of Quds.

Hanna described the situation in Quds for what happened in previous years and the sale of Palestinian homes and lands as disaster, saying, “The person who comes to this holy city sees that there are many houses and buildings on the roof of which the flags of the occupation regime are installed.'

The religious leader of Palestine, pointing out that the process of transferring ownership of this real estate by some well-known people who later escaped to the United States, Australia, Europe and other countries, noted that some of these people will continue their works.

Legitimate criticism of Israel is not anti-Semitism

By Ameen Izzadeen

When Israel’s Parliament, the Knesset, in the wee hours of July 19 passed a controversial law, declaring that Israel was exclusively a Jewish state, the passage of the bill made headlines but failed to generate much worldwide condemnation.

In any other democracy, including the United States, a bid to enact similar legislation will draw widespread denunciation. The new Israeli law undermines human dignity and upholds the superiority of Jewish citizens over its other citizens. It has been given the enshrined status of a Basic Law, underlying the principles of the State. Therefore, it cannot easily be repealed. The new law recognises “Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people” and reduces its Arab and Druze people to second class citizens.

Imagine if Sri Lanka’s parliament passes a law stating that Sri Lanka is exclusively a country for the Sinhala Buddhists. Within minutes, international condemnations will pour in. The United States and the European Union will withdraw trade concessions and warn of tough measures if the government fails to reverse the law. Sanctions will be slapped. Sri Lanka will be overnight reduced to a pariah state.

But Israel is often treated with kid gloves and allowed to get away scot free. It can kill a thousand unarmed Palestinians in one go and still strut about on the world stage, with the US patting it on the back and hailing it as ‘the only democracy in the Middle East’. When the abominable law was passed, there was not even a whimper of protest from the Donald Trump administration. Perhaps, Israel was emboldened by Trump’s move to recognise the whole of Jerusalem as the undisputed capital of Israel – a move that killed Palestinian peace hopes.

Expressing concern, the European Union issued a weak statement that hardly stood up to the depravity of the racist law. Much weaker was the statement the United Nations Secretary General’s office issued. "We reaffirm the United Nations' respect for the sovereignty of states to define their constitutional character while emphasizing the need for all states to adhere to universal human rights principles, including the protection of minority rights," said UNSG’s spokesman Farhan Haq.

The passage of the bill, on the contrary, warrants international isolation of Israel – just as South Africa had been during the apartheid years -- and the reintroduction of the 1975 United Nations General Assembly Resolution which asserted that Zionism was a form of racism. The resolution had the support of the Non-Aligned Movement. In December 1991, with the Cold War coming to an end, the resolution was revoked, under pressure from and in awe of the US, which was emerging as the sole superpower or, sadly, as the global bully,
unchallenged by any rival.

Israel’s Arabs and the Druze communities have challenged the law in the Israeli Supreme Court, but Zionist hardliners, including Premier Benjamin Netanyahu and Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked, have warned of an earthquake if the courts were to uphold the petitions.

Against this backdrop, a major controversy has erupted in the British Labour Party, with party leader Jeremy Corbyn, who has spoken in support of the Palestinians’ freedom cause, being slapped the anti-Semite label.

Corbyn’s problems began in April 2016 when Labour MP Naz Shah criticised Israel on social media posts and endorsed a suggestion that Israel be sent to the US. This was followed by former London mayor Ken Livingstone’s defence of Shah during a radio show. He added to the controversy by saying Hitler supported Zionism. He later resigned from the Labour Party, following his suspension.

These incidents and criticism of Israeli by several Labour activists saw Corbyn being accused of incompetence in dealing with anti-Semitism. In March this year, Jewish community leaders published an open letter accusing him of “siding with anti-Semites”. Although Corbyn had clarified matters saying he did not and would not support anti-Semitism, he remains vilified in the rightwing media. This is mainly because, Corbyn, in the true spirit of the traditional Labour, has been supporting the Palestinian cause, opposing Britain’s urge to bomb Syria and, domestically, pushing for radical socialist reforms aimed at uplifting the living standards of the working class.

Last month, amidst growing criticism, the Labour Party accepted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition of anti-Semitism in a bid to put the controversy to rest once and for all, but rightly did not agree to a stipulation which said criticism of Israel could be deemed anti-Semitism. The Labour Party argued that legitimate criticism of Israel could not be anti-Semitic.

Despite this principled stance, a section of the party wants Corbyn ousted. They are the rightwing members – the so-called Blairites or supporters of former Prime Minister Tony Blair who lied to the British people to launch the illegal war on Iraq in 2003, and who as the international community’s Middle East peace envoy did nothing but making millions of dollars through his private consultancy business targeted at the region’s despots.

The huge storm the criticism of Israel has created in British politics and the mild condemnations Israel’s apartheid law has evoked only underline the double standards the world has adopted in eliminating racism. The International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination reaffirms in its preamble that discrimination between human beings on the grounds of race, colour or ethnic origin is an obstacle to friendly and peaceful relations among nations and is capable of disturbing peace and security among peoples and the harmony of persons living side by side even within one and the same State.

In a related controversy, Britain’s former foreign minister Boris Johnson has drawn criticism from Prime Minister Theresa May and rights groups for saying that Muslim women who wear burqas or Niqab look like letter boxes or bank robbers. May, while scolding him, said women should be free to wear the burqa if they chose to do so.

But this appears to be a rare case of condemnation of Islamophobia defined as “dislike of or prejudice against Islam or Muslims”. Often, in the name of freedom of expression, any mockery of Islam and its prophet is allowed in the so-called liberal and enlightened West, where academics and researchers are still prevented from questioning the Zionists’ narration of the Holocaust or Israel’s right to rob the Palestinians’ land.

True, anti-Semitism is bad and needs to be condemned in the strongest possible terms. The Holocaust is remembered not to allow Israel to oppress Palestinians and occupy their lands in violation of international law, but to prevent another Holocaust, irrespective of who the victims are. Sadly, the Palestinians are subjected to a subtle Holocaust, by Israel with the explicit support of the US.

If the strongest condemnation is reserved only in defence of Jewish dignity and is not forthcoming with similar vigour when other ethnic groups and religious communities are ridiculed and their dignity tarnished, then those who are issuing such condemnation are practising the worst form of racism.

Armed Struggle Only Solution to End Palestinian Plight

The plight of the Palestinians knows no end. Not a day passes when they are not targeted by the usurpers of their homeland, whether in besieged Gaza, whether in the West Bank, or whether in the occupied Islamic holy city of Bayt al-Moqaddas.

They are killed like sitting ducks by the Zionist soldiers or the Jewish settlers streaming in illegally from various parts of the world to seize the lands of the Palestinians and to practice their skills with newly acquired rifles by taking potshots at the helpless men, women, and children. 

And if the Palestinians dare to defend themselves, they are branded ‘terrorists’ and denounced as ‘heartless brutes’, with the western media joining the Zionists to highlight ‘violent crimes’ against the ‘peaceful’ and ‘peace-loving’ Israelis. 

The UN, especially its Security Council, looks the other way, while the regimes ruling the Arab states have no interest, other than lip service, for the chronic question of Palestine.
This indifference has emboldened the Zionists to trespass with impunity on the sacred sites of Islam in the usurped land, as was evident the other day when soldiers and the so-called settlers joined together to desecrate the holy precincts of al-Aqsa Mosque.

Day before yesterday, Palestinian worshippers gathering for the weekly Friday congregational prayer at Islam’s third holiest site were barred by the Zionist soldiers, who closed the gates and fired teargas shells and live ammunition at the helpless protestors, accusing them of pelting stones and throwing combustibles.

It is obvious that no true Muslim will resort to such violence at a holy site and if there were such incidents as claimed by the Zionists then this should be the dirty work of the illegal Jewish settlers clamouring for destruction of the sacred Islamic precincts and the building of a temple in its place.

Not an eyebrow was raised by Arab reactionary regimes at the latest sacrilege in Occupied Bayt al-Moqaddas, or the unabated killing of peaceful protestors in Gaza by the Zionists, while the Saudis and Emiratis continued to shed Muslim blood in Yemen while labelling all sorts of wild accusations against the Islamic Republic of Iran for its defence of the oppressed and the downtrodden.

It is time for the Palestinians to realize that mere protests in Bayt al-Moqaddas, stone-throwing at the heavily armed Zionists in the West Bank, and combustible kites coupled with a few crude rockets fired at the occupiers of their homelands from Gaza, although commendable acts, are not enough to scare their enemies, let alone drive them away from the usurped land of Palestine.

They should take a leaf from the uncompromising spirit and innovative methods of Lebanon’s legendry anti-terrorist movement, the Hezbollah, or the indomitable heroism of Yemen’s popular Ansarallah Movement against invaders possessing state-of-the-art military technology.

In other words, only a well-organized armed struggle with asymmetric forms of modern warfare, including guided missiles and remote-controlled radar-evading drones, is the only solution to redress their plight that requires further sacrifices in view of the savage racist and terroristic nature of Israel, which eventually will be.

This technology, in addition to being available on the international market, can be assembled through accessible data on the websites, and there is no shortage of helping hands. All it needs is ingenuity by the Palestinians, as the Yemenis have shown with complete trust in Divine Assistance and full confidence in their own abilities.

It is certainly no crime nor terrorism for an oppressed, occupied and usurped people, to acquire whatever forms of defence equipment that is possible to procure through any means in order to protect their life, their dignity, their land, their families, their faith and their heritage.
The important point, however, is to be on guard against pressures, threats, and deception of both the implacable foes like the US, Britain, and France; and those feigning to be friends such as the UN, the Saudis, the Emiratis, the Qataris, the Kuwaitis, and the Egyptians.

In other words, unless the Palestinians resist and refuse with firm conviction any of those much-tried useless methods of talks, negotiations, and mediation that have yielded no results over the past seven decades, their situation will never change, let alone their steady slide into not just second or third class citizens, but slaves of the Zionists in their own ancestral land. 

Fortune favours the brave, and any laxity will be a costly lapse that might delay the march of the forces gathering in the vicinity of Palestine in scores of thousands for liberation of Islam’s former qibla.

-Kayhan Int’l 

Why House of Saud fears/hates Iran

Saudi spy chief Prince Bandar bin Sultan 

By Finian Cunningham

In countless media interviews and statements, it is clear that the Saudi rulers have an abiding obsession with Iran - an obsession that betrays an intense fear and hatred.

Senior members of the House of Saud have let it be known that their real focus in Syria, for example, is not primarily the government of Bashar al Assad, and their desire for regime change, but rather the main target is Assad's closest regional ally - Iran.

Everywhere in the region, the paranoid House of Saud sees the hand of Iran. In an oped piece in the New York Times in December, the Saudi Ambassador to Britain, Mohammed bin Nawaf bin Abdulaziz al Saud, accused Iran without any evidence, saying that it "has financed and trained militias in Iraq, Hezbollah terrorists in Lebanon and militants in Yemen and Bahrain." This is, of course, ironically crass, coming from the House of Saud, which is provably the sponsor of terrorists or terror regimes, such as the al-Qaeda-linked Jabhat al Nusra in Syria, ISIS in Iraq and the ruling Al Khalifa despots in Bahrain.

But the main point here is that Saudi Arabia, or at least its rulers led by the aging King Abdullah, is transfixed in animosity towards Iran. That obsession is driven by a visceral hatred. Why?

The short answer is self-preservation. But there are at least three specific reasons for this hatred, and they are inter-related.

The first is religious. The official religion of Saudi Arabia is Wahhabism. In this extreme deformation, Shia Islam is viewed as an intolerable apostasy. It is not just Shia that are perceived as "infidels". All forms of Muslim faith, including Sunnis, as well as Christians and other religions, that are deemed to not conform with the Wahhabi fundamentalist doctrine are considered infidels and are subject to merciless attack, even to the point of death.

In the warped Wahhabi belief Shia Muslims are the worst kind of "infidels". This explains why Shia and the closely related Alawite are subject to the most barbaric forms of violence in the Syrian conflict, where the anti-Syrian government militants are mainly driven by Wahhabi ideology - also known as Takfiris.

For historical reasons, Iran is the centre of Shia Islam in the region and the world. Iran therefore qualifies as the centre of Saudi hatred.

The second factor goes back to the Islamic Revolution in Iran. When the Iranian revolution succeeded in 1979 to kick out the US-backed dictator, Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi, that turmoil threatened all autocratic rulers in the region from the inspirational impact it conveyed to other populations to rise up against oppressive regimes. The House of Saud felt particularly threatened. That is why the Saudi rulers responded immediately by setting up the Persian Gulf Defense pact in the early 1980s, which comprised the other monarchies of Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Oman.

Indeed, the Saudi rulers' hatred of Iran has only intensified since the Iranian revolution. The House of Saud views Iran's demonstratively more democratic credentials as a mortal threat to its despotism. The more Iran's political influence grows in the region, the more the Saudi rulers fear an existential threat. This explains the paranoid mindset of the House of Saud towards Iran, as expressed by its ambassador to Britain cited above, which suspects that Iranian subversion is everywhere, even when it isn't.

The third factor is more mundane, but perhaps is the ultimate concern for the House of Saud - the vital issue of oil and gas economics.

Of the 12 OPEC member states, the top three producers are Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Iran. Of most significance is Iran's enormous gas wealth, which is as yet hardly tapped as an economic resource. Natural gas is the fuel of the future for the next century, being more efficient as an energy source in terms of transport via pipelines and in terms of calorific output. Environmentally, natural gas is a much cleaner fuel than oil, giving off much less harmful byproducts from combustion.

Iran is reckoned to hold the largest known reserves of natural gas on Earth in its Pars Field. If Iran's international relations were normalized by the removal of trade sanctions, the country stands to become an even more formidable global source of energy. Of particular strategic importance is the European market for which Iran would be a top supplier, along with Russia (a non-OPEC member).

This development, which has an inexorable trajectory owing to irrepressible human need, is seen by the House of Saud as an imperative threat. Saudi Arabia is endowed with oil, but much less so with natural gas. Saudi strategic value as an energy producer is therefore on the wane, whereas Iran is bound to grow owing to its vast natural gas deposits.

At all costs, from the Saudi point of view, Iran must be prevented from developing its potential energy wealth. Saudi Arabia is living on borrowed time. Its oil reserves will eventually be surpassed by Iran's gas riches. Already, the Saudi rulers are sitting atop a demographic time bomb of an increasing and unemployed youth population, which so far has been placated with state fiscal handouts from its oil exports. The days for those handouts are numbered.

What will happen when Saudi's oil economy goes into demise, and is sidelined with the new global energy economy of natural gas in which Iran is a leading nation? That will translate into greater Iranian political influence in the region and a diminishing hold on power by the sclerotic Saudi autocrats.

The political and economic fate of the United States is closely tied to the Saudi petrodollar economy and that of the other Persian Gulf monarchies. The bankrupt American dollar is already largely on life-support due to the Saudis and their related sheikhdoms dealing in the commodity with the greenback and funneling profits into the US Treasury, propping up the dollar.

If Iran were to develop to its full potential, trade in oil and more importantly natural gas would most likely be denominated in Euro, Ruble, Yen or Yuan. That is a doomsday scenario for the US dollar and its long overdue collapse.

Ultimately, Washington shares the intense antipathy of the House of Saud towards Iran's unfettered political and economic freedom. Not for arcane Wahhabi reasons, but for vital economic self-preservation. Hence, the sharp rebuke from Washington this week when a French business delegation visited Iran to explore possible partnerships. US Secretary of State John Kerry reportedly phoned his French counterpart Laurent Fabius in a panic to protest at the delegation. The last thing the Americans want to see is Iran doing independent trade with Europe without the dollar.

The Saudi despots and their American patrons cannot afford Iranian development as an economic power. That directly threatens the House of Saud, politically and economically, which in turn threatens Washington to its very core.

For all of the above reasons, the Saudi rulers fear Iran above all else. The Zionist Israeli regime and its desecration of Islamic sanctities in East Al Quds (Jerusalem) does not even raise a single heckle for the Al Saud - the self-proclaimed Custodians of Islam. Their only fear and hatred are expressed in waging covert war against Iran and its allies, including Syria and the people of Bahrain, Iraq, Yemen and anywhere else. They want Iran contained, thwarted, sanctioned at all costs, and Washington by geopolitical necessity is on the Saudi side.

But as the tectonic plates of global energy needs shift inexorably over the coming decades, the Saudi rulers and their American patrons will find themselves on the losing side. In a very real way, this spells death to al Saud and the American Empire. Hence, the hatred.

Finian Cunningham (born 1963) has written extensively on international affairs, with articles published in several languages. He is a Master’s graduate in Agricultural Chemistry and worked as a scientific editor for the Royal Society of Chemistry, Cambridge, England, before pursuing a career in journalism. He is also a musician and songwriter. For nearly 20 years, he worked as an editor and writer in major news media organisations, including The Mirror, Irish Times and Independent. Originally from Belfast, Ireland, he is now located in East Africa as a freelance journalist, where he is writing a book on Bahrain and the Arab Spring, based on eyewitness experience working in the Persian Gulf as an editor of a business magazine and subsequently as a freelance news correspondent. The author was deported from Bahrain in June 2011 because of his critical journalism in which he highlighted systematic human rights violations by regime forces. He is now a columnist on international politics for Press TV and the Strategic Culture Foundation.