Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman’s recent televised statement repudiating normalization with Israel in the absence of Palestinian statehood has generated a lot of interest. Perhaps it is, as some think, a cognition that Israel is beyond the pale even for the notorious MBS and that he has bowed to domestic and international pressure to distance himself from his talk about normalization.
And since few believe that Palestinian statehood is in the cards, the logical conclusion is that normalization isn’t either. Israel’s alleged aggression against Lebanon and Syria, two states at war with Israel since 1948, has been cited as an impediment to normalization.
There is an alternative take on MBS’s latest pirouette. It goes something like this:
Up until quite recently, MBS was eager to downplay the Palestinian dimension of normalization. While Secretary of State Antony Blinken was telling the Israelis that there had to be a “credible” pathway toward Palestinian independence, MBS wished to dispense with standard of credibility, and to propose to the Israeli and U.S. governments that the threshold for normalization be some sort of undefined process, regardless of its credibility.
Meanwhile, he spoke publicly and privately about his continued interest in normalization. So, the question is, which is the “real” MBS? The one who wanted to water down the precondition of a statehood negotiations, or the one who just made a speech on television insisting on independence before normalization?
This is an awkward question given his tendency to flip flop. On Iran, Yemen, Lebanon — whose prime minister MBS had kidnapped in 2017 — the Biden administration, allocation of resources to flagship projects, and other less dramatic issues, he has proven to be a mercurial decision maker. Where he winds up and the “stickiness” of his decisions is difficult to determine. It would not be at all surprising, therefore, if the condition of Palestinian independence as an a priori requirement for normalization was rolled back when the heat died down.
Steven Simon is the visiting professor of practice in Middle Eastern studies at the Jackson School of International Relations, University of Washington, and Senior Research Fellow at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft. Previously, he was the Robert E. Wilhelm Fellow in International Affairs at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He served as the National Security Council senior director for counterterrorism in the Clinton White House and for the Middle East and North Africa in the Obama White House. He is the author of "Grand Delusion: The Rise and Fall of American Ambition in the Middle East" (2023).
On Monday, Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp owner Meta said that it was going to ban a number of Russian state media outlets, including RT (formerly Russia Today).
“After careful consideration, we expanded our ongoing enforcement against Russian state media outlets: Rossiya Segodnya, RT and other related entities are now banned from our apps globally for foreign interference activity,” Meta said in a statement.
This occurs just days after the Biden administration announced sanctions against RT. United States Secretary of State, Antony Blinken said that Russian media entities “are no longer merely fire hoses of Russian propaganda and disinformation. They are engaged in covert influence activities aimed at undermining American elections and democracies, functioning like a de facto arm of Russia’s intelligence apparatus.”
In its own statement, the State Department said “The United States supports the free flow of information. We are not taking action against these entities and individuals for the content of their reporting, or even the disinformation they create and spread publicly. We are taking action against them for their covert influence activities.”
Those covert activities, the agency charged, include RT employees allegedly working with Russian intelligence services to influence the election in Moldova, as well as to crowdfund weapons and supplies for the Russian military in Ukraine, among other activities.
Earlier this month the Department of Justice announced the seizure of 32 web domains it said were linked to the Russian government-directed foreign malign influence campaigns in violation of U.S. money laundering and criminal trademark laws. Two former employees of RT were indicted for their links to a U.S. media platform designed to covertly spread Russian disinformation via American influencers, according to the DOJ.
Despite Meta chief Mark Zuckerberg’s recent lamentations over what he called government pressure to censor posts relating to the pandemic during the COVID era, he is likely still smarting from two previous presidential election cycles in which Facebook was accused of not doing enough to manage Russian bots and misinformation (a problem that has been hotly debated for its actual impact on the elections).
Meanwhile, during an interview with MSNBC on Tuesday, Hillary Clinton was asked whether the U.S. government was doing enough to combat the kind of Kremlin-directed propaganda cited in the recent indictments. She suggested that government censorship was also necessary to combat Russian misinformation, even positing that Americans might be criminally charged for proliferating it.
“I also think there are Americans who are engaged in this kind of propaganda,” she said. “And whether they should be civilly or even in some cases criminally charged is something that would be a better deterrence, because the Russians are unlikely, except in a very few cases, to ever stand trial in the United States.”
The Quincy Institute’s Marcus Stanley pointed out the ironies last week in a report about the House passing an authorization for $1.6 billion for a program that would allow the U.S. government to pursue its own potentially covert information operations via foreign media and civil society sources to combat Chinese “malign influence” globally.
Stanley points out that in addition to potential foreign blowback from such legislation, “another problem raised by the proposed legislation is the possibility that anti-Chinese propaganda financed by this program will flow back into the American media space and influence American audiences, without any disclosure of its initial source of funding.”
Washington is more than happy to participate in covert message management, all while Antony Blinken claims that aggressive moves against Russian media entities are “shining a bright light on what the Kremlin is trying to do under the cover of darkness.”
In other Ukraine war news this week:
The New York Timesreported on Tuesday that Moscow’s troops have been engaging in a counter-offensive in Kursk, reclaiming a few villages and threatening Ukraine’s ability to hold onto the territory it has seized. At the same time, Russian soldiers in Ukraine have continued advancing on the eastern Ukraine city of Pokrovsk, which is a strategic hub for Ukraine’s forces, and if lost would greatly impact Kyiv’s ability to move men and supplies to the front and take away a key buffer for central Ukraine. This comes after Putin ordered all Kursk territory to be returned to Russia by October first.
The number of Ukrainians and Russians killed or wounded has reached around one million according to the Wall Street Journal. A Ukrainian estimate placed Ukrainian deaths at 80,000 and wounded at 400,000. Russian casualties are estimated to be as high as 600,000 dead and wounded. This staggering number is bound to have long-term effects on both nations, especially as Russia and Ukraine have seen population declines in recent years.
As Western powers discuss the possibility of allowing Ukraine to send long-range missiles further into Russian territory, Vyacheslav Volodin, speaker of Russia’s lower house of parliament affirmed that such an action would be extremely antagonistic. According to Reuters, Volodin said “What the European Parliament is calling for leads to a world war using nuclear weapons," on Telegram.
State Department spokesman Matthew Miller was asked whether the Biden Administration would be announcing anything regarding White House approval for the use of American-made long-range missiles in attacks deep inside of Russia. Miller said no. When asked if the administration felt there was an urgency for a decision soon, given Ukraine’s need to improve its position on the battlefield, Miller responded by saying the administration wants to “make sure that with everything that we provide them there’s a strategic rationale for doing so.”
“There is no one capability that ultimately, by itself, is the magic wand that is decisive in this conflict,” he added. “There are a number of different capabilities that taken together can help Ukraine win this war, and that’s what we continue to provide them, and we will continue to assess whether there are additional capabilities, additional tactics, additional techniques that we ought to provide to them. And when we assess that it is in their interest and the interests of the United States to do so, we’ll do so.”
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Two women inspect the bodies of the Sabra and Shatila massacre in this file photo taken on September 18,1982 in the third day after massacre. REUTERS/Jamal Saidi JS
After nearly a year of U.S. presidential frustration with Israel’s conduct of its war in Gaza, it seems appropriate to recall another time when Israel defied Washington in another bloody conflict in which Palestinians were the principal victims.
This week marks the 42nd anniversary of the massacres in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps in West Beirut carried out by the Israel-backed Christian Phalangist militia. Estimates of the number of Palestinian and Lebanese slaughtered during the roughly 36-hour rampage range from 700 at the very low end to more than 3,000 — almost all of them civilians; the vast majority women, children and elderly.
They had been left behind after the evacuation of fighters from the Palestine Liberation Organization from Beirut the previous month as part of a U.S.-brokered ceasefire to end Israel’s seven-week siege of the Lebanese capital. The accord was predicated in part on an exchange of notes between the U.S. and Lebanon (and conveyed to the PLO) under which Washington promised to provide “appropriate security guarantees” to “law-abiding Palestinian non-combatants remaining in Beirut.”
Israel had invaded Lebanon on June 6, 1982 purportedly in retaliation for the attempted assassination of its ambassador in London (although the actual perpetrator hailed from the anti-PLO Abu Nidal Group) and alleged cross-border PLO attacks.
Israel’s aims, which were championed within a divided Reagan administration by Secretary of State Alexander Haig, were ambitious, as one historian put it: “destroying the PLO, expelling Syria’s forces [from Lebanon], buttressing Christian rule, and extracting a peace treaty from the Lebanese government.”
Meeting little resistance, the IDF under Defense Minister Ariel Sharon sped up the coast all the way to the outskirts of Beirut, which they hammered with artillery and airstrikes until an appalled (and no doubt deeply frustrated) President Reagan intervened directly with Prime Minister Menachem Begin. More than 5,000 people were reportedly killed during the siege, most of them civilians.
Under the subsequent ceasefire terms, a multinational force of U.S., French, British, and Italian soldiers was deployed to Beirut to oversee the evacuation of the PLO leadership and about 11,000 of its fighters to third countries and to ensure that the remaining civilian Palestinian population was kept safe for at least 30 days. Within days of the departure of the last PLO fighter, however, Washington withdrew its contingent.
Four days later, on September 14, things began going south when Lebanon’s President-elect, the Phalangist leader Bashir Gemayel was assassinated in a bombing, presumably carried out by Syrian agents. In violation of the U.S.-negotiated ceasefire terms and citing the need to ”keep the peace,” the IDF moved forces into West Beirut, including the area around the two refugee camps, on September 15.
The Reagan administration reacted with anger. In a meeting with the Israeli ambassador in Washington, Deputy Secretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger demanded an immediate withdrawal by the IDF. “We appear to some to be the victim of deliberate deception by Israel,” he charged, according to memos declassified by the Israeli State Archives.
But Israel didn’t comply.
“On the night of September 16, 1982, my younger brother and I were baffled,” recalled Columbia University historian Rashid Khalidi seven years ago, “as we watched dozens of Israeli flares floating down in complete silence over the southern reaches of Beirut, for what seemed like an eternity.”
"What we had seen the night before became clear when we met two American journalists on September 17. … We found out from them that the Israeli army had used flares the previous night in order to light the way for the right-wing Lebanese militias whom the Israelis sent into Sabra and Shatila."
On that same day in a meeting in Tel Aviv, when U.S. Special Envoy Morris Draper also demanded Israel’s withdrawal, Sharon reacted aggressively, insisting that 2,000-3,000 “terrorists” remained in the camps and needed to be eliminated. “When it comes to our security, we have never asked,” he exploded at Draper. “We will never ask. When it comes to existence and security, it is our own responsibility and we will never give it to anybody to decide for us.”
The following day, September 18, the day that Sabra and Shatila the massacres ended, Reagan released a statement, expressing “outrage and revulsion over the murders” and “demanding that the Israeli Government immediately withdraw its forces from West Beirut to the positions occupied on September 14.” But the damage had already been done.
The rest, as they say, is history, and it’s not a good one. The Israeli campaign, while it succeeded — at great human cost, the total dead numbered close to 18,000 — in evicting the PLO’s leadership and most of its military forces from Lebanon, the peace treaty it sought lasted all of nine months, from May 1983 to February 1984 when it was repudiated by the country’s parliament.
Furthermore, Israel’s occupation of southern Lebanon, which effectively began in 1978 and was formalized in 1985, provoked the resistance of the largely Shiite population and fueled the rise of what became Iran-backed Hezbollah, whose militias not only forced the IDF to withdraw completely from Lebanon in 2000, but which currently poses a far greater threat to Israel than the PLO ever did.
As for the U.S., it joined Italy and France in redeploying soldiers to Beirut to bolster the pro-Western government there and to help stabilize the country. But they soon found themselves in conflict with various Syrian- and Iranian-backed sectarian groups, culminating in the October 23 1983 truck bombing of the U.S. Marine barracks at the Beirut airport that killed 241 soldiers, the greatest loss of American servicemen in a single incident since World War II. Reagan withdrew the U.S. mission the following March.
Wednesday marks the 42nd anniversary of Reagan's public statement of “outrage and revulsion.” With Israel’s war today to “destroy Hamas” in Gaza already claiming the lives of more than 40,000 Palestinians, the cross-border conflict between Israel and Hezbollah escalating, and Israel’s defense minister reportedly insisting to President Biden’s top national security officials that “military action” is “the only way” to secure northern Israel, it may be timely to draw the lesson that a young scholar who excavated the Israeli State Archives drew 12 years ago.
“Sometimes close allies act contrary to American interests and values,” noted Seth Anziska, now at University College London, in his New York Times analysis. “Failing to exert American power to uphold those interests and values can have disastrous consequences: for our allies, for our moral standing and most important, for the innocent people who pay the highest price of all.”
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Soldiers deployed to At-Tanf Garrison, Syria, watch for the impact of an 81 mm mortar from an observation point during a readiness exercise on April 22, 2020. Coalition forces and our partner the Maghaweir al-Thowra remain united and determined in our mission to degrade and defeat Daesh in southern Syria. (U.S. Army photo by Staff Sgt. William Howard)
This September 18 marks the 23rd anniversary of the law that launched the so-called “War on Terror”: the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force, also known as the 2001 AUMF.
Passed by Congress a mere three days after the attacks of September 11, the 2001 AUMF still serves as the primary legal basis for a host of military operations around the globe. From air strikes against al-Shabaab in Somalia, hostilities against Iran-backed militias in Iraq and Syria, and detention operations at Guantanamo Bay, the 2001 AUMF has been the legal backbone for a series of wars that have continued for more than two decades — twice as long as the world wars combined.
The forever wars we find ourselves in were far from the intention of the Congress that passed the 2001 AUMF, which only permits the use of force against the “nations, organizations, or persons [the president determined] planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored such organizations or persons.” While not explicitly named in the AUMF, these were well understood to be al-Qaida — who carried out the 9/11 attacks — and the Taliban, who harbored them in Afghanistan.
So, how did we get here? How, with the war in Afghanistan having ended three years ago, is the executive branch still relying on a decades-old war authorization for operations against groups that didn’t even exist when it was passed?
While the 2001 AUMF was intended to apply to just al-Qaida and the Taliban, the absence of clear limiting language and some impressive legal gymnastics have seen successive presidential administrations expand it to cover numerous organizations across almost two dozen countries. The wars conducted under the 2001 AUMF have resulted in the loss of at least 432,000 civilian lives and expanded use of military force from South Asia to Africa and Southeast Asia, all without explicit congressional approval.
A significant driver of the overbreadth of the 2001 AUMF is the executive branch’s claim that it authorizes the use of force against “associated forces.” This concept — which is nowhere to be found in the text of the law — posits that the authorization can be applied to armed groups that are “co-belligerents” of al-Qaida or the Taliban.
While the concept of co-belligerency exists in international law, it lacks a formal definition. Furthermore, the way the executive branch has applied co-belligerency in the War on Terror has been criticized as “fluid, evolving, [and] internally contested.” The inherently flexible nature of the associated forces notion has led consecutive administrations to apply the 2001 AUMF to groups unconnected to the 9/11 attacks, some of whom — like ISIS — did not even exist in 2001.
It is what has allowed the 2001 AUMF to become what manycalla “blank check for war.”
A new report from the Friends Committee on National Legislation (FCNL) assessing all 30 AUMFs passed by Congress going back to 1789, finds the 2001 AUMF the only one in history without any clear and specific limits regarding who it will be used against, where it will be used, what actions can be carried out, or how long the authorization will remain active.
This finding highlights just how unprecedented the 2001 AUMF’s lack of limits is. Any replacement for the 2001 AUMF and all future authorizations must adhere to our long history of necessary restrictions by including limits as to time, geography, and enemy, and explicitly exclude the possibility of an unchecked president adding additional “associated forces” to the authorization.
Various attempts have been made to sunset or revise the 2001 AUMF, the most recent being a 2023 House effort, which culminated in a hearing last September before grinding to a halt. Despite the challenges, members of Congress who take on this task should be applauded for their efforts.
The need to revisit the 2001 AUMF is clear. FCNL’s new report should inform members of Congress as they consider the necessary limits on any replacement and how to craft any future AUMFs. Deciding if, when, and where the U.S. engages in military action is the responsibility of Congress, which has a long history of including necessary limits in AUMFs.
Congress must ensure it never again passes a war authorization that cedes its war authority to the executive branch by failing to appropriately limit force. Failing to do so will only lead to a world of continued endless wars and devastation. We have enough of that already.
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