Arab press roundup for November 29:
Arab newspapers on Monday highlighted Jordan's royal succession surprise, disbanding of Gaza "death squad"
Kuwait's Al Rai Al Aam commented on Jordan's King Abdullah's decision to remove his half-brother, Prince Hamzeh, as crown prince, describing it as a "premature coup d'etat".
The pro-government daily said that the unexpected decision came despite the fact that Abdullah's late father, King Hussein, had named him heir to the throne on condition that his crown prince be Hamzeh.
It said the dismissal of Hamzeh also reflected "the family and financial differences between King Abdullah and his wife, Queen Rania, on the one hand, and Queen Noor and her eldest son, Hamzeh, on the other".
The paper added that it also showed Queen Rania's desire to groom her eldest son, 10-year-old Hussein, for crown prince "to prevent a repetition of the sensational experiences that the Hashemite throne had gone through during King Hussein's reign".
The United Arab Emirates' Al Bayan commented on public Palestinian fears from the potential security chaos due to the widespread use of weapons, saying that only Israel would benefit from this situation.
The pro-government Gulf daily said that while the cycle of chaos was still limited in the Palestinian territories and did not pose an immediate threat to society, there were still public fears that the chaos would expand "through malicious moves instead of using the weapons to respond to the repetitive attacks by the Zionists".
The paper welcomed the decision to disband the Security and Protection Unit of the Palestinian Preventive Security Service, which it said was initially set up to protect senior Palestinian officials, but which became an unpopular unit known as the "death squad".
Kuwait's Al Qabas daily quoted a Western diplomat as saying that Syria dispatched an envoy to Washington after the reelection of George W. Bush, carrying a message that showed Damascus' readiness to meet US demands on Iraq and the peace process with Israel in return for retracting Washington's demand for a Syrian withdrawal from Lebanon.
The unnamed source told the pro-government paper that the letter from the Syrian leadership said Damascus was prepared to increase its security control of its borders with Iraq and to provide to the Americans all the names of those who came into Syria for two months and did not leave, especially those from the Gulf, Arab and Muslim countries "because they might have entered Iraq". The source added that the American administration refused to open any dialogue with Damascus and rejected in principle all that it offered.
The Saudi Al Watan quoted unnamed European sources as saying that prominent European countries were secretly encouraging the new Palestinian leadership to accept an interim solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
The sources told the pro-government daily the Europeans were trying to persuade the Palestinians into agreeing to establishing a "small Palestinian state with provisional borders in the Gaza Strip, to be announced in 2005 after the end of the Israeli withdrawal from the strip, which would be temporarily supervised by the European Union and the United Nations".
They said this plan would be accompanied by a European proposal to finance the reconstruction of Gaza "in order to push the Palestinians to peacefully co-exist with Israel".
Arab press roundup for Nov. 24:
Iraq's future, US-Iranian relations highlighted in the press on Wednesday
Jordan's independent Al Ghad on Wednesday suggested an active Jordanian role in rehabilitating Iraq's armed resistance and arranging for a national Iraqi dialogue to prevent a civil war and secure a stable political future for the country. The daily said the Arabs had a responsibility to help in closing the gap between the Iraqi government and the people by launching a national dialogue, which includes the armed resistance, in order to secure the participation of all Iraqi forces in the elections on January 30.
The London-based Al Quds Al Arabi commented on the Sharm El Sheikh conference on Iraq, which ended on Tuesday, saying that only two parties came out of the gathering as winners: "the American scheme in Iraq and Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi and his interim government". The independent Palestinian-owned daily accused the Arab foreign ministers attending the conference of being "nothing more than false witnesses", warning that these governments "will pay a high price for their collusion with the invasion and occupation of Iraq because they disappointed the Iraqi people, or at least the nationalists". It asked why the world, especially the Muslims, were "silent on the martyrdom of 100,000 Iraqis in this American war and its dealing with President [George W.] Bush and his client [Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad] Allawi as if they are peacemakers and not war criminals?"
Egypt's Al Ahram daily said in its editorial that the Sharm El Sheikh conference should not be the last initiative, insisting that the "current situation in Iraq has exceeded the issue of evaluating the morality and legality of this war and now requires real initiatives to activate a positive role" by the region to help Iraq. The mass-circulation daily, owned by the government that hosted the Sharm El Sheikh conference, also called for a definite and comprehensive process to follow through with Iraq's reconstruction, even amid objection to the war on the country.
Lebanon's Daily Star commented in its editorial on press reports that Secretary of State Colin Powell and Iranian foreign minister Kamal Kharrazi engaged only in "polite dinner conversation" when they sat next to each other on Monday night at the Sharm El Sheikh meeting on Iraq. The independent English-language daily said it was a "shame that neither side thought a substantive exchange was appropriate, because it is hard to think of any other two countries in the world that would benefit more from engaging each other". It suggested that Powell's successor, Condoleezza Rice, "should ponder this matter more seriously than her predecessor", and called for both sides to "drop their radical, rigid, nearly vindictive, approaches to diplomacy, and instead explore how they can work together on the many issues that matter to them - and to the rest of the Middle East".
Arab press roundup for Nov. 23:
Sharm El Sheikh conference main focus of newspapers on Tuesday
Jordan's Ad Dustour commented in its editorial on Tuesday that while the Sharm El Sheikh conference on Iraq showed the international community's concern toward that country, that concern was not enough to save the Iraqi people from the chaos and violence sweeping their country. The mass-circulation paper said that in order for the conference in the Egyptian Red Sea resort to succeed, the final communiqué should insist on the imminent need for the withdrawal of the foreign forces from Iraq as soon as the Iraqis elect their leaders.
Jordan's independent Al Ghad published a cartoon criticizing the Sharm El Sheikh conference as an Arab rubber stamp endorsing the American occupation of Iraq. It depicts President George W. Bush standing at a table with one of his hands on a piece of paper that says "Occupation of Iraq". With his other hand, he holds the lever of a wooden-looking stamp dressed as an Arab that says, "Sharm El Sheikh". The caricature of the president is pulling down the lever of the stamp, whose end is shaped like a hand pointing its thumb down and stamping the "Occupation of Iraq" paper.
The United Arab Emirates' Al Bayan also commented on the conference on Iraq, asking who was benefiting from the meeting when its final communiqué was issued five days before it was convened on Monday. The pro-government daily said that the first and only beneficiary of any regional or international conference on the Iraqi question should be the Iraqi people. It added that many points mentioned in the final communiqué "might bring some hope when it calls for Iraq's sovereignty and independence, the noninterference in Iraq's internal affairs by neighboring countries, calls for convening a meeting for all Iraq's factions and to stop violence as soon as possible before the elections to ensure a greater participation in the polls".
Iraq's Al Sabah daily reported that the economic committee in the Iraqi legislative council has recommended against recognizing debts approved by the Paris Club. The paper, which describes itself as independent and publicly-owned, said the legislative committee called for this file to be sent to a fair arbitrator under the supervision of the United Nations, "which has the authority to stop Iraq paying compensation". It added that the head of the committee, Saad Salih Jabr, on Monday presented the council with a report in which he said, "Recognizing these debts is a crime committed against the people of Iraq since repaying them will take dozens of years."
On the Palestinian issue, the London-based Al Quds Al Arabi quoted an unnamed member in the executive committee of the mainstream Fatah movement as saying that the insistence of Fatah's central committee to nominate Mahmoud Abbas for the presidency of the Palestinian Authority would cause a crisis to flare up within Fatah. The independent Palestinian-owned paper quoted sources as saying that the group's regional committees were not heeding calls by the organization's leadership to "maintain control and to follow instructions in loyalty to the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat".
Arab press roundup for Nov. 22:
Arab newspapers on Monday highlighted Palestinian elections, Sharm El Sheikh conference
Qatar's Al Watan commented on the Palestinian elections, saying that nothing could delay these polls except a "heavy-duty suicide operation inside Israel". The pro-government daily said that it was "safe to say the Palestinian presidential elections will be held on time and successfully" due to the "undeclared suspension" of the suicide attacks and the "Palestinian eagerness, in all their trends, to fill the huge gap left with the death of Yasser Arafat".
The London-based Al Quds Al Arabi commented on the Sharm El Sheikh conference on Iraq, calling it a "conference of conspirators against Iraq, not one to restore peace there". The independent Palestinian-owned daily insisted that the participating countries in the meeting were "not qualified to talk about peace, just as they don't have the right to give legitimacy to the occupation and their crimes", saying these countries "have been silent over the American crimes and supported the invasion and occupation" of Iraq. The daily, with leftist, pan-Arab leanings, insisted that the countries taking part in Sharm El Sheikh, whether Iraq's neighbors or the industrialized nations, "did not utter a single word on the massacres in Fallujah, with the exception of a few embarrassed comments by the secretary-general of the Arab League and some Turkish officials".
The Saudi Al Watan daily quoted Palestinian national security advisor Col. Jibril Rujoub as saying that Yasser Arafat's widow, Suha, will submit to the Palestinian leadership the medical report on the causes of Arafat's death. Arafat's widow has come under sharp criticism by both leaders and the general public for failing to reveal the causes of Arafat's death on November 11. Rujoub insisted that "all the financial and other accusations surrounding Suha Arafat are mere fabrications", adding that the late Palestinian leader had no secret funds. However, he added that the Palestinian Authority planned to form a committee to investigate whether there were secret finances, adding this committee will issue a full and comprehensive report of its findings.
The London-based Al Hayat reported that the chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization, Mahmoud Abbas, would head a high-level Palestinian delegation to Syria early next month aimed at reconciling relations with Damascus. In a related development, the Saudi-financed daily said that the head of the Palestinian Red Crescent Society, Haidar Abdel Shafi, had agreed to nominate himself for the Palestinian presidential elections set for January 9. It said Abdel Shafi would represent the "leftist democratic trend", adding that this nomination would pave the way for a number of other prominent Palestinian personalities to compete for this position.
Acknowledgement to UPI International
Review of the Arab press
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