Middle East

The Pakistani military reported that they entered and largely cleared the "Taliban headquarters" in South Waziristan today. The reported success is part of a large-scale offensive in the region, which is a stronghold of Tehrik-i-Taliban, an umbrella organization of Pakistani Taliban factions drawn together under the leadership of (the recently-killed) Baitullah Mehsud. The "headquarters" referred to is the town of Makeen, which had been Mehsud's hometown.

How important is it to clear Taliban headquarters, whether in Waziristan or Balochistan? In an interview with FP, Sameer Lalwani, a research fellow at the New America Foundation, argues the answer largely depends on what comes next:

[Makeen] might have been the center of TTP [Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan] organization, but I suspect that at some level, ‘headquarters' doesn't mean as much to an insurgency that's able to melt away and reappear down the road at different locations and continue operations... it certainly disrupts the organization of the group. [But] it's a very fluid network, they have alliances with other neighboring tribes, they're able to parlay their way, probably, for a safe haven within Afghanistan, or in the mountains, for a period of time.

So, it really depends on what the follow-up operations are.... I think this is one of the biggest demonstrations of Pakistani commitment, in their ground invasion of South Waziristan, and the most targeted, and probably one of the stronger efforts we've seen in recent years, but I'd still be apprehensive to say this is a categorical success, even [having] secured a few militant strongholds and, I guess, the center of operations, because the real question becomes ‘how long can they hold it?'"

The Taliban certainly isn't handing the territory off. Responding to Pakistan's recent military successes, a Taliban spokesman said simply, "We are prepared for a long war."

Photo: NICOLAS ASFOURI/AFP/Getty Images

The New York Times published an absolutely brilliant story today about the bomb detecting wands yielded by Iraqi security forces. Though the piece is written in the even-handed language you expect from the NYT, you can still practically hear the journalist screaming about how ridiculous this whole subject is.

You have the Iraqi general who claims: "I know more about bombs than anyone in the world."  There's the description of how the bomb-detecting wand works: a human operator, who must be well-rested and have a steady body temperature, inserts cardboard cards into the device, which does not have batteries or any other source of power. The piece even concludes with the reporter's failed attempts to use the wand to detect a grenade and pistol in plain sight on the table in front of him.

When you have facts like these, you don't even need editorials.

There is going to be a Muhammad biopic. Yes, that Muhammad. Many readers may wonder: How is that possible, with the whole he-shall-not-be-depicted rule? Well, it's pretty simple; the movie will never show him.

Due to start shooting in 2011, producer Barrie Osborne of Matrix and Lord Of The Rings fame will throw $150 million into a movie that he said is, "an international epic production aimed at bridging cultures. The film will educate people about the true meaning of Islam."

Osborne has enlisted Egyptian cleric Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi to help guide the film's positive portrayal of Islam as a religion of peace and tolerance, though it should be noted that Qaradaw is also barred from entering the U.K. because he defended suicide attacks on Israelis as "martyrdom in the name of God."

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28 years ago, Israel launched an airstrike against the Osirak nuclear reactor near Baghdad, terrified by the prospect of an Iraq with nuclear weapons. 19 year ago, the U.N. imposed comprehensive economic sanctions against Iraq, declaring the country's nuclear program needed oversight. Seven years ago, former president Bush announced that an Iraq with access to weapons of mass destruction, potentially including nuclear technology, demanded a U.S. military response.

And six years after that invasion, Iraq is lobbying to rebuild nuclear reactors. Just one more entry for FP's list of states looking to go nuclear to lose sleep over.

Photo: RAMZI HAIDAR/AFP/Getty Images

The Lebanese sure showed Israel this weekend. For years, the two held the same thing sacred, while only one could hold the title. That title, of course, is who could make the largest batch of hummus.

Israel used to hold the record for making the largest plate of the dip, but no longer after Lebanese chefs served up over two tons of chickpea-y goodness on Saturday. The entire affair is comical in the sense that too often it seems like neither side is actually talking about hummus.

The slogan for the event was, "Come and fight for your bite, you know you're right," illustrating the growing frustration. Several Lebanese businessmen also used the belligerent rhetoric.

"Lebanon is trying to win a battle against Israel," Fady Jreissati, the events promoter said. "Hummus is a Lebanese product and part of our traditions."

This isn't the first time the two counties have clashed over the dish, last year the Association of Lebanese Industrialists sued Israel in an effort to stop them from marketing hummus as Israeli. Saturday, the head of that group said, "If we don't tell Israel that enough is enough, and we don't remind the world that it's not true that hummus is an Israeli traditional dish, they will keep on marketing it as their own."

However the food wars don't end with hummus. Yesterday the Lebanese also made the world's largest batch of tabbouleh, a salad which Lebanon claims the Zionists are trying to take as their own.

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Via the invaluable Boursa Exchange, I see that the Egyptian government is contemplating a redevelopment plan in downtown Cairo which would transform the area into a pedestrian-only area. This plan has been commissioned by Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif, and envisions the construction of "multi-story underground garages" to eliminate traffic and pave the way for the creation of an area of open-air restaurants and shops.

As anyone who has even passed through Cairo knows, the traffic is truly hateful. It can sometimes take hours to get across the city, and the noise and pollution can be overwhelming. Therefore, the creation of a car-free zone in the center of the city seems like a grand idea.

This isn't the first example of the Nazif government's attempts to change the way Egyptians do business. Since becoming Prime Minister in 2004, Nazif has embarked on a series of structural reforms to the Egyptian economy which has moved the country closer to a free market system. The government has privatized many of the state's assets, particularly in the financial sector. These reforms allowed Nazif to aim to reduce the budget deficit to 3 percent of GDP in 2010, down from 8.2 percent in 2005, and paved the way for GDP growth near 7 percent.

So, if Nazif is the financial mastermind behind Egypt's economic recovery, why isn't he mentioned in the same breath as his Palestinian counterpart Salam Fayyad -- another technocrat who is taking steps to improve the West Bank's economy? The first reason relates to his boss: Mubarak has given no hint that he's prepared to loosen his grip on power, to the simmering resentment of many Egyptians. It's hard to love even an effective Prime Minister when he is the front man for an increasingly illegitimate dictator. 

More importantly, despite the impressive GDP growth, Nazif's reforms don't appear to be making a dent in Egypt's widespread poverty. Because of rapid population growth, Egyptian per capita income only grew 3.9% annually from 2002 to 2007, which is only middling by regional standards. To absorb the millions of new applicants to the job market, the Egyptian economy must grow at least 6 percent annually -- a rate that it almost certainly will not meet during the current recession.

The daunting task of restoring health to the Egyptian economy even makes one rethink the wisdom of creating a carless downtown Cairo. The area could very easily become the exclusive domain of the only people who can afford to drink cappuccinos in these chic open-air restaurants: upper-class Egyptians and wealthy foreigners. With rampant poverty spreading throughout Egypt, doesn't the Nazif government have better projects to spend its limited investment dollars on than downtown Cairo?

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Colonialism has some unfinished business. Like a messy divorce, former partners scratch and claw for who gets what and all too often the colonized lost. Their treasures were stolen; their cultural heritage and national heirlooms were boxed up and shipped to places such as France and the United Kingdom. Now, the fights over who gets custody of these artifacts are starting to sway in favor of the former colonies.

Some 2,000 Afghan artifacts went on display at The National Museum in Kabul on October 6, some as old as the bronze-age. These items were stolen and smuggled into Britain while the two countries fought a brutal war.  The museum was founded in the 1920s, after Afghanistan gained autonomy from the British Empire.

The New York Times reports Afghanistan was a treasure trove for ancient wares, given its geographical placement as a crossroads between China, India, the middle-east and Persia. In the early 1990s, after the Soviet invasion and civil war, the museum's director estimated 70 percent of the artifacts were stolen. Then in the name of Islam, the Taliban destroyed ancient statues of Buddha. The 2,000 pieces from the United Kingdom join nearly 13,000 returned from all over Western Europe and the United States after the Taliban fell in 2001.

Returned treasures don't always come so easily. The French government will return five ancient fresco fragments to Egypt after Cairo threatened to end cooperation with the Louvre. Egyptian authorities say the French bought the frescos in 1990, even though they knew they were stolen in the 1980s.

In a move of cultural sanctions, a British museum isn't returning an artifact to Iran due to the "post-election situation."  Iran threatened to cut off cultural cooperation if it isn't returned. The item in question, 6th century BC cylinder is engraved with what is called the first bill of rights. The Persian King Cyrus ordered it to be made. The British say they plan to return the cylinder, but they are just waiting for the "appropriate moment." The Iranians said their delay is just a ploy keep the cylinder and they will end their relationship with the museum if it isn't returned within two months.

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Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah will apparently only put up with so much from his clerics. Sheikh Saad al-Shethry has been removed from the kingdom's highest council of religious scholars by royal decree, after he criticized a newly-opened multibillion-dollar university for being un-Islamic. Shethry had a particular problem with co-ed classes:

"Mixing is a great sin and a great evil," al-Shethri was quoted as saying. "When men mix with women, their hearts burn and they will be diverted from their main goal (which is) ... education."

Abdullah has acquired a reputation as an unlikely reformer after this year's Valentine's Day reforms, in which he sacked the head of the infamous religious police and appointed a woman to his cabinet for the first time. But as Saudi Arabia expert Toby Jones argued at the time, Abdullah is probably less interested in liberalizing Saudi society than he is eliminating threats to his family's power.

The firing of Shethry certainly seems to be an example. The university -- which is named after the king, of course --  is something of a legacy project for Abdullah. He has touted it as a "beacon of tolerance" and as part of his plan to make Saudi Arabia a center of technological innovation. His patience for unsolicited sharia advice from the peanut gallery is likely to be pretty low.

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