[FP] Countries in Crisis at Record High

BY KATE BRANNEN 
AUGUST 15, 2014

In an unprecedented situation, the United Nations has declared four of the world's humanitarian crises "Level 3," the organization's highest designation. They are Iraq, South Sudan, Syria, and the Central African Republic.

The number and scale of these humanitarian crises -- all of which are in active conflict zones -- are placing extraordinary demands on the international aid system, according to organizations with people in these countries.

"I haven't seen anything of this scale before," said Noah Gottschalk, senior policy advisor for humanitarian response at Oxfam America. "Across the board, the humanitarian community sees this as one of the worst moments we've ever had to confront in terms of simultaneous, mostly man-made crises."

He added that while aid organizations like Oxfam "are working to ease the suffering, there's ultimately no humanitarian answer to these crises -- the only real solutions are political."

Another unwelcome milestone was marked in June when U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees António Guterres announced that for the first time since World War II, the number of refugees, asylum seekers, and internally displaced people worldwide exceeded 50 million people.

The complexity and scope of these problems are also unparalleled, said Craig Redmond, senior vice president of programs at Mercy Corps, which has people working in all four Level 3 countries. Sending staff into the midst of ethnic and sectarian conflicts marked by extreme violence requires aid groups to take extra measures to ensure their safety.

"It is really tough to meet all of these needs," said Gerald Anderson, senior director in the department of humanitarian response at Save the Children. The number of crises demanding a response has "put a strain on resources, staff capacity, and fundraising."

The U.N. increased its rating for Iraq on Wednesday, the day before President Barack Obama announced that a U.S. rescue mission on Mount Sinjar was no longer necessary.

"Declaring the crisis in Iraq a 'Level 3 Emergency,' which represents the highest level of humanitarian crisis, will help trigger more resources and expedite administrative procedures for the response," said Nickolay Mladenov, the United Nations secretary-general's special representative for Iraq, in a statement.

Most of the 40,000 people -- members of Iraq's Yazidi community -- who were stranded on the mountain have made their way to safety, sometimes by walking for days, and therefore no longer need the U.S. military to evacuate them. While temporarily safe from the threat of the Islamic State, the Yazidis' basic needs like water, food, and sanitation still need to be met.

And they're not alone. The U.N. estimates that 1.2 million people in central and northern Iraq are internally displaced, and that 1.5 million people there need humanitarian assistance.

"Our donors' support, especially from the Saudi government, has made a huge contribution. But more assistance will be needed in the long run," said Kieran Dwyer, spokesman for the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, at a press briefing in Erbil on Thursday.

The Inter-Agency Standing Committee, a forum involving key U.N. and non-U.N. humanitarian partners, determines what gets Level 3 emergency designation. The system is relatively new; it was established after a review of the international response to the 2010 earthquake in Haiti.

Emergency status is supposed to ensure that when the scale, scope, and complexity of a crisis are massive, the humanitarian community takes certain internal steps to prioritize it in terms of leadership and resources. It also accelerates the releasing of funds.

South Sudan received its Level 3 status in February. According to the U.N., 3.8 million Sudanese need humanitarian assistance, and more than 1 million of them have fled their homes because of violence.
Redmond said South Sudan does not get the same attention as Iraq, Syria, and other places but the international community is deeply worried that the trouble there could become regional. The possibility of famine is also growing: At least 1.1 million Sudanese don't have enough food.

In the Central African Republic, the U.N. estimates that 527,000 residents are internally displaced, while another 399,000 have fled into neighboring countries to escape the violence.

Meanwhile, the human suffering in Syria dwarfs these other hot spots. According to the U.N., 10.8 million people there need humanitarian assistance and 6.5 million people are internally displaced.

But the conflict's size, duration, and complexity hinder organizations' ability to raise money to help alleviate it.
Mercy Corps, like many international aid organizations, raised more money in three days for Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines last year than it has during the entire Syrian civil war, which began in 2011, Redmond said.

Gottschalk said people are far less likely to donate money for man-made and political crises than they are for natural disasters. All four of the U.N.'s Level 3 crises are political in nature, making it difficult to drive donors to give, he said.

In a July report, the French medical charity Doctors Without Borders (MSF) gave high marks to the international response to the Philippines' typhoon, which also reached a Level 3 designation. But it added that the world's responses to humanitarian crises could be much better.

"In the Central African Republic and South Sudan, countries with considerable security and logistical challenges, persistent problems remain with the scale up of the U.N. and [international nongovernmental] response, which is characterized by bureaucracy and risk aversion," the report stated.

To fill in the gaps in countries such as South Sudan and the Central African Republic, MSF says it had to massively bolster operations.

Meanwhile, there are myriad conflicts that have yet to reach Level 3, including Gaza and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Yemen, which is rarely in the headlines, has 14 million people who need humanitarian assistance, including 10 million who don't have enough food, Gottschalk said.

As they look at the world, many in the aid community are asking themselves, "How much worse is it going to get?" he said.

Former Mossad chief: An attack on Iran likely to foment a generations-long war

[Haartez, 2012-9-1] 
In contrast to former Mossad and Shin Bet chiefs Meir Dagan and Yuval Diskin, Efraim Halevy speaks not in black-and-white but i n shades of gray, writes Ari Shavit.

Efraim Halevy was an integral part of the Israeli security establishment. Between 1990 and 1995 he was deputy head of the Mossad and the architect of the peace treaty with Jordan. From 1998 to 2000 he was head of the Mossad. In 2002-2003 he headed the National Security Council. Nevertheless, in regard to Iran, Halevy’s voice was for years an exception. As early as 2007 he argued that a nuclear Iran would not pose an existential threat to Israel. In 2008, he submitted to the government a contrarian report that suggested an alternative way of coping with the Iranian nuclear threat. In 2010 and in 2011 he was openly and sharply critical of those who advocated attacking Iran. So this week, when I arrived at the modest north Tel Aviv apartment Halevy calls home, I expected to find a determined opposition figure to assail the decision makers who are agitating for an unnecessary war.

However, I was surprised. The London-born spy-diplomat was far more restrained and far more reflective than might be imagined. In contrast to former Mossad and Shin Bet chiefs Meir Dagan and Yuval Diskin, respectively, he spoke not in black-and-white but in gray. In contrast to Shimon Peres, he did not talk about coming to terms with Iran, but about a struggle of a different kind against a nuclear Iran. He was very careful not to attack the prime minister and t he defense minister directly. Nevertheless, Halevy’s approach is indeed different and anomalous. More than any other interviewee in this series, he displays empathy for the Iranians and tries to understand them. He suggests getting out of the strategic labyrinth in which we find ourselves not by force but by political means.

“What I have to say is complex,” Efraim Halevy tells me. “I do indeed argue that a nuclear Iran does not constitute an existential threat to Israel. If one day we wake up and discover that Iran has nuclear weapons, that does not mean the start of the countdown to the end of Israel’s existence. Israel need not despair. We have deterrent capability and preventive capability. If Iran acquires nuclear weapons, Israel will be able to design a true operational response that will be able to cope with that. We will be able to prevent a Hiroshima in Tel Aviv and we will prevent a Hiroshima in Tel Aviv; so we must not talk about a Hiroshima in Tel Aviv, because prophecies like that are self-fulfilling. Nor must we draw baseless analogies with the 1930s.

“The true Churchillian way is not to talk about the possibility of a second Holocaust, but to ensure that there will be no holocaust here. I was a boy in Britain during the Blitz. I remember vividly Churchill’s speeches blaring from the radio. He did not talk about the possibility that Britain might not survive. On the contrary: even in the direst straits he said that Britain would have the upper hand. He promised that whatever happened, come what may, in the end Britain would win. Anyone who purports to be Churchill needs to talk like Churchill and project self-confidence.

“I am absolutely appalled when I hear our leaders talking as though there were no Israel Defense Forces and as though there were no State of Israel and as though Auschwitz is liable to be repeated. As I see it, the message we should be conveying to the Iranians − and to ourselves − is that we will be here in any event and in any scenario for the next two thousand years.

“But we must not become confused,” Halevy continues. “A nuclear Iran is not an existential threat, but a nuclear Iran is a grave matter. Nuclear weapons in Tehran’s hands upset the regional balance and create a very serious strategic situation. Nor can we completely rule out the possibility that if Iran possesses nuclear weapons it will ultimately use them. When the danger is very great, even if the risk that it will be realized is only 10 percent, we need to treat it as a risk of 100 percent. So I am not one of those who are indifferent to the Iranian danger. Under no circumstances am I ready to accept a nuclear Iran. But I maintain that the way to prevent nuclearization is not necessarily by means of force.

“Going to war is an absolute and irreversible act that entails high costs. Accordingly, before using force, we need to exhaust all the other possibilities. To the best of my knowledge and to the best of my assessment, the other possibilities have not yet been fully exhausted. Some of them have not even been tried. The simplistic equation of bomb or bombing led to a mistaken focus on bombing as the only response to the bomb. But the truth is that a situation is possible in which there will be both bombing and a bomb. A situation is also possible in which there will not be a bomb without bombing. I do not say that bombing should not be resorted to in any situation.

“I also think that it is right to create a bombing capability and threaten with a bombing capability. But what I am suggesting is to step out of the box now and stop thinking in binary terms, and recruit our best brains to think of a way to stop the Iranian nuclear project without engaging in an all-out war. Because an attack on Iran is liable to foment a generations-long war with Iran, it is our duty to do all we can to prevent a bomb and prevent bombing and resolve the crisis creatively.”

I am ready to sign off on that immediately, I tell my interlocutor. I imagine that even Benjamin Netanyahu and Avigdor Lieberman would sign. But it’s not clear to me which magician will pull from which hat the rabbit you are talking about. After all, the international community tried negotiations and tried sanctions and got nowhere. We waved sticks and lured them with carrots, but the Iranians went their own way. That is why we are now in the situation in which we find ourselves. The soft means have been played out and the alternatives left on the table are the cruel ones.

“What we need to do is to try and understand the Iranians,” the former Mossad head says. “The basic feeling of that ancient nation is one of humiliation. Both religious Iranians and secular Iranians feel that for 200 years the Western powers used them as their playthings. They do not forget for a moment that the British and the Americans intervened in their internal affairs and toppled the regime of Mohammad Mosaddeq in 1953. From their perspective, the reason why, to this day, there is no modern rail network and no modern oil refineries in Iran is that the West prevented that. Thus, the deep motive behind the Iranian nuclear project − which was launched by the Shah − is not the confrontation with Israel, but the desire to restore to Iran the greatness of which it was long deprived.

“I believe that if the West could find a way to propose to Iran alternative methods to acquire that sense of greatness, Iran would forsake the nuclear road. If Iran were offered trains and oil refineries and a place of honor in regional trade, it would consider this seriously. You say carrots? The carrots offered to Iran until now were not big enough. Maybe the sticks were not thick enough, either.

“There should have been cooperation with Turkey vis-à-vis Iran. There should have been action against Iran in Syria. The Russians should have been brought into the picture. If Israel had adopted a creative, active policy, and if the international community had held up to the Iranians a far richer package of threats and enticements, I think there would have been a chance to dissuade the Iranians from embarking on the dangerous road they have taken. And I believe it is not too late. The sanctions are very painful. The negotiations have not yet been exhausted. The threat of an American military option can also be more concrete. If instead of focusing on a military solution, Israel were to succeed in mobilizing the international community for complex and sophisticated political-economic action, I believe that the results might be surprising.”

But you yourself apparently do not believe that Israel will adopt the path you are recommending, I say to the experienced and doleful man sitting opposite me. You yourself said that if you were an Iranian you would be very worried in the next few weeks. Are you also worried as an Israeli? Do you feel that Netanyahu and Barak will order the air force to attack during the autumn? Is it your assessment that an attack of that kind could result in a disaster?

In the fading light that fills the room, it is plain that Halevy really does not want to answer that question. He does not want to annoy the national leadership and does not want to infringe on national security. Nevertheless, it is clear that he is very worried. He does not like Netanyahu’s intervention in U.S. politics, and he is apprehensive about the interface that has been created between the Iranian issue and the U.S. elections this November. He thinks that Israel must on no account be perceived as having contributed to the election of one candidate or torpedoed the candidacy of another. His evaluation is that a combination of a Holocaust-influenced frame of mind and the desire to promote the election of the next American president is dangerous. However, Halevy’s remarks for the tape recorder are quite measured.

“We have to take into account the possibility that if we attack Iran’s nuclear facilities, there will no longer be a political horizon in regard to Iran or sanctions against Iran. We have to deploy for the possibility that while the immediate result of the operation will be Israel’s glorification in the Sunni Arab world, the later result will be a sharp anti-Israeli public wave in the spirit of the Arab Spring. We need to understand that after the attack, a deep Israeli complex will develop in Iran, one that crosses parties and opinions and communities, because we will become the symbol of those that humiliated Iran and prevented it from restoring its greatness. We need to remember that we are very much dependent on the United States and not utter boastful slogans that we are sovereign and therefore will take our fate into our hands.

“I was in our embassy in Washington during the Yom Kippur War and I saw how much we needed the airlift and how hard it was to organize an airlift, even when the U.S. administration was extremely sympathetic. I saw what happened when the president threatened Israel toward the end of the war that the United States would lift its protection. I suggest to all of us not to go back to that place and also not to repeat the mistake we made in 1956 when we went into the Sinai Operation without informing the Americans.

“I am not Chamberlain. I am not proposing peace with honor or peace in our time, but a realistic view of the situation. It is true that the present Iranian regime does not want Israel to exist. But that desire is not their top priority, and they themselves know that it cannot be realized. The Iranians are afraid of us no less than we are afraid of them. What they did in the past 20 years is to use the Israeli-Palestinian issue cynically to gain popularity and influence in the Middle East. But what is happening now is that the rhetoric of Israel as a cancer is gradually drawing them into an increasingly acute confrontation with us. We, for our part, are treating them like Hitler and are being drawn into a confrontation with them from which there will be no way back.

“That is a pity. Iran does not have a common border with us and there is no direct conflict of interest between them and us. A full-scale confrontation between us is unnecessary. I am not naive and I am not ready for the Iranians to deceive us. But what I recommend is trying to calm the Iranian-Israeli conflict and not escalate it. It is possible that, in the end, we will have no choice and will be forced to attack. If so, we will all have to stand behind the government that makes the decision and stand together in the campaign. In war, one acts as in war and shows solidarity. But before venturing on such an extreme and dangerous action, I suggest making a supreme effort to avoid it. We must not hem the Iranians in and we must not push them into a corner. We have to try to give them an honorable way out. It’s always worth remembering that the greatest victory in war is the victory that is achieved without firing a shot.”

以軍護核廠 導彈擊落不明物體

以色列周四出動戰機，發射導彈擊落闖進該國「高度機密」核電廠上空禁飛區的「不明飛行物體」。軍方發言人表示已就事件展開調查。

以色列空軍雷達站於周四午後，發現一個疑似大氣球的「可疑物體」，在死海南部上空盤飛，緩慢移向位於約30公里外的迪莫納（Dimona）核電廠禁飛區。以方擔心該物體為蒐集核反應堆情報之用，又或內藏爆炸物，企圖對核電廠作出攻擊，空軍司令緊急出動一架F-16戰機，發射導彈將之摧。以色列傳媒引述軍方消息人士稱，可疑物體是無人駕駛的引擎推進氣球，但根據墜地殘餘物，研判它有可能只是一個氣象探測氣球。

迪莫納核電廠是以色列最重要設施之一，上空不僅列為禁飛區，空軍還部署了地對空導彈系統守護。國防專家普遍認為，那是以色列暗地研製核武的地方，起碼已生產了逾200枚核彈，儘管以色列一直否認。

以色列一直不准聯合國國際原子能機構派員調查其核設施。伊拉克前薩達姆政權曾因多次拒絕同類檢查，招來美國轟炸。

法新社/路透社/耶路撒冷郵報

（明報 2010-12-18）

以巴和談條件 國際部隊協防

（法新社安曼17日電） 巴勒斯坦自治政府主席阿巴斯（Mahmoud Abbas）在約旦「明日報」（Al Ghad）今天刊出的訪談中表示，以色列必須接受國際部隊在未來的巴勒斯坦國境內部署，雙方才能展開直接談判。

阿巴斯說：「以色列必須接受，爭論中的巴勒斯坦領土得以1967年為疆界，並有第3方部隊進駐。」所謂1967年，阿巴斯指的是1967年以阿6日戰爭爆發之時。

阿巴斯指出，「我們會視此為追求進展的意願，而這將促成我們展開直接談判。」

明日報說，阿巴斯談到歐麥特（Ehud Olmert）任以色列總理時所簽訂的一項安全協定，該協定要求不包括以色列在內的國際部隊進駐，作為對巴勒斯坦領土的保障。

阿巴斯說：「就是這項協定，我相信約旦和埃及知道有這項協定存在，也原則認可這項協定。」

（譯者：中央社毛盈超）

http://hk.news.yahoo.com/article/100717/8/j7q6.html

以色列鷹派抬頭 奧巴馬束手無策

當全球的視點聚焦中美角力及海地大地震時，傳統熱點的中東地區又逐漸佔據國際舞台，剛過了的這個星期，中東上演了一齣帶黑色色彩的外交風波，事緣土耳其電視台播放了一部電視劇，被以色列政府認為是醜化以色列，於是傳召土耳其駐以大使表達不滿。這本來是正常的外交接觸，但以色列副外長阿亞隆在會見土耳其大使時，安排給對方的座位明顯矮一截，桌上也沒有擺放土耳其國旗。這一不合外交禮儀的事件公開後，引起土耳其強烈抗議，認為是刻意羞辱。第二天，阿亞隆發表聲明，承認他對待土耳其大使的態度欠妥。

這場外交風波放在戰機轟炸坦克出動的中東地區衝突背景下，表面是一場小風波，但由此折射出來的中東死結，反映中東這個國際舞台的幕後玩家美國對中東局勢的無力感。

土耳其是一個與西方關係極佳的伊斯蘭國家，是美國主導的北約成員之一。土耳其位處北約南翼，扼守歐亞咽喉生命線，戰略位置險要；美國和蘇聯在60年代古巴危機時，解決衝突的其中一個建議，便是牽涉到美國在土耳其的飛彈。土耳其親西方政權一個接一個，但卻能與伊斯蘭世界保持友好關係，更與以色列軍方多次進行聯合演習，這種微妙的「左右逢源」成為國際關係美談。

外交小風波　突顯強硬作風

土耳其和以色列關係轉差，見於去年一月，當時土耳其總理埃爾多安在世界經濟論壇年會上，與以色列總統佩雷斯就以軍出兵加沙激辯，之後突然拂袖而去，以色列有人認為連溫和的佩雷斯也遭此對待，視之為奇恥大辱。數星期前，以色列外長利伯曼推動名為「民族驕傲的外交政策」，阿亞隆對土耳其大使的做法，便是這種鷹派政策的反映。一葉知秋，「民族驕傲的外交政策」是以色列溫和派退居下風、強硬派抬頭的風向標，更是美國影響力開始減弱的證明。

奧巴馬上台後，把解決中東死結列為外交上的第一優先，他的幾次公開講話，都向伊斯蘭世界表達要改變中東僵局的決心，這也是他獲得諾貝爾和平獎的其中一個原因。奧巴馬起初很能抓住核心，確認中東局勢關鍵是以色列和巴勒斯坦，如果解決巴勒斯坦立國問題，阿拉伯國家和伊斯蘭世界對美國的敵意便會大減。

這裏頭有著連鎖關係，那就是一旦解決以巴僵局，伊朗問題也會有可能順利解決。眾所周知，伊朗近年高調擺出與美國對幹的姿態，是因為伊朗抓住「以巴死結核心在於美國」的矛盾，藉阿拉伯國家對美國的針鋒相對，從而提高本身在中東的地位。因此，伊朗的講話愈來愈激昂，甚至有「把以色列從地球上抹掉」這些話；同樣，在阿富汗被推翻的塔利班政權可以捲土重來，也和反美和反以色列情緒有直接關係。因此，以巴死結一日未解決，巴人的貧窮現象持續惡化，中東和平仍然無望，以色列和其他國家的大衝突小風波，仍會不絕上演。

內外壓力重至　奧巴馬指揮棒失靈

奧巴馬本來的策略是以色列停止在佔領區殖民並從區內撤軍，允許巴勒斯坦人建國，這套策略連同美國從伊拉克撤軍和解決伊朗核問題一併包括在內。但是結果並非如美國人設想那麼美好，美國內部親以色列的壓力以及美國在中東地區必須繼續擔任主導角色的外交戰略，令他在以巴僵局上沒有多大的解套空間。另一方面，以色列內部的鷹派亦看到奧巴馬的指揮棒失靈，奧巴馬曾經向以色列總理內塔尼亞胡擺出強硬姿態，但內塔尼亞胡看穿奧巴馬不可能頂住美國國內親以色列勢力的逼迫，更看穿美國不可能因此放棄中東的主導權，遂視凍結殖民區的建議如無物。去年二三月，美國國務卿希拉里和特使來回以巴穿梭，企圖說服各方接受美國的安排，可是以色列一步不讓，結果到了去年底，連精力充沛的希拉里也無法達成目標，只得宣布美國認為以色列增設殖民區的做法沒有錯。

猶太裔的美國前國務卿基辛格曾經說過，以色列沒有外交問題，只有內政問題。這句話可以理解為以色列從不必顧慮外交上的觀瞻，因為四周都是敵人，談不上外交往還。這是七十年代的評論，卻到今天踏入二十一世紀第二個十年還管用，從以色列和土耳其這場外交風波看到，以色列不會介意外交上四面樹敵，連美國這個老大哥也開始不賣帳。中東前景實在難以令人會有樂觀的期盼。

(retrieved from Mingpao, 2010/1/17)