World News Briefs: Israel, Singapore, Yemen and Iran

A few weeks ago, Israel had a parliamentary election, and once more, the wrong side came out on top. Benjamin Netanyahu had already shown himself to be a poor and even dangerous leader, seriously damaging the prospects for peace with the Palestinians by settlement expansion in the West Bank in defiance of world opinion and causing great suffering in Gaza, not only by getting into an avoidable war and using disproportionate force, but also by keeping a harsh blockade up that has kept Gazans in great poverty. He added further a black mark to his name by going to give a politically motivated speech to the US Congress a few weeks before the election at the behest of Republican leaders in a major violation of diplomatic protocol, doing significant harm to US-Israeli relations. Finally he clinched his negative reputation by sucking up to far right Israeli voters in the last days before the election, repudiating his past (admittedly lukewarm and superficial) support for a two state solution and making a blatantly racist attack on Israeli Arabs, urging right wing Israelis to get out and vote because the Arabs were voting "in droves" (as some pointed out, one has to wonder what Netanyahu's reaction would be if some right wing politician in Europe urged their followers to the polls with a warning that "Jews are voting in droves"). Yet this turn to the far right allowed him and his Likud party to win votes away from other right wing parties, giving them the largest share of seats and therefore a victory over the moderate, pro-peace Zionist Union. Even though the right did not actually win more votes than in past elections, they will once again form the government, dimming prospects for any kind of negotiated settlement between Israel and the Palestinians in the next few years. While I still feel that many around the world focus too much on Israel's occupation of Palestinian land and far too little on worse occupations such as China's in Tibet, it's hard not to feel that the US should stop defending Israel in global institutions and that Netanyahu and those who voted for him will deserve most of the rough ride Israel will get internationally over the next few years. The rest of the Israeli populace (many of whom do strongly support peace) don't, but hopefully they can dump Netanyahu before the damage becomes irretrievable.

Here in Asia, a major news item was the death of Lee Kwan Yew, the former long-time leader of Singapore, at the age of 91. He was eulogized by world leaders, including US President Barack Obama (who as a child lived for several years in Indonesia, not too far from Lee's then newly established nation), and Singapore had a big funeral for him. It is certainly true that he was a capable leader and was largely responsible for Singapore's economic success. However, as a piece in the New York Times observed, his record was decidedly mixed. He was essentially an authoritarian ruler and his Singapore was a faux democracy; in fact, despite some improvement in the years since Lee retired as prime minister, it is still far from a true democracy with genuine freedom of speech. Even the fact that his son, Lee Hsien Loong, is the current long-time prime minister is revealing: in this respect, Singapore is not much different from places like martial law Taiwan (where Chiang Kai-shek was succeeded by his son Chiang Ching-kuo) or even North Korea. True, between the two Lees Goh Chok Tong served as prime minister for some time, but even at the time it was commonly known that he was just holding the position until the younger Lee was fully ready to take over - and after all, a similar situation occurred in Taiwan, where while the younger Chiang directly followed his father as KMT party leader, Yan Chia-kan served for a few years as president, though as even more of a figurehead than Goh was in Singapore. More to the point, Lee repressed dissent and ensured his party remained in complete control. Sure, his methods, which his successors have mostly continued, were more mild than those of most other dictators, but they were still blatant. Foreign newspapers and magazines that included articles critical of Singapore had their circulation in the city-state severely cut. Critics of the government were sued in court. When a foreign academic wrote an article talking about an unnamed Southeast Asian state using a "compliant judiciary" to control dissent, the Singapore government sued him in their courts - and (surprise!) won. Residents of public housing estates (a large percentage of Singaporeans) were told that decisions about allocations of funds for repairs and improvements would hinge in part on how high a percentage of the vote the ruling PAP had received at each estate in the latest election. It is no wonder that Lee was admired as a model for rulers like Xi Jinping in China, not exactly something to be proud of, though no doubt Lee, with his paternalistic, autocratic mindset and his "Asian values" nonsense, thought otherwise.

On the other side of Asia, the civil war in Yemen has reached a new level, with Saudi Arabia using air power against those fighting the internationally recognized president, Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi, who has been forced to flee the country. In addition to the Houthi rebels (who are Shiite, unlike most of the remaining populace, which is Sunni) who forced Hadi out of the capital Sanaa, forces loyal to former president Ali Abdullah Saleh are helping the rebels against the government in what is clearly a marriage of convenience, as Saleh fought the Houthi for years when he was in power. Saleh himself is bad news, having previously ruled the country for decades, only surrendering power in 2012 under extremely strong pressure from the US, the Saudis, and massive domestic protests. Before he finally gave in, he had peaceful protestors gunned down, reneged several times on tentative agreements for a political transition, and allowed the country to deteriorate into chaos, with he himself eventually being forced to fly to Saudi Arabia for medical treatment after nearly being killed by a bomb attack on his presidential compound (indeed, it is probably that this injury and the several months he had to spend abroad for treatment helped force him to final give in to pressure to step down). It is clear that even now he dreams of regaining power, regardless of the cost to the people of Yemen. Aside from Saleh, the Houthis, and forces loyal to Hadi, there is also Yemen's powerful al-Qaeda branch as well as a secessionist movement in what was once the separate country of South Yemen. All in all, Yemen is now almost as much of a mess as Syria, and the conflict threatens to further inflame that part of the world.

Lastly, the negotiations over Iran's nuclear program are still hitting snags, despite the supposed deadline for an agreement today. Of course any decent agreement will at least make it very difficult for Iran to get nuclear weapons, though the trick is how to do that while allowing them to claim that they did not give up their right to nuclear power, and how to lift (or, as the West has proposed, suspend) sanctions to provide relief to the Iranian people and to strengthen moderate Iranian president Rouhani against hardliners. Of course we know that people like Netanyahu and right-wingers in the US claim the prospective agreement will give away too much to Iran, but they haven't proposed any reasonable alternatives. An example of how laughable (in a scary way) the idea of Ted Cruz as president is seen in the bill that he recently introduced in the Senate to scuttle negotiations, which as his latest newsletter explains, re-imposes previously suspended sanctions, adds new ones, and: "Gives Iran a clear path towards their removal: dismantling their nuclear program in its entirety; removing all centrifuges, relinquishing enriched uranium, and ceasing all research and development of the Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM) program." In other words, rather than a compromise solution, he wants a complete surrender on the part of Iran. Whether he is stupid enough to think that they would ever capitulate so completely or it is just that he badly wants another war in the Middle East (as that would be the only way left to prevent an Iranian drive for the bomb if he, Netanyahu and their allies force the Iranians to choose between total surrender and abandoning negotiations entirely) is not clear. Of course, this doesn't mean the West should give Iran everything it wants, either. After all this is a regime which not only suppresses political dissent, it is even trying to force its women to have babies by restricting access to contraceptives, banning sterilization and making it harder for women without children to get jobs. But a negotiated solution means both sides have to compromise, and any agreement that makes it harder for Iran to get nuclear weapons is better than abandoning negotiations entirely, which would almost certainly mean Iran getting the bomb or its opponents starting a war to stop it.