After Port Blast, Rudderless Lebanon Drifts towards the Rocks

Arab World

August 26th, 6:45pm

Asharq Al-Awsat

A general view shows the severely damaged grain silo following the explosion in Beirut's port area, Lebanon August 8, 2020. (Reuters)

Three weeks after the catastrophic explosion at Beirut port, Lebanon is drifting towards even more trouble as its politicians fail to agree a new government that can arrest a financial meltdown. As Lebanon grapples with the aftermath of the blast that killed 180 people, its politicians have been locked in fruitless talks to agree on a new prime minister who might be able to restart International Monetary Fund talks and enact reforms. Even before the Aug. 4 port explosion, caused by unsafely stored chemicals, the financial collapse had devastated lives across Lebanon, fueling hyperinflation and poverty and demolishing the value of savings in a now zombie banking system. An intervention by French President Emmanuel Macron, who is due to visit again Lebanon on Sept. 1, has been unable to break the impasse among the sectarian leaders responsible for steering Lebanon into crisis. All-too-familiar personal rivalries and factional interests are getting in the way. Now, barring a course correction, Lebanon is at risk of even deeper chaos, in the assessment of three senior sources from different parties. The central bank has warned it can only subsidize imports of basic goods for three more months, an official source said, raising concern that prices of fuel, wheat and medicine will spiral later this year. “It is very dangerous now. We were at a crossroads: either the right path or continuing going down the road to no IMF, no international aid, no money. This is pushing Lebanon towards chaos, complete collapse,” said one senior political source. A senior European diplomat said: “The speed of politics does not reflect the urgency of the situation. Does August 4 not show things need to change?” France’s foreign minister said on Tuesday Lebanon’s leaders should not use the explosion as an excuse to hide the reality that the country was on the edge of a precipice. “We hope that this moment will be the moment which allows the Lebanese authorities, the Lebanese officials, to take the necessary leap for a government with a mission to initiate the essential reforms that everyone knows (are needed),” Jean-Yves Le Drian said. The financial collapse is the biggest threat to Lebanon’s stability since the 1975-90 civil war. Donor states want to see reforms to curb waste and corruption that are the root causes of the collapse. But three cabinets have failed to make progress on reform since donors pledged more than $11 billion to Lebanon in 2018. The currency has sunk by as much as 80% since October. ‘We don’t know who is in charge’ Prime Minister Hassan Diab quit on Aug. 10 over the port blast. Nominated by the Iran-backed Hezbollah party and its allies in January using their parliamentary majority, Diab stays on as caretaker until a new government is formed. Hezbollah and its Shiite ally Amal are pressing for the return of Saad Hariri, seeing him as well placed to galvanize foreign support. But this has hit resistance from several parties, each for their own reasons. The opponents include Hezbollah’s ally President Michel Aoun and his son-in-law, Free Patriotic Movement leader MP Gebran Bassil, who have been at loggerheads with Hariri since last year. At the other end of the spectrum, neither the Lebanese Forces Party, nor Druze leader Walid Jumblatt want him back in the job for now. “If it isn’t Saad Hariri, we will remain with a caretaker government” until the end of Aoun’s term in 2022, said a senior politician familiar with the thinking of Hezbollah and Amal. “We are currently in a state of chaos,” the politician said. Without a deal on a new government, “we will go to even more chaos in the street”. Hariri announced on Tuesday he was not a candidate for the job. He has insisted he will only become prime minister of a cabinet of non-aligned experts with public sector experience able to drive through reform. The Saudi ambassador to Lebanon, Waleed Bukhari, told Reuters reforming Lebanon was more important than the identity of the next prime minister. “What matters to the international community is the next government’s program and its ... policies to meet the expectations of the Lebanese people and restore trust,” he said. Unless a compromise can be reached on Hariri, the choice now for Hezbollah, Aoun and Berri is whether to seek out another Sunni figure or leave Diab in a caretaker capacity. Hezbollah and Amal do not want anyone but Hariri, the politician familiar with their thinking said. “Now, after three weeks, there has been nothing; we don’t know who is in charge,” said a former government minister. “Not one of the current elite has moved one inch” in addressing demands for a government that implements political and economic reforms. “No one is asking ‘what is it that we have to do?’ No one is proposing anything.” The ruling majority in the political establishment could lean on the central bank to access the gold reserves to finance subsidies for a while longer to stave off chaos, said a senior opposition official familiar with the Lebanese Forces’ position, referring to reserves valued at $18 billion as of Aug. 15. But he added: “I can’t see any compromise government being able to conduct any reforms and I can’t see them agreeing on an independent government. This is pushing the country into further chaos either way.”

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/2471346/after-port-blast-rudderless-lebanon-drifts-towards-rocks

Kanye West Qualifies for Tennessee Presidential Ballot

Entertainment

August 26th, 6:39pm

Asharq Al-Awsat

Rapper and producer Kanye West. (AP)

Rapper and producer Kanye West will be on Tennessee's presidential ballot in November, the state election’s office confirmed. The secretary of state’s office announced this week that West cleared the 275 verified signature threshold to qualify as an unaffiliated presidential candidate. He will appear on the ballot with running mate Michelle Tidball, a 57-year-old spiritual coach from Cody, Wyoming. West has qualified in a handful of states, including Arkansas, Colorado, Idaho, Oklahoma and Utah. West announced a presidential bid in July, saying he’s seeking the nation’s highest office on a ticket he calls the “Birthday Party.” West has since been gathering signatures to get on the ballot in several states. Democrats claim Republicans are pushing West’s candidacy in several swing states to siphon Black votes away from Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden. West, who once backed Republican President Donald Trump, announced last month that he had broken with Trump and would launch his own presidential bid. Trump won Tennessee’s presidential election in 2016 by 26 percentage points, carrying all but four of the state’s 95 counties. Perennial candidate Rocky de la Fuente along with Jo Jorgensen and Alyson Kennedy have also qualified as independent presidential candidates in Tennessee. Other candidates are still being reviewed by the secretary of state's office.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/2471341/kanye-west-qualifies-tennessee-presidential-ballot

New York Rejects 11th Parole Bid of John Lennon's Killer

Entertainment

August 26th, 6:35pm

Asharq Al-Awsat

Memorabilia lie on circle with word Imagine on it to honor deceased Lennon in Central Park's Strawberry Fields in New York. (Reuters)

The man who cut short the life and music of rock superstar John Lennon with a burst of bullets nearly 40 years ago lost his 11th bid to be freed from a sentence that could keep him behind bars for the rest of his life, a New York prison system spokesperson said on Wednesday. A parole board denied a request for release from Mark David Chapman, who must wait two more years before he becomes eligible again, the state Department of Corrections and Community Supervision spokesperson said. The rationale behind the decision of the Board of Parole panel members who interviewed Chapman on Aug. 19 at the Wende Correctional Facility near Buffalo, was not immediately disclosed. Chapman, 65, who has previously said that he long ago stopped being the troubled young man who shot one of the most famous people in the world to gain notoriety, is serving 20 years to life after pleading guilty to second-degree murder. The assassination-style murder of Lennon, a founder of the Beatles who also had solo hits such as “Imagine” and “(Just Like) Starting Over”, stunned the music world, the British-born musician’s adopted home of New York City and a generation that grew up with “Beatlemania.” At 40, Lennon had just emerged from a musical hiatus with the release of his “Double Fantasy” album when he went to a nighttime recording session on Dec. 8, 1980. When he returned to his home on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, Chapman was waiting for him and shot him four times in front of his wife Yoko Ono. Since 2000, the first year Chapman was eligible for parole, Ono, 87, has steadfastly opposed his release. Her attorney, Jonas Herbsman, said she submitted comments to the parole board, which he would only say are “consistent with the prior letters.” At his previous parole interview in August 2018 Chapman said he was a changed man and a religious Christian who would welcome freedom even though he said he did not deserve it. A remorseful Chapman, whose 2018 prison photo shows a leaner man than the pudgy 25-year-old who pulled the trigger, remembered being in a “tug of war” with himself over what he was about to do before yielding to the idea of killing for fame. “I was too far in,” he said in a transcript of the hearing. Chapman has worked as a porter and wheelchair repairman at the prison hospital and has occasionally been visited by his wife whom he married about 18 months before the murder.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/2471331/new-york-rejects-11th-parole-bid-john-lennons-killer

Lebanese Forces Used Excessive Force in Blast Protests, Says HRW

Arab World

August 26th, 6:31pm

Asharq Al-Awsat

A Lebanese protester waves the national flag during clashes with security forces in downtown Beirut, Lebanon days after the port blast. (AFP)

Lebanese security forces used excessive force, including firing live ammunition, against anti-government protesters after the Beirut port explosion, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said on Wednesday. It called for an investigation into the abuses. The Aug. 4 detonation of highly explosive material stored unsafely for years killed at least 180 people, injured about 6,000 and damaged swathes of the city, and fueled outrage at a political class already blamed for an economic meltdown. In angry demonstrations four days after the blast, some protesters stormed government ministries and hurled stones at security forces. Reuters journalists heard shots fired. The Red Cross said some 170 people were injured, including policemen wounded by stones. US-based HRW said security forces had on Aug. 8 fired live ammunition, metal pellets, and projectiles such as rubber balls, including at health workers. It said police deployed excessive quantities of tear gas and security forces threw stones at protesters and beat them. “Such unlawful and excessive force against mostly peaceful protesters shows the callous disregard of the authorities for their own people,” HRW deputy Middle East director Michael Page said in a statement. An Interior Ministry official had no immediate comment. HRW called on the public prosecutor to open an independent investigation, and urged international donors to Lebanese security forces to “investigate whether their support is going to abusive units, and if so, halt it immediately”. The now-caretaker government, which resigned over the blast, declared a state of emergency in Beirut, which activists criticized as an attempt to suppress dissent. The Aug. 8 protests were the biggest since October when thousands of people took to the streets to demand an end to corruption and bad governance they blame for a deep financial crisis that has ravaged the currency, seen banks freeze depositors out of their savings and sent unemployment soaring.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/2471321/lebanese-forces-used-excessive-force-blast-protests-says-hrw

Could Injectable Microrobots One Day Run in your Veins?

Technology

August 26th, 6:18pm

Asharq Al-Awsat

The robots, seen here in a computer generated image, are around the width of a human hair. (AFP)

Scientists have created an army of microscopic four-legged robots too small to see with the naked eye that walk when stimulated by a laser and could be injected into the body through hypodermic needles, a study said Wednesday. Microscopic robotics are seen as having an array of potential uses, particularly in medicine, and US researchers said the new robots offer "the potential to explore biological environments". One of the main challenges in the development of these cell-sized robots has been combining control circuitry and moving parts in such a small structure. The robots described in the journal Nature are less than 0.1 millimeter wide -- around the width of a human hair -- and have four legs that are powered by on-board solar cells. By shooting laser light into these solar cells, researchers were able to trigger the legs to move, causing the robot to walk around. The study's co-author Marc Miskin, of the University of Pennsylvania, told AFP that a key innovation of the research was that the legs -- its actuators -- could be controlled using silicon electronics. "Fifty years of shrinking down electronics has led to some remarkably tiny technologies: you can build sensors, computers, memory, all in very small spaces," he said. "But, if you want a robot, you need actuators, parts that move." 'Figuring out what's possible' The researchers acknowledged that their creations are currently slower than other microbots that "swim", less easy to control than those guided by magnets, and do not sense their environment. The robots are prototypes that demonstrate the possibility of integrating electronics with the parts that help the device move around, Miskin said, adding they expect the technology to develop quickly. "The next step is to build sophisticated circuitry: can we build robots that sense their environment and respond? How about tiny programmable machines? Can we make them able to run without human intervention?" Miskin said he envisions biomedical uses for the robots, or applications in materials science, such as repairing materials at the microscale. "But this is a very new idea and we're still trying to figure out what's possible," he added. 'Swallow the surgeon' Researchers said that they were able to produce the components for the robots in parallel, meaning they could make more than one million of them in each four-inch wafer of silicon. The legs were made from nanometer-thick platinum that bends when stimulated by laser light, creating the walking motion. Their average speed was about one body length per minute, the study said, adding this was "comparable to crawling biological microorganisms". The robots can survive highly acidic environments and temperature variations of more than 200 degrees Kelvin (-73 degrees Celsius), the study said. In a commentary also published in Nature, Allan Brooks and Michael Strano of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology said the concept of robots small enough to travel through blood vessels had been around since Nobel laureate Richard Feynman talked about the potential to "swallow the surgeon" in 1959. They said the new study provides "a clear vision" for solving the challenge of creating a tiny robot that can both convert energy into motion and is able to be programmable. "The authors' robots, although not autonomous in their current form, can be seen as a platform to which 'brains' and a battery can be attached," they said, predicting the "hurdle of developing autonomous programmability for microrobots will soon be overcome".

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/2471316/could-injectable-microrobots-one-day-run-your-veins

Eiffel Tower of Debris Cleared from Beirut Port

Arab World

August 26th, 6:14pm

Asharq Al-Awsat

French and Lebanese soldiers have cleared 8,000 tons of steel and concrete equivalent to the weight of the Eiffel Tower from the Beirut port after it was devastated by a monster explosion. (AFP)

French and Lebanese soldiers cleared 8,000 tons of steel and concrete equivalent to the weight of the Eiffel Tower from Beirut port which was devastated by a monster blast, an officer said Wednesday. Efforts have focused recently on clearing the parts of the port worst affected by the massive August 4 explosion that ripped across swathes of Beirut and killed more than 180 people. "It took me four days to clear 8,000 tons of concrete and steel," said Lieutenant Paulin, a French officer coordinating clearing operations at the port. "8,000 tons since we got here five days ago, that's the equivalent of the weight of the Eiffel Tower," said Paulin, who belongs to a French civil engineering regiment. The Tonnerre, a huge French amphibious helicopter carrier, arrived in Beirut earlier in August with dozens of trucks and heavy machinery to clear the debris. The blast, one of the largest in recent history, levelled entire sectors of the port, created a 43-meter-deep crater that was covered by the sea, and sent a shockwave that damaged property and wounded people several miles away. Colonel Yusef Haidar of the Lebanese army said the port, on which the country usually relies for around 90 percent of its imports, was currently operating at almost half of its capacity. "Last week, it was 30 percent, today we're talking around 45 percent," he said during a news conference inside the port. Three weeks after the blast, which was widely blamed on negligence by the Lebanese state, the port was still a sea of wrecked cars, mangled containers and collapsed warehouses. French and Lebanese soldiers could be seen salvaging goods and sorting them in such a way that traders and insurance experts can visit and make loss assessments in the coming days.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/2471311/eiffel-tower-debris-cleared-beirut-port

Israeli Killed by Palestinian in Stabbing Attack

Arab World

August 26th, 5:57pm

Asharq Al-Awsat

A Palestinian stabbed an Israeli rabbi on a street in the central Israeli city of Petah Tikva. (AFP file photo)

A Palestinian from the occupied West Bank fatally stabbed an Israeli rabbi on a street in the central Israeli city of Petah Tikva on Wednesday, police said. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu conveyed on Twitter his condolences to the family of Rabbi Shai Ohayon, 39, and said Israel would move to demolish the assailant’s home after “the terrorist stabbing attack”. Police said in a statement that a 46-year-old Palestinian from the West Bank city of Nablus carried out the stabbing in Petah Tikva, a city adjacent to Tel Aviv, and that investigators suspected it stemmed from “nationalist” motives. YNet News website said the alleged attacker, who was arrested after passersby chased him down, had a history of mental health problems, held an Israeli work permit and was not affiliated with any Palestinian militant group. Israeli officials have said attacks by Palestinians allowed to work in Israel have been rare. In waves of Palestinian stabbings, shootings and car rammings in Israel and the West Bank in recent years, most assailants have been young men who were not among the tens of thousands of Palestinians who work in Israeli factories or building sites after being vetted by security authorities.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/2471306/israeli-killed-palestinian-stabbing-attack