Let's talk about Qatar

The rise of Qatar has been one of the most remarkable developments in the recent history of the Middle East. How this small, oil-rich Gulf state built Al Jazeera and parleyed the TV station's influence into a diplomatic role across the region is an insufficiently explored issue. The list of the monarchy's achievements is impressive, even putting aside how they secured the football World Cup for 2022. Qatari diplomats have mediated in Lebanon, helped rejuvenate the Arab League, led condemnation of Bashir al-Assad and joined the fight against Libya's Muammar Gaddafi. In a way, Qatar has become one of the region's lynchpins, second only to Saudi Arabia as the West's go-to country. The Prime Minister is said to speak regularly to his Qatari counterpart as part of a relationship that may now have surpassed the considerable UK-Omani link.

Let's talk about Qatar

Is Libya Sliding Toward Civil War?

Correspondents report that Tripoli today is a patchwork of fiefdoms held by rival militias that arrived in the capital months ago to chase out Qaddafi and have since refused to leave. Each of the militias appears to believe that its power to influence the future course of Libyan politics depends on maintaining an armed presence in Tripoli. Two of the militias are homegrown groups from Tripoli itself. One is led by Abdel Hakim Belhadj, an Islamist who spent time in Taliban camps and is the NTC-backed military council commander in the capital. The other is led by Abdullah Naker, a former electronics engineer who is openly critical of Belhadj. But there also militias from outside. There is one from Misurata, east of Tripoli; another from Zintan, southwest of the capital; another from the east of Libya; and another representing the country's Berber minority. All maintain territories and checkpoints, with their presence increasing after nightfall. Correspondents say the fighting usually breaks out when members of one militia try to cross through territory of another while refusing to disarm. It is just that kind of dispute that is believed to have led to this week's fighting, when fighters from Belhadj's military council detained a member of the Misurata militia.

Is Libya Sliding Toward Civil War?

Secretary Clinton on Qatar-US collaboration

SECRETARY CLINTON: Qatar is and remains a very valuable American partner. As we look back on the year just finished, I’m not sure there was any one like it. It was an extraordinary time, and during it, our partnership evolved to address new challenges and take advantage of new opportunities, including the unprecedented joint operations with NATO over the skies of Libya.

Secretary of State Clinton Remarks With Qatari Prime Minister After Their Meeting

Exxon's Partner In Giant Qatar Project To Help Exporting U.S. Shale Gas

Golden Pass (which is owned 70% by Qatar, 17.6% by Exxon and 12.4% by ConocoPhillips) would be just one of a handful of LNG export terminals on the gulf coast. Cheniere Energy, which was among the earliest to build an LNG import terminal at Sabine Pass, has already had its plans approved by the feds, and expects to begin exporting U.S. gas in 2015. In addition to the gulf coast export plans, ExxonMobil, BP and ConocoPhillips have been working on plans to export gas stranded in Alaska to the Asian market. This is all a huge change from just a few years ago, when the big players assumed the U.S. would need gas from the rest of the world. “People used to say that shale gas couldn’t compete with natural gas,” al Attiyah reportedly said. “In my 40 years in the industry, I have learned one thing: don’t believe in forecasts.”

Exxon's Partner In Giant Qatar Project Says It Wants To Reverse LNG Terminal To Export U.S. Shale Gas

Terrorists target international journalists in Syria

A Mistaken Case For Syrian Regime Change

Al-Jazeera has, and continues, [18] to provide technical support, equipment, hosting and "credibility" to Syrian opposition activists and organizations. Reports show that as early as March 2011, al-Jazeera was providing messaging and technical support to exiled Syrian opposition activists [19] , who even by January 2010 were co-ordinating their messaging activities from Doha. Nearly 10 months on, however, and despite the daily international media onslaught, the project isn't exactly going to plan: a YouGov poll commissioned by the Qatar Foundation [20] showed last week that 55% of Syrians do not want Assad to resign and 68% of Syrians disapprove of the Arab League sanctions imposed on their country. According to the poll, Assad's support has effectively increased since the onset of current events - 46% of Syrians felt Assad was a "good" president for Syria prior to current events in the country - something that certainly doesn't fit with the false narrative being peddled. As if trumpeting the success of their own propaganda campaign, the poll summary concludes: The majority of Arabs believe Syria's President Basher al-Assad should resign in the wake of the regime's brutal treatment of protesters ... 81% of Arabs [want] President Assad to step down. They believe Syria would be better off if free democratic elections were held under the supervision of a transitional government. [21] One is left wondering who exactly is Assad accountable to - the Syrian people or the Arab public? A blurring of lines that might perhaps be useful as two main Syrian opposition groups have just announced [22] that while they are against foreign military intervention, they do not consider "Arab intervention" to be foreign. Unsurprisingly, not a single mainstream major newspaper or news outlet reported the YouGov poll results - it doesn't fit their narrative.

A Mistaken Case For Syrian Regime Change

In the Arab Spring, Watch Turkey

Landlocked Iraqi Kurdistan also needs a conduit to export its oil to the West. The only country that can fulfill both roles is Turkey. That is why K.R.G. officials, instead of supporting their ethnic brethren inside Turkey, have often sided with Ankara against the separatist Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or P.K.K. All this explains why the bombing on Dec. 28, in which the Turks killed 35 Kurdish smugglers whom they mistook for terrorists, provoked little outrage in Iraqi Kurdistan. On the streets of Erbil there are no signs of protests against Turkey. Instead, one notices Turkey’s ubiquitous presence in the form of construction, investment, consumer goods and tourists. Should more pipelines leading from Iraqi Kurdistan to the Mediterranean via Turkey be built, the result will be the de facto creation of an Iraqi-Kurdish buffer state. Dependent on Turkey for its survival, such a state would also form a barrier to Iranian (or American, or P.K.K.) interference in Turkish affairs. In the southern part of Iraq, the situation is just the opposite. There, a Shiite Arab buffer state, buttressed by Iran as a bulwark against Turkish, American or Saudi encroachments, is being created. The last two weeks’ events have removed any doubt that Maliki is “Iran’s man” in Baghdad. Yet despite this de facto partitioning of Iraq over the last month, Turkey and Iran are not challenging each other’s spheres of influence.

In the Arab Spring, Watch Turkey