WarSclerotic

GENEVA, Switzerland — A Lebanese businessman living in Switzerland has offered Adolf Hitler’s top hat and other former possessions to the Israel-based Keren Hayesod, an umbrella body for pro-Israel fundraising in Diaspora Jewish communities.

Abdallah Chatila, who made his fortune in diamonds and real estate in Geneva, said he had bought the items at a controversial auction in Germany last week in order to keep them out of the hands of neo-Nazis.

He “wanted to buy these objects so that they would not be used for neo-Nazi propaganda purposes,” Chatila told the Swiss weekly Le Matin Dimanche. “My approach is totally apolitical and neutral.”

Chatila spent 545,000 euros ($601,000) on 10 lots at the Wednesday auction in Munich by the German auction house Hermann Historica, including a top hat worn by Hitler, his cigar box and typewriter, as well as a luxury edition of his book “Mein Kampf” embossed with an eagle and a swastika that belonged to the Nazi leader Hermann Goering, one of Hitler’s chief lieutenants.

“Far-right populism and anti-Semitism are spreading all over Europe and the world, I did not want these objects to fall into the wrong hands and to be used by people with dishonest intentions,” Chatila told the Swiss weekly.

Born in Beirut in 1974 to a family of Christian jewelers, Chatila is one of the 300 wealthiest people in Switzerland.

He told the paper that the Nazi artifacts “should be burned,” but that “historians think that they must be kept for the collective memory.”

He said he had made contact with Keren Hayesod, which was acting “for the building and development of the State of Israel.”

“I’m going to give them those objects… that should be exhibited in a museum.”

The auction sparked an uproar in Germany, particularly in the Jewish community.

Rabbi Menachem Margolin, president of the European Jewish Association, said earlier this month that Germany was “in the forefront in Europe with regard to the number of reported anti-Semitic incidents.”

The EJA called on “German authorities to oblige the auction houses to disclose the names of buyers,” which “could then be placed on a government list of people to watch.”

MANAMA, Bahrain (AFP) — French Defense Minister Florence Parly took aim Saturday at “gradual US disengagement” in the Middle East and said its failure to respond to provocations blamed on Iran set off a dangerous chain of events.

Since May, tensions in the Gulf have escalated alarmingly with attacks against tankers, a US unmanned drone being downed, and strikes on key Saudi oil facilities in September.

Iran was blamed but denied involvement.

Despite the attacks on its Saudi ally and having one of its own drones shot down, the United States has avoided equivalent retaliation.

“We’ve seen a deliberate gradual US disengagement,” Parly said at the annual Manama Dialogue on regional security, adding it had been “on the cards for a while” but had become clearer with recent events.

Iranian Revolutionary Guards patrolling around the British-flagged tanker Stena Impero as it was anchored off the Iranian port city of Bandar Abbas, on July 21, 2019. (Hasan Shirvani/ MIZAN NEWS AGENCY/AFP)

“When the mining of ships went unanswered, the drone got shot. When that in turn went unanswered, major oil facilities were bombed. Where does it stop? Where are the stabilizers?” she asked.

“The region is accustomed to the ebb and flow of US involvement. But this time it seemed more serious.”

Parly said the US drawback was a “slow process” and acknowledged that a US carrier strike group had just entered the Gulf.

“But the trend is, I think, quite clear and thus probably irrespective of who wins the next elections.”

The US aircraft carrier strike group Abraham Lincoln sailed through the Strait of Hormuz last week to show Washington’s “commitment” to freedom of navigation, the Pentagon said.

It was the first time a US aircraft carrier group has passed through the strait since Iran downed a US drone in June in the same area.

In this photo from the US Navy provided on November 19, 2019, the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln, left, the air-defense destroyer HMS Defender and the guided-missile destroyer USS Farragut transit the Strait of Hormuz with the guided-missile cruiser USS Leyte Gulf. (Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Zachary Pearson/U.S. Navy via AP)

Speaking from the same stage in Bahrain, Saudi Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Adel al-Jubeir insisted there was no US withdrawal from the region and no doubt about its commitment.

“We believe the US is very dependable ally, and has been for the past seven decades” he said of its staunch ally.

In this photo from February 4, 2019, Saudi Arabia Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir speaks with reporters during an European Union-Leagues Arab States ministerial meeting in Brussels. (John Thys/AFP)

“There is a desire in the US historically to try to retreat from the international scene, but that desire is not is reflected in America’s posture,” he said.

Jubeir defended Riyadh’s measured response to the September strikes, saying the kingdom was being “strategically very patient” in its investigation so there is “not a shadow of doubt” on where the drones and missiles came from.

“We have said all along we don’t want war, so to jump into war very quickly is not a rational position,” said Jubeir.

Red lines

The French defense minister also put herself at odds with the US on maritime security in the Gulf, after Washington earlier this month launched a maritime coalition based in Bahrain to protect shipping in the strategic Strait of Hormuz.

France instead favors a European mission which Parly said should be able to start “very soon.”

“We want to make clear that our policy is separate from the ‘maximum pressure’ American policy,” she said, referring to Washington’s increasing sanctions against Tehran.

“I would like to add that we are not subtracting anything, we are adding, as a number of countries would not have participated in the American initiative anyway.”

A picture obtained by AFP from Iranian News Agency ISNA on June 13, 2019, shows fire and smoke billowing from a tanker said to have been attacked in the waters of the Gulf of Oman, near the Strait of Hormuz. (ISNA/AFP)

In a wide-ranging and strongly-worded speech, Parly also spoke out on the dangers of chemical weapons again being used in Syria — an outcome that would be a red line for France.

“Yes there is a risk and when you look at [rebel-held] Idlib province there is a strong risk,” she said.

“I am convinced that if these weapons were used again that France would be ready to react again.”

US President Donald Trump, Brigitte Macron talks to French President Emmanuel Macron during the G7 family photo in in Biarritz, France, August 25, 2019. (Francois Mori/AP)

She also homed in on strains on NATO, saying it remained the cornerstone of security in Europe but that it was “time to move from the brain-dead to the brainstorm.”

French President Emmanuel Macron stirred controversy this month saying he believed NATO was undergoing “brain death,” lamenting a lack of coordination between Europe and the United States, in an interview with The Economist magazine.

Parly said proposals will be laid on the table at the alliance’s summit in London in December including for a group of “wise persons or elders to think about the future of NATO.”

Iran is unlikely to have been undeterred by increased US troop deployment in the Middle East and remains on track to carry out a large-scale attack in the region, the head of the US military’s Central Command said in an interview published Saturday.

“My judgment is that it is very possible they will attack again,” Gen. Kenneth F. McKenzie told the New York Times.

Over the past summer Iran shot down an American drone with no retaliation from Washington. It has subsequently been blamed for — and denied — attacking international oil tankers and destroying large portions of a major Saudi petroleum facility.

The lack of serious consequences has led Israeli officials to warn an emboldened Tehran could seek a major attack on the Jewish state soon.

In this April1 14, 2018, file photo, then-Marine Lt. Gen. Kenneth “Frank” McKenzie speaks during a media availability at the Pentagon in Washington. (AP/Alex Brandon, File)

McKenzie himself did not address such a possibility but did warn that Gulf nations were in danger.

“It’s the trajectory and the direction that they’re on,” he stated. “The attack on the oil fields in Saudi was stunning in the depth of its audaciousness. I wouldn’t rule that out going forward.”

Earlier this month a US-led naval coalition officially launched operations in Bahrain to protect shipping in the troubled waters of the Gulf.

Iran, which has denied any responsibility for the mystery attacks, has put forward its own proposals for boosting Gulf security that pointedly exclude outside powers.

In this image made from a video broadcast on the Saudi-owned Al-Arabiya satellite news channel on September 14, 2019, a man walks through a parking lot as the smoke from a fire at the Abqaiq oil processing facility can be seen behind him in Buqyaq, Saudi Arabia. (Al-Arabiya via AP)

In June, US President Donald Trump called off a retaliatory strike after Iran downed an American drone that Tehran said entered its airspace. The US, which denied the drone entered Iranian skies, was later reported to have launched a cyberattack on Iran.

In September around half of Saudi Arabia’s oil production capacity was knocked offline due to an attack claimed by the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen. There was no response to that attack, which the US, Israel and others also blamed on Iran.

And since May, there have been a series of attacks on oil tankers in the Persian Gulf. While Tehran denies being involved, the US Navy says Iran used magnetic mines on the vessels.

Netanyahu last month said Iran was emboldened by the lack of a response to the series of attacks attributed to it. He vowed Israel would respond forcefully to any attack.

On Tuesday, Iran’s Quds Force fired four missiles at Israel from Syria, according to the Israel Defense Forces. All four were shot down, and Israel responded a day later with a punishing round of airstrikes against Iranian and Syrian targets.

Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Quds Force commander Gen. Qassem Soleimani, center, attends a meeting with Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and Revolutionary Guard commanders in Tehran, Iran, September 18, 2016. (Office of the Iranian Supreme Leader via AP)

At least 23 combatants were killed, 16 of them likely Iranians, according to a Syrian war monitor.

Israel has repeatedly said that it will not accept Iranian military entrenchment in Syria and that it will retaliate for any attack on the Jewish state from Syria.

A Lebanese newspaper on Thursday reported that Tuesday’s rocket attack on the Golan Heights from Syria was retaliation for recent Israeli strikes near a soon-to-be-opened border crossing along the Syria-Iraq frontier.

Israel fears the Albukamal crossing will be used by Iran to transport weapons, equipment and fighters through Iraq, into Syria and onward to Lebanon and other countries in the region.