Day: September 22, 2023

Give us 5 minutes, and we’ll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.

“I’m still processing that,” the actor and director said of watching the film back, knowing it’s one of the few accounts that captured the war at its start.

The increased frequency of China’s military activities around Taiwan recently has raised the risk of events “getting out of hand” and sparking an accidental clash, the island’s defence minister said on Saturday.

Taiwan has said that the past two weeks has seen dozens of fighters, drones, bombers and other aircraft, as well as warships and the Chinese carrier the Shandong, operating nearby.

China, which views democratically governed Taiwan as its own territory, has in recent years carried out many such drills around the island, seeking to assert its sovereignty claims and pressure Taipei.

Asked by reporters on the sidelines of parliament whether there was a risk of an accidental incident sparking a broader conflict given the frequency of the Chinese activities, Taiwan Defence Minister Chiu Kuo-cheng said: “This is something we are very worried about”.

Warships from China’s southern and eastern theatre commands have been operating together off Taiwan’s east coast, he added.

“The risks of activities involving aircraft, ships, and weapons will increase, and both sides must pay attention,” Chiu said.

China has not commented about the drills around Taiwan, and its defence ministry has not responded to requests for comment.

Chiu said that when the Shandong was out at sea, which Taiwan first reported on Sept. 11, it was operating as the “opposing force” in the drills. Ministry spokesman Sun Li-fang added that China’s Eastern Theatre Command forces were the “attacking force”, simulating a battle scenario.

Taiwan’s traditional military planning for a potential conflict has been to use its mountainous east coast, especially the two major air bases there, as a place to regroup and preserve its forces given it does not directly face China unlike the island’s west coast.

But China has increasingly been flexing its muscles off Taiwan’s east coast, and generally displaying its ability to operate much further away from China’s own coastline.

China normally performs large-scale exercises from July to September, Taiwan’s defence ministry has said.

On Saturday the ministry said China had largely dialled back its drills, reporting that over the previous 24 hour period it had only spotted two Chinese aircraft operating in its air defence zone.

Taiwan has frequently said that it would remain calm and not escalate the situation, but that it won’t allow “repeated provocations” from China, whose forces have so far not entered Taiwan’s territorial seas or airspace.

Somalia is facing a dilemma over plans to continue a drawdown of peacekeepers from the country by a deadline of the end of 2024 because it’s not known whether the country’s poorly equipped security forces can put down al-Shabab militants’ security threat to the government by that time.

Hussein Sheikh Ali, national security adviser for Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, wrote to the United Nations requesting a 90-day delay in the second phase of the departure of African Union Transition troops in Somalia.

Somalia “formally requests a technical pause in the drawdown of the 3,000 African Union Transition in Somalia uniformed personnel by three months,” the letter read.

According to the letter, if continued under the current plan, the pullout would mean the departure of 3,000 troops by the end of September.

A diplomatic source in the government who requested anonymity because of a lack of authority to comment on the issue confirmed to VOA the authenticity of the letter. The source said the government wants to buy time for its effort to have an arms embargo lifted — a campaign supported by Ethiopia and Uganda, two regional powers.

“Somalia believes its campaign for lifting the U.N. arms embargo depends on proving that it can take the responsibility for its security without the dependence of AU peacekeepers, so it can better fight al-Shabab terrorists. At the same time, it does not want ATMIS [the African Transition Mission in Somalia] with its stronger military hardware to leave the country in the middle of unpredictable war with al-Shabab,” the diplomat said. “It is buying a time.” 

 

Appeal to General Assembly

In an exclusive interview with VOA, Somali Prime Minister Hamza Abdi Barre said he would appeal to the U.N. General Assembly this weekend about removing an international arms embargo, so Somalia could be capable of eliminating al-Shabab, a U.N.- and U.S.-designated terrorist organization that has fought the Somali government for 16 years.

A U.N. resolution calls for the ATMIS force to be reduced to zero by the end of next year, surrendering security responsibility fully to the Somalia’s national army and police forces.

The Somali government had repeatedly said it would be ready to take over security responsibilities from ATMIS when those troops withdrew from the country, in line with U.N. Security Council Resolution 2687.

Mohamud, who is in central Somalia to command the government fight against al-Shabab, said on August 18 that he believed the government would “eliminate” the jihadists by the end of the year.

According to the government letter to the United Nations, during the ongoing military offensive against the al-Qaida-affiliated al-Shabab militant group in central Somalia, the government had “managed to re-liberate towns, villages and critical supply routes.”

The government military gains, however, did not prevent the militant group from waging deadly counterattacks on government bases.

The government letter said the military operation had suffered.

“Several significant setbacks” have occurred since late August, the letter said, following a deadly dawn attack by the militants on a newly captured base in the village of Cowsweyne, Galguduud region, in central Somalia.

As a result of the attack, the Somali military suffered heavy losses, forcing other military units to retreat from towns and villages captured in recent months in the same region.

“This unforeseen turn of events has stretched our military forces thin, exposed vulnerabilities in our front lines, and necessitated a thorough reorganization to ensure we maintain our momentum in countering the al-Shabab threat,” the letter said.

“We hold firm in our belief that this technical pause will, in the long run, contribute to the enduring peace, stability and prosperity of Somalia,” it said, adding that the government remained fully committed to the complete ATMIS drawdown by the end-of-2024 deadline.

Security experts in Somalia said al-Shabab militants have been withdrawing from towns and villages and retreating into the bush with the intention of prosecuting a prolonged guerrilla war.

The government request to the United Nations came days after ATMIS announced it had kicked off the second phase of the drawdown, with the projected departure of 3,000 troops by the end of September.

Since the beginning of the ATMIS drawdown, 2,000 AU troops had left by the end of June, and six bases have been handed over to Somali forces.

Before the troop reductions began, ATMIS was made up of about 20,000 uniformed personnel drawn from Burundi, Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya and Uganda.

Some information for this report came from Agence France-Presse.

My Opinion: Russian peacekeepers look at these duties as the extended vacation (see video). UNSC mandated peacekeepers would be more preferable for both sides. They will be needed for a while. And there is no reason, why both sides, Armenian and Azeri, could not say to the Russians: “Thank you for your help, from now on we will manage by ourselves. Good By.” Russians may be happy to use these forces somewhere else. M.N. 

Т. Зульфугаров: То, что произошло выгодно как Азербайджану, так и Армении

Watch the full event

Peace and security are “not free of charge,” Sigrid Kaag, the Dutch deputy prime minister and finance minister, said Friday. 

“If we lose the war in Ukraine, we’re all lost. No peace and security on this continent,” she argued. “This is something we have to keep financing.” 

At the Transatlantic Forum on GeoEconomics in Berlin, hosted by the Atlantic Council and Atlantik-Brücke, Kaag said that Russia’s war in Ukraine is part of a trend of international conflicts “increasingly being fought on economic terrain.” That, she added, has brought a geoeconomic awakening for the European Union (EU).  

Before, the EU had previously focused closely on markets and trade, “but it didn’t spread its political wings,” Kaag explained. Now, the EU “needs to assert itself on the international stage,” to ensure liberal democracies come out on the winning side. 

Below are more highlights from her conversation with Atlantic Council President and CEO Frederick Kempe, which touched upon how the EU should navigate a geoeconomically fragmented world and a future response to Russia’s aggression. 

Wide awake

• Kaag said that the EU needs to assert itself in part because the international playing field has become more complex, for three reasons: first, technology such as artificial intelligence; second, the declining importance of the West; and third, a retrenchment of globalization, spurred by public backlash. 
• For the EU to assert itself, Kaag recommended using economic tools such as trade agreements, access to markets, and foreign investments. “Geoeconomics is a source of our strength,” she said. And, she added, the EU should use these tools “in a collaborative way with its partners.” 
• As the EU undergoes this awakening, it needs to “take a good look” at itself, Kaag said, to make member economies “more competitive, innovative, and resilient to shocks,” and to solve its own internal fiscal policy and political problems.  
• One way the bloc is “getting our own act together,” she said, is the EU’s Green Deal Industrial Plan, a “follow-up” to the US Inflation Reduction Act. 

A fragmented world

• Kaag argued that in facing today’s geoeconomic challenges, the EU should employ “a mix of defensive and open policy instruments.” Defensive measures, she noted, “remain important” because they can help countries avoid creating dependencies on other countries, which “can all too easily be weaponized” by leaders with ill intentions.  
• But those instruments have drawbacks. Kaag warned that fragmentation could cost 7 percent of the global gross domestic product; it would also impede “our ability to address global issues such as climate change” and poverty, she added.  
• While Kaag said it is vital to focus on strengthening and enhancing global economic cooperation, she acknowledged that multilateral cooperation “is not always… effective” when alliances are shifting and countries are changing. That means working with countries beyond the “usual suspects,” even when it’s difficult and there’s less common ground. “We consider a new approach to the Global South essential,” she said. 
• Cooperation is central to “open strategic autonomy,” a concept that Spain and the Netherlands promote in strategic autonomy discussions at the EU and which calls for cooperating whenever possible, while ensuring that the bloc can cope on its own when it must. “We see our security also strengthened through an investment in shared prosperity.” 

Keeping up resolve

• With elections approaching on both sides of the Atlantic—and with some politicians calling for an end to supporting Ukraine—Kaag said she is not “entirely optimistic” about the ability of the EU, its member countries, and the United States to continue their military and financial support until the war’s end.  
• She explained that it will depend on countries’ abilities to foster economic growth and support their citizens’ purchasing power. There’s a “false choice” between financing the war in Ukraine and keeping costs of living from spiraling at home, Kaag argued.  
• Sanctions have had “a significant effect” on the Russian economy already, Kaag explained, pointing to Russia’s declines in consumer spending and arms production, coupled with rising inflation. But sanctions are really “long-haul” mechanisms, she said. 
• “Sustain the pace,” Kaag told the audience of financial policymakers and experts. “Look for loopholes to avoid sanctions diversion,” to find ways the Russian economy is still accessing “financial avenues.” 
• “We will always find new packages, more sharper and so-called ‘smarter’ sanctions” to disrupt Russia’s procurement of the instruments of war, Kaag said. She noted that the Netherlands is willing to explore additional sanctions, in addition to having discussions about using frozen Russian assets to assist in Ukraine’s reconstruction. “We should not leave any avenue unexplored,” she said. 

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Katherine Walla is an associate director of editorial at the Atlantic Council.

Watch the full remarks

The post Financing Ukraine’s defense is a down payment for peace in Europe, says Dutch deputy prime minister appeared first on Atlantic Council.

CHICAGO (NewsNation) — Throughout the nation, one can spot aging, abandoned churches falling into despair, with some even bearing graffiti inside.

However, on any given day, you could pass by an unassuming building like Soul City Church in Chicago without realizing that hundreds of Gen Z’ers gather there to worship.

What becomes evident is American spirituality isn’t fading away; rather, it’s undergoing a transformation.

YouTubers are also providing virtual tours of these dilapidated, graffiti-covered old churches, offering viewers a glimpse inside.

These churches, once community cornerstone, now have empty pews. However, what might not be immediately evident is the vibrant gathering of young people, often in modest surroundings, uniting to worship.

Pastor Jarrett Stevens of Soul City Church in Chicago is very aware of the dechurching trends, but appears to have found a solution.

“The average age of our church right now is 27; I definitely feel like I’ve aged out of our church,” Stevens said. “What they don’t see is when you create a space for people to have an authentic experience when you give them a voice a seat at the table, they’ll want to not just be involved, they’ll want to shape the church.”

However, the new generation’s church experience is different from that of their parents.

When asked if they prayed daily, only two of the three members of the congregation that NewsNation spoke to raised their hands.

When asked if they’d describe themselves as “religious,” two raised their hands., however, Hannah Gronowski Barnet said she doesn’t relate to the term.

“That probably would differ depending on how you talk about religion,” said “For me, religion is actually not something I relate to at all, the term religion. So, for me, it’s more of I’m actively following God.”

“When I was growing up in a highly religious family, it felt inauthentic because it felt like I was having to compartmentalize myself,” said Kayla Eastman. “Certain parts of me weren’t welcome at church, but other parts were, and the parts of me that struggled with mental health.”

“Many people don’t know this, but many theologians who have studied the lives of these disciples,” Barnet said. “Many people believe they were actually in their late teens or early 20s.”

This particular age group is now at the forefront of a modern movement, and this phenomenon isn’t limited to urban centers like Chicago.

For example, a revival at the University of Kentucky went on for 11 consecutive days, eventually needing to be shut down. A 1,400-person auditorium was packed to capacity after word spread on social media.

Similarly, at Oklahoma University, the “Fill The Stadium” event drew thousands of young participants.

However, for some, their faith exists beyond the confines of a traditional house of worship.

“People often ask what my beliefs are now that I’ve deconstructed,” Donnell McLchlan wrote in a TikTok post. “I currently don’t practice organized religion but I am a religious pluralist.”

McLachlan, the “TikTok theologian,” has amassed a following of 266,000 followers keen on following his journey of “deconstruction” as he reevaluates the beliefs he was raised on.

“I’m not coming across as anti-Christian because I’m not anti-Christian. I’m pro-religion and pro-people hanging onto ideas that ultimately help them grow into better people,” he said.

McLachlan is one example of an influencer who has transformed his relationship with the church.

Recent statistics indicate many Americans are undergoing a process known as “de-churching,” wherein those who used to attend church at least once a month now go less than once a year.

New polling data from Gallup shows nearly half of Americans now identify as religious, while a third say they are spiritual but not religious.

Among the 82% of Americans who do hold some sort of belief system, 47% said they were religious, 33% said they were spiritual but not religious and just 2% identified as both spiritual and religious.

Over the last 25 to 30 years, this shift has led to 40 million people ceasing their regular church attendance.

“It’s the largest shift in religiosity in America over the last 200 years,” said Ryan Burge, an Eastern Illinois State University associate professor of political science. “There’s actually more people (who) left religion than joined religion during the first Great Awakening, the Second Great Awakening, and all of a Billy Graham crusades combined.”

Yet, not every part of America has experienced a decline in religious faith.

Burge, co-author of the book “The Great Dechurching,” notes nearly 80% of Americans still express some level of belief in God.

“I think spirituality is just shifting, I don’t think spirituality will ever die,” McLachlan said.

When asked if he’s hopeful about the future for Gen Z and religion, Burge said: “Look we’re talking about a faith that has prevailed for over 2000 years, I’m not worried about that, I’m worried and concerned about the hands that try to hold on too tightly to it rather than entrusting them to people who are coming up behind them.”

Rabbi Angela Buchdahl wants you to know that she did not skip out on singing “Hatikvah” at this morning’s rally for Israeli democracy outside the United Nations because of the backlash from some of her more conservative congregants.

It’s not that there wasn’t backlash. Buchdahl, senior rabbi of Manhattan’s mammoth Central Synagogue, got a number of very tough emails challenging her decision to protest outside the U.N. of all places, saying it would only embolden Israel’s enemies. There were plenty of nasty comments online, too, after her Rosh Hashanah sermon saying American Jews “cannot walk away” from this fight went a little viral on YouTube (34,000 views and counting).

But Rabbi Buchdahl responded to each of those emails with strong counter-arguments. Then on Wednesday night, she tested positive for COVID-19.

“I didn’t not show up because people were mad about it, because that is not how I roll,” she told me by phone.

“These days are days that you discern what really matters and what you care about and how we want to behave in this coming year,” Buchdahl said of this period between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, known as the Days of Awe. “Here is a first opportunity for those who want to see a thriving Israel to act on that.

“This feels like a real act of teshuvah,” she added of the protest, using the Hebrew word for “return” and repentance. “It feels like a kind of return to our Israeli brothers and sisters, who’ve been crying out for the last nine months and we’ve been mostly silent.”

This is our editor-in-chief’s weekly newsletter. Click here to get it delivered to your inbox on Friday afternoons. Davening by bullhorn: A few dozen liberal American Jews had a spirited, egalitarian morning prayer service before Friday’s pro-democracy rally outside of the United Nations, where Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke. (Jodi Rudoren) As regular readers of this newsletter know well, I’ve been saying kaddish for my dad every morning since he died in February. So when I decided to cover this morning’s protests against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s judicial overhaul plan, I concocted an elaborate plan to get into Manhattan early enough to park, get coffee, and Zoom into my regular Friday minyan.   I was listening in to that service via AirPods as I strolled into Dag Hammarskjöld Plaza ahead of the rally’s scheduled 8:30 a.m. start, only to find an exuberant circle of men and women in prayer shawls and tefillin reciting the morning blessings. Many wore handout cardboard yarmulkes printed with “Pray for Jewish and democratic Israel.”   This was a new thing for the local arm of the protests, which until this week had been filled mainly with secular Israeli-Americans. The organizers had made a pointed effort to engage American rabbis in this week’s rallies around Netanyahu’s visit to the U.S., given that it coincides with the holiest week of the Jewish year.   At one point, I looked across the makeshift minyan to see Esther Sperber, an Upper West Side architect who has been the main non-Israeli organizer of the New York rallies. She was in tears.    “I’ve been working so hard to get my community to show up and they’re finally here,” explained Sperber, who described herself as “liberal-leaning modern Orthodox.”    “I’ve been talking to all of them for the last eight months about how if missiles were falling on Israel, we’d all be out in force, and this is a self-inflicted missile,” she said. “I think this may be the turning point.”     A key part of that was persuading prominent leaders like Buchdahl, whose synagogue has 3,000 member-households — with 800 more on a wait-list — to take a marquee role. When she couldn’t make it, the organizers invited all the clergy in the crowd to the stage for “Hatikvah,” the Israeli national anthem; there were 30 or 40 of them, men and women, queer and straight, in knitted kippot and baseball caps.    In the middle stood Elliot Cosgrove, senior rabbi of Park Avenue Synagogue on the Upper East Side, the largest Conservative shul in New York. He is an icon of the mainstream Jewish establishment, and looked the part in suit and tie, a sharp contrast to the sea of T-shirts with political slogans (“Save Israeli Democracy,” “Resisting Tyrants Since Pharoah,” “Torah Trumps Hate,” “Palestinian Lives Matter”).    “This is an amazing moment for us that he’s here,” Shany Granot-Lubaton, the Israeli-American leader of the New York protests, said in introducing Cosgrove. “I’m saying this for the Israelis, most of whom are secular and don’t know. This is a major moment.”    Cosgrove surprised and delighted the crowd by delivering his short and stirring speech in both Hebrew and English, invoking Hillel’s famous saying, with a twist: If not now, when? If not here, where? If not me, who?   “This has been such a transformative year for American Jewry,” Cosgrove told me offstage. “Protesting the Israeli government has become an expression of Jewish identity. What was treyf has become kosher.”  “I’ve been talking to all of them for the last eight months about how if missiles were falling on Israel, we’d all be out in force, and this is a self-inflicted missile. I think this may be the turning point.”   – Esther Sperber, protest organizer Maybe. About 2,000 people turned up Friday morning outside the U.N., far more than at any previous protest in the U.S. since Netanyahu’s far-right government proposed its judicial plan — and far, far fewer than typically join New York’s annual Celebrate Israel parade on Fifth Avenue.    The crowd definitely included a higher percentage of Americans than the March protest I attended in Greenwich Village. But when someone bumped into me, she said “slicha” — Hebrew for “sorry” — and many of the crowd-control instructions were given in Hebrew first.    As with the weekly democracy protests in Israel, the plaza was a sea of Israeli flags — the organizers had purchased 1,000 for the occasion. And as in Israel, there was an eclectic mix of slogans on the signs and shirts: “From the river to the sea, democracy for all.” “Jews for Palestinian justice.” An image of Netanyahu tearing an Israeli flag. “Rabbis say: Repent, Bibi!”    There were no visibly Orthodox Jews — until a couple of dozen Chabad guys in black hats and black suits showed up on the sidelines, asking random men if they wanted to wrap tefillin — I wished they’d been there an hour before to see the women wearing tefillin at the egalitarian minyan; I wished I’d brought my own tefillin to show them.    There were two small counter-protests: One with a few dozen people holding signs with pictures of Netanyahu that said “Americans got your back,” the other made up of perhaps a dozen Haredi Jews with banners opposing Zionism altogether. This is what democracy looks like, indeed.   Offir Gutelzon, the Israeli-American tech entrepreneur who started UnXeptable, the group leading the U.S. protests, agreed with Sperber that this week has felt like a turning point. His group has doubled the number of people on its email list and WhatsApp group to 10,000 since the Israeli Knesset’s July vote to strip the Supreme Court’s of some of its power to review legislation, he said. It now has 40 chapters across North America, up from 25 earlier in the year.   The protest movement has also hired a high-powered Washington P.R. firm, Trident DMG, for three months at a cost of $75,000. And this week’s actions included a plane flying overhead with a banner saying “Defend Israel’s Democracy,” a boat sailing across from the U.N. with a sign shouting “NEVER SURRENDER” and messages projected onto prominent New York buildings. (Spokespeople declined to say how much all this cost, or how much the movement has raised in 2023.)   “It grew up really fast,” Gutzelon said. “It’s hard to get Jewish Americans to say something against the policies — the DNA was always you support Israel no matter what. It’s hard to get people to say, ‘It’s OK to criticize the judicial overhaul, it’s not about criticizing Israel.’ You are holding an Israeli flag, you cannot be against Israel.”   That’s pretty much what Rabbi Buchdahl told the conservative congregants who expressed concern about her plan to participate in today’s rally, what she said in her sermon.   “We are reclaiming the flag, we are reclaiming the Declaration of Independence, we are reclaiming this language around Jewish values,” she said. “Of all my Israel sermons, this one felt less controversial to me, because who doesn’t stand for democracy? We are one people. Our destinies are bound up with each other. We shouldn’t walk away from Israel.”   Buchdahl, who I’ve known since college and who is a member of the Forward Association — our advisory board — first went to Israel at age 16 on the prestigious Bronfman fellowship. She has  been back about 40 times since, including this year, when she joined the hundreds of thousands protesting every Saturday night on the streets of Tel Aviv.    She had not originally planned to speak about Israel during these High Holidays — her Rosh Hashanah address was going to be about artificial intelligence. But she said she changed her mind about three weeks before the holiday, after listening to some podcasts in which prominent Israelis were begging for Americans to stand up and speak out.   “I woke up one morning,” she recalled, and thought to herself, “‘You are a rabbi in this moment, you have to talk about Israel.’ Up until this point, American Jews have been radically silent in the face of all that’s going on. It’s like, where the hell are American Jews right now?”   Some hundreds of them were in Dag Hammarskjöld Plaza on Friday morning, screaming “Busha, busha” — Hebrew for “shame, shame” — backed by drums and whistles as Netanyahu spoke inside the U.N., largely ignoring the political turmoil tearing his country apart.   It hardly feels like enough. Shabbat Shalom and G’mar chatimah tovah!  Questions/feedback: rudoren@forward.com   Dept. of Corrections : In introducing our three new fellows in last week’s newsletter, I should have said the program is supported in part by a grant from the Jews of Color Initiative, in partnership with the Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation. To join them in supporting the Forward, become a monthly donor today.   WATCH: WHAT’S NEXT? Our Laura E. Adkins sat down with two leading experts on Israel’s judicial overhaul and the protest movement, Daniel Gordis and Dahlia Scheindlin. In normal political times, Gordis sits on the center-right of the political spectrum and Scheindlin on the left, but they are in violent agreement about the threats the current government poses to Israeli democracy.

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JEWISH PRIORITIES Imagine having the entire Jewish people over for dinner. That’s the idea behind Jewish Priorities, a new anthology that includes my essay about the essentialness of asking great questions. It’s not officially out until Oct. 24, but you can pre-order a copy here, and if you come to one of our launch events — at the Weitzman Museum of Jewish History in Philadelphia on Oct. 22 or at New York’s Streicker Center on Nov. 2 — I’d be more than happy to sign it!

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

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