Excerpts: Arab states urged expel Iran from OIC. Lebanons Aoun looks to
revival of ties with Saudi Arabia. Iran transfers surplus heavy water to
Oman for sale. Women serve in Israel's army. Commander General approves
election Michel Aloun Lebanon Army November 21, 2016


+++SOURCE:Al Arabiya News 21 Nov,’16:”Expel Iran from OIC,Arab states urged”,by
Staff Writer
SUBJECT:Arab states urged expel Iran from OIC
FULL TEXT:The Council of Gulf International Relations (COGIR) has urged Gulf
Cooperation Council (GCC) as well as Arab and Islamic states to expel Iran
from the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) because of its harmful
acts against Islamic unity and solidarity and its sponsoring of terrorism
and promoting sectarianism.

The Council also stressed that Tehran’s instigation of its agents in Yemen
to target Makkah showed the Muslim world the hatred of this country for
Islam’s holiest sites.

This was announced by the President of COGIR and Chairman of its Arab
Society for Press and Freedom of Information Dr. Tariq Al-Sheikhan.Last
Month, 11 countries wrote a letter to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon
cautioning that Iran was continuing a negative role in causing tension and
instability in the region.The letter cited Tehran’s expansionist regional
policies, flagrant violations of the principle of sovereignty and constant
interference in the internal affairs of Arab states.The letter was signed by
the UN ambassadors of Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait, Morocco, Oman, Qatar,
Saudi Arabia, Sudan, United Arab Emirates and Yemen.

UN Watch, a Geneva-based monitoring group, welcomed the letter, saying it
was “important” that Muslim countries were speaking out against Iranian
policies.“Iran likes to dismiss all criticism of its human rights violations
and brutality at home and abroad as part of a Western plot, but that’s hard
to sustain when the accusers are all Muslim governments, including recent
allies of Iran like Sudan,” said UN Watch director Hillel Neuer in a
statement.

This article was first published in the Saudi Gazette.

+++SOURCE:Al Arabiya News 21 Nov.’16:”Lebanon’s Aoun looks to revive ties
with Saudi Arabia”,by Staff Writer
SUBJECT:Lebanon’s Aoun looks to revival of ties with Saudi Araba

FULL TEXT:Newly-elected Lebanese President Michel Aoun has said he looks
forward to reviving and consolidating ties with Saudi Arabia.

The news comes shortly after Saudi Arabia’s Prince Khaled al-Faisal invited
Aoun to visit Saudi.

Al Faisal, governor of Makkah and an adviser to the king, said during an
official visit to Lebanon that Aoun had promised to visit as soon as a new
Lebanese government was formed.

The Saudi delegation also announced that it will hold meetings with
Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri and Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri


+++SOURCE:Naharnet(Lebanon)21 Nov.’16:”Iran Transfers its Surplus Heavy
Water to Oman”,by Associated Press
SUBJECT:Iran transfers surplus heavy water to Oman for sale

FULL TEXT:Iran's semi-official ISNA news agency is reporting that the
country has transferred an amount of its surplus heavy water to Oman for
sale.

The late Sunday[20 Nov] report quotes Behrouz Kamalvandi, spokesman for the
Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, as saying "In view of the progress of
talks with several foreign firms and countries to purchase heavy water, some
quantities of Iran's surplus production has been transferred to Oman."

A recent U.N. report said that Tehran had slightly more heavy water in
storage than the 130 metric tons allowed by the agreement between Iran and
six world powers.

The landmark 2015 nuclear deal went into effect in January to cap Tehran's
nuclear activities in exchange for the lifting of economic sanctions.


+++SOURCE:Naharnet(Lebanon)21 Nov.’16:”Women Increasingly Join the Fight in
Israel’s Army”,by Agence France Presse
SUBJECT:Women serve in Israel’s Army

FULL TEXT:Her face covered in mud, 18-year-old Smadar crawls beneath thorny
brush, her automatic rifle around her neck.She smiles despite the intensity
of the training, and her commander, also a woman, shouts encouragement.

"I don't regret choosing this unit," said Smadar, who was not allowed to
provide her last name under Israeli army rules"I wanted to do my military
service in the most combative unit possible."

Smadar is part of a discreet but profound change taking place within the
Israeli military, with a growing number of women taking part in combat
units.

Just four years ago, some three percent of enlisted women served in combat
units compared to seven percent today, according to the army.

That number is expected to rise even further to 9.5 percent in 2017.

The increase has come both due to changes in society, with women's
participation in combat units no longer dismissed, and a shortage in
available soldiers due to reductions in the amount of required service time
for men.

Israel's military is an institution at the heart of society, with nearly all
Jewish citizens required to serve, and such changes are likely to
reverberate beyond the barracks.

- Equal right to serve -

Even before the state of Israel was created in 1948, women played an
important role in the Haganah, the forerunner to the country's military,
today the region's most powerful.

Currently men are required to serve two years and eight months after they
turn 18, while women serve two years.

Women's roles had historically been confined to such positions as nurses or
radio operators -- an arrangement undergoing rapid change.

The first mixed unit, known as the Caracal battalion, was formed in 2000,
taking its name from a type of wild cat whose males and females look the
same.

It was that year that the law was amended to state that "women's right to
serve in any position is equal to the right of men."

Smadar, who was training in the hills of the Galilee in the country's north,
is preparing to join the Bardelas battalion and will likely be stationed in
the semi-desert south.

Bardelas is one of what are now three mixed combat units in the Israeli
army. A fourth battalion is planned for March 2017.

Women wanting to take part in combat units must commit to serving eight more
months, an equal amount of time as men. It has not dissuaded volunteers.

"What a man can do, a woman can also do," said Smadar.

A 25-year-old woman from the Caracal battalion wondered why all units cannot
be mixed.

She arrived in Israel in 2004 from Ukraine and said she wanted to do
whatever possible for her new country.

"Whoever can fight must do it," she said. "Man or woman -- there is no
difference."

- A global trend -Israel's experience is similar to trends globally, said
Megan Bastick of the University of Edinburgh, who has studied women's
participation in security forces.

"Across the Western world, there has been a general increase over recent
decades in the proportion of women joining the military," she said.She cited
Australia and Canada as two countries in particular offering equal
opportunities.

In the Middle East, fighter pilot Major Mariam al-Mansouri led a combat
mission for the United Arab Emirates against Islamic State group jihadists
in 2014, recalled Dalia Ghanem-Yazbeck of the Carnegie Middle East Center.

Algeria has a number of women generals, while women also serve in Jordan,
Lebanon and Tunisia, she said.

In Syria, a number of women hold the rank of general and fight in combat
unitsGhanem-Yazbeck says that remains the exception.

Within combat units in the region, women often "continue to be in
traditional gendered positions such as translators or data-entry personnel
or social workers and so on."

"Despite an evolution, women remain the aides of their male counterparts."

- Integration tool -Israel's army has served as an integration tool for
society, bringing in Israelis of different ethnic backgrounds as well as
sexual orientations, a contrast with the conservatism of much of the
region.The military is thought to include more than 120,000 soldiers in
mandatory service -- an estimation since the army does not provide such
figures.More than 41 percent of those serving are women, the military says,
and 85 percent of army posts are available to women.

More than half of women serve, with ultra-Orthodox Jewish families exempt.

Amos Harel, defense correspondent for influential Israeli newspaper Haaretz,
said the increase in women does not reflect "ideology but a need," with the
timeframe for men to serve recently reduced from 36 to 32 months.

Mixed units operate along relatively calm borders, including those with
Egypt and Jordan, the only two Arab countries with peace treaties with
Israel.

Other units are assigned to more risky areas, such as the Lebanese border
and along the Gaza Strip.Forty-four female soldiers have been killed in
combat since 1948.

Harel questions whether the military will follow through and allow women to
serve in all roles at the risk of what has concerned many: one of them being
kidnapped.

The kidnapping of male soldier Gilad Shalit in 2006 by Hamas caused shock
nationwide"One cannot help wonder whether the response to the abduction of a
female soldier would be more extreme," Harel wrote recently in Haaretz.


+++SOURCE:”Naharnet (Lebanon)21 Nov.’16: “Qahwaji:Aoun’s Election Turns a
New Page for Lebanon)”,by Naharnet Newsdesk
SUBJECT:Lebanon Army CommanderGeneral approves election of Michel Aoun

FULL TEXTArmy Commander General Jean Qahwaji hailed on Monday[21 Nov] the
election of President Michel Aoun and said that it turns a new leaf for
Lebanon that will help to found the basis for national unification that has
long been sought.

Qahwaji's comments came during his Order of the Day on the Occasion of
Independence Day, he said: “The election of President General Michel Aoun
has turned a new page and reshaped the broad lines of a political reality
that has witnessed a lot of divisions and alignments. It heralds a promising
era in the regularity of the state institutions and the integration of their
roles, and to improve stability.”

Aoun was elected president on October 31 ending a presidential vacuum that
lasted for over two and a half years.

Pointing to the kidnapped Lebanese soldiers who are still held captive by
the Islamic State group, Qahwaji said: “We will spare no effort or
opportunity in order to reveal their fate and free them.”

Nine servicemen who were kidnapped in 2014 during deadly battles with
jihadists around the northeastern border town of Arsal are still held
captive by the Islamic State group.

The nine troops were among more than 30 servicemen who were abducted during
the battle.

While al-Nusra Front released 16 captives as part of a swap deal in December
2015, nine hostages remain in the captivity of the IS group and Lebanese
officials have vowed to exert efforts to secure their release.
==============
Sue Lerner - Associate, IMRA