بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم
International News Review 27/11/2021
West Raises Alarm of Renewed Russian Escalation at Ukrainian Border
According to a report by the Military Times on Sunday, ‘Russia has more than 92,000 troops amassed around Ukraine’s borders and is preparing for an attack by the end of January or beginning of February, the head of Ukraine’s defense intelligence agency told Military Times.’ Bloomberg reported the next day that ‘The U.S. has shared intelligence including maps with European allies that shows a buildup of Russian troops and artillery to prepare for a rapid, large-scale push into Ukraine from multiple locations if President Vladimir Putin decided to invade, according to people familiar with the conversations.’ Bloomberg also said, according to two of its sources, that ‘…Moscow had also called up tens of thousands of reservists on a scale unprecedented in post-Soviet times. They explained the role of reservists in any conflict would be to secure territory in a later phase after the tactical battalions paved the way. Russia hasn’t publicly announced any major call-up of reservists.’ Interfax cited Russia’s Black Sea fleet as saying, “About 10 aircraft crews and ships of the Black Sea fleet's Novorossiysk naval base... took part in this combat training event.” Reuters reported regarding the border with Belarus that Ukraine ‘launched an operation on Wednesday to strengthen its frontier, including military drills for anti-tank and airborne units.’ According to the Washington Post, ‘Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky asserted Friday that a group of Russians and Ukrainians planned to attempt a coup in Ukraine next month’. Also, on Friday, Ukraine’s president announced an $11 billion initiative to improve home and office insulation over the next five to ten years in order to reduce Ukrainian dependency on Russian gas.
Ukraine’s eastern border with Russia has been subject to conflict since pro-Russian separatists clashed with Ukrainian military forces in the eastern Ukrainian region of Donbas. The conflict erupted one month after Russia forcibly seized Crimea from Ukraine, and the Donbas separatists are also understood to be backed by Russia. Although Russia has denied any intent at this time to invade Ukraine, Russia’s President Vladimir Putin has often spoken of Ukraine historically being an intrinsic and inseparable part of Russia. In July, Putin published an essay under the title, “On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians” in which he criticised the Soviet Communist government for artificially foisting the Ukrainian identity on what were Russian people, saying, “The Bolsheviks treated the Russian people as inexhaustible fodder for social experiments” and that this led to the creation of artificial national identities, “So they drew borders at will and handed out generous territorial ‘gifts.’ In the final analysis, it no longer matters what guided the Bolshevik leaders in cutting up the country. One can argue about details, the causes and the logic off certain decisions. One thing is obvious: Russia was essentially robbed.” Furthermore, Russia has been betrayed over the expansion of NATO into former Soviet territories, and is sensitive to further NATO encroachment into Ukraine. Putin complained, in a major foreign policy speech on 18 November 2021, that the West is not taking Russian red lines seriously enough, saying that “We're constantly voicing our concerns about this, talking about red lines, but we understand our partners — how shall I put it mildly — have a very superficial attitude to all our warnings and talk of red lines”.
US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said on 10 November 2021 that the US is “concerned by reports of unusual Russian military activity”. However, the Ukrainian conflict, as with many other conflicts in the world, is expected to continue to fester as America is, in fact, uninterested in actually solving such problems. America only seeks to intensify such conflicts wherever it can, in accordance with the style of creating a permanent ‘balance’ between other great powers. America needs Europe and Russia to permanently clash with each other, so that they each drain their power and strength in such conflict, and so that they each look to America to support them in this conflict. Russia knows it cannot advance any further without tacit American endorsement. At the same time, because of such conflicts, Europe is forced depend even more heavily on the American-led NATO alliance instead of working to build their own independent military force.
The international politics of the Western powers only fills one with disgust. Islam reigned supreme for over a thousand years; although it resorted to balance of power tactics in particular times and particular situations, the Khilafah State did not attempt to make this a general permanent policy for the entire world. With the permission of Allah (swt), the Muslim Ummah shall soon re-establish their Islamic Khilafah (Caliphate) State on the method of the Prophet (saw) that shall unify all Muslim lands, liberate occupied territories, restore the Islamic way of life, implement the Islamic sharia and carry the call for Islam to the entire world. The Khilafah State will, almost from its inception, join the ranks of the great powers due to its immense size, vast population, overflowing resources, geostrategic expanse and Islamic ideology, and engage in international politics in order to confront, contain and then pacify the other world powers, thereby restoring stability, peace and prosperity to world affairs as it did before, fulfilling the responsibility of the Ummah towards all of mankind, in accordance with the ayah of Qur’an:
[كُنتُمْ خَيْرَ أُمَّةٍ أُخْرِجَتْ لِلنَّاسِ تَأْمُرُونَ بِالْمَعْرُوفِ وَتَنْهَوْنَ عَنِ الْمُنكَرِ وَتُؤْمِنُونَ بِاللّهِ وَلَوْ آمَنَ أَهْلُ الْكِتَابِ لَكَانَ خَيْرًا لَّهُم مِّنْهُمُ الْمُؤْمِنُونَ وَأَكْثَرُهُمُ الْفَاسِقُونَ]
“You are the best nation produced [as an example] for mankind. You enjoin what is right and forbid what is wrong and believe in Allah. If only the People of the Scripture had believed, it would have been better for them. Among them are believers, but most of them are defiantly disobedient.”[Aal-i Imran: 110].
Erdogan Speech Triggers Historic Crash of Turkish Lira
Triggered by a speech given by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan this week, the Turkish Lira fell to a new record low against the US dollar. According to the Washington Post, ‘The Turkish lira suffered a historic crash Tuesday, dropping by more than 15 percent against the dollar after President Recep Tayyip Erdogan gave an evening speech in which he defended an unorthodox economic policy that economists have dubbed “insane” and “irrational.”’
In fact, Erdogan has a healthy suspicion of Western Capitalist economics, and knows the dangers of their theories about inflation and their use of usury in the monetary system. Mainstream Western economic thinking holds that ramping up interest rates is necessary in order to combat inflation. But inflation has multiple causes, and some types of inflation and deflation are perfectly legitimate. According to one hadeeth narrated by Anas ibn Malik: غَلَا السِّعْرُ عَلَى عَهْدِ رَسُولِ اللَّهِ ﷺ فَقَالُوا يَا رَسُولَ اللَّهِ سَعِّرْ لَنَا، فَقَالَ: «إِنَّ اللَّهَ هُوَ الْمُسَعِّرُ الْقَابِضُ الْبَاسِطُ الرَّزَّاقُ وَإِنِّي لَأَرْجُو أَنْ أَلْقَى رَبِّي وَلَيْسَ أَحَدٌ مِنْكُمْ يَطْلُبُنِي بِمَظْلِمَةٍ فِي دَمٍ وَلَا مَالٍ»The people said: Messenger of Allah, prices have shot up, so fix prices for us. Thereupon the Messenger of Allah (saw) said: “Allah is the one Who fixes prices, Who withholds, gives lavishly and provides, and I hope that when I meet Allah, none of you will have any claim on me for an injustice regarding blood or property”. However, the West’s use of fiat currency enabling extrinsic manipulation of the volume of money results in unwanted complicating factors that they then choose to control through the abhorrent usurious banking system that fails to discriminate between genuine and manipulated inflationary elements.
Erdogan sees some of the fault in Western thinking, saying that increasing interest rates is not the solution to inflation. But his crime is greater because, even knowing that Western Capitalism is fundamentally flawed, he continues to implement its economic system and rejects returning to the implementation of the Islamic Sharia, which would abolish fiat currency in its entirety and return to the bimetallic gold and silver standard. Our economic problems can only be solved by the full implementation of Islam and not by trying to crudely transplant some policy vaguely inspired by Islam onto a system that is entirely alien to it. Furthermore, Erdogan’s opposition to standard Western economic thinking in this particular matter only is for an ulterior purpose, which is to provide cheap bank loans for the clique of large private Turkish enterprise that constitutes much of his political support base. Indeed, it is to gratify this base that Erdogan permitted private enterprise to freely and independently take direct foreign US dollar loans, which is the principle reason for the weakening of the Turkish Lira in the first place.
We shall not see the true implementation of Islam until the Muslim Ummah arises and overthrows the entire present class of agent rulers, who place their own interests and the interests of their Western masters above the interest of the Ummah and its Deen. Allah (swt) says in the Noble Qur’an:
[أَلَمْ تَرَ إِلَى الَّذِينَ يَزْعُمُونَ أَنَّهُمْ آمَنُواْ بِمَا أُنزِلَ إِلَيْكَ وَمَا أُنزِلَ مِن قَبْلِكَ يُرِيدُونَ أَن يَتَحَاكَمُواْ إِلَى الطَّاغُوتِ وَقَدْ أُمِرُواْ أَن يَكْفُرُواْ بِهِ وَيُرِيدُ الشَّيْطَانُ أَن يُضِلَّهُمْ ضَلاَلاً بَعِيدًا]
“Have you not seen those who claim to have believed in what was revealed to you, [O Muhammad], and what was revealed before you? They wish to refer legislation to Taghut, while they were commanded to reject it; and Satan wishes to lead them far astray.”[An-Nisa: 60].