18-Aug-20: An Arab-on-Israeli knifing in Jerusalem's Old City and a dead assailant

Screen cap from the Israel Police video report [here]

The general sense of fury being projected by a wounded and failed Palestinian Authority leadership in the wake of Israel's suddenly open 'normalized' relationship with the United Arab Emirates received its depressingly predictable expression last night.

Here in Jerusalem, near Lion's Gate (שער האריות) in the Old City at around 8:40 pm Monday night, shortly before Muslim evening prayers and close to the Bab Huta entrance (one of several) to the Temple Mount, an attacker wearing a protective face mask launched an explosive knifing attack. His victim was a 19 year old armed Israeli security officer who came out of it with moderate injuries but alive and recovering.

The attacker was almost immediately shot by security personnel and died of his injuries. Palestinian Arab news reports like this one predictably say the young Arrab was 'executed'.

The security camera video [here] makes plain the usual procedure: young Arab male, walking along one of the Old City paths, lunges without warning towards a security forces member standing guard to protect the peace, whips a knife out of his clothing. Thrusts a hand holding the weapon towards the upper body of the Israel, causing what undoubtedly would be the first of several lethal wounds if no one stops him. But he is stopped by the shots of another alert Israel Border Guard officer and falls to the ground.

Arabic-language news reports (like this one from the official Palestinian Press Agency, archived here) say (translated from the Arabic original) "the Israeli occupation forces executed a Palestinian youth", that "the martyr... is from the Shuafat refugee camp in Jerusalem" and "he is 30 years old".

The murderous assault comes against the background of what a Times of Israel report calls "a general lull in terror activity in the capital, which had not seen a stabbing attack in nearly three months".

The teenage border guard, presumably in the midst of his compulsory national service, was taken to hospital (Yediot Aharonot says Shaarei Zedek; Times of Israel reports Hadassah Mount Scopus Medical Center) for emergency treatment. Initial first aid was given at the site by Magen David Adom medics. The hospital reports that he sustained stab wounds to the chest and is "stable and fully conscious”.

Haaretz quotes Israel Police announcing that the Temple Mount gates were closed immediately after the knifing. Social media reports (like this) say that in the Shuafat neighborhood of north Jerusalem there were clashes in the hours that followed between Israel Police and locals.

04-May-16: Begging for spare Arab change at UNRWA

Everyone and his personal struggle: Addressing transport
issues in the UAE [Image Source: Reuters]

In the Middle East, there are two fundamental, but different, realities that influence strongly the shape of the Arab/Israel conflict. One is the passion with which Arab states, especially the richest among them, pledge undying support for the "resistance" "struggle" of the Palestinian Arabs. The other is the financial resources they put behind that "support".

UN Palestinian agency turns to Gulf countries to avoid funding crisis | Established in 1950, UNRWA helps some five million Palestinians living in Jordan, Syria, Lebanon and in the Palestinian territories (File photo: AP) | AFP | United Nations (United States) Tuesday, 3 May 2016 | The head of the UN Palestinian refugee agency on Tuesday urged Gulf countries to donate millions to help UNRWA avoid a funding crisis. Last year, the agency was hit by a major funding crisis that threatened to affect the opening of schools. An appeal by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to donors helped resolve the crisis, but the agency still has a funding gap of some $80 million. “We’d be very appreciative to have countries that have come forward last summer to help, and in particular three Gulf states –- Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and Kuwait -– renew their generosity this year,” said Pierre Krahenbul, UNRWA’s commissioner-general. “If we could have that, we’d be able to avoid another crisis this summer,” he said.

Image Source

To give this a frame of reference, the Gross Domestic Product in 2014 (US dollars), the latest numbers we could find, for the three Arab countries to which UNRWA is turning its beseeching eyes:

• United Arab Emirates $399.5 Billion
• Kuwait $172.6 Billion
• Saudi Arabia $746.3 Billion

To help readers put this pathetic charade into perspective, and understand the decades of deep Arab cynicism about their beloved Palestinian brothers, see "19-Jun-13: We actually do understand why Arab states put almost no money in the Palestinian Arab "refugee" fund pot. We just don't get why the US does."

Based on some numbers we published here four years ago, pretty much the same question should be asked of the European Union, Australia, Sweden, UK, Norway and a list of other Western countries.

29-Dec-15: Gaza and what manipulative, highly-politicized foreign aid can buy

The red carpet is constantly out for visitors to Shujaiyeh
neighborhood, Gaza City. This non-Photoshopped photo is from nearly
a year after the destruction [Photo Credit: Dan Cohenvia 972Blog]

Gazan suffering. It's a vastly potent issue that drives much of the passion on the Palestinian Arab side.

With bitter wintery weather setting in fast, why are so many Gazan Palestinian Arabs still waiting for homes destroyed in 2014's summer battle with Israel to be reinstated and/or replaced?

Some digging around by reporters for the Wall Street Journal today offers surprising insights: "Politics Slows Rebuilding in War-Ravaged Gaza Strip | Political differences among Gulf Arab states play large role in who gets aid" [Rory Jones and Abubakr Bashir | Wall Street Journal, December 29, 2015]

It frames the question in terms of the very different fates experienced by a pair of Gazan brothers and their two adjoining residences. They are Abdelraziq Harara, 53, and and Jihad Harara, 65, two Palestinian Arab everyman-like unknowns who happen to have lost their neighboring Gaza homes in the storm of war that swept over them in July 2014. That's when the densely-populated Shujaiyeh neighborhood of Gaza City became the center of fierce fighting involving the terrorists of the rocket-rich Hamas regime and the IDF. More than 140 Hamas rockets had been fired in the general direction of Israel from the Harara brothers' neighborhood in the 12 days commencing July 8, some of them reaching well into Israel's centers of population in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv and .

Open-air prison? [Source]

Israel's patience got stretched thinner and thinner. Then it ended. At that point, Israel took some extraordinary preliminary measures before commencing a much-needed counter-offensive. Starting on July 16, 2014, and with the intention of minimizing the loss of civilian lives, the IDF

by means of leaflets, loudspeaker announcements, telephone calls, text messages and radio messages, told the residents to leave and relocate in central Gaza City until further notice... By 19 July, OCHA reported that while the majority had not left their homes,and ignored the warnings, up to half had gone as bombardments intensified. Israel condemned Hamas for using "human shields". According to Amnesty International, the UNRWA shelter facilities were overflowing and many of the residents had nowhere to go. Residents interviewed later also cited confusion due of lack of electricity and communications. The official Israeli view was that Hamas had compelled residents of Shujai'iya to stay behind in the face of IDF warnings to evacuate prior to the IDF assault, holding civilians as "hostages".Jordanian-Palestinian politician Mudar Zahran wrote that a Gaza medical worker had told him "Hamas militants blocked exits, shot people as they were running and forced the rest to return to their homes and get bombed". [Wikipedia]

Serious air, tank and mortar fire began on the night of July 19, 2014. Then shortly afterwards, Israeli ground forces entered the neighbourhood. Much destruction ensued.

Concentration camp? [Source]

Fast forward to today's WSJ analysis.

While Abdelraziq Harara's house is almost completely rebuilt, the immediately-adjacent lot, where his brother Jihad Harara's house once was, remains desolate. Same street, same family, completely different outcome. Why? As the WSJ article makes clear, the answer is: very poorly managed money, and the cynical manipulation this makes possible.

Soon after the end of the 2014 fighting, foreign donors were convened in Cairo for a one-day hand-over-the-money conference aimed at raising enough money to reverse the damage suffered by the Gazans. We noted here ["27-May-15: The cheque for Gaza is in the mail, or whatever"] that

the fund-raiser was an incredible success. The organizers had hoped to raise $4 billion, but ended with pledges to Gaza of an incredible $5.4 billion,.. And you have to take your hat off in recognition of the donors' selfless generosity. Some of them may be astronomically wealthy but let's give credit where it's due: they really wanted to help. Their fraternal ties to the Arabs of the Gaza Strip provided a powerful incentive to do the right thing. As we noted, major pledges of funding came from Qatar ($1bn). Saudi Arabia ($500m), Turkey ($200m), United Arab Emirates ($200m), the European Union ($568m), the United States ($212m) and the United Kingdom ($32m).

Successful as it all seemed to be, seriously negative signs were not hard to find even then. We suggested what this meant for Gaza's teeming masses and the desperately-needed cash that seemed to have been raised:

[T]he United States which pledged $277 million has handed over 84% of that. The European Union promised $348 million, and 40% has shown up so far which, compared with the Arabs, is not too shabby... [On the other hand] Qatar is spending tens of billions of dollars on getting ready to host the 2022 FIFA soccer World Cup. Of the $1 billion it pledged to its Gazan brothers, it has delivered 10 percent. The Saudi Arabians have produced just one-tenth of the $500 million they promised. Turkey pledged $200 million and has sent $520,000. Kuwait, not to be outdone, also pledged $200 million - and has not sent a penny. The unimaginably rich United Arab Emirates said it was giving $200 million; the World Bank says it has no data for how much arrived... ["27-May-15: The cheque for Gaza is in the mail, or whatever"]

With due modesty, it turns out we were right. As today's WSJ piece, written 14 months after ours. demonstrates, a mere

$1.2 billion of the $3.5 billion has been delivered, with Gulf states dispensing only about $170 million. Like other donors, Gulf governments have attached conditions on how their aid money is spent, according to Palestinian, United Nations and World Bank officials. “Donors have different requirements and priorities,” said Bashir Rayyes, who coordinates the Gaza aid effort for the United Nations and reports to the Palestinian Authority, which governs the West Bank. Chief among these differences is their views about Gaza’s rulers. While Qatar supports Hamas, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have grown more aggressive in recent years in their opposition to Hamas... [Wall Street Journal, December 29, 2015] 

Gas chamber? [Source]

There's a self-serving quote in the article from a Hamas politburo member, an Islamist regime insider by the name of Ziad al Zaza:

"Each one of these countries wants a say in Gaza... We will never allow anyone to have a say in Gaza except the Palestinians."

Zaza, who knows how these things work, is a former Hamas deputy prime minister and finance minister. Other than his last three words, we think he ought to be believed... and the homeless of Gaza ought to be pushing him out of power as fast as they can.

Here, paraphrasing the WSJ team's findings, is what's known now about how certain super-wealthy Arab countries are playing their Gaza "relief aid" hand:

• Qatar, encouraged by Hamas to do this, has set up its own foreign-aid office in Gaza. In this way, it hires contractors and laborers directly to carry out road, school and home reconstruction. Still, it has managed to spend only a fraction of the $1 billion it pledged in Cairo.
• Saudi Arabia, for its own reasons, has no interest in seeing Hamas benefit from aid. So its funds are channeled via UNRWA. And, if you're wondering, it too has delivered just a tiny part of what it promised in Cairo last year.
• United Arab Emirates is sending some of its aid money to Gaza via Mohammed Dahlan, who was a powerful (and phenomenally wealthy) figure under Yasser Arafat. It's calculated to cause problems. Hamas see Dahlan as a rival. Fatah insiders say he has been trying to overthrow the Palestinian Authority's president Mahmoud Abbas. Just the right guy.
• Kuwait is also bypassing Hamas, and said to be sending its contribution via the Palestinian Authority. So how much have they already sent? According to the WSJ, oh, about exactly zero.

Qatar's man in Gaza gives the whole messy affair some revealing context:

Ahmad Abu Rass, who heads the [Qatari government] office, said Doha [the Qatari capital] won’t shell out more cash in Gaza until other donors step up efforts to fulfill their pledges. A half-hearted aid effort only sows more despair among Gazans and sets the stage for another round of fighting, making any aid a wasted investment, he said. [Wall Street Journal, December 29, 2015] 

Let's say that differently: no foreign aid serves Hamas better than foreign aid that never arrives. That's because Hamas has no interest at all in aiding its people - only in leveraging their plight for malevolent Islamist purposes. 

As poorly understood as this is by large parts of the mainstream media and by foreign governments (which it certainly is), ordinary Gazans comprehend it in practical and down-to-earth ways:

Abdelraziq said he and other displaced Gazans would take cash from Israel if it meant living in their own homes again soon. They don’t care about politics, he said... As Qatar’s maroon-and-white flag flew above a completed house nearby, [his still-homeless brother] Jihad said he had no control over what country aided him or why. He just hoped the money would come soon. “If the Israelis built the house, I’d fly the Israeli flag.” [Wall Street Journal, December 29, 2015] 

Not exactly what Hamas wants people to hear.

But then the messaging of its dominant fat-cats ["23-Nov-14: Gaza's wealth and where it is - and is not - going"] has always been strong on blunt threats and on real and threatened terror/fear - and considerably lighter on the basic business of taking care of the people they rule.

By the numbers. Source: WSJ

(The revealing WSJ graphic - note that we we removed a small part of it to simplify the message - sums up the Arab "largesse", contrasting it sharply with aid from Western sources.)

Describing accurately and fully how this works is a rare and tricky thing. Complex, often interwoven interests affect and are affected by it. That trickiness contributes to spiraling hyperbole - the need to reach for ever more evocative ways of depicting it, and never mind how outlandish or fact-free. The headlines we included in the screen shots above hint at the creative spirit behind much of the failed reporting and the supremely irresponsible rhetoric.

Understanding why so much misery goes on for so long in Gaza despite the phenomenal sums of money that have been channeled into countless relief efforts, special funds and emergency humanitarian appeals, remains Mission Almost-Impossible. Chronic distortion of facts is an essential part of the whole sad and endless process.

07-Sep-14: In Gaza, they're at work on the next war

Residential tower destroyed in Gaza City, August 26, 2014 [Image Source]

While we're under the relatively fresh influence of news reports focused on the devastation in Gaza [BBC video here], on photos of dead children and of their parents and clans-people screaming with agony and anger, and on social action NGOs clamoring for more funds to rebuild and revive, it's good to take a moment to remind ourselves of how the terrorist leadership that has turned Gaza into a vast underground arsenal is selling the events of the past two months - and their plans for the future.

This report by Barak Ravid comes from Haaretz this evening: "Israeli official: Hamas has begun repairing Gaza tunnels":

Israel has received intelligence indicating that Hamas has begun reconstructing the attack tunnels that were destroyed during Operation Protective Edge, a senior Israeli official said on Sunday.
Two weeks have passed since the cease-fire went into effect, the official said, and Hamas has already begun preparing for the next confrontation with Israel and is focused on replenishing its arsenals.
The senior official said that Hamas militants have returned to arms smuggling through several tunnels that remain intact under the Philadelphi Route in Rafah. He said that the smuggling continues despite the Egyptian security forces' more concentrated and effective efforts to stamp out the tunnels.
The official added that production of the M75 rockets – capable of reaching the Gush Dan region in central Israel – has resumed in factories inside the Gaza Strip. He said that even after Operation Protective Edge, 40 percent of Hamas' capability to produce rockets locally remain intact.

A Friday article in the Chcago Sun-Times ["Decimated Hamas makes ludicrous claims"] captures some of the madness in the moment:

While the truce holds, the propaganda war continues. Despite the many funerals, the hospitals filled with the wounded, the loss of hundreds of combatants, and the rubble of collapsed high-rises and other buildings and homes, Hamas ridiculously claims victory. 

Yes, it is ridiculous. Actually it's far worse than that because it is clear to rational onlookers that the absent Hamas political leadership, issuing commands from luxurious hotel suites in Qatar and Dubai, fully intend that as many as possible Palestinian Arab Gazans should die at the hands of the Israelis. Their utter absence of remorse would be breathtaking if we were not already so familiar with it. And tragically - leaving morality and humanity out of things, which is what they do - it has to be said their calculation is right; dead children advance their side's interests.

Over there in Gaza, the Palestinian Arab masses are thoroughly in the grip of victory fever. It even has numbers by which it can be quantified; we posted about this two days ago: "5-Sep-14: A society steeped in the ethos of terror, and the poll results to prove it".

In another part of the Arab world, where there's much more money, they see victory and loss differently. Here's an August 10, 2014 article ["What the world builds, Israel bombs"] from The National, published in the Emirates:

International donors are wary of funding another rebuilding effort in Gaza, with the European Union divided over increasing pressure on Israel for a lasting solution to the Palestinian issue... An international donor meeting for Gaza is to be held in Norway next month. Yet, there is concern about a repeat of the donor conference after the 2008-2009 war, where only a fraction of the nearly $5 billion pledged for rebuilding came through. “We hope to receive help, but promises aren’t always kept here,” said Naji Sarhan, Gaza’s deputy minister of public works. “It’s hard to convince people to come here when they know Israel acts as our agent of destruction.”

Whether viewing Israel as the problem (something of a constant theme in the UAE's media), or seeing the issues as more nuanced and influenced hugely by the terror-addiction of the Hamas leadership, the outcome might be the same. In reality, there is no bottomless well out there of funding available to restore what gets devastated when Hamas takes on Israel. At some point, the emerging middle class in Gaza - the customers of its classy restaurants, the buyers of its luxury vehicles, the owners of its penthouse apartments - may demand to be heard, and to have their interests brought into consideration. Once there is a significant part of Gaza that has something to lose, some interests to protect, the game changes. At that point, declaring victory in the face of utter defeat may get harder to do.

But not yet.

20-Aug-13: Planning to travel? One or two (dozen) places not to even think of going

Though warnings of this sort tend to get pooh-poohed in some quarters, we think it's important to record here what the Israeli public was formally told yesterday about current and immediate dangers confronting us in "coming weeks".

The warning comes from a professional, and essentially non-political, government body: the Counter-Terrorism Bureau (CTB), part of the National security Council that is, in turn, a part of the multi-dimensional Prime Minister's Office. Its website defines the mission of the CTB as a peak-level coordinating and organizational body among all the various other bodies active in the counter-terrorism field.

The Monday announcement speaks of “concrete” indications of upcoming terrorism. Geographically, it first addresses these places, ascribing the highest level of danger to them (listed here alphabeticallly within each group):

• Bahrain
• Egypt
• Jordan
• Kuwait
• Qatar (citing a “basic” terrorist threat)
• Sinai Peninsula ("because of the chaotic situation in Egypt", and because of “information on the intention to carry out further attacks”)
• United Arab Emirates, meaning Abu Dhabi, Ajman, Dubai, Fujairah, Ras al-Khaimah, Sharjah, and Umm al-Quwain

At the next level going down, CTB tells Israelis to postpone nonessential visits (because of “ongoing potential threats”) to 

• Morocco
• Oman
• Turkey

CTB reconfirmed the Israeli ban on Israelis going to these states where the “concrete” terror threat is “very high”

• Iran
• Iraq
• Lebanon
• Saudi Arabia
• Syria
• Yemen

The following are characterized by “very high” terror threats; Israelis are told not to go there, and if already there, then to immediately leave:

• Afghanistan
• Algeria
• Chechnya
• Djibouti
• India’s Kashmir province
• Libya
• Mauritania
• Parts of Kenya
• Northern Nigeria
• Parts of the southern Philippines
• East Senegal
• Somalia
• Sudan
• Parts of southern Thailand
• Tunisia (where there are “threats to carry out attacks on Israeli and Jewish targets”)

After the "very high" threats comes the merely "high":

• Burkina-Faso
• Indonesia
• Ivory Coast
• Malaysia
• Mali
• Pakistan
• Togo

Still feeling the travel urge? The CTB says Israelis traveling overseas must

take extra precautions, such as avoiding unexpected meetings or out of the way places, and to change regular travel routes.

Why now? According to Times of Israel, the CTB cites

concerns about terrorist acts timed to coincide with the forthcoming Rosh Hashana (New Year), Yom Kippur and Succot festivals, and also said that the anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the US was likely to be “a favored period” for al-Qaeda and other global jihadist groups to attempt to carry out acts of terrorism. Iran and Hezbollah, it warned, were continuing their “global terror campaign” against Israeli and Jewish targets. It noted that Iran remained bent on avenging alleged Israeli responsibility for the killing of Hezbollah terror chief Imad Mughniyeh in a Damascus car-bombing in 2008, and the deaths of three Iranian nuclear scientists. It said its information indicated that Israeli businessmen and ex-government officials were prime potential targets for assassination and/or kidnapping.

15-Jun-13: Attention Qantas travelers: A pungent follow-up here to our earlier posts about Emirates, Qantas and Dubai

Click for our earlier posts about Emirates/Qantas
"The World's Leading Airline Partnership" 

In the course of more than thirty posts starting in September 2012, we reflected in this blog on the infuriating saga of Prof. Cyril Karabus and what we termed his Kafka-esque treatment in Dubai at the hands of the United Arab Emirates authorities.

(Click here to see our earlier posts about Emirates/Qantas, "The World's Leading Airline Partnership".)

In the course of analyzing what was being done to him, we noted time and again how Australia's Qantas airline has very recently blended a large part of its operations into the Dubai-based Emirates Airlines. And we warned of what travelers availing themselves of the Emirates/Qantas hookup might encounter in light of the Karabus affair.

Fortunately Prof. Karabus is safely home and we have discontinued our focus on him and his ordeal. But today he is interviewed in Haaretz, and we feel this ought to be more widely disseminated.

Without further ado, here is a direct quote, from "Caught in a Kafka-esque ordeal in Dubai, a South African doctor finally comes home":

...Much of Karabus’s palpable anger is directed at Emirates Airways. He says that just before leaving Canada he was told by airline personnel that there seemed to be a problem with his ticket – some official query from Dubai about him. “I asked what it was and asked them to investigate – and they assured me that it had been resolved. But they knew, they knew, oh yes, that the police were looking for me – and they let me go ahead and fly straight into a trap. What does that mean?” asks Karabus furiously. “It means that the Emirates Airways is an arm of the UAE law enforcement agency. What kind of crap is that?” Various newspapers, notably the Johannesburg Sunday Times, approached Emirates Airways both locally and at its head office to respond to Karabus' accusations. The company said it had nothing to do with Karabus' situation and refused to comment further. [Haaretz]

You can see some of our earlier notes about the implications of an Emirates tie-up for people who, like us, admire Qantas and enjoy flying it but sense something seriously worrying has happened, here.

(No response came to us from either Qantas or Emirates during the nine months of our coverage.)

17-May-13: Prof. Karabus, according to news reports, has been released and is on a flight to Cape Town at this hour

[Image Source]

For those interested enough, there will soon be a plethora of news reports fleshing out the missing details of what is happening right this minute, in the final stages of the Karabus scandal. The hitherto-captive paediatrician is reported to have departed the UAE in the small hours of this morning ["Karabus on his way to SA" via SAPA, 8:45 this morning] and to be on a nonstop flight to Cape Town, South Africa right now. The hope is he will be on home turf before noon today, Friday. If there is justice in the world there will be a cheering crowd of well-wishers and a delegation of government officials on hand to greet and comfort him. May it all go smoothly and with zero surprises. The past nine months have produced far too much [see our posts] of a very different sort of experience.

It will be perfectly understandable if today's focus will be on the happy ending. That is completely fitting.

But it will be irresponsible and unjust to ignore the injustices, indignities and distortions to which the man and his family have been exposed and of which they have been undeserving victims. The problem is that the problems stem from a phenomenon whose political un-correctness makes it mostly un-reportable and un-discussed.

Far from being respectable nations in the modern sense, the UAE is a collection of family-owned businesses ('emirates', in the tight control of unelected hereditary rulers) with the extremely good fortune of either themselves possessing, or of being close neighbours of others who possess, epic quantities of subterranean resources. So many individuals and institutions partake of the feast created in the past three decades by the flow of oil, gas and hard currency that the dark underside is, by common agreement, rarely discussed out in the open.

The oppression, exploitation and disenfranchisement of foreign workers; the capricious meting out of self-serving rules and laws and punishments; the undisguised discrimination based on race, on gender, on religious faith - everyone who comes into contact with life in the region knows about the realities but it serves almost no one, other than the victims, to talk about them out in the open.

So the victims continue to be victimized and everyone else does whatever they need to do to avoid becoming one themselves. And so it goes on.

The bright lights of Dubai, Abu Dhabi and the rest will continue to attract the moths, at least so long as the party goes on and the money flows. But it's good to keep in mind the blinding effect those lights can have. And it's always wise to recall how inadequately the news media can sometimes convey the realities of things that happen to other people in remote places.

Welcome back to the embrace of your homeland and your loved ones, Prof. Karabus.

15-May-13: Emirates authorities 'bungle' visa, so Prof. Karabus continues to remain their captive

Emirates service: The web version differs somewhat from the
actual experience of some travelers, Prof. Cyril Karabus for instance.

The Cape Argus, a South African news source, reports tonight that:

There is yet another last minute scramble before Cape Town oncologist Professor Cyril Karabus can board a plane home – the visa he was issued by United Arab Emirates authorities was incorrectly dated and must be changed... The UAE prison authorities yesterday finally returned Karabus’s passport to him after making him wait for about two weeks following his final acquittal on charges relating to the death of a child patient of his in 2002... Apart from being acquitted in March and then winning an appeal which followed, Karabus also had to wait for his name to be cleared from the UAE’s records. The incorrect dates on the visa was the latest in a string of bungles by administrators in the UAE.

Readers of this blog might recall our mentioning in a previous post ["31-Jan-13: UAE's foreign ministry is "closely following" Prof. Karabus' nightmare"] four and a half months ago how the unelected government of the non-democratic Emirates defended the scandalous manner in which it legally ensnared and imprisoned the distinguished retired paediatric oncologist.

In view of the daily humiliations to which Prof. Karabus is being subjected even now, weeks after the criminal case against him was thrown out twice by the courts, let's recall what the bureaucrats in the service of the owners of the oil-rich statelets said in an official statement that even today remains posted on the website of their foreign ministry [here]:

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is closely following the case of the South African oncologist
03 February 2013 | ...the judicial process in the United Arab Emirates is independently and wholly overseen and managed by the Federal Supreme Court.  The Government of the United Arab Emirates cannot and does not interfere in the independent judicial process... The Ministry of Foreign Affairs understands the difficulties involved for the family of any person who is on trial, especially when a trial is taking place in a country that is not their own. However, it is imperative that the proper judicial process is followed... 

There continues to be almost zero coverage in any of the Emirate news channels of the ongoing ordeal of which Prof. Karabus is a victim. Consequently, there is no reason to expect the sort of thing that a free press might have done if UAE had such a thing - calling the Emirates rulers and their bureaucrats to account. This innocent man's passport ought to have been handed back to him, without any need any his part to go chase it through the inscrutable maze of Emirate government offices, the minute the court threw the charges into the garbage. Instead he has been chasing its return for two weeks.

The people who issued the pompous press release we quoted above ought to have been told to demonstrate  just how "closely" they are "following" the Karabus case by (for instance) ensuring all UAE visas, records, computer entries and every other kind of idiotic formality were immediately removed or issued or fixed or whatever it takes so that he can get out of their territory and go home.

Chronically over-optimistic sections of the South African media are today running stories like "Cyril Karabus heads home", and "Karabus' ordeal finally ends". But the reality is harsher; he will be spending tomorrow chasing a visa with the right dates on it to replace the bungled version he was issued by the UAE today.

One more thing. That same SA news report today mentions in passing that

Yesterday, after Professor Karabus had a fight with them, Emirates Airlines agreed to reinstate the ticket he had from there to Cape Town but could not use at the time of his arrest. [Cape Argus] 

How appalling that, after all he has been through, Prof. Karabus has had to fight the people at Emirates, the airline that brought him into Dubai and which declined to extend basic courtesies to him as we mentioned here in January.

14-May-13: It's being reported that Prof. Cyril Karabus' passport was returned to him today

From the South African News24 site:

Cape Town - 2013-05-14 14:54 | United Arab Emirates (UAE) officials handed back South African doctor Cyril Karabus's passport on Tuesday afternoon, the international relations department confirmed. Spokesperson Clayson Monyela said the passport was handed to the SA embassy around noon. The UAE interior department also issued a letter which would allow Karabus to leave the region. "The SA Embassy in the UAE will tomorrow [Wednesday] morning assist Prof Karabus to obtain the exit visa from the UAE, in view of the fact that the relevant office in the UAE was already closed at the time of receiving his passport," said Monyela. He said Karabus would be assisted with travel arrangements to return to South Africa within the next two days...

Click for some of the posts we have written here during the nine months of Prof. Karabus' shameful and unjustified incarceration at the hands of the United Arab Emirates authorities.

9-May-13: No reason to expect Prof. Karabus, cleared of all charges, to be free and back home. This UAE news source says he's busy "finalising"

Let Prof. Karabus on the plane. It's more than
enough already.

The ongoing lesson in what the people who run those oil-drenched autocratic sheikhdoms can do to innocent people continues.

This is from a United Arab Emirates newspaper, The National. Though the time now is 9:00 pm Thursday in Abu Dhabi, the item is datelined tomorrow, Friday. Why? They don't provide too many answers in that part of the world.

UAE prosecutors will not further appeal Cyril Karabus acquittal | Haneen Dajani | The National | May 10, 2013 | ABU DHABI // Prosecutors will not appeal further against the acquittal of South African doctor Cyril Karabus. Two weeks ago the Appeals Court upheld a Criminal Court decision clearing Dr Karabus of the manslaughter of a three-year-old leukaemia patient who died in 2002. Prosecutors had 30 days to decide whether they would appeal again but decided against it, a judicial source said. The source said that the professor remains in the country as he is finalising procedures with the Ministry of Interior. He and his lawyers could not be reached for comment. Sarah Adel died at Sheikh Khalifa Medical Centre in 2002. A year later, after the expatriate doctor had left the country, Dr Karabus was found guilty in absentia of manslaughter. Prosecutors claimed he had failed to give the girl a vital blood transfusion, and later covered up his mistake by forging a medical report. He was cleared of both of these charges in a retrial by the Criminal Court and subsequent appeal at the Appeals Court following his arrest in August last year. Dr Karabus was arrested after landing at Dubai International Airport while in transit to South Africa, after attending his son's wedding in Canada.

An interesting journalistic turn of phrase, no?: "he is finalising procedures with the Ministry of Interior".

In reality, Prof. Karabus' rights have been under systematic and cynical abuse from the start of his scandalous treatment at the hands of officials in the thoroughly non-democratic Dubai  and Abu Dhabi from the time of his seizure at Dubai airport in August until today.

We have been closely following (see these posts) the outrageous things that have been done to Prof. Karabus since August. Reports these past two weeks in the South Africa media (for instance "Lack of passport stamp stalls Karabus' freedom" on May 6; "Karabus might get passport at weekend" on May 2; "Karabus passport wait not over" on April 30) describe how the 78 year-old retired paediatric oncologist  has been pathetically left to beseech the UAE authorities to hand back to him the passport they imperiously seized nine months ago when the Kafaesque nightmare to which he has been subjected began.

We're not connected to South Africa in any particular way. But we wish someone there would take a look at our post of a week ago and take the necessary steps: "2-May-13: The scandalous abuse of Prof. Karabus must end today. A practical suggestion for how"...

We have an uninvited suggestion. In view of the thoroughly disgraceful - we would say scandalous - way he has been treated from the outset by the authorities in the UAE, the government of South Africa should immediately, today, appoint Prof. Cyril Karabus as one of its diplomatic representatives. It should then immediately, today, issue him with a diplomatic passport, deliver it to him by courier or via the numerous South African consular officials posted in the UAE, and have a cluster of determined senior diplomatic representatives in the UAE accompany him to the Emirates/Qantas check in counter at Dubai airport, where a complementary upgrade to first class should be waiting for him. And if making him a diplomat causes problems, then just issue him with a fresh SA passport, but let it be today. And if the flights to South Africa are full, then just fly him out of that place to anywhere. May we suggest some of our South African readers adopt this and pass it along to the people who can make it happen today? Here are some contact details... [more]

At this point, the failure of Prof. Karabus' government to take meaningfully active steps on his behalf is beyond comprehension.

UPDATE 11:00 pm Thursday: A South African news report published tonight, "Government calls for Karabus’s return", quotes the following close-to-but-not-quite-forthright contribution by an official spokesperson for SA's Department of International Relations:

"It is time to allow South African doctor Cyril Karabus to return home from Abu Dhabi... Whilst respecting the sovereignty of the UAE... the South African government believes that the matter must be brought to a speedy conclusion, so that the professor can finally be reunited with his family...” [SAPA]

Without intending to cast aspersions on any innocent parties, what precisely is it about the conduct of the undemocratic, thoroughly autocratic UAE in this sordid affair that justifies their sovereignty being respected? Even by reference to their own legal system, the UAE's ruling elite have for months contemptuously trampled all over Prof. Karabus' human and legal rights, and are continuing to do so at this moment.

2-May-13: The scandalous abuse of Prof. Karabus must end today. A practical suggestion for how.

Dubai airport

The South African news site Eyewitness News says today:

Professor Cyril Karabus will not be returning home from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) on Wednesday. The 78-year-old appeared in court earlier to collect his passport, but upon his return back to prison for release he was told the documents were insufficient. The paediatric oncologist was recently found not guilty of manslaughter and forgery by two Abu Dhabi courts... His son, Michael Karabus, said they are hoping for better luck on Thursday. “The South African consulate official drove him to the prison where he was held to collect his passport. He was then advised that the paperwork that he had was insufficient so he will now go back to court tomorrow to try and see if he can get the right paperwork this time.”

(If you are new to the tribulations inflicted on Prof. Karabus, please click here for some of our earlier posts.)

We're no experts in how to work within the undemocratic and arcane UAE/Abu Dhabi/Dubai legal system or its bureaucracy. Nor can we understand the mostly-passive role of the South African government and its representatives.

Nonetheless we can venture a guess: the documents presented by Prof. Karabus are going to remain "insufficient" until someone in power decides that they are sufficient, and that there is no more value in pressuring the innocent, distinguished retired doctor for blood money or for anything else. That's when the unfortunate man will be allowed to finally go home after being an enforced 'guest' of the UAE legal system since mid August 2012.

So we have an uninvited suggestion. In view of the thoroughly disgraceful - we would say scandalous - way he has been treated from the outset by the authorities in the UAE, the government of South Africa should immediately, today, appoint Prof. Cyril Karabus as one of its diplomatic representatives. It should then immediately, today, issue him with a diplomatic passport, deliver it to him by courier or via the numerous South African consular officials posted in the UAE, and have a cluster of determined senior diplomatic representatives in the UAE accompany him to the Emirates/Qantas check in counter at Dubai airport, where a complementary upgrade to first class should be waiting for him. And if making him a diplomat causes problems, then just issue him with a fresh SA passport, but let it be today. And if the flights to South Africa are full, then just fly him out of that place to anywhere.

May we suggest some of our South African readers adopt this and pass it along to the people who can make it happen today?

Here are some contact details. The South African Embassy, Abu Dhabi, is conveniently located on Airport Road, opposite the Mushrif Mall, Villa 202, 25th Street, Abu Dhabi. The consular officer, who we presume can issue passports, can be reached on +971-2-447-3262. At the same time, since this is serious humanitarian issue (we hesitate to say that South Africa's dignity is on the line), a call should also go to the South African Consulate-General's Duty Officer whose cell number is +971-50-558-1235. It is located on Khalid Bin Al Waleed Street on the third floor of the New Sharaf Building, and walking distance from the Khalid Bin Al Waleed Metro station.

Enough already!

1-May-13: The Emirates continue to educate the world on how decent people can expect to be treated under their system of law and order

The head of the UAE began a visit to the UK today [Image Source]

There continue to be more questions than answers today in the ongoing travesty of justice suffered in the United Arab Emirates by the distinguished 78 year old paediatric oncologist, Prof. Cyril Karabus, a South African about whom we have been writing here [examples] with rising anger since August 2012:

Cape Town doctor Cyril Karabus will again try on Wednesday to get his passport back from United Arab Emirates (UAE) authorities. The elderly pediatric oncologist is still stuck in the UAE after two Abu Dhabi courts found him not guilty of manslaughter in connection with the death of a young cancer patient he treated more than a decade ago. For a second day in a row, Karabus has been unable to get his passport. His son, Michael Karabus, said it was now a waiting game. “There’s never been any doubt that this will all end, but there’s always been a doubt as to when that would be.” Michael said his father remains confident he will be home within the next few days. Karabus will return to an Abu Dhabi Court on Wednesday to try and get his ticket home.  [SA Eyewitness News, today]

This brief South African news report could - but did not - have said much more, such as that Karabus has been detained against his will in the United Arab Emirates since August 18, 2012 in the following circumstances:

• He had been convicted and sentenced in absentia during 2004 (and ordered to pay what the Sharia law system of the UAE unabashedly calls blood money, as well as serve time in prison) over the death of a terminally-ill child from Yemen whom he treated for leukaemia in 2002. He was a contract doctor at the time, working in a rich UAE hospital for a short period in order to supplement his meager SA government salary and pension.
• Did we say in absentia? He was in fact never told of either the charges or the 'conviction' until...
• Nine months ago, when he and his family were transiting through Dubai airport as passengers on Emirates. According to news reports, the airline has been strikingly unhelpful since the start of the Karabus nightmare.
• His 'trial' in a UAE court was adjourned more than twenty times, and as far as we can tell from reports, never really happened in the conventional sense. Among numerous problems, the prosecution lacked, or was unwilling to produce, key evidentiary documents right up until the end.
• From a criminal law standpoint, the key issues were medical and technical and far beyond the competence of the judge/s. 
• So to address that aspect, the Abu Dhabi court in charge of hearing the matter eventually appointed a committee of doctors. That committee appointed a sub-committee and they took many weeks, and several missed hearing dates, before deciding that Karabus had no culpability.
• The court therefore acquitted Prof. Karabus of all charges on March 21, 2013.
• The sordid matter ought to have ended there and the man allowed to finally go home. But the authorities in that thoroughly non-democratic corner of the world continued to hold onto his passport and instructed the people at the airport to refuse him the right to depart.
• Then the prosecution appealed against the acquittal.
• On what grounds? If there were any (in our uninformed view there were none), they have never been given any publicity anywhere, and the lawyers representing poor Prof. Karabus never received them. Since the conviction in absentia was erased because of a finding of fact, it's rather difficult to see what possible grounds for appeal there might be.
• That appeal was due to be heard, and then not heard, and then terminated on April 24, 2013 with a surprising announcement (five days ahead of the scheduled date) that the prosecution's appeal was dismissed, the charges were unproven, the conviction was overturned and the accused was free - technically.

But this is the United Arab Emirates, and the farce goes on. Although Prof. Karabus' ordeal formally ended with the dismissal of the prosecution's "appeal", he remains a prisoner of the UAE government, stuck and unable to get on a plane and go home so long as his passport remains confiscated. He tried to get it yesterday and the day before, and is said to have been left "drained" by his failure.

Meanwhile those for whom the plight of a retired professional whose lifelong career was devoted to saving the lives of ill children is of little to no importance, might be interested to know that in far-away London, there was a major outbreak of pomp and circumstance yesterday. Khalifa bin Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, the unelected President of the United Arab Emirates and unelected emir of Abu Dhabi arrived for a two day official visit to the UK. His entourage includes the unelected Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed, Minister of Foreign Affairs; the unelected Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Presidential Affairs; the unelected Sheikh Hamad bin Zayed, Chief of the Abu Dhabi Crown Prince's Court; and the unelected Sheikha Lubna Al Qasimi, Minister of Development and International Co-operation.

We are unable to find a single mention of Prof. Karabus' ongoing pursuit of his passport and his freedom in any of the Emirate newspapers today. On the other hand, a major British paper covers a little-reported aspect of His Highness' state visit to the British capital in an article entitled "Why is Britain rolling out the red carpet for the UAE's Sheikh Khalifa?". An excerpt:

"A lot of the British public may already find it hard to stomach seeing the royal treatment given to the undemocratic leader of a country where the police torture prisoners and trials are a “mockery of justice”.  That we are doing so even when it is our fellow Brits on the receiving end of the electric baton will be seen as an act which abandons not only our principles, but also our responsibilities to our own citizens. If anything positive is to come out of what is shaping up to be one of the more sordid state visits of recent years, torture and fair trial issues – and in particular the cases of the three British tourists – must be at the centre of every discussion at every level between Britain and the UAE" [The Statesman, April 27, 2013]

As we wrote in the introduction, more questions than answers.

25-Apr-13: Karabus and the appeal(s) of the UAE

UAE's ministry of justice [Image Source]

Here are the most recent twists in the Kafkaesque nightmare of the distinguished pediatric oncologist Prof Cyril Karabus.

He has been in enforced detention in Abu Dhabi and Dubai since August 2012, having been convicted a decade earlier of serious charges arising from the death of a terminally ill three year old patient. He was never notified of those charges, nor of the 'trial' or subsequent conviction. He was astonished to be seized by the UAE authorities as he transited through Dubai's glitzy airport en route back to his South African home after a son's wedding in Canada. He is 78 years old, and a highly regarded expert in his field; he is also in poor health. (Click here to see our previous posts on Prof. Karabus' lonely nightmare.)

A UAE newspaper, the Khaleej Times, reports this morning that Prof. Karabus

was cleared by the Abu Dhabi Court of Appeal on Wednesday... The court had adjourned the pronouncement of the verdict to April 29, but the defence lawyer requested the court to speed up issuing the decision due to the health condition of his client.

It's difficult to make sense of what they are saying. The latest phase of the Karabus affair consisted of an appeal by the state against a finding by a court-appointed medical committee on technical/medical issues. The committee's report to the court found that the accused had done nothing wrong. What legal grounds of appeal can there be against a finding of fact like that? There's little point in speculating since no published report has ever stated (as far as we are aware) what the prosecution's grounds of appeal were or are.

The entire history of this sad matter has been like that: the use (or abuse) of some version of law to make it seem like the UAE is a normal place with normal institutions doing perfectly normal things. It's none of the above.

Another UAE news source, the National, illustrates this in a report posted last night.

A second court has cleared Dr Cyril Karabus of manslaughter... The Appeals Court issued its verdict yesterday, five days earlier than scheduled, with the judge explaining this was done at the request of the professor’s legal team, who argued the trial was taking too long and that the doctor needed to travel back to South Africa as soon as possible... But the South African professor must remain in the country while prosecutors decide whether to launch a final appeal... But the paediatric oncologist, 78, faces a further wait of up to 30 days while prosecutors decide whether they will take the case to the Cassation Court... Prosecutors said yesterday they had not decided whether to take the case to the Cassation Court, saying they would study the details of the verdict before deciding whether to do so. A draft of the verdict is yet to be printed... Should they decide to drop the case before the 30-day period is up, he will be then be free to leave the country.

A final appeal? The mind boggles. And defence lawyers claimed the trial was taking too long? The trial included literally dozens of adjournments including many ordered by the court because the prosecution was unable to produce (or find) key documents. It ended with Prof. Karabus' acquittal in March. We wonder whether the writers at the National or the Khaleej Times understand the significance of such details. 

The National's reporter evidently spoke with Prof. Karabus last night, and quotes him:

“I was really happy when my lawyer phoned me this morning, thinking it is was all over. Then I read your report saying there could still be an appeal.” He said he had been in contact with his travel agent to arrange a flight home, and was planning to leave on a flight on Saturday. But after reading the article he called his lawyer, who confirmed he needed to wait for the prosecutors’ decision.

The National, in a separate but related story yesterday, puts some useful context around the atrocious way in which the UAE's instruments of power have dealt with the elderly and innocent (reminder: acquitted after trial, vindicated on appeal) oncologist whose passport was seized and held by UAE law enforcement officials since August making it impossible for him to go home. It quotes the UAE's Minister of Justice, Dr Hadif Al Dhaheri, discussing justice:

The minister admitted delays were a problem, but said the ministry was trying to speed matters up to meet international standards. "We are keen to reach this," he said. "To have fast and just cases." Dr Al Dhaheri's comments came amid criticism over repeated delays in the retrial of Cyril Karabus, a South African doctor arrested at Dubai airport in August and cleared in March of the manslaughter of a child he treated. Dr Al Dhaheri said the courts could not treat foreigners and Emiratis differently. "All are in front of the court the same, according to the constitution," he said.

And that's one of the key lessons for those of us far from these events and living in democratic societies. Well-trained bureaucrat/technocrats, like His Excellency Dr Hadef Jouan Al Dhahiri (doctorate from Cambridge; LL.M. from Harvard) serve as vital cogs in a regime in which they administer non-democratic systems of law and governance on behalf of autocratic, absolute hereditary rulers. They cover over the inherent capriciousness of the system's actions through resort to such formulations as "equal before the law", "separation of powers", "independence of the judiciary" and other familiar expressions that conceal the fundamental inequalities and distortions that are at the heart of what happens there. Seven phenomenally rich, absolute monarchies that make up the UAE - essentially family-controlled business empires where Western notions of law, justice, equity and fairness are remote; as Wikipedia points out:

Although secular law is applied, the basis of [UAE] legislation is Sharia (Islamic Law)...

The justice minister is right when he says delays are a problem. But they are a relatively small part of a vast and far deeper problem that goes to the essence of the UAE.

The ongoing nightmare of the abused doctor ought to be a signal to professionals from more advanced and democracy-friendly parts of the world to keep away from oil-soaked Abu Dhabi, Dubai and other UAE kingdom-statelets. But evidently there are reasons why they keep coming.

12-Apr-13: Karabus: Some long overdue major international media attention on the Emirates

Good to see the front page of this morning's International Herald Tribune, the international edition of the New York Times, giving some factual attention to the appalling treatment of Prof. Cyril Karabus at the hands of the authorities in Abu Dhabi and Dubai.

Not that there is any expectation of them adjusting their opaque, undemocratic and legally-dysfunctional approach to his improper incarceration, but arousing public opinion by shining some bright light on this little-publicized Emirates scandal can't be a bad thing. That's about the only remaining strategy when authoritarian regimes in dark, press-controlled corners of the Third World engage in their capricious ways with innocent people's freedom.

The New York Times version of the same article which will also appear in Friday's paper edition is headlined "Emirates’ Laws Trap a Doctor Just Passing Through". 

We have written again and again (most recently in "9-Apr-13: Justice, United Arab Emirates style: The outrageous saga continues") on the Emirates/Karabus scandal. It stands for something more than 'merely' a disgraceful example of unchecked absolute power being applied wrongly and unfairly on a powerless victim (endemic in this part of the world). The unlawful actions of the 'authorities' in Abu Dhabi, Dubai and the United Arab Emirates, and the benign way the world's media generally treat them, are part of a much larger issue that affects many more people and not only those who unwittingly visit the UAE. 

You can see some of our earlier comments in a March post of ours [28-Mar-13: He is acquitted but Prof. Karabus "has no choice but to submit"] and via the links embedded in that and earlier This Ongoing War posts. 

Just one more word of a practical nature: we wrote a few days ago that health professionals attracted by the shine and glitz of Dubai and Abu Dhabi and by jobs promoted on sites likethis, this, this and this should be warned ahead of time about just how different the UAE and its authoritarian regimes are from the world they know.

9-Apr-13: Justice, United Arab Emirates style: The outrageous saga continues

An online South African news site, The Daily Maverick, reports ["Karabus family facing massive financial toll"] on how the astonishing case of the distinguished and retired pediatric specialist Prof. Cyril Karabus was looking this morning. Some excerpts:

• "When Karabus appears in court on Tuesday [today], it is unclear what arguments the prosecution will mount in order to appeal his acquittal – particularly given that the medical committee which examined the case exonerated Karabus of any wrongdoing. “We didn’t realise that there was any basis for an appeal,” Karabus’s daughter Sarah told the Daily Maverick on Monday. “Of course they have the legal right to appeal. But because they won’t tell us what the basis for the appeal is, we can’t prepare any defence until we hear it in court for the first time.”
• "Every day that Karabus remains in the UAE, the cost to his family mounts. “The bills have been over the R2 million mark now,” Sarah Karabus confirmed on Monday. [We estimate that to be about US $225,000 - TOW]... The major part of the detained doctor’s costs are his legal fees, but everyday living expenses in the UAE – where Karabus has been staying with another South African doctor since his release on bail in October –  are also very high.
• "The reason why Karabus took a brief locum shift at the Sheikh Khalifa Medical Centre in Abu Dhabi was that a career spent working in South Africa’s public health system had left him in poor financial shape for his future. For many years, Karabus led the unit of paediatric oncology at Cape Town’s Red Cross Children’s Hospital. He was “very much at the forefront of accessing treatment for South African and African children who needed it”, former colleague Professor Heather Zar told the Daily Maverick last November. “He’s an extremely frugal man. He’s barely bought a new pair of shoes in 15 years,” Sarah Karabus said.
• "When Karabus appears in court on Tuesday, there are a number of potential outcomes. There may be some kind of postponement or delay, as has happened on numerous occasions in the Karabus case before. If the prosecution presents the evidence for an appeal, the defence may have a turn to rebut, or the judge may simply decide to throw the matter out. Sarah Karabus said on Monday that her father was hopeful of the latter.

So here's what happened today.

Prosecution appeal of UAE cancer doctor acquittal delayed  | Haneen Dajani | The National [Abu Dhabi] Apr 9, 2013 | The prosecution appeal against the acquittal of Doctor Cyril Karabus was today delayed at the first hearing. The case has been adjourned until April 23 as no medical translator was present at the Appeals Court today... The reason why prosecutors have appealed the acquittal was not mentioned.

If you have not heard about this infuriating abuse of law and judicial power, please start reading at "8-Apr-13: Medical professionals thinking of working in the world's most expensive open-air prison may want to think again" and work backwards via the links we provide there. 

The things that continue to be done to Prof. Karabus - the victim of an opaque legal system and wrongfully held in the UAE for more than eight months - hold lessons that deserve the widest exposure. That's a point that the World Medical Association's head, in a new article called "Just Delayed, Justice Denied – Again: The Case of Cyril Karabus" makes today forcefully and well.

8-Apr-13: Medical professionals thinking of working in the world's most expensive open-air prison may want to think again

South African websites and news channels (like TimesLive)
are reporting on the "global fallout" from the Karabus case. We
think they have an optimistic view of how much the authorities in the
UAE even care.

Regular readers of this blog will have followed our numerous postings here about the unresolved drama of a retired South African oncologist entrapped in the medieval law-order-and-blood-money system of the United Arab Emirates. 

For a summary: "21-Mar-13: Is Prof Karabus finally being released and going home?"; "29-Jan-13: UAE "Justice" officials fiddle: The scandalous treatment of Prof. Karabus goes on and on"; and "1-Jan-13: Prof. Cyril Karabus faces his thirteenth hearing in a United Arab Emirates court tomorrow". 

Though never actually put on trial in the way most people would understand the word, Prof. Cyril Karabus was convicted in his absence, without any knowledge of the existence of the absurd charges, more than a decade ago. In August 2012, entirely unaware of the danger, he was seized at Dubai airport when, as an airline passenger passing through on Emirates, he was traveling home to SA from the wedding of his son in Canada. He was immediately arrested and put in prison.

Since then, the experiences to which the distinguished doctor, 77 years old at the time of the arrest, has been subjected have gone from bad to scandalous to outrageous. It could have been scripted by Franz Kafka.

He has been held by the UAE authorities against his will for eight months so far. Initially this was in a bare Abu Dhabi prison cell within a particularly notorious prison. After numerous frustrated attempts to secure bail in court, he was eventually released from prison after two months minus his confiscated passport. He was ordered not to leave the UAE and required by force of law to remain as an involuntary paying visitor and separated from his family in what is probably the world's most expensive open-air prison.

Since his well-being depends in some measure on the goodwill of the government of South Africa, we will refrain here from analyzing what was and was not done to represent his cause on a government-to-government basis. The bottom line: he is still there, held against his will, and burning through his dwindling resources.

Some weeks ago, the sole tribunal of fact in this case - some kind of medical committee appointed by some kind of authority and with the court's knowledge - came back to the court with a finding, somewhat delayed after months of investigation but a finding in every sense of the word. Their conclusion: Prof. Karabus is absolved of all blame for the death of the terminally-ill child he had treated in an Abu Dhabi hospital 13 years earlier. Case closed.

But unfortunately it was not closed. Instead of grabbing the opportunity to climb down from the tree, the Abu Dhabi authorities - having led no evidence, having conceded that the original medical file cannot be found, having essentially incarcerated an innocent man with a proud career of saving children's lives on the flimsiest of bases for months, availed themselves of the technical right to appeal against the court's finding of innocent.

In a more-normal, due-process-oriented democratic society with a free press and responsible, elected political leadership (we are obviously not referring to Abu Dhabi or Dubai or any other corner of the UAE), the much-aggrieved Prof. Karabus would have been given back his passport the same day along with profound apologies and a complementary pass to Dubai airport's most VIP lounge.

Instead, the man continues to be the victim of a disgraceful abuse of power. The UAE authorities presiding over it and making capricious and unchecked decisions at every step bear most of the responsibility. But given the honor-based culture in which they operate, it does no one much good to focus on what has gone wrong there.

This is, after all, happening in the UAE, officially classified by The Economist's Democracy Index 2012 as an authoritarian regime and ranked 19th from the bottom out of a list of 167 countries. Its overall Democracy Index score of 2.58 positions it just ahead of Zimbabwe and behind Afghanistan. Nice neighbourhood!

So what can be done? The World Medical Association says it is doing what it can.

Global fallout over Karabus | April 8 2013 at 09:52 am | Caryn Dolley, Cape Times | In an unprecedented move triggered by the Cyril Karabus case, the World Medical Association (WMA) will advise physicians around the globe about the risks of working in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). It has encouraged its 102 member countries to do the same in a decision made at a WMA council meeting in Bali late last week. At first, the SA Medical Association (Sama) pushed for the world association to call for health workers to boycott the UAE, but it settled on the advisory instead... On Sunday, in a phone interview with the Cape Times, Karabus said he was set to appear in a UAE court again on Tuesday. He said he had been told about the WMA advisory and while he hoped it would have an impact, he did not believe it would affect UAE authorities. “I don’t think they care … I don’t think they’ll take too much notice,” Karabus said. He believed a call for medics to boycott the UAE would have been more effective and possibly make authorities take note. [Mzukisi Grootboom of the South African Medical Association] said even though the WMA did not agree to the boycott of the UAE, the advisory to physicians about the risks of working there was a step forward. The WMA had agreed to (a) Publish the advisory on its website. (b) Alert its 102 member countries, spread across North and South America, west and east Europe, Asia and some African countries, of the advisory. (c) Publish the advisory in the World Medical Journal. On Sunday, Karabus’s South African lawyer Michael Bagraim said he had been receiving e-mails from medical associations “across the globe”. He said if Karabus was detained even longer, it could seriously impact on health workers travelling to the UAE. “It looks very strongly that doctors worldwide would boycott going there,” Bagraim said. [Cape Times]

The South African media, reporting on the medical conference decision, are calling it a global fallout. We of course wish them well with their efforts, but if the aim is to bring pressure on Abu Dhabi and Dubai, then they need to understand how the darker and more repressive corners of the Arab world work. After diligent searching, how many news channels in the Arab world in general and in the UAE in particular have even reported on the World Medical Association's Karabus-inspired 'advisory'? Answer: Not one as of today. (And if we are wrong on this, we will be delighted to hear from you.)

Health professionals attracted by the shine and glitz of Dubai and Abu Dhabi and by jobs promoted on sites like this, this, this and this should be warned ahead of time about just how different the UAE and its authoritarian regimes are from the world they know.