KUWAIT: Arab rift over Gaza hard to heal

Arab divisions, which have hardened since the Israeli offensive on the Gaza Strip, resurfaced at the Kuwait summit.

Arab governments failed today to develop a common position over the situation in Gaza, but hopes for reconciliation arose after King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia criticized Arab divisions and called for unity. “We have transcended the phase of differences and opened the door for Arab fraternity and unity to every Arab.” 

Shortly after, Egyptian, Saudi, Qatari and Syrian leaders sat for lunch together, which some media celebrated as a sign of a possible rapprochement  between the U.S. allies who refuse to throw their full support behind Hamas, including Egypt and Saudi Arabia on one hand, and Iranian allies in the region,  namely Syria, on the other.

IRAN: Ahmadinejad slams Arabs for sluggish response to Gaza fighting

He first slammed Arab governments for standing idly by while Israel continued to kill Palestinians in Gaza.

Then Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad asserted that the Islamic republic was the nation spearheading “political pressure” to stop the Jewish state’s war on Palestinians and those who support it.

Ahmadinejad, who spoke in an interview with Hezbollah’s TV channel, Al-Manar, on Wednesday evening, claimed that Iran does not have any leverage over the Palestinian militant group, Hamas, which, according to him, is totally independent.

Western powers believe that Iran supplies Hamas with weapons.

KUWAIT: Visit of controversial Shiite cleric creates political crisis

A rift between the Kuwaiti Parliament and the government of this oil-rich princedom over the visit of a controversial Iranian cleric has escalated into yet another political crisis.

On Tuesday, the Kuwaiti cabinet announced its resignation as three legislators prepared to question Prime Minister Sheikh Nasser al-Mohammad al-Sabahover for allowing the cleric, whom they accused of offending Sunnis, to enter this small Persian Gulf nation a few weeks ago.

The cleric, Mohammad Fali, has allegedly made derogatory remarks about the Prophet Mohammad’s companions, whom the Sunnis revere. Tensions have been reported in the past between the Sunni majority and the Shiite minority in Kuwait.

Although Fali left the country following a wave of protests against his visit, the crisis continued as the three Islamist lawmakers insisted on demanding formal clarifications from the prime minister, a member of the ruling family.

The ruler of the country, Sheik Sabah al Ahmad al Sabah, put on hold the resignation and ordered the ministers to continue attending to their duties until he takes his final decision, according to the State’s news agency, KUNA.

PERSIAN GULF: Financial crisis hits Dubai, Kuwait real estate

In yet another indication that the international financial crisis has arrived on the shores of the Persian Gulf, the largest mortgage lender in the United Arab Emirates, Amlak, will temporarily stop granting new home loans, according to media reports.

Experts say this is bad news for the UAE real estate market. As credits dwindle, the prices of real estate in this oil-rich emirate might further drop, and the whole economy might be negatively affected.

The UAE's English-language daily, the National, sounded the alarm, quoting Chris Dommett, chief executive of John Charcol Dubai, a mortgage advisory firm: 

“I think they don’t have funds to lend. It sends a very negative message to the market at a time when they need some sort of positive news.”

Property prices fell last month by 4% in Dubai and 5% in Abu Dhabi, according to data from HSBC Bank cited by the National.

KUWAIT: Stock market suspended as investors panic over big losses

As the international financial crunch continues to hit Persian Gulf markets, trade at the Kuwait Stock Exchange was halted by a Kuwaiti court ruling today in an effort to curb the slump in the market’s slide, according to Kuwait’s official news agency KUNA.

The unprecedented ruling will be maintained until Nov. 17, when the court will review its decision aimed at preventing massive losses among small investors in this rich small emirate, which is the fourth-largest oil producer in the world. 

In a first reaction, Kuwait's finance minister, Mustafa Shimali,  said that his government would uphold the ruling but he criticized the court's decision as "dangerous," according to KUNA: 

"We respect the court ruling and as a government we only have to implement it.... The consequences of this ruling would be dire.... How will those who filed the suit shoulder the consequences?"

This comes amid pressing demands from Kuwaiti investors for the government to intervene and stop the big losses in the emirate's stock market, the second largest in the region after that of Saudi Arabia. 

TUNISIA, SAUDI ARABIA: Press freedom on the run

On Saturday evening, Tunisian Web journalist Slim Boukhidir was heading to a local Internet cafe in the city of Sfax when he was stopped by a group of men and stuffed into a French-made automobile.

He was taken first to a police station and then he found himself back in the car and heading outside of the city and into the rural hinterlands.

The car stopped and the journalist, who was freed last July after spending eight months in prison for publicly criticizing President Zine el Abidine ben Ali, was released without harm.

But not without a warning, according to an account he gave to the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists:

After leaving the police station, they started insulting me and threatened to inflict on me the same fate of Libyan Internet journalist Daif Al Ghazal, kidnapped and killed in neighboring Libya in 2005.

The U.S. gets all hot and bothered about human rights abuses and suppression of speech in places such as Iran or Syria. But it has remained relatively silent about an apparent uptick in repression of journalists among its allies in the Arab world, like the staunchly pro-American Tunisia or Saudi Arabia.