الكاتب: kafej

Main opposition party calls it president’s ‘attempt to eliminate the constitutional order’.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has waded into a brewing judicial crisis, accusing the country’s highest court of making mistakes and defending an unprecedented criminal investigation against its judges.

The comments on Friday stoked a debate over the rule of law after the appeals Court of Cassation unexpectedly challenged the authority of the Constitutional Court this week, making a criminal complaint against judges of the Constitutional Court.

The dispute revolves around jailed lawyer Can Atalay, one of seven defendants sentenced last year to 18 years in prison as part of a trial that also saw the award-winning philanthropist Osman Kavala jailed for life.

The 47-year-old Atalay was allowed to run from jail in May’s general election and was elected to parliament as a member of the leftist Workers’ Party of Turkey (TIP).

The Constitutional Court ruled last month that the jailed parliamentarian should be released – a ruling the appeals court said was unconstitutional.

“Unfortunately, the Constitutional Court has made many mistakes in a row at this point, which seriously saddens us,” Erdogan told reporters on a flight back from Uzbekistan, according to a text published by his office on Friday.

“The Constitutional Court cannot and should not underestimate the step taken by the Court of Cassation on this matter,” he said.

Turkey’s bar association and the main opposition party have denounced the appeals court’s ruling as an “attempted coup”, and hundreds of members demonstrated, many of them lawyers in legal robes, chanting “justice” on the streets of the capital on Friday.

They marched more than 10km (6 miles) from the Ankara courthouse to the Ahlatlibel district, where the Constitutional Court and the Court of Cassation are located side by side.

“Our citizens need to understand that this struggle is not just a struggle of lawyers, it is a struggle for the constitution,” said the head of the Ankara Bar Association, Mustafa Koroglu.

Joining the march in front of the Constitutional Court building, the new leader of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), Ozgur Ozel, said the latest judicial crisis was “an attempt by Erdogan to overhaul the constitutional order”.

“The president, who takes his power from the constitution, supports Court of Cassation’s actions ignoring the constitution. Constitutional Court rulings are binding for everybody, according to the constitution,” Ozel said, urging Erdogan to protect the constitution.

Erdogan told his ruling AK Party members to support the appeals court challenge, appearing to take aim at some in its ranks who had criticised the move.

‘Degradation of rule of law’

In comments made later at a ceremony in Ankara, Erdogan said the dispute between the two top courts showed the need for a new constitution, reflecting his longstanding position that parliament should take up the matter next year.

The latest crisis showed that Erdogan wants “more control over what happens in Turkey, including a judicial system that does what he wants, such as prosecuting and imprisoning his critics and opponents”, according to analyst Gareth Jenkins.

“His preference is to do things according to the constitution. That is why he has amended the current constitution in 2010 and 2017 and is now talking about a completely new one,” he added.

Legal experts said such a crisis between the country’s two most prominent courts was unprecedented and underlined concerns that the judiciary has been bent to Erdogan’s will.

It coincided with the European Commission’s release of an annual report on Turkey’s long-stalled European Union membership bid, in which it underlined “serious backsliding” on democratic standards, the rule of law and judicial independence.

The commission also said Turkey did not comply with the principles of human rights and fundamental freedoms in its “counterterrorism” operations.

On Thursday, the White House announced that Israel has agreed to daily four-hour pauses in fighting in northern Gaza to allow people to flee hostilities and for humanitarian aid to be let in.

Yet, within hours, Israel’s bombing campaign had targeted Gaza’s largest hospital, al-Shifa, and Israeli tanks had surrounded four other hospitals in the northern part of the besieged enclave.

With more than 11,000 Palestinians killed and over 27,000 injured, the al-Shifa Hospital has received just two shipments of life-saving supplies since the conflict escalated. The facility is barely hanging on by a thread, with many others fettered shut due to the fighting and the Israeli siege on Gaza following Hamas’s attack on southern Israel on October 7.

Meanwhile, Gaza is running short on water, many of its hospitals and other facilities are out of fuel, and a humanitarian crisis is deepening.

While the pauses could have offered some hope that hospitals might have been restocked, and other essential facilities could have received supplies, the attacks over the past 24 hours raise questions about Israel’s intent, and that of the US, said many experts. The pauses are also inadequate, they said.

Both the US and Israel have made it clear that there will be no ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.

Unilateral move

Emanuela-Chiara Gillard, a senior fellow at the Institute for Ethics, Law and Armed Conflict at the University of Oxford and an associate fellow at Chatham House, welcomed the humanitarian pause announcement but said it has gaping holes.

“I think that any announcement to suspend hostilities temporarily is positive in view of the situation on the ground and the needs,” Gillard told Al Jazeera. “In the immediate short term, what is clearly needed is a temporary suspension of activities, to allow humanitarian actors to transit safely, to allow people to [receive] this humanitarian assistance.”

“The issue is that it is a unilateral rather than an agreed pause between Israel and Hamas and the other parties,” she added.

This raises the question of whether Hamas and other factions will respect the pause, as the Palestinian group has not committed to anything, Gillard said.

A third-party mediator should facilitate the agreement of pauses that would be respected by both sides, she added.

Gillard also said that Israel’s communication of the details of the pauses is of outright importance, otherwise civilians making use of them could land in harm’s way.

‘Pauses are not a solution’

Other analysts said that a humanitarian pause falls short of what is needed, and that Israel needed to cease hostilities entirely.

“Pauses are not a solution,” Abdel Hamid Siyam, professor of political science and Middle East studies at Rutgers University, told Al Jazeera, saying what is needed instead is a “ceasefire so that humanitarian aid can come in uninterrupted, that foreigners can leave the country, and maybe negotiations can take place”.

Siyam said that past directives by Israel have failed to protect civilians.

“If this is only a pause to allow people to move from the north to south, it did not work in the past, it will not work in the future,” he said. “In four hours, people cannot come. They don’t have cars, they don’t have fuel. It’s not going to work.”

He said that a ceasefire, however, may be on the cards soon.

“There is mounting pressure on Israel now to open up for a real ceasefire, a real truce for a day or two or three. I think that is coming in the next few days,” said Siyam.

Protecting Biden’s interests

Meanwhile, the US has its own interests in pushing its ally for the pause, said Sami Hamdi, the managing director at International Interest, a political risk firm focusing on the Middle East.

“The pause is designed to be a vehicle through which the US can continue to support Israel’s push to ethnically-cleanse the northern part of Gaza, but also be able to reframe and present that support to the raging global public as ‘humanitarian’,” Hamdi told Al Jazeera.

US President Joe Biden has come under pressure domestically, with resignations from his Department of State, and a letter from more than 500 former campaign staffers protesting against his refusal to call for a ceasefire.

What will particularly worry him, Hamdi said, are polls suggesting that he is now trailing former US President Donald Trump in several battleground states.

Rising public pressure might also make the current US position of rejecting a ceasefire untenable soon and Biden will be forced to intervene to stop Israel’s offensive, he said.

The delay in announcing the pause, however, also reflects growing tensions between Washington and Tel Aviv.

“Tel Aviv is concerned that the US push for a humanitarian pause is a ploy by which Biden hopes to lull Netanyahu into ceasefire talks, and has been adamant in demanding assurances that this is not the case,” said Hamdi.

And Palestinians will fare no better with the pause, he said, forced still to choose between leaving their lands for Israeli settlers, or to remain and die.

For some organisations on the ground, it is too early to tell whether the humanitarian pause will be helpful.

“We’ll see when –  and if – it’s implemented and then we will be able to comment,” Juliette Touma, UNRWA’s director of communications told Al Jazeera.

“We continue to call for a fully-fledged humanitarian ceasefire across the Gaza Strip for the protection of civilians wherever they are, inside the Gaza Strip and elsewhere, for the sake of civilians for the sake of humanity,” she added.

Who: Pakistan vs England

When: Saturday, November 11, 2pm (08:30 GMT)

Where: Eden Gardens, Kolkata

Pakistan captain Babar Azam has fired back at critics with his side on the verge of World Cup elimination in India.

The hosts’ near neighbours must humiliate the holders, England, at Eden Gardens in Kolkata on Saturday if they are to have any chance of reaching the semifinal stage.

The 29-year-old has come under fire for both his batting and captaincy.

“I have not performed the way I should have in the World Cup, that’s why people are saying that I am under pressure,” he said.

“Over the last two-and-a-half or three years I was the one who was performing for the side and leading the team.

“It seems everyone has an opinion on me – he should be like this, or like that.

“If someone really wants to advise me, I think everyone has my number, but I guess it is easy to give advice on TV.”

Pakistan started the tournament with two wins, against Netherlands and Sri Lanka. A four match losing streak has cost them.

Defeats by India and Australia were manageable. The next two defeats against Afghanistan and South Africa left them in despair.

Only the brilliance of Fakhar’s 126* from 81 balls against New Zealand in their last match has kept them alive in the tournament at this stage.

A dramatic result in the teams’ final group stage match is not out of the question.

England stormed to victory in the 2019 final against New Zealand. But the wave they rode four years ago has sucked them back out to sea in India.

Their 2023 campaign – just two wins and six losses – has been disastrous and Jos Buttler’s side must now win the final group-stage match to qualify for the Champions Trophy.

Pakistan’s biggest opponent will not be the defending champions but the scale of the net run-rate reverse they must produce to progress.

A victory would take them level on points and wins with New Zealand but defeating England by a stunning margin is their only hope of claiming fourth spot.

This means batting first and taking a huge total before skittling England cheaply with a margin for 287-runs or more.

Throughout their cricketing history Pakistan, World Cup winners in 1992, have had a reputation as the team for the improbable – the odds and the statistics are heavily against them this time though.

Their highest total against England is 361 at Southampton in 2019.

If they were to replicate that then they would need to bowl the English out for 74 or fewer.

“It’s not like this matter is not in the back of the mind. It’s in our mind and we will try to do it,” said Azam.

“But we can’t just go in and start firing blindly – we want that but with proper planning, how we want to play the first 10 overs, then the next 20 – how we have to achieve that target.

“There are a lot of things in this, like partnerships, which player will stay in the pitch for how long.

“We can do this and we have planned for this.”

England are already licking their wounds.

Their Test captain, Ben Stokes, needs surgery on his knee but has put off returning home to help the struggling side.

Buttler replaced Eoin Morgan as white-ball captain in 2022 and he, like Azam, has faced criticism for team and toss selection in India.

Champions Trophy qualification will be scant reward, or indeed respite, but it is at least a motivation for a side in desperate need of focus.

“It’s great to be heading there with something on the line,” Buttler said of the match in Kolkata.

“We’re not playing for what we wanted to be playing for, but it’s a really vital match for us in the grand scheme of things.”

Head-to-head:

The teams have faced each other 88 times in one-day internationals.

Pakistan have won 32 while England have won 56.

There’s never been a tie – but that wouldn’t be of any use to either now.

England have won the last three encounters in their home series in 2021.

It was a virtual C-team fielded by England due to COVID-19 absentees in the full team and the Lions squad as well.

Pakistan’s last victory was in 2019 at the World Cup.

It was a 14-run win at Trent Bridge, Nottingham.

Pollution-fuelled smog has shrouded major cities across South Asia this week, with businesses and schools forced to close in some areas.

As of midday on Friday, four of the top five cities with the worst air quality in the world were in South Asia, with the only outlier in nearby Indonesia.

Pakistan, India, Nepal and Bangladesh have all been blighted by toxic air, which appears to be mostly caused by a combination of pollution and relatively cooler temperatures.

The Air Quality Index (AQI) – a measure developed by government agencies – puts Kolkata in India as the most polluted city in the world, followed by the country’s capital, New Delhi, in second.

Indonesia’s capital, Jakarta, ranked as the third most polluted, while Bangladesh’s capital, Dhaka, was fourth and Nepalese capital Kathmandu was fifth.

The smog has been keenly felt in recent days in Lahore, Pakistan, which had an AQI of 432 on Wednesday, before dropping to 103 on Friday.

Anything over 301 is considered hazardous – the most serious ranking – while a score above 101 is a warning for sensitive groups, such as children, the elderly, those with respiratory conditions and pregnant women.

As a result, schools and markets have been closed in the city of more than 11 million people and the wider Punjab region – home to 110 million in total – from Thursday to Sunday.

Offices, restaurants and businesses, aside from priority services like hospitals and courts, have all shut in a bid to limit movement outside, as ordered in a directive from the provincial government.

But it hasn’t stopped tens of thousands from falling sick, according to officials, as doctors advise the population to wear face masks and stay at home.

Many have reported coughing and breathing problems in Lahore, which was once known as the city of gardens in the 19th century.

Experts say the burning of crop residue at the start of the winter wheat-planting season is a key cause of the pollution.

More generally, growing industrialisation in South Asia in recent decades has fuelled a rise in pollutants emanating from factories and vehicles in densely populated areas.

The problem becomes more severe in cooler months, as a temperature inversion prevents a layer of warm air from rising and traps pollutants closer to the ground.

Smog at the World Cup

In neighbouring India, which is hosting the cricket World Cup, authorities in New Delhi announced they would restrict the use of vehicles for a week from Monday as air quality remained dangerously unsafe despite mitigation efforts.

Cricket players have chosen to remain indoors at times in New Delhi, with Bangladesh’s team cancelling a training session earlier this week and Sri Lanka’s squad wearing masks.

Primary schools were also shut in the capital until Friday.

Overnight rain brought some relief on Friday morning, while air in the financial capital of Mumbai also improved due to showers in nearby coastal areas.

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Scientists are considering seeding clouds in New Delhi – a process that involves spreading substances that can encourage rain – to trigger heavy showers.

Friday’s rain comes two days before the Diwali festival, when many defy a ban on firecrackers, causing a spike in air pollution.

In Nepal, Kathmandu has an AQI of 128, while Bangladesh’s capital, Dhaka, ranks at 156 – considered “unhealthy” on the index.

The World Health Organisation has repeatedly found air pollution to be the leading risk factor for death and disability in Nepal.

Thousands of Palestinians are streaming onto Gaza’s only highway as they try to flee the combat zone in the north, after Israel announced a window for safe passage.

It comes as Israeli forces struck near several hospitals in Gaza City as the military pushes further into dense urban neighbourhoods.

Parents carried children in their arms while others brought what possessions they could in animal-drawn carts in a line stretching as far as the eye could see.

Follow live: IDF ‘kills 30 Hamas fighters’

The accelerating exodus to the south came as Israel agreed to start implementing a four-hour humanitarian pause each day and to open a second route for people to flee the north, the White House said.

Those fleeing to the south face the prospect of ongoing airstrikes there, and dire humanitarian conditions.

More and more people have been living in and around Shifa Hospital – the largest hospital in Gaza – in the hope that it will be safer than their homes or United Nations shelters in the north, several of which have been hit repeatedly.

Early on Friday, Israel struck the hospital’s courtyard and obstetrics department, according to the head of the Hamas-run media office in Gaza, Salama Maarouf.

The Health Ministry in Gaza later said one person had been killed at Shifa Hospital and several others wounded.

Israel has accused Hamas fighters of hiding in hospitals and using the Shifa Hospital complex as its main command centre, which the militant group and hospital staff deny, saying Israel is creating a pretext to strike it.

More than 10,800 Palestinians have been killed since the hostilities began, according to the Gaza health ministry.

More than 1,400 people have been killed in Israel, mainly in the initial Hamas attack, and more than 30 Israeli soldiers have been killed in Gaza since the ground offensive began.

Israel’s military said it killed 19 Hamas militants overnight – including a company commander and a platoon commander who were involved in the 7 October attack – and also destroyed a shipping container that held some 20 rocket launchers.

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Meanwhile, the head of the UN Palestinian refugee agency (UNRWA) said on Friday that more than 100 UN workers had been killed since the start of the Israel-Hamas conflict.

“UNRWA is mourning, Palestinians mourning, Israelis mourning,” Philippe Lazzarini said, reiterating a call for a humanitarian ceasefire.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, speaking on a visit to India, said that “far too many” Palestinians have died and suffered as Israel wages war on Hamas.

He urged Israel to minimise harm to civilians and maximise humanitarian assistance that reaches them.