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Explainer: How Does BRICS Membership Expansion Impact MENA Amid Global Shifts?

BRICS

(CTN NEWS) – In a time of unfolding multipolarity, the decision of the BRICS group to enhance its membership shouldn’t be unexpected. This development might have implications even for the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region in the midst of a potential shift in the global order.

The BRICS consortium comprises Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa, serving as a balancing entity against the G7, which includes Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

During the culminating session of the BRICS summit in South Africa, held on Thursday, four out of the six invitations extended were directed towards nations from the MENA region: Saudi Arabia, Iran, Egypt, and the United Arab Emirates.

This expansion initiative stems from the group’s aspiration to rectify what it perceives as a skewed global landscape.

On that very day, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva indicated that the alliance intends to further broaden its membership by inviting nations of significant geopolitical importance, rather than solely adhering to ideological considerations.

READ MORE: BRICS Economic Bloc Expanding: Six New Members to Join, Stirring Geo-Political Dynamics

MENA Countries’ Strategic Inclusion Amplifies BRICS Influence

This implies that the inclusion of MENA countries was also motivated by the objective of augmenting the group’s influence.

The UAE has promptly embraced the bloc’s proposition. Similarly, Iran and Egypt are anticipated to acknowledge their invitations, likely motivated by financial considerations, according to analysts.

On the other hand, Saudi Arabia is presently deliberating over the proposal, although experts predict its eventual acceptance. This step aligns with Saudi Arabia’s objective of balancing its association with the United States while engaging with emerging powers like China.

Observing several fronts where the kingdom’s staunch alliance with the US has already shown signs of flexibility, entry into the BRICS could mark another gradual transformation, albeit without severing existing ties.

Sami Hamdi, Managing Director at International Interest, a Middle East-focused political risk firm, stated to Al Jazeera, “Riyadh will initially assess Washington’s response and evaluate offers from delegations that [US President Joe] Biden might send to Riyadh before deciding on embracing the invitation.”

Notably, Saudi Arabia, which holds a prominent regional role, nurtures aspirations to wield significant global influence.

This vision underscores the significance of bolstering ties with China, a goal highlighted by Michelle Grise, Senior Policy Researcher at the RAND Corporation.

ORIGINAL STORY: BRICS Summit 2023: Developing Nations’ Leaders Address Expansion And Global Dynamics

Chinese President Xi Jinping, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi huddle during the 2023 BRICS Summit at the Sandton Convention Centre in Johannesburg on Aug 24, 2023. – AFP photos

UAE’s Calculated Equilibrium in BRICS Amid Evolving Alliances

Likewise, the UAE, which is also aligned with the United States, shares a comparable inclination towards equilibrium, according to Grise.

BRICS membership provides Saudi Arabia and the UAE with a means to harmonize their affiliations with the United States alongside their aspirations for strengthening economic connections with China,” Grise conveyed to Al Jazeera.

The inclusion of these nations would not necessarily denote an antagonistic stance against the West, as Hamdi contended.

“I don’t perceive this as them adopting an anti-Western stance,” he stated.

“Rather, it signifies the degree to which these Western allies have grown disenchanted with the West and the increasing realization that the West may no longer be fully dedicated to safeguarding their interests and security.”

With the US expressing its intention to reduce its regional engagement, this serves as an added catalyst for influential Gulf countries to broaden their diplomatic relationships, Hamdi explained.

“There’s a sentiment that due to the diminishing priority the West places on these allies, the strategy of diversifying relationships and pursuing alternative centers of influence, alliances, and partnerships has evolved into a crucial political and economic necessity,” Hamdi elaborated.

Iran’s BRICS Entry: A Strategic Move Amid Global Disruptions

Conversely, Iran, already grappling with strained relations with numerous Western nations, has seized the opportunity presented by its BRICS invitation to assert that the prevailing US-led international order is in a state of disintegration.

“The expansion of BRICS signals the decline of the unilateral approach,” quoted Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi as stated on Iran’s Arabic-language television network Al Alam.

Iran has actively endorsed BRICS’s endeavors to reduce reliance on the US dollar. The United States’ dominance over the global financial system has proven particularly challenging for Iran, given its economic struggles under the weight of US sanctions.

Hence, Iran’s inclusion in the consortium signifies a more comprehensive trend where the nation aims to fortify its economic and military bonds with non-Western powers, according to Grise.

“In a broader context, Iran’s entry also underscores its endeavor to cultivate economic and military relationships with non-Western nations,” Grise remarked. “This move likely stems from necessity, given the persistent imposition of sanctions.”

Hamdi emphasized that the entry of Iran alongside the UAE and Saudi Arabia could yield substantial ramifications for oil trade and policy, given that all three are significant oil producers.

“With these new additions, BRICS transforms into a collective entity capable of wielding substantial influence over global oil dynamics and the financial mechanisms governing oil trade,” Hamdi affirmed.

MENA’s Evolving Dynamics and the BRICS Expansion: Navigating Cooperation Amidst Differences

As the MENA region undergoes a transformation characterized by the cultivation of improved bilateral relationships among previously estranged countries, certain disparities have persisted.

Nevertheless, the entry of the four MENA nations has the potential to complicate the spirit of cooperation within the bloc, according to analysts.

“In the past year, we’ve witnessed the UAE reestablishing diplomatic ties with Iran, followed by a warming of relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran – these developments create a scenario where envisioning all three countries as part of BRICS becomes plausible,” stated Grise.

Hamdi noted that Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Iran have historically set aside collective differences as members of OPEC, implying that they could similarly navigate such differences within the BRICS framework.

“While their divergences might introduce complexities to the decision-making process, it’s improbable that they would obstruct the functioning of the bloc,” Hamdi remarked.

Ayham Kamel, Head of the Middle East and North Africa Research team at Eurasia Group, concurred that regional matters are unlikely to dominate discussions.

He emphasized that focusing on regional conflicts would be counterproductive within the context of this otherwise advantageous arrangement for the region.

“This expansion would position the Middle East and North Africa with four representatives within an expanded BRICS organization,” Kamel informed Al Jazeera. “This structural enhancement would augment their leverage.”

A fortified region would contribute to the progression of a multipolar world, as Trita Parsi, Vice President of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, highlighted.

“As the global landscape shifts away from unipolarity, the United States is concurrently losing its capacity to act as a gatekeeper,” Parsi conveyed to Al Jazeera.

“No single state possesses the authority to unilaterally define membership in the Community of Nations or designate an entity as an outcast.”

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Google’s Search Dominance Is Unwinding, But Still Accounting 48% Search Revenue

Google

Google is so closely associated with its key product that its name is a verb that signifies “search.” However, Google’s dominance in that sector is dwindling.

According to eMarketer, Google will lose control of the US search industry for the first time in decades next year.

Google will remain the dominant search player, accounting for 48% of American search advertising revenue. And, remarkably, Google is still increasing its sales in the field, despite being the dominating player in search since the early days of the George W. Bush administration. However, Amazon is growing at a quicker rate.

google

Google’s Search Dominance Is Unwinding

Amazon will hold over a quarter of US search ad dollars next year, rising to 27% by 2026, while Google will fall even more, according to eMarketer.

The Wall Street Journal was first to report on the forecast.

Lest you think you’ll have to switch to Bing or Yahoo, this isn’t the end of Google or anything really near.

Google is the fourth-most valued public firm in the world. Its market worth is $2.1 trillion, trailing just Apple, Microsoft, and the AI chip darling Nvidia. It also maintains its dominance in other industries, such as display advertisements, where it dominates alongside Facebook’s parent firm Meta, and video ads on YouTube.

To put those “other” firms in context, each is worth more than Delta Air Lines’ total market value. So, yeah, Google is not going anywhere.

Nonetheless, Google faces numerous dangers to its operations, particularly from antitrust regulators.

On Monday, a federal judge in San Francisco ruled that Google must open up its Google Play Store to competitors, dealing a significant blow to the firm in its long-running battle with Fortnite creator Epic Games. Google announced that it would appeal the verdict.

In August, a federal judge ruled that Google has an illegal monopoly on search. That verdict could lead to the dissolution of the company’s search operation. Another antitrust lawsuit filed last month accuses Google of abusing its dominance in the online advertising business.

Meanwhile, European regulators have compelled Google to follow tough new standards, which have resulted in multiple $1 billion-plus fines.

google

Pixa Bay

Google’s Search Dominance Is Unwinding

On top of that, the marketplace is becoming more difficult on its own.

TikTok, the fastest-growing social network, is expanding into the search market. And Amazon has accomplished something few other digital titans have done to date: it has established a habit.

When you want to buy anything, you usually go to Amazon, not Google. Amazon then buys adverts to push companies’ products to the top of your search results, increasing sales and earning Amazon a greater portion of the revenue. According to eMarketer, it is expected to generate $27.8 billion in search revenue in the United States next year, trailing only Google’s $62.9 billion total.

And then there’s AI, the technology that (supposedly) will change everything.

Why search in stilted language for “kendall jenner why bad bunny breakup” or “police moving violation driver rights no stop sign” when you can just ask OpenAI’s ChatGPT, “What’s going on with Kendall Jenner and Bad Bunny?” in “I need help fighting a moving violation involving a stop sign that wasn’t visible.” Google is working on exactly this technology with its Gemini product, but its success is far from guaranteed, especially with Apple collaborating with OpenAI and other businesses rapidly joining the market.

A Google spokeswoman referred to a blog post from last week in which the company unveiled ads in its AI overviews (the AI-generated text that appears at the top of search results). It’s Google’s way of expressing its ability to profit on a changing marketplace while retaining its business, even as its consumers steadily transition to ask-and-answer AI and away from search.

google

Google has long used a single catchphrase to defend itself against opponents who claim it is a monopoly abusing its power: competition is only a click away. Until recently, that seemed comically obtuse. Really? We are going to switch to Bing? Or Duck Duck Go? Give me a break.

But today, it feels more like reality.

Google is in no danger of disappearing. However, every highly dominating company faces some type of reckoning over time. GE, a Dow mainstay for more than a century, was broken up last year and is now a shell of its previous dominance. Sears declared bankruptcy in 2022 and is virtually out of business. US Steel, long the foundation of American manufacturing, is attempting to sell itself to a Japanese corporation.

Could we remember Google in the same way that we remember Yahoo or Ask Jeeves in decades? These next few years could be significant.

SOURCE | CNN

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2024 | Supreme Court Won’t Hear Appeal From Elon Musk’s X Platform Over Warrant In Trump Case

trump

Washington — Trump Media,  The Supreme Court announced Monday that it will not hear an appeal from social media platform X about a search warrant acquired by prosecutors in the election meddling case against former President Donald Trump.

The justices did not explain their rationale, and there were no recorded dissents.

The firm, which was known as Twitter before being purchased by billionaire Elon Musk, claims a nondisclosure order that prevented it from informing Trump about the warrant obtained by special counsel Jack Smith’s team violated its First Amendment rights.

The business also claims Trump should have had an opportunity to exercise executive privilege. If not reined in, the government may employ similar tactics to intercept additional privileged communications, their lawyers contended.

trump

Supreme Court Won’t Hear Appeal From Elon Musk’s X Platform Over Warrant In Trump Case

Two neutral electronic privacy groups also joined in, urging the high court to hear the case on First Amendment grounds.

Prosecutors, however, claim that the corporation never shown that Trump utilized the account for official purposes, therefore executive privilege is not a problem. A lower court also determined that informing Trump could have compromised the current probe.

trump

Trump utilized his Twitter account in the weeks preceding up to his supporters’ attack on the Capitol on January 6, 2021, to spread false assertions about the election, which prosecutors claim were intended to create doubt in the democratic process.

The indictment describes how Trump used his Twitter account to encourage his followers to travel to Washington on Jan. 6, pressuring Vice President Mike Pence to reject the certification, and falsely claiming that the Capitol crowd, which battered police officers and destroyed glass, was peaceful.

musk trump

Supreme Court Won’t Hear Appeal From Elon Musk’s X Platform Over Warrant In Trump Case

That case is now moving forward following the Supreme Court’s verdict in July, which granted Trump full immunity from criminal prosecution as a former president.

The warrant arrived at Twitter amid quick changes implemented by Musk, who bought the company in 2022 and has since cut off most of its workforce, including those dedicated to combating disinformation and hate speech.

He also welcomed back a vast list of previously banned users, including Trump, and endorsed him for the 2024 presidential election.

SOURCE | AP

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The Supreme Court Turns Down Biden’s Government Appeal in a Texas Emergency Abortion Matter.

Supreme Court

(VOR News) – A ruling that prohibits emergency abortions that contravene the Supreme Court law in the state of Texas, which has one of the most stringent abortion restrictions in the country, has been upheld by the Supreme Court of the United States. The United States Supreme Court upheld this decision.

The justices did not provide any specifics regarding the underlying reasons for their decision to uphold an order from a lower court that declared hospitals cannot be legally obligated to administer abortions if doing so would violate the law in the state of Texas.

Institutions are not required to perform abortions, as stipulated in the decree. The common populace did not investigate any opposing viewpoints. The decision was made just weeks before a presidential election that brought abortion to the forefront of the political agenda.

This decision follows the 2022 Supreme Court ruling that ended abortion nationwide.

In response to a request from the administration of Vice President Joe Biden to overturn the lower court’s decision, the justices expressed their disapproval.

The government contends that hospitals are obligated to perform abortions in compliance with federal legislation when the health or life of an expectant patient is in an exceedingly precarious condition.

This is the case in regions where the procedure is prohibited. The difficulty hospitals in Texas and other states are experiencing in determining whether or not routine care could be in violation of stringent state laws that prohibit abortion has resulted in an increase in the number of complaints concerning pregnant women who are experiencing medical distress being turned away from emergency rooms.

The administration cited the Supreme Court’s ruling in a case that bore a striking resemblance to the one that was presented to it in Idaho at the beginning of the year. The justices took a limited decision in that case to allow the continuation of emergency abortions without interruption while a lawsuit was still being heard.

In contrast, Texas has been a vocal proponent of the injunction’s continued enforcement. Texas has argued that its circumstances are distinct from those of Idaho, as the state does have an exemption for situations that pose a significant hazard to the health of an expectant patient.

According to the state, the discrepancy is the result of this exemption. The state of Idaho had a provision that safeguarded a woman’s life when the issue was first broached; however, it did not include protection for her health.

Certified medical practitioners are not obligated to wait until a woman’s life is in imminent peril before they are legally permitted to perform an abortion, as determined by the state supreme court.

The state of Texas highlighted this to the Supreme Court.

Nevertheless, medical professionals have criticized the Texas statute as being perilously ambiguous, and a medical board has declined to provide a list of all the disorders that are eligible for an exception. Furthermore, the statute has been criticized for its hazardous ambiguity.

For an extended period, termination of pregnancies has been a standard procedure in medical treatment for individuals who have been experiencing significant issues. It is implemented in this manner to prevent catastrophic outcomes, such as sepsis, organ failure, and other severe scenarios.

Nevertheless, medical professionals and hospitals in Texas and other states with strict abortion laws have noted that it is uncertain whether or not these terminations could be in violation of abortion prohibitions that include the possibility of a prison sentence. This is the case in regions where abortion prohibitions are exceedingly restrictive.

Following the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, which resulted in restrictions on the rights of women to have abortions in several Republican-ruled states, the Texas case was revisited in 2022.

As per the orders that were disclosed by the administration of Vice President Joe Biden, hospitals are still required to provide abortions in cases that are classified as dire emergency.

As stipulated in a piece of health care legislation, the majority of hospitals are obligated to provide medical assistance to patients who are experiencing medical distress. This is in accordance with the law.

The state of Texas maintained that hospitals should not be obligated to provide abortions throughout the litigation, as doing so would violate the state’s constitutional prohibition on abortions. In its January judgment, the 5th United States Circuit Court of Appeals concurred with the state and acknowledged that the administration had exceeded its authority.

SOURCE: AP

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