An ambitious deal to replace EU's Russian energy imports; The new textbook that says Hong Kong was never a British colony
And a brutal beating of a Chinese woman who said no to sexual harassment.
In the Middle East:
The European Union took a big step Wednesday towards diversifying its energy imports.
The big news: Israel, Egypt, and the European Union signed a trilateral natural gas deal on Wednesday. The agreement, which is the first of its kind, has been in the works since May and was finalized in Cairo. It will see Israel and Egypt boost its gas exports to the E.U. as the bloc struggles to wean off Russian energy following Russia’s war on Ukraine.
The details: Under the agreement, Israeli gas will be sent through an existing pipeline to liquefaction plants on Egypt’s Mediterranean coast, where some will be liquefied and transported on tankers to European shores.
The E.U. will also encourage European companies to participate in Israeli and Egyptian exploration tenders. The group expects to launch a partnership with Egypt for green hydrogen production later this year. Green hydrogen, a low carbon energy source generated without fossil fuels, is part of the E.U.’s new energy policy as it aims to hit its zero carbon emission goal by 2050.
What does the deal mean for Israel, Egypt and their relationship?
Europe’s scramble to replace Russian energy is a golden opportunity for Israel to become a major player in the international energy market. Israel’s gas industry has immensely grown in the past few years, thanks to major offshore discoveries, but its clients are mainly Jordan and Egypt.
As for Egypt, the country will be one step closer to realizing its vision of becoming a regional gas re-export hub. (It’s already quickly becoming the fastest growing Arab exporter). According to an initial draft of the agreement seen by Reuters, Egypt would be able to purchase some of the gas being transported to the E.U. or other countries via Egyptian infrastructure, adding that Egypt could use it for its own consumption or for export.
The backgrounder: The deal further deepens the economic and energy cooperation between the two Middle Eastern countries, which has been growing since Israel first exported natural gas to Egypt in 2020. President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi has been expanding relations with Tel Aviv, in hopes that stronger ties could help boost Egypt’s economy. The Arab state is also looking for Israel’s help handling the U.S. administration, which has been withholding aid to Cairo due to its infringement on human rights. Ironically, Israel has also been accused of human rights violations against Palestinians
Will Israeli gas completely replace imports from Russia?
Not likely. Israel’s supply is expected to be nowhere near Russian capacity. The country produces roughly 10 billion cubic meters of natural gas a year.The country is on track to doubling its output to 40 billion cubic metres in the next few years, industry officials told Reuters.
Even if Israel met that target, it would still be a fraction of the E.U.’s needs. In 2021, the bloc imported 155 billion cubic meters of natural gas from Russia, accounting for about 45 percent of E.U. gas imports. Israeli gas imports to Europe will start small, said officials, and are not expected to expand significantly before 2024 as production and delivery capacities increase.
The caveat: It’s not clear if and when Egypt or the E.U. will be able to boost their gas trade. Both Europe’s LNG import terminals and Egypt’s exports were at their maximum capacity a few months ago, leaving little room for the new agreement.
Israel’s continued gas exploration made headlines the past couple of weeks after renewed attempts to bring online the Karish field which lies in the disputed maritime border with Lebanon. Tel Aviv says the Karish field is part of its UN-recognised exclusive economic zone. Lebanon insists it is in a disputed area.
How the public is reacting: The E.U. deal received polarizing responses on Arab Twitter. A majority of people said the deal was shameful, adding that Israeli gas was stolen from occupied Palestinian territories. Others applauded the agreement for the economic benefits it’s expected to bring Israel and Egypt.
Advocacy group Food & Water Action Europe said the deal is a setback in Europe’s plans to cut back on fossil fuels. Pascoe Sabido, a researcher and campaigner at the Corporate Europe Observatory, was not impressed with the E.U.’s newfound reliance on Egypt and Israel to replace Russia.
“The European Union is shifting from one repressive regime to two more,” he told Al Jazeera. “It is putting the priority of getting gas over human rights.”
The U.S. government is stepping in to review investment in China.
The Big News: The U.S. congress revised a draft proposing the screening of American investments in countries like China to protect U.S. technologies and rebuild critical supply chains, according to congressional aides and a revised draft of the bill reviewed Monday by The Wall Street Journal.
The details: Both the Democratic and Republican supporters in the Senate and the House of Representatives have agreed on revised text narrowing the scope of the screening to specified sectors and technologies. The measure in discussion would require companies and investors to disclose certain new investments in adversarial nations and authorize the federal government to form a new panel that reviews and potentially blocks the investments on national security grounds.
What’s the BFD? The legislation could rewrite the rules for U.S. companies investing overseas. It is also part of a broader effort to strengthen U.S. competitiveness with China in critical sectors including semiconductors, large-capacity batteries and so on.
The bottom line: Business groups as well as the U.S. Treasury has been cautious about giving additional powers to the state to review investments in countries like China as increased government intervention may hinder the so-called free market economy in the country. But the worry has been trumped by a stronger desire to compete with China as the world No.1 superpower. As a result, the lawmakers offered a compromise. A discussion paper from the office of John Cornyn (he is the leading supporter for the bill and a republican senator in Texas) said supporters of the bill have no tolerance for “efforts by members, backed by industry that wish to continue to build the scale and technological capabilities of foreign adversaries.”
The one where CCP gets to rewrite history, again.
Give it a glance: China is rewriting new text books that will tell students in Hong Kong the city was never a British colony. The four sets of textbooks for a class on citizenship say the Chinese government never recognized the 19th-century treaties that gave Britain control of Hong Kong. They also doubled down on the government’s position on the 2019 pro-democracy protests, blaming them on “external forces.”
Three women were brutally beaten after rebuffing harassment.
*Caution: some of the links below contain graphic footage
Don’t forget the little guys: A man approached a woman at a restaurant in a small city in Northern China, Tangshan, putting his hand on her back. After the unnamed woman pushed him away, the harasser slapped her and along with several other men began a violent attack on her and her friends that lasted for minutes leaving two women with severe injuries. The men beat the other women relentlessly, hitting them with chairs, kicking them and dragging them outdoors.
The assault was captured on a surveillance video which went viral on Chinese social media and sparked furious debate on gender-based violence despite the state’s effort to downplay the incident.