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Rising Tensions Between Baghdad and Erbil: Beginning of a New Phase?

Judges from Baghdad and Erbil during a seminar on the Iraqi Constitution (Government Media file photo)
Judges from Baghdad and Erbil during a seminar on the Iraqi Constitution (Government Media file photo)
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Rising Tensions Between Baghdad and Erbil: Beginning of a New Phase?

Judges from Baghdad and Erbil during a seminar on the Iraqi Constitution (Government Media file photo)
Judges from Baghdad and Erbil during a seminar on the Iraqi Constitution (Government Media file photo)

Iraqi experts foresee escalation in tensions between Erbil’s Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) and Baghdad following recent Federal Court decisions and the resignation of a Kurdish judge.

They note that while relations between the two capitals are heating up, political divisions within Kurdish factions may limit their ability to take decisive actions.

Previously, Erbil played a significant role in federal politics, primarily clashing with Shiite parties in Baghdad, notably Nouri al-Maliki’s Dawa Party.

However, recent disputes have shifted towards legal and constitutional matters addressed by Iraq’s top court.

Baghdad’s alleged political moves against the KRG are prompting Erbil to respond.

The recent withdrawal of Kurdish Judge Abdul Rahman Zibari from the Federal Court, supported by the party of Masoud Barzani (Kurdistan Democratic Party), seems aimed at disrupting the court’s operations.

It’s seen as an attempt to upset the ethnic and national balance among its members, according to some legal experts.

The Kurdistan Region Judiciary Council sharply criticized the Federal Court on Wednesday for its decision to annul the minority quota. This move, from the Kurdish perspective, is seen as applying constitutional pressure on Baghdad and the Federal Court.

The head of the Kurdistan Judicial Council, Judge Abdul Jabbar Aziz Hassan, on Wednesday stated that Iraq became a federal state in 2004 with the State Administration Law.

Its governance system, outlined in Article 4, is based on historical and geographical facts, separating powers between the center and the Kurdistan Region, he added in an official statement.

The 2005 constitution recognized the Kurdistan Region and its authorities, granting it powers except for those reserved for federal authorities.

Judge Hassan explained that anything not exclusively under federal authority is within the region's jurisdiction. He emphasized that regional laws take precedence over federal laws in areas of shared authority.

He criticized the Federal Court for overstepping its legal boundaries, citing its decision to cancel the minority quota in the Kurdistan Parliament election law.

Kurdistan’s judiciary believes that the division of electoral districts is solely the regional parliament's responsibility, not the Federal Court's.

KRG Prime Minister Masrour Barzani reaffirmed the region’s commitment to its constitutional rights, stating that they wouldn't be relinquished under any pressure or circumstances.

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Winter Is Hitting Gaza and Many Palestinians Have Little Protection from the Cold

Reda Abu Zarada, 50, displaced from Jabaliya in northern Gaza, warms up by a fire with her grandchildren at a camp in Khan Younis, Gaza Strip, Thursday, Dec. 19, 2024. (AP)
Reda Abu Zarada, 50, displaced from Jabaliya in northern Gaza, warms up by a fire with her grandchildren at a camp in Khan Younis, Gaza Strip, Thursday, Dec. 19, 2024. (AP)
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Winter Is Hitting Gaza and Many Palestinians Have Little Protection from the Cold

Reda Abu Zarada, 50, displaced from Jabaliya in northern Gaza, warms up by a fire with her grandchildren at a camp in Khan Younis, Gaza Strip, Thursday, Dec. 19, 2024. (AP)
Reda Abu Zarada, 50, displaced from Jabaliya in northern Gaza, warms up by a fire with her grandchildren at a camp in Khan Younis, Gaza Strip, Thursday, Dec. 19, 2024. (AP)

Winter is hitting the Gaza Strip and many of the nearly 2 million Palestinians displaced by the devastating 14-month war with Israel are struggling to protect themselves from the wind, cold and rain.

There is a shortage of blankets and warm clothing, little wood for fires, and the tents and patched-together tarps families are living in have grown increasingly threadbare after months of heavy use, according to aid workers and residents.

Shadia Aiyada, who was displaced from the southern city of Rafah to the coastal area of Muwasi, has only one blanket and a hot water bottle to keep her eight children from shivering inside their fragile tent.

“We get scared every time we learn from the weather forecast that rainy and windy days are coming up because our tents are lifted with the wind. We fear that strong windy weather would knock out our tents one day while we’re inside,” she said.

With nighttime temperatures that can drop into the 40s (the mid-to-high single digits Celsius), Aiyada fears that her kids will get sick without warm clothing.

When they fled their home, her children only had their summer clothes, she said. They have been forced to borrow some from relatives and friends to keep warm.

The United Nations warns of people living in precarious makeshift shelters that might not survive the winter. At least 945,000 people need winterization supplies, which have become prohibitively expensive in Gaza, the UN said in an update Tuesday. The UN also fears infectious disease, which spiked last winter, will climb again amid rising malnutrition.

The UN Agency for Palestinian Refugees, known as UNRWA, has been planning all year for winter in Gaza, but the aid it was able to get into the territory is “not even close to being enough for people,” said Louise Wateridge, an agency spokeswoman.

UNRWA distributed 6,000 tents over the past four weeks in northern Gaza but was unable to get them to other parts of the Strip, including areas where there has been fighting. About 22,000 tents have been stuck in Jordan and 600,000 blankets and 33 truckloads of mattresses have been sitting in Egypt since the summer because the agency doesn’t have Israeli approval or a safe route to bring them into Gaza and because it had to prioritize desperately needed food aid, Wateridge said.

Many of the mattresses and blankets have since been looted or destroyed by the weather and rodents, she said.

The International Rescue Committee is struggling to bring in children’s winter clothing because there “are a lot of approvals to get from relevant authorities,” said Dionne Wong, the organization’s deputy director of programs for the occupied Palestinian territories.

“The ability for Palestinians to prepare for winter is essentially very limited,” Wong said.

The Israeli government agency responsible for coordinating aid shipments into Gaza said in a statement that Israel has worked for months with international organizations to prepare Gaza for the winter, including facilitating the shipment of heaters, warm clothing, tents and blankets into the territory.

More than 45,000 Palestinians have been killed in the war in Gaza, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. The ministry's count doesn't distinguish between civilians and combatants, but it has said more than half of the fatalities are women and children. The Israeli military says it has killed more than 17,000 militants, without providing evidence.

The war was sparked by Hamas’ October 2023 attack on southern Israel, where the armed group killed 1,200 people and took 250 hostages in Gaza.

Negotiators say Israel and Hamas are inching toward a ceasefire deal, which would include a surge in aid into the territory.

For now, the winter clothing for sale in Gaza's markets is far too expensive for most people to afford, residents and aid workers said.

Reda Abu Zarada, 50, who was displaced from northern Gaza with her family, said the adults sleep with the children in their arms to keep them warm inside their tent.

“Rats walk on us at night because we don’t have doors and tents are torn. The blankets don’t keep us warm. We feel frost coming out from the ground. We wake up freezing in the morning,” she said. “I’m scared of waking up one day to find one of the children frozen to death.”

On Thursday night, she fought through knee pain exacerbated by cold weather to fry zucchini over a fire made of paper and cardboard scraps outside their tent. She hoped the small meal would warm the children before bed.

Omar Shabet, who is displaced from Gaza City and staying with his three children, feared that lighting a fire outside his tent would make his family a target for Israeli warplanes.

“We go inside our tents after sunset and don’t go out because it is very cold and it gets colder by midnight,” he said. “My 7-year-old daughter almost cries at night because of how cold she is.”