Opinion: This is a time for outrage at the direct hits

A hypothetical

If the presumed BUK surface-to-air missile system shot from the territory of pro-Russian rebels in Ukraine had whizzed past Malaysia Airlines flight MH17, it might have been reported sighted and considered a near-miss with some expressing a bit of outrage at such a reckless activity.

Alas! It was a direct hit and with it 298 souls were lost, the consequence of which should have precipitated such outrage at the needless, careless and atrocious waste of human life wrought by bungling rebels with Russia's support.

Then again

Down in the Middle East, literally all the rockets fired from Gaza into Israel, whilst terrifying and capable of causing carnage with the loss of life and damage to goods and property, they are in their thousands, near misses. We must for all intents and purposes express outrage at the crude militancy that is no match to Israel’s firepower and organisation.

Then, you watch the missiles fired from Israel into Gaza that has no defence weaponry, literally every missile has been a direct hit, whether intentional or not, people are losing their lives in the hundreds and this calls for widespread outrage, because of the carnage caused, that is presented as a defence.

Between terror and killings

Now, I can understand the terror of missiles coming into Israeli cities, terrifying all, young and old; the government needs to have some strategy and game plan to deal with this nuisance, though I have my doubt that even with the incursion into Gaza, the missiles can be stopped entirely, for there is a deep-seated issue of unrest that is not been addressed towards achieving peace for Israel and its neighbours.

Yet, the terrified can be becalmed, for near-misses belie a stark reality along with a sense of survival. Direct hits are a different story, the people are dead and that is the end of their story.

Blood for fear barbarity

The exchange system between Israel and Palestine of avenging fear within the borders of Israel with the blood of Palestinians in their cooped-up regions as they are ring-fenced from Israel with settlements, borders and walls cannot be the roadmap to peace for all concerned.

What has developed is escalating belligerence with no prospect of peace on the horizon. More pertinently, until we are ready to express unbiased outrage at the needless loss of life anywhere in the world and make perpetrators of the killings accountable for their actions, we acquiesce and grant immunity for more impunity to those have taken the level of their lawless activities to an unspeakable level of atrocious violence.

We must condemn the near-misses, but the direct hits must attract the sternest criticism from all fair-minded members of our humanity as well unmitigated outrage.

Opinion: Finding the right food for the conscience - truth

"We are lying and finding sexier ways to do it." Sarah Firth

Narratives are many

Many current events in the world has forced people to take sides, speak fully persuaded of the narrative that appeals to them and that has become their truth.

Whether there are facts or evidence to support the view they espouse is another thing.

However, there is a tendency to buy into a narrative, to be identified by a Shibboleth and that becomes a sworn mantra to be recited to any that might have ears.

Know who is at fault

From the fundamentals, one can examine the sometimes odiously accepted view that a lady's dress is ultimately responsible for her being raped and that the rapist is excused, exculpated and never needing to account for the crime, that is how the seed of impunity is sown through a contrived narrative that grants immunity.

Yet, all you have to hear in any statement is the qualification, "ultimately responsible" and with that the perpetrator walks, the victim twice victimised and bereft of justice.

How we champion impunity

For decades, we have excused Israeli belligerence against its cheek by jowl Palestinian neighbours and lands adjacent, impunity reigning with the narrative of security and defence without any accountability, except to a contrived sense existential threat.

We all know Israel is there to stay, it is not under threat of extermination, even if words have been spoken to that effect, but it is a political and propaganda tool deftly used by reprehensible politicians to distract us from a deeper truth of untrammelled aggression, unspeakable atrocities and bloody injustices that make the heart ache.

We must apportion blame where it is due, whoever dropped the bomb is responsible for the carnage just as the other side is responsible solely for their own acts.

How deny the truth

I return to the analogy that regardless of the manner of dress, whether provocative or not, the rapist is responsible for the rape and that is where the law stands and where justice is sought.

Likewise, the downing of the Malaysia Airlines MH17 to Kuala Lumpur from Amsterdam was the sole criminal act of the pro-Russian rebels in eastern Ukraine, no other contrived narrative is permissible and they should be brought to book.

Provocation is not responsibility

Provocation should never become responsibility, if the provoked should choose to retaliate, the provoked should be held responsible for the consequences of their actions without dissimulation.

Therein is the matter of conscience as expressed in Sarah Firth's quote. Would we accept the lie of a contrived narrative or the truth of clear responsibility for particular actions?

I have a conscience, it has a duty to stay true by supporting the truth. It has the task of expressing my humanity of empathy, feeling, understanding and appreciating the broad spectrum of what life is.

For to know pain, suffering, injustice, cruelty and hurt is to begin to see the truth of aspects of our human wretchedness.

Most importantly we must save our consciences from being seared with narratives untrue that serves to exacerbate unconscionable impunity.

Postscript:

Sarah Firth resigned from reporting for RT today.

Editorial: Israel's legislative nadir

A rotten law

The passing of a law by the Israeli Knesset giving the right of vexatious civil prosecution to petitioners from parts of the Israeli State who have suffered boycotts marks a nadir in the democratic life of Israel.

There might be very little objective reason to boycott the substantive and legally constituted state of Israel; however, there is every reason by conscience, law and legality to boycott the settlements which are viewed by international law to be illegal.

What makes the law egregious, very bad and a departure from common-sense and reason is that petitioner does not even have to prove “economic, cultural or academic damage” was caused, as long as the petitioner can suggest, assume or imply that a boycott can be reasonably expected to cause damage no matter how contrived.

This law as much as it abridges the freedom of expression and choice of the Israelis by inference confers undue legitimacy on these outposts of the law where already too much is squandered in maintaining an uneasy calm on illegally annexed lands of the Palestinians.

Israel wants no peace

Religionists might for their ulterior purposes suggest that modern Israel which is a fraction of the promised Canaan of antiquity to Abraham and his seed is the ancestral land of the Jews; it is without doubt that the imposition of ancient literality over what must for global interests of today be figurative at best is unfortunate.

However, the biggest signal from the leaning of the current Israeli parliament and government of Israel is not of a state seeking peace with its neighbours but one of a belligerent hegemony whose concept of peace is really that of security borne of being superiorly equipped as a threat and menace whilst depriving its closest neighbour of any means of its own defence and military projection if that course of action becomes necessary.

One can so easily conclude that Israel probably enjoys its continual projection of pseudo-victim within a hostile Middle-Eastern neighbourhood; and as long as we are always distracted and confronted with the spectre of an existential threat to Israel the need to force the issue for peace never assumes the needed priority because any useful peace settlement might well make Israel pale into relative regional insignificance.

Justice needs to prevail

It goes without saying that codifying such atrocious laws into their statute books and by so doing conferring legality on an illegality does make the reasonable, fair and just begin to question the legitimacy of Israel – for whilst representative democracy might well be purposeful, it can yet be abused by the tyranny of ideology.

One would hope that the legality of this law gets tested in the highest courts of the land and the bench will with boldness contemn the intent, purpose, process and enactment of this law whilst striking it down with a stinging rebuke to all those who gave support to this travesty.

Editorial: Tenth of May 2011

Mona Lisa Philistines

There is a sense that fundamentalist religious practices today hark back to medieval times and worse in a century that we wishfully think accords equality of sexes after all the emancipation and progressive rights advocacy of the 20^th Century.

Israel is one country that is delusional with pretence suggesting their apparent Western democracy and liberal values have permeated every representation of people as portrayed by the excuse of a free media.

One picture that has had global viewing is the White House Situation Room photograph taken when Osama bin Laden was being exterminated in Pakistan.

The prominent view of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton with hand over mouth and a senior female staffer standing at the back seem to have disappeared from that picture when it was published by two orthodox Jewish newspapers.

It is was a teaching time for me in that it would have been safer not to include the picture at all in the story than to allow for parallels to be drawn with another scholarly and fundamentalism group known as the Taliban.

It is argued that maintaining the chastity of women requires they may not appear in publicly viable material just as it saves the men from the lure of the lurid and sexually questionable – you will just have to view the picture as it is published.

Service must be above party

There are some to whom the newly elected President of Nigeria will not find respect, adoration, praise or deference. That is their prerogative.

The ruling party has in terms captured a majority of elective offices and that means it would take a tsunami of evidence to overturn what we can safely assume will be the de facto government for the next 4 years.

The job of running the country is not going to be an easy one and even if there is to be an opposition to the government one would hope that they are constructive, assertive and most of all reasonable.

The real concern is getting competent personnel to fill in the positions necessary to help Nigeria achieve its potential regardless of party or political affiliation. Nigeria cannot afford politicking and party recalcitrance for another four years when there is much work to be done.

Party hierarchies can continue to oppose and object as they wish but those called to the service of our dear fatherland should be allowed the privilege and given every assistance and blessing to perform to the very best of their ability and for the good of all Nigerians.

Thought Picnic: Palestine

Cannot stand the spin

The news junkie in me has started a news Lent very early; I have completely starved myself of news and completely switched off the news channels because they are all camped out on the matter of Gaza.

I have channel-hopped between Cartoon Network and Boomerang keeping my mind away from the misery, the suffering and the lies.

The news has been spun off the realms of information and it has become atrocious propaganda peddling of the most absurd kind, we are expected to believe all sorts of convoluted opinions rather than address the basic facts on the ground.

Addressing legitimacies

The legitimate needs for the nationhood of Israel in some place of approximation derived from some adherence to a holy writ that asserts the promise of Canaan to Abraham and his seed in Biblical times cannot be disputed for all sorts of reasons.

However, the legitimate rights of the people of Palestine who were displaced 60 years ago by the writ of the United Nations where 55% of the land was given to the Jews for the land of Israel and the contemporaneous occupiers then shunted into the remaining 45% without adequate redress cannot be ignored.

This constitutes the powder keg that the Middle East has become and represents how peace would almost be impossible in the Middle East until a man or woman properly weighs those different and critical legitimate concerns and brings an unambiguous, even-handed, visionary and accommodating deal to both sides.

The rhetoric within the history

The whole idea that Israel can be completely wiped off the map by any force or nation is hogwash. It just feeds the rhetoric necessary to run untrammelled through the disputed lands with matchless force in the unattainable quest for peace.

We cannot divorce the creation of the state of Israel from the deep contrition of Europe and the United States for allowing the Holocaust and the compelling expiatory exercise that expedited the creation of Israel without properly negotiated terms for the people of Palestine with respect to the Balfour Declaration of 1917.

It sometimes gives weight to the thought that President Ahmedinejad suggested at one time that a land for the Jews which would probably not be called Israel should really have been created somewhere in Europe rather than in the Middle East.

Is there a new Biblical captivity about?

At the back of my mind I remember the Biblical histories of Jews that suggest that Israel and Judea has always been a nation in flux depending on the relationship of their leaders and the people with God. They were mostly in conflict with the neighbouring tribes and sometimes overrun and taken into captivity until they re-established their relationship with God.

It makes one wonder if the nation is kicking against the goads for another wave of the cycle of Biblical events since the all claims derive from those historical links. It would send a shudder down the spines of all protagonists if the natural ebb and flow of the Jewish nation is interfered with by belligerence that simply exacerbates an untenable situation.

Getting to solutions

This is where the United States has not been a useful broker for peace, brow-beating Palestine into terms they would just have to accept because of the status quo will not kill the aspirations of a people for a land to a call theirs and it would not obliterate the claims of dispossession that others have made for over 60 years.

Be it the 1948 lines, the 1967 lines or the new lines drawn by the wall as a demarcation boundary between Israel and Palestine; some force for good has to be dispassionate about this issue regardless of old allegiances and deliver a plan that all can gather round and all can accommodate with compromise and negotiated for all the people in the dispute.

The Middle East conflict is no more a matter of who is right or who is wrong; the issue of defence and/or revenge is simply symptomatic of a deeper conflict that needs bold and courageous unravelling.

It cannot be assuaged by inaccurate missiles or precision guided missiles – just imagine if Palestine were just as formidably armed as Israel and matched Israel bomb for bomb and missile for missile – I am sure the guarantee of mutual self-destruction would have yielded a kind of peace settlement a long time ago. There are uneven hands in this game.

Between genocide or peace

The implacable extremists (be they settlers, fundamentalists or terrorists, they are all undesirable for peace in the Middle East ) on both sides have to be made to see the futility of efforts for better offers to the majority of the people on sides of the conflict.

In the end, tanks and amazing military force can destroy buildings, institutions and kill people but if anyone thinks the bullets and bombs of one mighty nation seeking peaceful co-existence can subjugate a cause just as passionate as it draws support and the compassion from humanity and deny the legitimate yearnings of a people for land, peace, justice and fairness – you will need a genocide worse than the Holocaust to achieve that.

The war must stop.

References

Blogs on Israel

Thought Picnic: Our Truth

Introduction

A friend once commented that I have a way of making a deep analysis of very simple issues – maybe it is a foible, but true to that observation I have decided to start a topical blog called – Thought Picnic – You get a brainwave and suddenly decide to go out into nature with a picnic basket of snacks and fellowship whilst admiring the beauty of nature.

The Thought Picnic visits the imponderable, sometimes it would admire thoughts, thinking or ideas but then there are times when it would all seem incredible, astonishing, amazing and downright outrageous – but that is a matter of opinion, not necessarily fact.

My first Thought Picnic appears below, it does not follow my stricter attribution system but all references are fully acknowledged with the text.

Lying to the truth

George Michael wrote in his song, Freedom – “All we have to do is take these lies and make them true, somehow”.

We find ourselves in a situation that we cannot trust that we are hearing or reading the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

Your opinions against the facts

Sadly, we are caught in a war of opinions about all sorts of issues which is fine and we have Senator Moynihan to thank for saying, “You are entitled to your own opinion but you not entitled to your own facts.”

What then is fact and what is fiction? Who documents the facts, who verifies the facts and who publishes those facts?

Those are the difficult questions and this is not helped by a comment that gives this blog its title; made by an Israeli representative this afternoon about their YouTube uploads showing their precision targeting in one of the most densely populated areas in the world.

“We are showing the world our truth”, she said – that elicited a wry smile from me, but truth has become a commodity to be managed and traded by those who can control access to the raw data that is gathered together to make up the body of facts.

The truth in the grist mill of propaganda

That way you find that journalists are not allowed in Gaza as the defence, retaliation, discipline, containment, war, massacre, carnage or genocide depending on which opinion of the facts appeals to you most from how each side wants you to view the situation.

And so we find that governments are unable in the main to tell the truth and so they repackage it for consumption and for those who do not bother to research beyond the headlines; who do not seek the facts, the detail behind the facts and whose agenda is being promoted; they are the sponges for what is conveniently called propaganda.

They are at pains to offer a perspective that is almost plausible but sounds so hollow to any right-thinking person who applies commonsense to the issue, it makes you cringe.

If I may, propaganda is the manufacture of a perspective to obfuscate the facts in order to create a truth of what is usually blatantly a lie, just because someone somewhere does not believe we can handle the truth – the resources required to maintain the machinery of propaganda is unwieldy.

Fact or perspective?

But in the game that juxtaposes fact against fiction and truth against opinion the big battles for the mind and elicitation of support for each position then becomes.

Almost 400 Palestinians have died in Israel’s precision targeting of Hamas infrastructure in probably the most densely populated place in the world whilst 4 Israelis have died as a result of Hamas’ imprecise and random home-made missiles falling on Israeli border towns - what is the significance of the numbers of the dead and people killed compared to the effectiveness of each campaign?

Is Palestine a worthwhile cause in the face of the purported defence of Israel against terrorism, the walls being built, the settlements that thrive or the supposed aggression of Israel against Palestinians in Gaza?

Is Hamas a legitimate democratic choice of the Palestinians or the pariah of terrorism as seen by the West?

Are the problems of Zimbabwe caused by white rule or black rule?

Should there be a free press including complete Western access to all issues, events and people in Zimbabwe and would this depict the whole truth?

Is the government of Sudan justified in crushing the rebels in Darfur?

Do your research

There are many questions and what suffers in finding answers to these questions is the way the opinions get in the way of the facts, the truth suffers for the portrayal of a preferred lie and the most disgrace propaganda tools are deployed in the process of presenting a manufactured view as news.

The old saying avers that all that glitters is not gold, but if we do not scratch the surface we would have paid for something that is probably completely worthless – it is incumbent on every consumer of information to objectively seek the facts and peel off the veneer of news and opinion to get at the truth – Do not be sold on everything that seems to agree with your pre-disposed sentiment.

Satan's hand in human stupidity as church splits

More Henry than Luther

If I were to compare and contrast the events that have engulfed the Anglican Church worldwide with other seminal changes and schisms in history, I see more of King Henry VIII [Source - Wikipedia, the free encyclopaedia] than I see of Martin Luther [Source - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia].

The common thread between them is I find people who have become so cantankerous in seeking their particular brand of fiery bigotry that insulates the church from those who need it allegorically aligned to Henry VIII’s desire for a divorce on not siring a heir – for which he usurped church authority from Rome to achieve his own ends.

Indulgences are what align these people with Martin Luther; in short, we have been indulgent of people whose goal is to pretend to doctrinal differences in order to break up the church.

Breaking away

After the congregation for the schism completed their sojourn in Jerusalem, unwelcome as they were by the Bishop of Jerusalem, they launched a new faith movement called the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans (FOCA) [Source - Conservative Anglicans form global network | World news | guardian.co.uk], I could suppose this is an exclusive club for the indoctrinate with no allowance for those who have not become holier than thou.

The works of Satan

However, what I find so utterly annoying is the tendency to attribute sloppiness, lack of planning and out right arrogance to the work of Satan.

Bishop Akinola was refused entry into Jordan from Israel a fortnight ago for visa irregularities and he claims that was satanic [Source - Lambeth Conference not for us – Akinola – Nigerian Tribune].

Looking at the requirements for entry between Israel and Jordan [Source - Jordan from Israel], there is free movement after a number of conditions are satisfied one of which requires the visitor have a visa to enter both countries have them appropriately stamped from the country of departure regardless of whether to have a diplomatic passport or not.

Sloppy and disingenuous

Bishop Akinola [Source - Wikipedia, the free encyclopaedia] or his handlers failed to make those simple arrangements and ensure that he would have free passage for his itinerary.

I would suppose the Bishop might have tried to drop names or pull rank, but that is what the Nigerian Embassy should be sorting out if anyone knew what they were doing.

To attribute such sloppiness and lack of effective preparedness to Satanism is just completely out of order and disingenuous to say the least.

Somehow, they save their scruples by quickly switching their coven to Jerusalem where having decided to split from the church they have now decided they would not be attending the Lambeth Conference [Source - The Lambeth Conference Official Web site].

I doubt if they would be missed and it might well turn out a more spiritual meeting helping the church to become more relevant to its community.

But, if homosexuality has so much a strength and potency to split the church, I present both sides of this schism a different dilemma.

Wherefore the Beatie family?

Mr. Beatie was born a female, underwent treatment to legally become a man but retained his female reproductive system. He conceived through artificial insemination and so recently gave birth to a healthy baby girl [Source - Transgender "man" gives birth - Yahoo! News].

Who of the clergy in the finery of their robes and the erudition of their theological schooling would find the Christianly compassion to blessing the child at her christening, baptised her when she comes of age and confirm her when she is knowledgeable about Christianity?

Would Mr. Beatie, his wife, Nancy and the beautiful baby girl be welcome to worship in your church?

Earth-queers quaking in Israel

Temple smarts and street dunces

It is a shame that sometimes we cannot look to our religious leaders to foster social cohesion and promote the need to help all peoples live together in harmony.

Their deep knowledge of presumably spiritual matters is sometimes expressed in crass stupidity about social, political or natural law issues.

Even those who believe in miracles do not oppose natural laws; no one would call for rain to come out of the ground nor would they expect the crippled to rise up and walk on pig trotters.

Then we have political figureheads of extreme and fundamental causes who in their ignorance and idiocy look for social cannon fodder to blame for simple natural occurrences which get passed off as acts of God.

Pastor President with Bible Constitution

Mike Huckabee the Republican presidential nominee aspirant represents one shade of that perspective where America would be in danger of having a pastor for a President and the Bible for the constitution – how that can be any different from Ayatollah’s Iran surprises me as so-called conservatives dyed in the formaldehyde of the past still ply in to vote for him.

Can anyone tell these people that human government is radically different from religious government? One requires popular support; the other thrives on the cult of the personality and worse things that impact on the efficacy of democracy.

Earth-queers quaking in Israel

However, the reason for this write-up surrounds the crass statement by a political leader from the ultra-Orthodox (read - not of these times) Jewish Shas Party indicating the recent earthquakes in the Holy Land were caused by gays.

In other respectable forums, a statement like that should make the person certifiable but because he is a politician, stupidity is taken for political savvy – my view – if many people vote for an idiot, it does  not suddenly make the winner of the popular vote smart.

History and experts

I am not going to go into a seismological survey of the Holy Lands but an expert in the geology of the Levant did indicate in November 2007 that the Middle-East was ripe for another earthquake.

Apparently, there are 400-year historical circles that offer a kind of pattern to these predictions with major earthquakes occurring at these times in history along the Jordan Valley in 31 BCE, 363 CE, 749 CE and 1033 CE – Other experts.

To go by the assertion of this political leader I would wonder what societal malaise might have taken a 400-year cycle to coincide with major earthquakes.

It is morally reprehensible for religious or political leaders to seek a minority group to blame for natural disasters and the sooner adherents and followers call their leaders to account the less their beliefs and dogma are subjected to ridicule.

Not 5 in the Israel of God

If I were to seek a Scriptural aside to this verbal atrocity one would only have to refer to the intercession of Abraham on behalf of Sodom and Gomorrah where God acceded that He would spare them if He could find 5 godly people in those two cities.

In the end, only 4 escaped the wrath of God in those 2 cities; Lot, his wife and his two daughters – so maybe the earthquakes in the Levant could have been prevented but for the unfortunate situation that not even 5 godly men could be found in the whole of the Israel of God.

I do not need to carry this argument any further without offering the likes of Shlomo Benizri the opportunity to make idiots of anyone who gives any attention to his comments.

What has any minority done to warrant unfair and dastardly attacks like this?

Fielding 11 clowns for Chelsea

For now, Avram is out of his depth

I probably do not know much about football, I was quite feeble-boned even though I grew out of my size as a kid, that I skipped with the girls than I played with the boys.

It might be too early to gloat, but football does have a strange mindset to its management and play, it is not like boxing where flair is scored by points and knockdowns might count for nothing if the opponent is not knocked out.

The word is, Mourinho accepted a parting from Chelsea on mutual terms not because his team was not winning, but his game plans were not entertaining; meaning the stadiums were not full of spectators and all that results from having big followings, he would be laughing all the way to the bank with 8 figures in pounds.

His replacement in Avram Grant might have achieved much in Israel, if the Toto Cup - a minor Israeli cup competition he has won 6 times is a football big deal; but since when was Israel a footballing nation? Don’t get me wrong, people can be plucked from obscurity and they become stars; time will tell if Mr. Grant can really fill José Mourinho’s shoes.

For now, I think he has stepped into skis and he is about to go mountain-climbing, he is complete out of his league for all I care. He might however not hold the post for more than 12 weeks if he does not get a UEFA Pro license soon or the Football Association might grant a special dispensation to allow him run the club till the end of the season.

Entertaining losers?

The whipping of Chelsea by Manchester United tonight did not come as a surprise, as they acquired both an outright red card and a dying minute penalty, there would be great disarray before things pan out, but do not except miracles before the friendship between Roman and Avram leads to a serious exchange of views.

As for entertaining football, the basic law is that teams win matches through scoring goals, and then if their game plan includes skill, flair and panache, so be it. Chelsea could have retained Mourinho and simply gotten the players to paint their faces and wear tutus on the field, the goalie can be in drag, whilst those on the benches skipped and pirouetted every few minutes, probably blowing up a few animal balloons.

They would have been funny, maybe entertaining and more kids might have had their parents buy tickets to see the matches just because of the show, winning is paramount, flair is a bonus and some teams are not cut out for being entertaining apart from putting 11 clowns on the pitch.

Condolezza brings condolences - maybe more

Would Condi be doing Condolences?

One can only begin to wonder what Condolezza Rice would be attempting to achieve when she gets to the Middle-East today.

There is no argument that Israel does have the right to defend itself and it should be done vigorously, however, the manner and strategy at play does leave one wondering what they intend on achieving.

I am still of the view that focus has shifted – if that was ever the focus - from dealing with Hamas and Hezbollah militarily to the point that it is looking like the economic obliteration of those societies and psychological propaganda with the hope that wanton destruction of all types of infrastructure would make people withdraw support from those organisations.

Whose terrorists are they anyway?

Until we move from the view of looking at those organisations through the blinkered view of terrorists, because only Israel, America and Europe labels elements of Hamas and Hizbollah as terrorist – we would fail to realise that these groups also represent the aspirations of people who have been deprived and wronged on the one hand, they are also the least corrupt of the leaderships emanating from their peoples.

There is no doubt that Europe and America are very well at variance on the matter in the Middle-East, it was evident in the eavesdrop between Bush and Blair – where Bush thought Syria held the keys to stopping the shit and Blair saw a bigger issue.

Arms away

To now hear that in the midst of the outrageous abuse of military might Israel is acquiring new precision weapons from America leaves one completely gob smacked – America is helping to add fire to an untenable situation which might now go on for another few weeks.

The Arabs would take good note of that and hopefully would give a Condi a stern view of this atrocious development.

I could be that it is American weaponry that is used to cause suffering, pain and loss in the Middle-East, the availability of which feeds Israeli bravado to the drunken swagger of believing there is a military solution to this conflict.

I think NOT.

Peace born of negotiation

Like it or not, Israel would have to negotiate with these “terrorists”, if they do succeed to eliminating military threat of Hezbollah by bombing television stations amongst other things, they had better be ready for guerrilla warfare.

Taking a foothold in Lebanon might bring in a less desirable grouping of terrorists – Al Qaeda in Lebanon on the border of Israel would be the least acceptable conclusion to this military escapade.

I have my doubts any of the proponents can achieve the objective of peace with this indiscriminate bombing and the possibility of new arms from a seemingly rotten cause.