Category Archives: Middle East

Iraq Returns (?) to Sectarian Violence

05 Thursday Dec 2013

Posted by in Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Iraq, Islamic Small Wars, Middle East, Politics, Religion

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A wave of violence Friday killed 52 people in Iraq, most of whom were kidnapped and shot dead with their corpses abandoned, in scenes harking back to Iraq’s sectarian war . . .  More than 6,000 people have been killed this year, forcing Baghdad to appeal for international help in battling militancy just months before a general election, as official concern focuses on a resurgent Al-Qaeda emboldened by the war in neighbouring Syria.

52 dead in throwback to Iraq’s sectarian bloodshed | Bangkok Post: news – 11/30/2013.

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Oh my!

Will that do?  Or should we take it up a notch?

Those bastards!

Raise the volume all you like, talk is talk and that’s all it is: in coming days, so one may suspect with reason, it will become near impossible for the morally pissed off and remote to be heard over or through the bodies piling up as they do when the cause has become nothing short of madness itself.

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STERLING HEIGHTS, MICH. — The Iraqi government is negotiating with the US government and BAE Systems to purchase 200 Bradley Fighting Vehicles sometime during the next 15 months, according to BAE officials.

The potential deal is expected sometime in 2014 and could come just before another expected agreement is reached with Saudi Arabia to buy Bradleys in 2015. The Iraq contract would provide recently upgraded M2A2 ODS (Operation Desert Storm) variants to the Baghdad government, the same vehicles that the US Army National Guard uses.

Iraq Requests 200 Bradley Fighting Vehicles; Saudi Deal in the Works | Defense News | defensenews.com – 8/28/2013.

Anyone see anything wrong with this picture?

Related: Iraq’s Months of Sectarian Violence May Lead to a Civil War | TIME.com – 10/1/2013; Iraq suffers ‘accelerated surge’ in sectarian violence – CNN.com 10/6/2013; from this place: Iraq – Back to the Dark Ages Today | BackChannels – 11/8/2013.

The search string “Iraq Sectarian Violence 2013” doesn’t produce news anymore: it produces a story line that starts with taking off the lid covering this simmering pot of scorpions, the seemingly unintended consequence of the 2003 invasion — ten years and eight months ago — and opens a long scene two or three (I don’t think three acts will do it for this part of the world) that is playing now and keeps cycling back to unconventional, sub-state, guerrilla style barbarism and sadism within the context of (yawn) Sunni-Shiite predispositions that have absolutely nothing to do — and they will have nothing to do — with tomorrow.

▶ Iraq 2013: Year of Carnage (Promo) – YouTube – 11/26/2013.

I’m sure my life in media’s fringe would be more exciting (and solvent) if I worked for RT!

However, it takes no genius to understand the astoundingly absurd structure of this portion of the Islamic Small Wars: Putin : cash / Assad : survival / Khamenei : ambition / Shiite : expansion and survival vs. Obama : Obama / Sunni Quasi-Democratic Kerfuffle (Syria) / Iraq : Sunni Reassertion with “gorious” Al Qaeda-type Edging.

Iraqis are suffering murder associated with or motivated by cultural and religious precepts that have absolutely nothing to do with the nature of God, humanity, or the universe — and for that, or just perhaps ignoring that, Iraq as a state is laying in large arms contracts.

Beware the next Gulf War.

All this other bloodletting: calisthenics.

Iraqis need an army of detectives, psychologists (cultural, ethnographic, linguistic, social), and wondrous poetic minds (preferably Jewish or, perhaps, Presbyterian — for the kindness thing), for every surprised and tortured corpse in this year’s Iraq body count, so far, of 6,000 (update that: 6010 or so as I type) was murdered by somebody else’s programming in the head, which programming always exists and persists as language foremost albeit molded by emotion best interpreted through the portal opened by the terms “civilizational narcissism” and “malignant narcissism”.

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Gun battles between Iraqi security forces and armed attackers have left at least ten dead and more than 40 injured in Kirkuk.

Suicide bombers and gunmen initially launched an assault on police intelligence headquarters in the northern Iraqi city.

A two-hour exchange of fire followed.

Co-ordinated attack in Kirkuk leaves several dead as violence in Iraq escalates | euronews, world news – with video – 12/5/2013

▶ Iraq violence producing a ‘damaged generation’ NewsNews – YouTube – Posted 12/5/2013; however: BBC News – Iraq violence producing a ‘damaged generation’ – 11/1/2013; related: BBC News – Iraq army asks tribe leaders to help end violence – 10/29/2013; US, Iraq agree more equipment needed to fight al Qaeda in Iraq – World News – 11/1/2013 (if a dateline is absent, the date posted here comes from the Google search engine).

At the state level, state forces consistently engage Al Qaeda when apparent, much to their credit, but the sub-state, transnational character of that insult to humanity knows its way around tanks and patrols.  What’s needed would seem an extraordinary upgrade in intelligence concepts and methodology, including HUMINT.

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It was the second month in a row that the overall death toll declined, but the U.N. envoy to Iraq, Nickolay Mladenov, said he was “profoundly disturbed” by an uptick in “execution-style” killings. In three places around Baghdad last week, Iraqi police found bodies of 31 men, women and children who had been shot in the head.

World news digest: In Iraq, attacks raise fears of Sunni-Shiite violence – The Washington Post – 12/1/2013.

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By April 2013, simmering sectarian tensions boiled over and the country experienced its deadliest month in half a decade. If a day goes by in Iraq without scores being maimed or killed in car bombings outside schools, mosques or crowded markets, that day is the exception rather than the rule. Hundreds continue to die each month in such grisly attacks. What follows is an account of the violence that has gripped the country over the past year. There are no coffins draped in Stars and Stripes, but the cameras are rolling and the world is watching.

Iraq 2013: a year of carnage — About – 2013 attack data, month-by-month, day by day, to the end of November.

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RT: Score!

CNN: ?

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Syria has emerged as the new “Jihadist cause célèbre” across the Arab world, energizing that movement and providing a melting pot for foreign fighters from across the region to create personal ties that will underpin future terrorist networks.

By the measures of manpower, weaponry and territory, it can now be argued that the broader al Qaeda network is stronger than at any time since the peak of the Iraq insurgency half a decade ago, and perhaps even than at any time since 9/11.

Resurgent al Qaeda: new concern about U.S. homeland – CNN Security Clearance – CNN.com Blogs – 12/2/2013.

Maybe CNN will focus on Iraq a little more tomorrow.

Maybe.

Maybe not.

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Gaza – No Justice – A Glimpse Into Kleptocracy

05 Thursday Dec 2013

Posted by in Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Israel, Middle East, Politics

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Ironically, throughout all of the alleged Israeli siege on Gaza, Israel has consistently been providing Gazans water and power supplies, which Israel threatened to cut in 2011 if Palestinian Authority pursued reunification with Hamas — a threat which Israel never carried out.

Moreover, numbers speak for themselves: in March 2012, the same month when 300 Hamas rockets were fired from Gaza at Israeli towns, 3,653 truckloads of goods were delivered from Israel to Gaza and 1,375 Gazan patients and companions entered or passed through Israel for medical treatments, followed by another 1,364 in April, 2012.

In August 2012, the Hamas prime minister’s brother in law was allowed to enter Israel for treatment in an Israeli hospital.

Who Is Really Besieging Gaza? :: Gatestone Institute – Mudar Zahran – 11/15/2012.

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“there are 1,200 millionaires in Gaza since Hamas took power… these people took advantage of the tunnels and the commerce of fuel to Gaza and took advantage of the people in Gaza.”

Gaza Strip full of corrupt millionaires, says Palestinian official – Middle East Israel News | Haaretz – 11/16/2013.

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WAFA reported that the wealth came from controlling the smuggling of good through the tunnels with Egypt, including “alcohol and drugs,” describing Hamas leaders as “Gaza’s drug lords”.

In addition, the prominent Egyptian newspaper, al-Mesryoon, quoted Egyptian writer and academic Abdul Munim Saeed as saying that Hamas was the main importer and exporter of drugs into Gaza.

The Jewish Press » » Hamas’ Drug Lords – 4/22/2013.

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A campaign against drugs was launched by Gaza’s interior ministry last month targeting tramadol tablets which are widely used by youth in the Sector.

Tramadol is a drug prescribed by doctors as a pain killer; however it is widely misused by drug addicts as a replacement drug. Opium, marijuana and various other kinds of drugs are in short supply in Gaza as a result of the strict anti-drug campaigns carried out by the ministry of interior.

Gaza government fights ‘tramadol’ smuggling – 7/8/2013.

The quotations having to do with narcotics proceeds and trafficking in Gaza rather seem to contradict one another but are not necessarily irreconcilable: the soul of corruption and crime resides in the opaque qualities of a governance that enables some to many to engage in illicit activities without consequence to themselves.  In such atmospheres, tightening laws and initiating crackdowns may as well serve to remove one’s own competitors or enemies from the market, which is not to say that’s what’s happening, but who is to know — and how would they know it?  Independent accounting and audit would see unknown to governments — this is not about Hamas only — that rely too heavily on their own opacity, privacy, and security in doing what they do.

Results nonetheless come out in one form or another of cash input and output comparisons, and if cash seems in short supply where in fact it has been signaled as abundant, than one knows it has been disappearing down into very dark and bottomless pockets.

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The tunnels that move goods into the Strip from Egypt have been linchpins of the economy, employing 12,000 to 15,000 and supplying as much as 75 percent of the products sold in the markets, according to Sameer Abumdallala, head of the economics department at Al Azhar University in Gaza. Now the smugglers say their importance is waning: Access to Israeli goods is improving, and the Gazan government has begun regulating the tunnels, sapping profits.

Twilight of Gaza’s Smuggling Tunnel Millionaires – Businessweek – 1/31/2013.

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Palestine – Gaza City.

Septemper 4, 2013

palestinian man who lost his right foot (disabled)he has 10 children in Gaza City ( Alzayton area) suffers poverty and the family lives in just two rooms.

Five of the children they don’t going to school because of the bad economic situation in the family. — family also thay don’t have an sewerage network

Gerechtigkeit für Gaza – justicia para Gaza – justice pour Gaza – justice for Gaza: Ezz Al Zanoon – brilliant photographer from Gaza – 9/4/2013.

Whose constituents are they?

Readers who click on the above link will arrive at an almost too beautiful picture of an equally ugly circumstance made more so by the point of this post: enormous sums have channeled through the Gaza Strip, but evidence of fair and responsible distribution through local governance has been weak and, in fact, both Israeli and Palestinian presses seem to have turned up stories indicating interests opposite accountable and responsive area-wide governance.

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Dictatorships and the “malignant narcissists” who manipulate and thieve from their areas of control often offer sweet words to their constituents but their wallets and their forces tend to serve mostly themselves.  For such, ideologies and religions would seem to serve mostly as cloaks and shields inscribed with the con artist’s favorite invocation: “Trust me.”

Addendum 12/5/2013

The streets of some Gaza neighborhoods are completely flooded with raw sewage, so that pedestrians have no way to go but through the muck. The Hamas government has been sinking Gaza into a quagmire of violence, blackouts, water shortages and now: a cholera epidemic waiting to happen.

The Jewish Press » » Israel Warns EU of Emerging Gaza Humanitarian Disaster – 12/3/2013.

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In the past few years, the war-torn Gaza Strip relied on Egyptian fuel at 3.5 Israeli shekels (one dollar) per litre. Then in July, Egypt closed down all supply tunnels to Gaza in an attempt to crush the Hamas Islamic movement for being an ally to overthrown Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi (2012-2013). The municipality says that fuel coming through Israel is heavily taxed, forcing them to pay double, at 7.0 Israeli shekels per litre.

Gaza Returns to Donkey Days – Sabbah Report – 12/5/2013.

1. Former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak sets out to establish a family dynasty in the last years of his tenure;

2. Egypt, en masse, decides to not let Mubarak get away with that, and he’s ousted from power;

3. The only political player on the block turns out the Muslim Brotherhood, which handily, ruthlessly, takes care of its competition, ascends to power, and sets about the business of consolidating everything, starting with the army, quickly advancing to the constitution, its way;

3b. Hamas, itself a part of the Muslim Brotherhood, cheers for the arrival of its new buddy;

4. Civil war breaks out in Syria, partially, initially, aligning Shiite against Sunni Islam, and Hamas, knowing what it’s really about (read the charter), knows what it’s about, which alienates the puppet master in Iran;

5. Meanwhile, in Egypt, President Morsi turns out so ham handed, venal, and on his economy just plain absent or stupid — you decide — Egyptian about half or three-quarters en masse demand his ouster and return to the comfort of the arms of the army;

6. Uh oh for Hamas — Egyptian, Israeli, and United States diplomatic and military interests discover common cause in heading off the fascist Brotherhood (while mouthing away for more genuine democratic process, one way or the other) — and it’s Hamas — the Hamas government and governance — that can no longer sustain an inscrutable presence in the lives of Gaza’s constituents;

6a. Hamas successfully stifles the launch of protests in its streets by way of pre-event arrests and detentions and the usual methods amounting to intimidation — and no one shows up: the by-Hamas-silenced continue suffering (related on this blog: “Hamas – Tamarod – 11/11 [You’re Going to Need a Cup of Coffee“]).

7. Israel, watching this meltdown in governance, the wholesale shirking of responsibility for basic services — keep in mind Gaza’s millionaires, their number, their sources of income, their comforts — alerts the European Union as regards the strips vulnerability to other human catastrophe, including the creation of conditions for cholera.

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A STRING of regional developments over the past two years has left the Islamist Hamas government in Gaza in dire straits and opened up new opportunities for Israel and Palestinian moderates.

In backing the Sunni rebels in the Syrian civil war, Hamas forfeited its special ties with its biggest arms supplier, Iran; the military ouster of its Muslim Brotherhood allies in Cairo put serious strains on its relations with Egypt; and a change of leadership in Qatar left a big question mark over the extent of financial aid from the oil-rich Gulf state it can continue to count on.

ICT – Commentaries > Hamas in disarray – 11/26/2013.

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“I can’t emphasise enough that Israel’s security in this negotiation (with Iran) is at the top of our agenda,” Kerry said at a joint news conference in Jerusalem.

“The United States will do everything in our power to make certain that Iran’s nuclear programme of weaponisation possibilities is terminated.”

Kerry stressed the two men had spent “a very significant amount of time” discussing the peace talks with the Palestinians.

“Israel’s security is fundamental to those negotiations,” he said.

Israel security key in talks on peace, Iran: Kerry – Yahoo!7 – 12/5/2013.

Hate may for a while drive the heart but it consumes it too and all it envelopes.

* * *

The charter states that “our struggle against the Jews is very great and very serious” and calls for the eventual creation of an Islamic state in Palestine, in place of Israel and the Palestinian Territories,[1] and the obliteration or dissolution of Israel.[2][3] The charter also states that Hamas is humanistic, and tolerant of other religions as long as they do not block Hamas’s efforts.[4] The Charter adds that “renouncing any part of Palestine means renouncing part of the religion” of Islam.[5]

Hamas Covenant – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia – as viewed 12/5/2013.

Any who care to look ahead to how that story ends may well look beyond Gaza, Hamas, and Israel: a figure approaching 130,000 have died in neighboring Syria’s civil war, which effort to depose a dictators has been skewered by the forces of “Islamic Jihad” that would have it a war for Islam rather than for democracy, human rights, and inclusion in power; beside that figure stands the displacement of one-third of Syria’s population before the war.

I’ve seen no figure describing the suffering and trauma visited on Syrian innocents and noncombatants, but then I believe no such figure can ever exist.

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Iran’s Path – A Simple Juxtaposition

04 Wednesday Dec 2013

Posted by in Anti-Semitism, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Facsimile Bipolar Political Sociopathy, Iran, Islamic Small Wars, Middle East, Politics

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London: Britain’s Daily Telegraph newspaper has published satellite images that it says prove Iran is developing a second path to a nuclear weapons capability by operating a plant that could produce plutonium.
The images – commissioned by the Telegraph and taken as recently as February 9 – show steam rising at the heavily-guarded Arak heavy water production plant, about 240 kilometres south-west of the capital Tehran. International inspectors have been barred from the plant since August 2011.

New nuclear concern over Iran as satellite images expose plant – 2/28/2013

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Iran’s Mullahs, with the aid of the beguiled illiterate and religiously fanatic masses, strengthened their stranglehold as they blamed others for their incompetence and larcenous nature for the people’s intractable problems. The ever-machinating Mullahs had to find a scapegoat, preferably many scapegoats, to blame. True to form they turned and bit the hand that helped bring them to power — the United States. For good measure, the Mullahs included Israel. Jews have always been good scapegoats for Islamists, going back to the time of Muhammad in Medina. The prophet of Allah, as soon as he gathered enough power, found it expedient to plunder the Jews’ properties, kill the men and take the women and children as slaves to exploit or sell.

Archived-Articles: Mr. Obama: Don’t Betray My People – 7/3/2008

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Iran, once OPEC’s second-largest producer, is talking with European companies about future projects, Bijan Namdar Zanganeh told reporters today in Vienna. The minister said he hopes Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM:US), Royal Dutch Shell (RDSA) Plc, BP (BP/) Plc, Eni SpA and Statoil ASA (STL) will invest in the country. Iranian officials will meet with international companies in London in March, he said, declining to identify them.

The Islamic republic agreed last month to restrict work on its nuclear program for six months in return for a loosening of sanctions that offers about $7 billion in relief and access to $4.2 billion in oil revenue frozen in foreign banks.

Iran Plans to Meet Foreign Oil Companies to Seek Investment (1) – Businessweek – 12/4/2013.

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What could go wrong?

Don’t answer.

The future will be here soon enough.

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Snapshot – Maaloula and Yabroud

04 Wednesday Dec 2013

Posted by in Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Islamic Small Wars, Politics, Syria

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Syria: Pope Francis Speaks Up for Maaloula Abducted Nuns – IBTimes UK – 12/4/2013

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The “fog of war” descended on Syria a long time ago.

That process began with a despotic and reactionary state eschewing talk with its challengers and leaping to air power to bomb the daylights out of its own constituents — city blocks, suburbs, towns, villages, schools — free of discrimination regarding noncombatants.

The same seems to have picked up with the fractured assembly of the Free Syrian Army and to have accelerated with the incursion of the Al Qaeda affiliates and their ability to steal The Revolution, redefine The Cause, and confuse the comparative loyalties and purposes of the patchwork of anti-Assad forces.

* * *

The fighting in Maaloula is part of a wider struggle between Al-Qaeda linked fighters of the Nusra Front and the Syrian army for control of the strategic Damascus-Homs highway, which passes close by the town.

Maaloula was the scene of heavy fighting in September. It is considered to be one of the birthplaces of Christianity and is home to a number of shrines and monasteries, which are listed as UNESCO world heritage sites.

Islamist fighters move 12 abducted Syrian nuns from Maaloula to rebel-held town — RT News – 12/3/2013.

* * *

Activists and residents say Syrian rebels have again taken control of parts of Maaloula, an ancient Christian town near Damascus.

A spokesman for the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and a local resident said on Monday that rebels were steadily seizing swathes of the town which they have occupied on previous occasions as fighting has ebbed and flowed in the rugged Qalamoun region near Damascus.

Syrian rebels take control of Christian town Maaloula – Syria – FRANCE 24 – Google lists the posting date as 12/3/2013.  😦  I urge the majors — and everyone else — to return to datelining their stories!

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In a statement relayed by the Lebanese National News Agency, Qabbani said that “kidnapping and physical abuse go contrary to the teachings of Islam, and are offensive to the essential teachings of tolerance especially at a time of conflict and war.”

It was not immediately clear whether the nuns had been kidnapped or merely evacuated for their own safety.

Pope, Lebanon mufti call for release of Maaloula nuns | Al Akhbar English – 12/4/2013.

Oh, please, oh sponsored press: the Islamist front has retaken a critical position in the Syrian theater, picked up in the weird way of the religious world a dozen useful assets that it may use to forestall the next Assad airstrike, or, if the jets fly anyway,  use as anti-regime PR (by way of their obliteration by the air force of the despot) even while a few of their own are dispatched to Paradise.

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Posted May 19, 2013 —

Syria – Crazy Freaking Assad Blasts Yabroud – YouTube – 5/19/2013.

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The Syrian terrorists abducted 12 nuns from Mar Takla monastery, which lies in the historic town of Maaloula in Damascus, and movedNuns them form to the nearby town of Yabroud.

Syria Terrorists Move Maaloula Nuns to Yabroud Northern Damascus – 12/3/2013.

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▶ ‫أصابة دبابة تابعة لعصابات الأسد بصاروخ السهم الأحمر بالقرب من قيادة اللواء١١٢ بالقرب من نوى‬‎ – YouTube – 12/4/2013.

#Syria #Daraa #Nawa Rebels hit a regime tank… | YALLA SOURIYA – 12/4/2013.

While America’s lopsided right-side conservatives excoriate President Obama for this mess, it may dawn on some to take a second look at the weight and singularity of the emerging rebel arsenal.  Neither the weapons launched in the above attack or very good zoom video used to record the attack arrived out of thin air.  As with all film and television productions, especially today the real ones, there would seem to be a lot of treasure involved.

Whose?

When?

Through what channels?

I don’t think I’m going to find the answers to those questions on the World Wide Web.

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To Be Abandoned and Betrayed by Politics’ Malignant Narcissists

03 Tuesday Dec 2013

Posted by in Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Israel

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“This is how I live, day in, day out, in Gaza. Most of the population is less privileged than I am. When poverty wins out and there is no work and no solution on the horizon, there’s nothing worse than losing hope.”

My sea, my day – Israel Opinion, Ynetnews – by Dr. Mona al-Fara 12/2/2013.

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” . . . . there are 1,200 millionaires in Gaza since Hamas took power… these people took advantage of the tunnels and the commerce of fuel to Gaza and took advantage of the people in Gaza.”

Gaza Strip full of corrupt millionaires, says Palestinian official – Middle East Israel News | Haaretz – 11/16/2013.

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Briefest Observation: for dictators — “malignant narcissists” — political space, locality to state, provides exclusively for their own aggrandizement and comfort through the accumulation of wealth and has otherwise no significance as regards the interests of other constituents in their immediate surrounds.

For such “kleptocrat” personalities and the systems they create around themselves, the achievement of murderous and thieving power would seem the main thing, and whatever holds together to sustain that “thing” — their thing — is the only genuine concern.

As much would seem as true for “Putinistas” investing their wealth and their lives outside of Russia, for the Assads who have decimated their constituent population in Syria — now one-third displaced or refugee, and for Gaza’s “tunnel millionaires” who have essentially forsaken those around them: all have in common the abandonment and growing impoverishment of those who had believed in them and counted on them most.

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Syria – A Poisonous Honeypot for War Lovers

27 Wednesday Nov 2013

Posted by in Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Islamic Small Wars, Middle East, Politics, Syria

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In sum, Syria embodies multi-layered “spider web-like “ networks of Sunni and Shia militias and paramilitary forces, and this can only continue to plunge Syria into violence and chaos not unlike the Lebanese Civil War (1975-1990), although Syria’s war is at least 100 times worse and intense and potentially will last a lot longer.

The supporters of these proxy rebel groups, like Saudi Arabia, the UAE , and other GCC states on the Sunni jihadists’ side, and Iran on the Shia side, have no regard for the innocent civilians suffering horrifically in Syria and also as refugees in neighboring countries. These proxy supporters are as guilty of atrocities as Bashar al-Assad. All sides are guilty of war crimes

The merger of jihad franchises in Syria: A war of Islamisms | JPost | Israel News – 11/26/2013.

In the order encountered in the above article: The Islamic State of Iraq and Sham (ISIS); Free Syrian Army; Ahrar al-Sham; Jaysh al-Islam; Suqour al-Sham; Liwa al-Tawhid; Liwa al-Haqq; Ansar al-Sham; Kurdish Islamic Front; Hezbollah; Revolutionary Guard Corps.

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“I want to say to the clerics to fear Allah.  They have destroyed people.  They have destroyed families.  They have destroyed all people.  They have destroyed young people.  They lie to them and lure them.  For what?  For Jihad for the sake of Allah.  All this is nothing but slander and brainwashing.”

▶ Jordanian Jihadist Surprised as he Finds out he was Treated for 6 Months at Syrian Govt Hospital. – YouTube – Posted 11/26/2013.

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We can thus say with high confidence that at least 1,200 European Muslims have gone to Syria since the start of the war. This is a remarkable figure; we are talking about the largest European Muslim foreign fighter contingent to any conflict in modern history.

Number of foreign fighters from Europe in Syria is historically unprecedented. Who should be worried? by Thomass Hegghammer, 11/27/2013.

Referenced by the above link: European Foreign Fighters in Syria – The Washington Institute for Near East Policy – 4/2/2013.

Also by Thomas Hegghammer: “Should I Stay or Should I go?  Explaining Variation in Western Jihadists’ Choice between Domestic and Foreign Fighting.”  American Political Science Review, February 2013.

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Hey, guys, let’s put on a war and see who shows up!

The Mohammad Must Off Ya Club, partially invited by the Old Soviet Boys Network and the Shiite Propeller Beanies — everyone’s making money but the fighters, and some of those are making money too — have found their calling in Syria:

Explosive weapons, including bombs, killed seven in 10 of the more than 11,000 Syrian children under the age of 17 who have died in Syria’s brutal civil war, according to a report released on Sunday . . . Most often, they were killed by explosives, but also from executions and torture. Since March 2011, 113,735 civilians and combatants have been killed in the Syrian conflict.

Report: Over 11,000 Syrian children killed in war, most by explosives | Al Jazeera America – 11/24/2013.

At the start of Syria’s agony, Maher al-Asad himself set the tone by firing a weapon from an urban sidewalk toward an opposite corner.  Since then, the barbarism all around has dived into subhuman realms and expanded through the combatants coming on to or persisting on the field.

Exercise your imagination with this factoid from the above cited Al Jazeera piece:

Small arms fire from guns and rifles accounted for 2,806, or 26.5 percent, of the children killed, with 764 children who were executed and 398 killed by fire from a sniper. And among those children who were executed, 112 were tortured, including some infants.

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Upon arrival in Syria, the mercenaries were told that their employers were private individuals, not the Syrian government, and the weapons they were told they’d be given, including T-72 tanks, were replaced by antiquated tanks that didn’t run, and by makeshift armored vehicles with machine guns. Also, they soon learned that instead of guarding oil fields, they were supposed to be recapturing them from jihadists.

The Insane Story of Russian Mercenaries Fighting for the Syrian Regime | James Miller – 11/21/2013.

Oh what a tangled web we weave when what we do best is set out to murder and deceive.

For money.

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St Petersburg newspaper Fontanka interviewed some mercenaries who said that they were lured by a promise to get $4,000 per month and a solemn oath that the first salary would be transferred within days.

They were taken on a flight to Beirut, Lebanon and from there they were transferred by cars to Damascus. When they reached the Syrian border they traveled with a convoy of local guardsmen. In Damascus they were taken to a local hotel. The following day they were transferred by a plane to Latakia, and from there to a Syrian military base.

Russian mercenaries helping Assad against Syrian rebels | Ya Libnan | World News Live from Lebanon – 11/17/2013.

Anyone want to fight the brutal dictatorship or the anachronistic Jihad?

The action’s Over There, Syria, wide open, no rules but mob rules, mafia or sharia.

Choose sides; find some buddies; prepare to bomb or torture infants or just lay back and trade mortar, RPG, and automatic fire around the countryside.

Film crews provided.

▶ Al-Nusra Front Attacking Syrian Army Checkpoint In Idlib – YouTube – Posted 11/19/2013.

In Syria already and not in love with fighting?

These alternative headlines are for you:

No easy way to Germany for Syrian refugees | World | DW.DE | 27.11.2013

No Room Service for Syria’s Refugees | ASHARQ AL-AWSAT – 11/26/2013.  ” . . . Syrian refugees cling to a fragile existence on Istanbul’s streets . . . .”

For Syrian refugees in Lebanon, mounting piles of debt (+video) – CSMonitor.com – 11/25/2013.

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The Islamic Small Wars are no longer about infidels, Islam, or states: they’are about kinds of persons, sometimes the absolute autocrats one feels comfortable referring to as “malignant narcissists”; sometimes common bandits, murderers, psychos, and thieves taking the opportunity to cloak themselves in patriotism or religion; sometimes nothing more than young men in the hormonal sway of grandiose messianic delusions.

Perhaps it will turn out a good thing to have had them gathered so in one bloody place.

They’re all easier to see that way — and what a spectacle they make of themselves.

While the malignancies do the chop-chop and Kalashnikov war dances, Oxfam on Syria notes the following:

  • The UN estimates that almost 7 million Syrians inside of Syria are in need of assistance, including 4.25 million internally displaced.
  • Thousands continue to flee Syria daily.
  • The total number of refugees in neighboring countries is now more than 2.2 million.
  • It is estimated that the population of Lebanon has increased by more than 25% and the population of Jordan by 6%. This is putting extreme pressure on local infrastructure.

Crisis in Syria: What Oxfam is doing | Oxfam International

Soon there will be no one with whom to negotiate peace, nor any basis for peace, nor any justice in any accommodation involving peace.

The Syria once owned by the Assad regime has died and gone to hell, and there it is burning, its many fires kept lit by demons within and without.

Related Reference

Underfunded and outgunned Free Syrian Army faces additional enemies | PBS NewsHour | Nov. 26, 2013 | PBS

Turks worry as sons go to fight in Syria – Yahoo News – 11/26/2013.

Toronto 18: Convicted terrorist stopped checking in with police in 2012 | Toronto Star – 9/26/2013.

Jihad in Syria | Institute for the Study of War – 2012.

Addendum 11/28/2013

In what has become the style of this blog:

“One 24-year-old man, suspected of organising journeys to Syria, was in touch with several “fixers” who facilitated travel between Turkey and Syria, while another previously fought with an Islamist group in Syria, the sources said.”

http://www.france24.com/en/20131115-france-arrests-four-suspected-syria-jihadists – 11/15/2013.

In casual and often jocular language typical of messages on social media, the authors paint a rosy picture of life on the front, stressing the pious atmosphere and the sense of brotherhood-in-arms shared by the fighters. They note that recruits may come with their wives and children, and stress the practical advantages of joining the jihad community in Syria, such as the prospect of finding a bride and the low cost of living.

French-Speaking Jihad Fighters In Syria: ‘France, Soon It Will Be Your Turn’ – Atlas Shrugs – 11/9/2013.

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After al-Quds University Students Raise the Black Flag and Do the Hitler Salute

24 Sunday Nov 2013

Posted by in Anti-Semitism, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Free Speech, Islamic Small Wars, Israel, Middle East, North America, Politics, Psychology, Regions, United States of America

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Demonstrators at the Palestinian school paraded in paramilitary gear, with massed black flags, mock assault weapons, and arms extended in Nazi-style salutes. There were banners lionizing suicide bombers, and hand-drawn Israeli flags on which students trod. Islamic Jihad — long identified as a terrorist organization by the United States and the European Union — posted photos of the rally on its website. In one, students representing dead Israelis sprawl on the ground as black-clad jihadists brandishing weapons stride past.

Rally shows pervasive Palestinian anti-Semitism – Opinion – The Boston Globe – 11/24/2013.

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“Even universities like Al Quds university are established especially in Jerusalem, in order to show that Arabs and Muslims are the masters of this place and not the Jews, because in their view, if Judaism will control Jerusalem it will mean that Judaism came back to life after Islam came to replace it.

“This is why the basis of the struggle over Jerusalem and over the whole land of Israel is a religious struggle – not between Israel and the Arabs but between Judaism and Islam. This is the essence of th struggle, and everything stems from this archimedic point of the struggle.”

The speaker is the well-known scholar Mordechai Kedar and the source this one: Footage: More Nazi-Style Rallies at Al-Quds U. – Middle East – News – Israel National News – 11/28/2013.

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During his press conference in Jerusalem today on the “peace process,” U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry criticized Israel again, but did not place any emphasis at all on the fact that the Palestinian Authority tolerates (and in many cases actively encourages) incitement to kill Jews.

Mideast Dispatch Archive: Scenes yesterday afternoon from a “moderate” Palestinian university – 11/6/2013

Related: Mideast Dispatch Archive: Update: Al-Quds photos receive attention from Netanyahu through to Al Jazeera (Tom Gross Media) – 11/11/2013; Elder Of Ziyon – Israel News: 11/07 Links Pt1: Fascist Rally at Al Quds Uni, Iranian Nobel Laureate – Rouhani is no Moderate – 11/7/2013; The Jewish Chronicle – Palestinian university partnership with Brandeis under fire after fascist style rally – 11/14/2013; Al Quds University « Commentary Magazine – 11/20/2013; Brandeis University suspends its partnership with Al-Quds University effective immediately | BrandeisNOW – 11/18/2013; Brandeis University Criticized for Nazi-Style Rally | Washington Free Beacon – 11/11/2013; Al-Quds president says Brandeis counterpart ‘gone overboard’ in row over rally | The Times of Israel – 11/22/2013.

In the final reference of the above block, Sari Nusseibeh, president of al-Quds University may have through the subtext of his response made it clear how difficult it was — and remains — to stand up to and condemn the anti-Semitic bigotry and hate paraded by Islamic Jihad on campus.  While defending his actions on the matter, which I believe he did well, he appears (in words) not to have gone so far as to lead his campus in recognizing and condemning with certainty its own deeply fascist elements and tendencies.

The Jewish press at once defensive and active –in this instance David Horovitz writing for the Times of Israel — hammers home the telling nail: “In his statement issued to al-Quds students Sunday, Nusseibeh had said that “Jewish extremists” were using the demonstration to “capitalize on events in ways that misrepresent the university as promoting inhumane, anti-Semitic, fascist, and Nazi ideologies.”

No extremists, Jewish or otherwise, would seem needed to recognize the deeper structure in argument having to do with choosing between a loyalty that pacifies, placates, and patronizes its children when they are wrong, and an integrity in matters that risks upsetting their malign narcissistic souls.

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“We are very disappointed and saddened to have learned of these recent events at Al-Quds University,” said Kevin Quinn, Syracuse’s senior vice president for public affairs, in an email to The Jerusalem Post.

He said Syracuse’s Institute for National Security and Counterterrorism would end its ties with Al-Quds. The decision by Syracuse came three days after Brandeis University severed its relationship.

Syracuse follows Brandeis in halting ties with Al-Quds | JPost | Israel News – 11/22/2013.

When something stinks, people who don’t stink back away from it.

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DEARBORN — Dozens of Arab Americans across southeast Michigan converged on Dearborn Friday to mark National Al-Quds (Jerusalem) Day, condemning Israel’s continued occupation of Palestinian lands.

The protest was held at Dearborn City Hall, the designated “free speech zone” in the city.

Muslims Mark Al-Quds Day in Support of Palestinians – Around Town – Dearborn, MI Patch – 8/4/2013.

Should you click on the Dearborn Patch link, you will see a photo of a young lady holding a post with blocked and black letters on a white field: “Israel: No Right To Exist.”

Scroll down some and learn that “Abir Safa of Dearborn read a poem during the rally, and said that the event serves as a wake up call for all Muslims to take a stand against global Zionism and global hegemony and aggression regardless of race, religion or creed.”

Good idea — start with the saluting black shirts of al-Quds University, Jerusalem, Israel.

But wait — that would be off the point, which might fit a little more with observations similar to this one by Andrew Kirell writing for Mediaite:

It’s a match made in hate-filled heaven: former Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard and Louisiana legislator David Duke endorsed, via video, Charles Barron, the controversial anti-Israel Democrat from Brooklyn, New York, who currently seeks the party’s nomination for the U.S. House of Representatives.

Former Black Panther Barron has a long history of controversial remarks, some of which have been interpreted as anti-Semitic. He once called Israel the “biggest terrorist in the world,” and likened the Gaza Strip to “a virtual death camp, the same kind of conditions the Nazis imposed on the Jews.” At one point, he praised the late Libyan dictator Muammar Qaddafi as a “freedom fighter.”

United In Hate? Fmr. KKK Leader David Duke Endorses Black Anti-Zionist For Congress | Mediaite – 6/22/2012.

Readers of this blog should by now well recognize the “Paranoid Delusional Narcissistic Reflection of Motivation” involved in the concoction, unconsciously or by way of deliberate and venal conceit, of “against global Zionaism . . . hegemony . . . aggression” especially when it links directly back to jack-booted, black shirt wearing, rigidly parading and Nazi-emulating thugs associating themselves with other Palestinians, among them some or many — who knows absent of free speech and unblemished elections?  — who may finally wish to think twice — independently and off their own research and reflection — about who it is, or what it is, that has been purporting to represent them.

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A little bit of “Never Forget!” by way of the 1930s, Facebook, and Harry’s Place (reference provided).

boycotJGS

Harry’s Place » Old Hatred In New Words? – 9/2/2008.

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While before a person had to be personally exposed, through people or perhaps a book, to vile characterizations of Jews, today anti-Semitism is prominently available everywhere anytime — to those seeking it out or to the innocent person just looking for information. Typing “Jew” into Google or Bing returns a top site (sometimes No. 2) called JewWatch, which is a vast emporium of anti-Semitic accusations and hatred claiming 1.5 billion pages in support of its mission to defame and eliminate Jews and their supposed power. This is but one of tens of thousands of anti-Semitic hate sites, which include a growing alternative to Wikipedia, called Metapedia, which seeks to create (currently in 18 languages) an anti-Semitic informational universe.

Opinion: How the Web spreads anti-Semitism – CNN.com – 10/18/2013.

With the democratic open society concept, a lot of people write and publish — and a lot more read and respond through the manner in which they conduct their lives — but to create a pervasive information atmosphere, one infused with anti-Semitic vitriol, takes some pile of sleazy cash: one wonders about who has been putting up the Big Bucks to inflame and incite yet another generation to wanton murder.

Additional Reference

Brandeis president will reach out to Al-Quds University | j. the Jewish news weekly of Northern California – 11/27/2013.

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FTAC – If Information is Power, How Much Greater Must Be Power Over Information

21 Thursday Nov 2013

Posted by in Anti-Semitism, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Islamic Small Wars, Israel, Middle East, Philology, Politics, Psychology

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Some settlers may not be perfect 🙂 I don’t know for the paucity of mainstream media or otherwise vetted journalists combing the territory and less weighed down with agenda channeled by a special interest press. The “Pallywood” and issues related involve a stepped concept: the belief that 1) information is power, and if that is so, then 2) power over information must be really powerful. That organizations would arm Palestinians with cameras for their defense but also do so in an environment in which baiting, false flag, and provocation seem a part of the atmosphere may well produce viscerally compelling images without necessarily telling a whole story. Accompanying the idea that “power over information must be really powerful” (let’s ask Putin what he thinks about that — and also what he learned on the way to becoming a colonel) may be the conceit that one is above it and others merely susceptible tools, especially if the information environment is pervasive enough and there’s a little something in the target’s heart (in my world: learned but forgotten messages gleaned during early childhood language uptake) that wants confirmation still of the rule embedded and unconsciously in suspension.

Much of the Islamic Small Wars as well as the ghosts of the Soviet Union persist in informational dark space. Neither Fatah nor Hamas have produced around them anything close to “open democracy”. http://www.cpj.org/tags/fatah-voice For all the bloodshed along the several axis coinciding in these so far small wars — autocratic, criminal (narcotics, arms running, kidnapping, extortion, other trade), and religious — much would abate with growing strength in integrity and perhaps greater insight into the cognitive mechanics of “malignant narcissism”.

The interpretation of the world in language – how one knows how to talk about the experience of life in a place — may be also reflective of language programming in the head.  That programming is powerful, sufficient, certainly, to see in some fashion – or confirm with enthusiasm someone else’s observation — ghosts and witches in one century and to find the experience of either inaccessible in the next.

Autocrat, dictator, or totalitarian monster would wish his constituents (and everyone else) to see things his way.

Perhaps the little monster consign themselves to writing poetry while the larger ones erupt with whole political programs.

In any case, I suspect both grandiose and hateful desires and illusions follow sensibly from the time-hidden tracks of childhood’s social grammar.

What might keep a really bad train boiling down the line?

Absence of resistance linked to concepts not articulated within or otherwise remote from thought suspended generally in the cognitive texture of the culture of interest: one cannot call a man crazy who appears (given the tools at hand) merely inspired and passionate even if he turns out a copy of Charles Manson.  Indeed, there’s a certain malignancy that knows its targets cannot defend themselves from what they cannot — or for love, will not — perceive in the reality that has approached them to engulf, use, and eventually destroy them.

Related

Palestinians Shoot Back With Video Cameras – Video – TIME.com, n.d.

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