Syria conflict: 'Suicide bomb' kills defence minister

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I talked to a man from Egypt. He said of the Middle East "You can only rule that region with fire and iron, nothing else... Democracy is a circus there, democracy is not possible in the Middle East." He was telling me this and saying the President in Egypt was for the most part a good man, and was concerned about the protests happening there. Seems like he was right.

Regarding Lebanon, I'm gonna start a flamewar now, but if you look at the demographics of Lebanon, about half the country was Christian before Israel started the civil war there. I cannot feel terribly much sympathy for the Palestinians, the Palestinian State was a state created by British occupation, so in that regard Palestinian nationalism doesn't hold much water to me. But at the same time, the Israelis displaced the Palestinians, then they went all over the Middle East and caused trouble, and tried to take over Lebanon. Then of course, Israel being the kindhearted bunch they are decided to bomb the hell out Lebanon and screw it up because the PLO was there, basically slapping them in the face during the middle of a civil war that Israel was more or less the cause of.

But during all this, many of the Christians in Lebanon either died or left Lebanon. So while Lebanon is a bit more functional of a free state than many other places in the Middle East, it's a shadow of its former self when it was a nice even split between Christians and Muslims (or some would argue there was Christian majority there.) Regarding Jordan, you can again see there a pretty sizable amount of Christians there (that have been there before Islam,) and the same in Turkey, etc, you see a Middle Eastern country without a sizable amount of Christians, and it's probably not a place you wanna live.

And regarding Libya....could Obama do this?
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0smTCyTuL8[/youtube]

No chance. Interestingly, sources for western media observed 'parties on the street' in Tripoli in the hours following Gaddafi's death, while all other sources for news I had observed an eerie quiet, occasionally disturbed by roving militias looting abandoned buildings or shooting into the air. Guess which sources had actual imagery, and which sources relied on stock photos to go along with their version of the story?

The local dictators have been driving Islamists out of their countries for decades. Kicking their a**ses. They wind up twiddling their thumbs in failed states while planning anti-western attacks for PR. I'd rather they go home and all sort it out together. Playing islamic teaparty will give them something else to do anyway.

What's funny is that so many righties are against the Arab Spring. Yet this was a central justification of the Iraq War under Bush. The democratic domino theory. Suddenly Arabs arent good enough for democracy? You are either pro-democracy or not. And democracy doesnt come with a warranty. You roll the dice with each election. If they vote in Hitler, so be it. Eventually they'll settle down and build the autobahn.

I for one am grateful that President Obama has chosen not to get involved in this one. The possible outcomes range from bad to worse. The sheer number of dead already makes this a major tragedy, but intervention would only compound it. Most of the public, it seems, are blithely unaware of how this conflict could easily spark a much wider war.

For all his protestations, I have to believe that PM Erdogan of Turkey has enough sense not to intervene directly. Same for Obama & Hillary Clinton. However that can not be said of the neoconservatives in the U.S., or the Saudis - the opportunity to "flip" Syria & replace it with a pliant, Sunni-led regime - & deliver a strategic defeat to Iran - may be seen as to great to pass up. If Mitt Romney wins the election this fall, there will be U.S./NATO intervention of some sort. In that case, there would be nothing that Russia could do to stop it. After all, in addition to regime change in Iran, the neoconservative/Republican foreign agenda also includes cutting Russia back down to size.

While I couldn't predict an outcome here, it's safe to say that this story isn't going to have a happy ending.

Which Bush era 'righties' are against 'the Arab Spring'? It seems like most of the GOP seem pretty eager to intervene in countries like Libya and Syria. Lets thank god John McCain isn't president or we'd probably be occupying the entire middle east right now starting WWIII. I suppose Obama can be given some credit for war mongering being more subtle that McCain's 'bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran' but in a lot of ways what Obama is doing is much more dangerous.

They have the right to self-determination and the rest of the world needs to stay far away from their business. We're not doing that tho, we're purposely destabilizing the region for ulterior reasons than 'spreading democracy'. We weren't doing that in Iraq and our involvement now isn't for it either.

A period of unrest after this phase isn't too much unpredictable.



And it wasn't better under Mubarak, he always 'failed' to protect the Coptic churches from burning and all kinds of assults, there had been countless of anti-church incidents in his era and the Copts themselves always accused Mubarak of not taking enough measures against the radicals.

Do you know the Copts had to get a formal permission from the regime back then every time they had to repair anything (a sink, a window...anything) in a church? It has been the case since Sadat and Mubarak didn't do anything about it.

So far, the Islamist Morsi is being better than Mubarak when it come to the Copts.





and so...? What does that prove? it proves that Gaddathi had miserably failed to remove the tribal thinking in his society.


Again, you are expecting too much to happen in overnights.

Democracy takes decades or longer sometimes to be reached. There is always a transition period and struggle for power.

You can't "teach" democracy, it comes on its own accord.

Democracy isn't about voting in leaders outsiders think are "the best choice for them". It's about the people being able to make that choice for themselves and reap what they sow.

Further to the above people have to realise the West have constantly armed and financially / politically backed a lot of the sides of conflicts that currently hold positions of power and government in the Middle East. Likewise, they have also seen it fit to decide when certain political assets of theirs (people) need to be out of the picture or have to be stopped ironically in this case for freedom from tyranny. So if you guys have problems with a lot of the governments or lack of in the Middle East for the most part thank the West as they helped make it happen.

I'd think going in and literally taking over everything in Syria would be the best idea for the UN, if it weren't for the fact that the moment you stop putting guns to their heads in order to make them act civilized, they go right back to massacring each other. It's a damn tragedy, but one that doesn't seem like it's ever gonna end.

But Face...you just dont GET it!

Do you?

The people of the Middle East have suddenly gotten infected with this strange idea that the middle east belongs too... the people of the middle east! They all seem to think that the place is their's to manage, or mismanage as they see fit.

Where did they get such a notion!

Do you middle eastern people think you all OWN the place? Or what?

The middle east ofcourse belongs to the Netherlands, and to the USA, and the rest of Nato.


And thats why the west has to pick dictators for you.

What a BS, most of those rebels are former army men and led by officers, they do not shy to show their IDs on TV.

What you stated is another western myth, usually common among the leftists, but the fact is: the Arab spring contradicts the very core of Al Qaeda and its goals, the mere mass rise of national flags was the biggest slap on Al Qaeda's face.

And it seems that massacring Sunnis isn't a sectarian bloodshed to you, you are just worried about a sectarian bloodshed that *might* happen ahead while ignoring the pure sectarian bloodshed that was already being committed by the regime.

It's the Assad who played the sectarian card in the first place: http://nowlebanon.com/NewsArchiveDetails.aspx?ID=406439

Last edited by The_Face_of_Boo on 20 Jul 2012, 2:48 am, edited 2 times in total.

If you were being sarcastic then I applaud you, good one.

If not,

then I give you this

http://th44.photobucket.com/albums/f22/ ... finger.jpg

but I think you were being sarcastic (the Netherlands hint makes it clearly sarcastic...)

We'll see what happens. I had plenty of people denying that Libya would be a mess.

Fighting and unrest in Libya have not ceased yet. The national government isn't capable of bribing a militia only eighty miles down the road, and in many places, militias decided what the elections looked like. The only thing the National Transitional Council seems to have held at all times since Gaddafi's death are the oil fields. Not even Tripoli - parts of Tripoli revolted against them, Benghazi declared itself an autonomous part of Libya, and militias rule the rest of the country. Militant islamists supposedly have caches of stolen weapons in the desert, and Mali is now in trouble because Gaddafi isn't there to help the government take care of them.

Meanwhile, 20,000 refugees are heading for Lebanon. Historically, large amounts of refugees are never a good sign. You just sit back and enjoy the ride.

^ read JanuaryMan's post again, read it several times.

From what I saw on the local news, most of them are middle to upper class Damascus families (and hence not potential militias), most of their money are probably already in our banks .....their coming would be good extra income for us.

It's the earlier refugees who can be a source of trouble/conflict tho (and a burden).



Updates:

http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Local- ... z219Y7FJ7k


http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Middle ... z219Y7FJ7k

Last edited by The_Face_of_Boo on 20 Jul 2012, 4:54 am, edited 1 time in total.

As it is now, working democracy in the Middle East won't exist outside of Israel for some more decades. Most of us will probably be dead if that ever happens in an islamic country in the Middle East. What's happening in Syria now is just another conflict that may or may not replace a relatively-secular bloodthirsty dictator by a religious bloodthirsty dictator or a military council while further destabilizing the region.

who's "us"?

People on this forum, current human population of planet Earth.