Senator McCain, the Media Moderate Republican Leader?

 

That is the favorite phrase we seem to read whenever the media is about to attack some Republican for some treachery or perceived misdeed. They have been appearing repeatedly in articles when there is a need for a quote of a Republican questioning, disagreeing, criticizing, decrying, denouncing or in some other way disgracing President Trump or those in his administration. Often the article will then point out how President Donald Trump is not a normative Republican or has often contributed to Democrat candidates or some other action which apparently should disqualify him from support by the entirety of the Republican Party. Such articles often then explain that obviously President Trump running for President as a Republican, a false Republican, but a Republican just the same, must be opposed by the Democrats and their final conclusion is always that President Trump must be opposed by everybody because he has forsaken both parties and is a disruptive influence on American politics. What these articles appear to have missed is that the recent political season has been a revolt against politics as usual. The first, and until Trump, the biggest and most obvious sign was the Brexit vote. The European Union was campaigning against any move by the British to leave their ranks and Prime Minister Cameron even went so far as to threaten to resign should the BREXIT vote remove Britain from the European Union. Well, the people were, according to almost every poll, predicted to vote to remain by a small margin and the result was more definitive than predicted but was in favor of leaving. The British are taking a long and winding approach to leaving presumably in order to allow time for reconsideration which is not likely coming. The good news is that Cameron did resign as threatened, or promised depending on your viewpoint, and the British have a Prime Minister who presumably has their confidence as she is in favor of withdrawing from the European Union even if slowly. Then there were rumors of the European right wing parties gaining strength, especially the nationalist parties, and that it was expected that the German elections would replace Chancellor Angela Merkel who was likely to lose and then that French President François Hollande announced he would not seek reelection. Donald Trump winning as President of the United States was just the crowning exclamation point on the dearth of the liberal west which just a few years earlier with the reelection of President Obama was looking as if they would rule for the foreseeable future.

 

Then the media was all over the prediction by Senator Chuck Schumer, the great spokesperson of the Democrat left, where he prognosticated the divorce between the Republican Party, or at least those Republicans in the House of Representatives and the Senate, and President Trump. His claim was that in four months there would be a splitting between true Republicans and Trump because of his ignoring protocols and not giving them adequate measure in his appointments and his populace stances which they cannot agree with and would rub roughly making them chafe and itch so badly that they would have to disassociate from Trump to remain pure. You have to understand that the media will quote anybody claiming that Donald Trump is making enemies anywhere and with anyone, any group, any political faction or any people holding purist views. They seek anger from any quarter and will attack any crack with crowbars of skepticism trying desperately to turn the slightest crack into a chasm if there is even the remotest of possibilities it will alienate Trump from voters. You see, Donald Trump must be brought low for he is a scoundrel who has bested the media in the game of words. They are used to having all the words coming from them and that their words win in the end and that there be no way around their words. Then there came Trump and the Twitterverse where Tweets are louder than all that the media’s words can carry. His reaching the public directly and telling them exactly what he means and what they should believe about him in 140 characters or less. The media cannot fight Donald Trump even in the Twitterverse because they have never mastered brevity as their trade is wordiness and Trump has mastered cutting to the chase and directly to the chase. The media attacks with lengthy diatribes and Trump replies with 140 characters or less and they have no answer for these tweets. The people get the essence of Trump and the media is powerless to dilute his wisdom, his tweets.

 

Politics has changed and Trump along with the Internet has changed it and never again will campaigns be won by cumbersome political machines and large campaigns. Brevity has become the new watchword and that 140 characters or less limit is the initial cause with short attention spans being the final touch. Campaigns will be held just as much on YouTube as every in person appearance can also be shared with the world in real time and then returned to be viewed again and again. Donald Trump has taken politics out of the hands of the political machines and eventually this revolution could bring down the large political parties. This was the idea of a candidate back during the 2000 elections whose campaign literature and all was on the Web, the Internet, where his supporters had hoped it might catch and go viral, a phrase not even born at that time, or in its infancy. This campaign did benefit from these postings as it gained the campaign the support of a group which was already Internet savvy, the gun rights groups which found his pro-gun stance to their liking and came out solidly behind him. Unfortunately that proved not to quite be sufficient in a rather liberal area but it did give hope that perhaps there would be a future where the Internet would trump, pardon the pun, the regular media and the rest of the structured political monopolies. That day has arrived and this genie will not be put back in its box. This new paradigm scares the likes of Senator McCain, Senator Schumer, the media and the leadership of both parties. Their regular power structure has been toppled by a campaign which utilized the media as their public awareness source having the media carry their water and do their advertising for them while straightening any wrongful reporting or damaging news reports and editorials by going directly to their base online and stating that their positions and responses to accusations and rumors would be made on Twitter, YouTube or their web address. People got used to seeking information refuting news stories, or at least clarifying them, by following Donald Trump on Twitter or finding his actual campaign appearances recorded on YouTube or, as a last resort, going to his web site to find answers.

 

Fake News Galore

 

Where will the media go without political campaigns every four years depending on them carrying their water when there is a firehose called Twitter and a garden hose for a slower and more detailed watering of the public on YouTube and other locations on the Internet? That is a good question and with the way they are currently acting, that question becomes all the more pressing. The torrents of “Fake News” stories are not doing the media any favors. When the people now trust the President more than the media covering him and the President remains trending on Twitter, then this will only trend worse and worse for the media. With every story told about President Trump which he denies and then gives his version in one, two, three or so 140 characters Tweets basically asking, “Who are you going to believe, Donald Trump or the lying media?” Unfortunately for the media the majority of the citizenry, according to a poll, believe Donald Trump over the White House Press Corps, which kind of answers the previous question. The media, if it knows what is good for them and their future, should start speaking straightly and honestly even if the news is not to their liking. With every story which results in the media being shown to have told another set of lies, their credibility sinks lower and further from any ability for redemption. When people have direct access to the seats of power, the actual leaders and their real statements, the media faces a real problem. They no longer filter the information the people receive as the leaders and politicians and the people have direct access to the real stories in the words with which they were spoken. They have little actual choice but to give the truth or face obsolescence as they spiral into irrelevance. Imagine a world with no New York Times, no Wall Street Journal, no Washington Post, no CNN, no Fox News and the remainders of the mainstream media have collapsed into a pool of lies of their own making. In some way it is really a shame that it had to be Donald Trump who brought about this change and gave the media their comeuppance. But then it was always going to take somebody famous, flamboyant and somewhat irregular to bring about such change, so, in a way it needed to be somebody exactly like Donald Trump.

 

We have to face it that there are very few people in this world anything like Donald Trump. He brags like few others. Where he may not be as wealthy as he claims, he sure can play the part even if he has his doubters. He has the brashness to face the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune. Now he is deconstructing the myth of the inviolate media whose words are as pure unvarnished truth as he proves they are more often than not painted tapestries telling fanciful tales and yarns of myth and magic. He has challenged the evening anchors to a war of words and abbreviations and proving that his 140 characters or less are greater than their hour of comic coverage. This will be a battle of the ages and it will be amusing to witness. There is one warning we would like to impart to President Donald Trump. Whatever you do remember that it was the people who made you and should you believe too highly in yourself, they will remind you that you are very little without them and that the last thing they will accept from you is anything short of the truth. Do not for a moment believe that you are smarter or more wise than the people as their collective wisdom and ability to smell a yarn is far greater than any single person’s ability to get away with misleading them or concealing the truth from them. The people will always find out the liar in the end and they will more oft than not do it before the liar gets out of town. Tell them the truth and they will forgive the mistake and even the slightest of misconceptions, but lie and they will roast you like you can never know. Recovery from their anger is impossible and once deceived they will not be won back to your side for they are a mean mistress whose scorn will destroy the strongest of leaders. Keep the people at your side and nothing can stand against you, not even political parties because all political power arises from the people, or at least that is the theory. Trust the people if you ever hope for them to trust you. And if you could, be nicer to the media, please. OK, just kidding.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely calls for Gradual Sovereignty

 

Tzipi Hotovely, from the ruling Likud Party, for all intents and purposes is the Israeli Foreign Minister though she insisted she be the Deputy Foreign Minister for religious reasons which are not a consideration except to note her actual position has all the power of any Israeli Foreign Minister. This makes her comments and any policy statements carry the weight of the leader of the Foreign Ministry. That makes her recent statements on the “settlements,” the Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria, and the reality that the Jewish communities are the ones under occupation and threat, not the Arab communities. We agree as the area is under military rule but much of the land is actually ruled under either Jordanian law left over from the Jordanian nineteen year occupation or British law left over from the twenty-five plus years of oppressive and pro-Arab British rule. So, let us first quote exactly the words from Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely:

“In the years when we did not dare to ask sovereignty we lost. We lost justice, truth, the Israeli story. In the years when we told the world that we can resolve the matter in a compromise because we are a peace loving nation, we did not engage in a struggle for justice in Israel. Anyone who does not believe in the right to settle in Shilo, Beit El and Eli has no business in Tel Aviv, Herzliya and Rishon Lezion.
“We learned the hard way that you cannot divide the country. We uprooted Gush Katif and we received the terrible Gaza which is bad for both Israelis and Palestinians,” she added during a meeting with Netanyahu last week where she urged him to apply sovereignty. “It can be done in a gradual manner, starting with the greater Jerusalem area and from there applying Israeli law on the entire settlement enterprise and later to sovereignty from the sea to the Jordan, but doing so requires unity, no contest who is more right-wing.
“We represent half a million people who want the law which applies to them to be the Israeli law and not the Civil Administration and the military regime. It is the settlers who are really under occupation, and it’s time to end the occupation.” Her concluding thought expressed included that, “it is more important to tell the world why we are here, because when we tell our truth, we’ll have stability all around us.”

 

We fully agree with her desire to apply Israeli laws over the entirety of Judea and Samaria and remove the horrifically horrendous anti-Zionist applications of foreign laws and allowing NGO’s and the Supreme Court to uproot Jewish communities on the flimsiest of evidence which often proves to have been false or an extreme stretch using hundreds of years old Ottoman deeds and claims simply to destroy Zionist and religious communities because they are considered an anathema to some Jews backed by European monies. The current situation allows the poisons of European systemic, historic, lingering anti-Semitism couched as anti-Zionism and pro-Palestinianism and pan-Arabism to destroy Jewish lives as well as destroying Jewish employers who employ hundreds of Palestinian Arabs as well as Jews giving these Arabs equal pay and advancement and paying salaries four times that of what they might expect from similar positions in the areas under the Palestinian Authority (PA). These attacks are meant to destroy Jewish claims and make Judea and Samaria into an Arab enclave which will fall most likely to Hamas or possibly to the Islamic State because they believe the falsehood that giving away Judea and Samaria will work better than what occurred when we surrendered Gaza and got hundreds of thousands of rockets, mortars and terrorism in return costing Israeli lives and forcing a generation of Israelis residing near the Gaza border to live under hellish attacks and threats constantly hanging over their heads, literally. Children show signs of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) except that their Traumatic Stress is current and constant which would make their condition Current-Constant-Traumatic Stress Disorder (CCTSD).

 

Tzipi Hotovely

 

Giving all of Judea and Samaria, which includes the Judean Heights which overlook the heart of Central Israel and the vast majority of Israeli industry, production, power generation and three quarters of the population’s residences, would place all of this under direct line of sight for launching rockets, mortars, anti-tank weapons and other weapons which could be used by snipers or casual terrorist who woke-up and desired some excitement defined as shooting Israelis in a barrel with the barrel being Petah Tikva, Rehovot, Giv’atayim, Netanya, Ashdod, Ashkelon, Herzliya, Yafo and, of course the gem and biggest target, Tel Aviv (see map below). Additionally, these heights give a direct shot at more than buildings as it includes direct targeting of all flights in and out of Ben Gurion International Airport as well as easy shooting at vehicles on some of Israel’s most used highways (see images below map). Opening up such vulnerabilities would be beyond insane into suicidal. The building behind the runways is Tel Aviv on up to Netanya and as one can see the Mediterranean Sea beyond one gets an idea at how close and easy it would be to target these communities and the heart of the largest collection of center city structures in Israel. And if all of this were not enough, surrendering Judea and Samaria would leave Jerusalem at the end of a thin vine containing two highways and railway tracks which would be easily cut off leaving Western Jerusalem hanging to die on the cut vine connecting it to the rest of Israel. Surrendering Judea and Samaria would mean surrendering all of Jerusalem as it would simply be a matter of time with modern weaponry to lay siege to Jerusalem by simply making the roadways and rail lines unusable. Lastly, this would also result in the surrender of the Jordan Valley which the Jordan River flows through. This valley is a natural barrier to any land assault and provides Israel with a natural defensive position. Surrendering all of Judea and Samaria would result in allowing the three passes which allow the passing from the Jordan Valley onto the Judean Heights to any Arab force that would be determined to launch a land assault against Israel (see bottom figure below). This was something Israel learned very early in its modern life as Arab armies flowed through these passes on May 15, 1948 when more than a half dozen Arab Armies attacked Israel on the first morning of her existence in an attempt to genocidally destroy all of Israel. This was the declared Arab League’s commentary on the purpose of the attack. This was the attack where Jordan took Judea and Samaria and Egypt took Gaza and these nations occupied what was supposed to be Israeli land and broke the rules of the Geneva Convention by transferring populations into these lands, especially Jordan who forced thousands of Arabs to be relocated from Jordan to Judea and Samaria plus making the Arabs who wished to reside there be rewarded with Jordanian citizenship while annexing the entirety of Judea and Samaria. Their annexation was only recognized by Britain and Pakistan with even the Arab League denouncing the Jordanian actions. Jordan reneged on their offer of citizenship after losing the lands of Judea and Samaria when Israel liberated the areas in the Six Day War in a defensive war in early June of 1967. Jordan subsequently claimed to have gifted Judea and Samaria to the Palestinian Arabs as their own nation and denied having annexed the area after Israel recaptured their lands. The final reason why Israel needs to retain Judea and Samaria is that it alters the tactical depth of Israel from a mere nine miles along the midsection to forty-five miles from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea allowing time to react to any land assault instead of immediately being cut in half as would be the case without the lands of Judea and Samaria.

 

Katyusha Rocket Range by Mark Langfan
Depicting the Near Complete Coverage
of the Heart of Israel by Even the Smallest
Home-made Rockets Both Hamas and Fatah
Are Capable of Producing in Bulk

 

Ben Gurion Airport Plane Vulnerability from Palestine
(c/o Dr. Martin Sherman and Arutz Sheva)

 

Trans-Israel Highway Route 6
(c/o Dr. Martin Sherman and Arutz Sheva)

 

Cutaway View of Tactical Advantage and Necessity
of the Jordan Valley and Judean Hills for Defending
Coastal Plains and Israel Alongside the Mediterranean Sea

 

Obviously we see the necessity for retaining control over all the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea which was guaranteed the Zionist Congress and every Jewish organization and governance right up to November 29, 1947 when the United Nations broke their own Charter rules from Article 80 and offered the Arab League to divide Israel in half and give the most productive areas to the Arab nation and leave the Israeli Jewish State holding two-thirds desert lands in the Negev. The Jews accepted this deal reluctantly but accepted this perfidy by the General Assembly but the Arab League declined this compromise instead relying on what they figured would be an easy victory destroying Israel and genocidally cleansing the land of the Jews. They had the armies of Saudi Arabia, Syria, Jordan, Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, Yemen and the Sudan plus militias and the Palestinian army under Mufti of Jerusalem Haj Amin al Husseini. There were rumors that operating behind the scenes and possibly closer to the front lines there were former British and Nazi officers assisting the Arab forces most often with the Egyptian, Jordanian, Syrian and Iraqi forces. When the Arab League rejected the United Nations General Assembly Resolution 181 dividing the lands between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea the entire resolution became null and void. By null and void we and the rules mean into the circular file, burned in the furnace, gone, disappeared, vaporized, and most important, completely irretrievable. United Nations General Assembly Resolutions, not just 181, become inapplicable as soon as any side rejects any part, let alone all of the resolution as the Arab League did Resolution 181 immediately upon its passage. That particular rejection just might have set a world record which will be impossible to beat as the Arab League had decided to reject the action by the United Nations before it even was finished being written, let alone the ink to dry. This is also why there has not been a peace reached with the Palestinian Arabs as they are simply the mallet with which the Arab League and the Arab World has been beating Israel senseless for the past seventy plus years. The PA obeys much of the Khartoum Resolution and the Three No’s; no peace with Israel, no recognition of Israel, no negotiations with Israel. The PA may appear to negotiate with Israel but if you look at the results you will find that the PA have never kept a single agreement and have never compromised on their demand that all of Israel be placed under Arab rule, period. This has been the demand from day one with the sole possible change to be allowed is that the Jews will be permitted to reside as Dhimmis under their Arab masters. Such is supposed to be better than what Jordan did to the Jews who owned land, homes, farms, businesses and other properties in Judea and Samaria as they were ejected from their properties which were then given to Arabs that were forced by Jordan to move to these properties in order to permanently change the ownership making a record which refused Jewish ownership.

 

That brings us back to the comments and ideas of the Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely. The problem with her idea is that it opens up Israel to constant denial of ownership of any of Judea and Samaria. With her idea of first annexing all of Jerusalem, a useless idea as Jerusalem has already been annexed and the Arab citizens granted Israeli citizenship with partial political rights. As we discussed in our article Why Does Israel Continue to Exist Today?, Israel was only required to grant the people residing in their homelands before they were declared a state civil rights, property rights, religious rights but not necessarily political rights. That is why and how Israel is permitted to allow the Arabs of East Jerusalem the right to vote in any Jerusalem election, though that was not required and done out of fairness as that is the one set of elections which most affects their lives, but not permit them to vote in national elections as of now. Then she wants to annex the suburbs around Jerusalem. Her idea continues to then annex the “settlement blocks” which are only in parts of Area C. Then she would eventually annex more and at some point the rest of the entirety of Judea and Samaria. Really? Such a plan is guaranteed to fail as the world comes unglued at each step. And knowing how the Likud lead-headed politically-defective step by step gradual way of accomplishing anything they feel might be controversial. Nothing could be any more wrong-headed and reality-challenged. They have learned nothing from their means of building housing in Judea and Samaria. Each time they take a single step they invite condemnations, denunciations, criminal charges to be filed, and international uproar. They announce the plan to debate allowing the building of twenty apartments in one block of a single building. The world screams endlessly for a couple of weeks. Then Israel announces they will take tenders (bids) for the building of the twenty apartments in a single building and the world screams endlessly for a couple of weeks. Then they announce they are reviewing the tenders and deciding which contractors will be in the final considerations and the world screams endlessly for a couple of weeks. The announcement then comes on which contractor won the bid and the world screams endlessly for a couple of weeks. Then they announce the intended date they will break ground and the world screams endlessly for a couple of weeks. Then they announce the date again with two weeks to go and the world screams endlessly for a couple of weeks and then with one week to go and the world screams endlessly for a couple of weeks. Then comes the big announcement that the building has been cancelled because of the world outcry and, believe it or not, the world screams endlessly for a couple of weeks over the fact that Israel even had considered such an affront to the world order. Did you catch a consistency in this process? Yep, every time Israel announced anything with the word build in any form the world screams endlessly for a couple of weeks. What does this mean for annexing Judea and Samaria? Well, probably that Israel would be best served by simply annexing all of Judea and Samaria in one fell swoop, rather than in small steps as she presented, and the world screams endlessly for a couple of weeks and then life continues.

 

The reason that so many Israelis are so touchy and seemingly timid about anything concerning Judea and Samaria is they have become gun shy. The constant screaming by a small minority of the world but a very loud and active group has scared them into believing that much of the world is against Israel. The problem is the more Israel acts like a scared two year old the more people jump on the bandwagon as it becomes less of a cost if Israelis run timid. The way to prevent this situation would be to take the entire problem on straight ahead and grab the bull by the horns. Simply take exactly what the world granted Israel from the beginning, well, almost the beginning. The very beginning Israel was supposed to be all the lands of the British Mandate, all of what today is Jordan as well as the lands west of the Jordan River. Responding to Arab pressures in the form of pogroms and rioting killing Jews and attacking British soldiers, the British reneged giving the 78% of the lands, all the lands east of the Jordan River to the Iraqi border to the Arabs placing it under the Hashemite King Hussein. That left the 22% of the lands west of the Jordan River for the Jewish State. The arguments are over the lands occupied by Jordan illegally and liberated by Israel. All Israel need do to end the tortuous Arab-Israeli conflict is formally annex the remainder of their lands, Judea and Samaria. Simply extend Israeli law over the entirety of the lands west of the Jordan River and simply permit the Arabs to vote in local election but not in national elections. In some cities the elections will require being split with the Arabs ruling part of the city and the Jews ruling their part of the city. This would be necessary in Hevron and some other split cities. The schools would need to come under Israeli education system and not continue to be indoctrination institution teaching the Arabs students to hate Jews and portray martyrdom as an honorable act respected and which will grant great pride and honor to be given to your family along with a permanent paycheck for their having a martyr in their family. Ending the atmosphere of hatred and violence and allowing the people to have rights while removing the kleptocrats currently ruling over the Arabs in Judea and Samaria would give the Arabs of Judea and Samaria greater opportunity to succeed and make a better future for themselves. With time, the Arab society would prosper and there is a movement in Jordan to extend citizenship in Jordan and install democratic governance replacing King Hussein. We discussed this in our article Israel’s Worst Enemy is Israel. This option is a real possible and fair solution if only the world will give the Palestinian Arab majority in Jordan the opportunity to have self-rule. Granted, there will need to be some deal for a generous reward for the Jordanian King and his family as they will need to abdicate their power and likely accept a ceremonial position similar to the royalty in England and other European nations which are governed by a democratic form such as a parliament or whatever and their royalty are ceremonial with a comfortable life style and allowance from the government. This with allowing that the minority in Jordan have their rights protected can lead to a new dawn in Jordan and as the JOC desires peace and cooperation with Israel there could be a situation where the Arab Palestinians residing in Judea and Samaria who are currently under PA jurisdiction can become Jordanian citizens while remaining in Israel as legal resident aliens. This would have them voting in Jordanian elections and taxing would need to be decided by the two governments such that these Jordanians are not a burdensome demand on Israeli support. All of these difficulties can be overcome and Israel can claim all of her promised lands and peace will be the logical result. Let the world scream for the entire three to six months before they get tired of screaming at the hand and getting nowhere. Should anybody be so determined to take the annexing to any international court they will find out very quickly why the Arabs never took that route, Israel has the rights to all the land and the treaties and agreements to show for it starting with the San Remo Conference and on all the way to Article 80 of the United Nations Charter which overrules and voids the recent angry resolution that President Obama fostered through the United Nations Security Council as a Chapter Six Resolution which is not binding.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Trump Accepting Minorities Means More than Just Christians

 

Trump excluded minorities from the immigration temporary ban, which might surprise many as to the numbers and different minorities exist throughout these seven nations listed in President Trump’s order, Iraq, Syria, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan and Somalia. Perhaps we should start with a quick reference of the population of each of the nations in question. So, on with the show.

 

 

Iraq consists mostly of differing tribes such as Kurds (some being Muslims), Bedouins (some being Muslims), Feylis, Yazidis, Shabaks, Kaka’is, Armenians, Circassians, Persians, Mandaeans, Sabians, Bahá’ís and Doms. The minority religious makeup is Christianity accounting for 0.8% of the population while the rest practice Mandaeism, Yazidism, Zoroastrianism, a minor smattering of Jews who remaining in Iraq and other religions. Iraq is on the verge of failing as a governance as the Sunni central zones and the Shia majority in the south are in conflict and the Kurdish north has allied with the Kurds of Syria but are being targeted by the Turkish forces which cross into the nation claiming to attack terrorist groups when in reality they assist terrorists against Assad and more so against the Kurds. If the Kurdish areas from the Syrian northeast, the northern areas of Iraq and the Kurdish regions in northwest Iran were united, they could form the promised nation of Kurdistan and take in any Kurds wishing to relocate from Turkey thus removing the perceived threat by Kurds to Turkey and potentially ending the bloodshed.

 

Syria also has a number of tribal minorities including Kurds, Armenians, Turkman, Aramaic Assyrian, Chaldean, Yazidi, Druze, Syriacs with religious minorities numbering Christian 10% which includes Greek Orthodox, Greek Christian, Latin Catholics, Protestants, Maronites, Uniate, and Nestorian as well as Druze 3% and a minor smattering of Jews who remain in Syria. The war in Syria has more sides than a set of dice and the nation has no operative governance and has completely failed as a nation.

 

Iran also has a sizeable Kurdish minority (10%) many of which are Muslim but likely not banned by President Trump’s order. Turkmans Balochs and Arabs make up two percent of the population each while sixty percent of the population being of Persian extraction Azeris making up most of the remaining population at sixteen percent. Iran has a tiny minority of non-Muslims totaling less than one percent of the population consisting of a mix of Christian, Jewish, and Zoroastrian. Iran is probably the most stable country in governance but qualifies for the list as the largest state funder of terrorism worldwide.

 

Libya is a mix of mostly Muslims tribes mostly ruled by their strongest clan with each tribe warring with their neighboring tribe. The violence between the many tribal factions even made terrorist training camps unsafe to such a point that many packed up and left for safer climes. The situation has only worsened progressing from bad to worse after the dethroning of Muammar Gaddafi leaving a central government barely able to rule the capital of Tripoli. The uncertainty of the entire region was made evident with the murder of United States Ambassador Chris Stevens as well as his aide Sean Smith along with former Navy Seals Glen Doherty and Tyrone Woods who both went down fighting throughout the night finally succumbing to mortar fire from al-Qaeda terror groups who were seeking to gather as many MANPAD anti-aircraft weapons, the same weapons which the Americans who were murdered were attempting to intercept and send on to Syria to assist the American backed Syrian rebels.

 

Sudan has a small Christian population consisting of Nubian Coptic, Coptic Orthodox and other groups of Christians in the Nuba Mountains who have declared their area to be a new nation recognized as South Sudan, Animists of several roots and persuasions. Like Yemen the Sudan and South Sudan are warring as the Muslims from the Sudan, the northern half, are trying to unify the breakaway nation which is largely Christian and Animist. There have been too many genocidal assaults against the South Sudan and the nation is in turmoil with the South most resembling a failed state.

 

Yemen once had a sizeable Jewish population but the Jews are now mostly held in a government compound for their protection as otherwise they would rapidly become an endangered species, its Christians are divided into Roman Catholic, Anglican, Ethiopian Orthodox and Tewahedo, and there exists a smattering of Hindus. The real problem with Yemen stems largely from it being engaged in a civil war with the sides being aided by outside national forces. The Houthi tribes are being supplied, trained and even assisted by Iran while the former government and Sunnis are receiving aid from Saudi Arabia. Yemen has all the signs of a failed state.

 

Somalia is predominantly Islamic and tribal with a small minority of Christian and traditional Animists who reside in the south. Somalia has been without any measurable governance for the last few decades with tribal warfare and piracy being rampant across much of the nation with no reasonable end in sight. Somalia probably qualified well ahead of the rest, but how would we know.

 

Many of these minorities are persecuted by the Islamic majority governments spending much of their lives in a sort of hiding keeping a low profile. Often ministering to these minorities is a life threatening career as they are a central target whenever the government seeks a distraction or a group to blame. This position is often filled by Israel but these minority populations are target one when something closer to home is required. Ignoring this exception or attempting to make it appear as if it was only about religion is inaccurate as the Kurdish and Bedouin tribes are often largely Islamic. The President’s order was not about Muslims as much as it was about terrorism which was likely the same reason that Presidents Obama and Bush also named these same nations for additional precautions during their administrations. But why lay everything out in the open when there is a new President to smear. Yes, Trump brought this on himself and deserves much of the scorn being heaped upon him but the media also deserves some truth serum as they pretend such limitations on immigrations have never existed before.

 

Remember that there are a small number of those who would be permitted entry into the United States who are Jews. This stands in stark contrast to during World War II when despite the State Department and President Franklin Delano Roosevelt knowing about the extermination camps and the Final Solution to eliminate Jews, Homosexuals, Roma and other “undesirables” that FDR refused to permit Jews attempting to escape the advancing Nazis to enter the United States while the British refused them entry to the areas under the British Mandate. FDR is rumored to have stated that the United States did not need any more than a minority of Jews and he feared permitting additional Jews into the United States. At least this time the Jews will be permitted to escape potential persecution should they so choose. There will also be numerous Islamic minority peoples who also will be permitted entry along with Christians and Animists among others. And for the record, Islam is not a race and encompasses membership from virtually if not every racial group on Earth.

 

Beyond the Cusp