Iran Desires Some Things Even the Saudis Cannot Buy

 

Saudi Arabia is used to facing problems for where the determining factor is oil or money. The current crisis is not one of that ilk. It is not one that can be done completely just by controlling the price of oil as doing that might upset Russia, the Saudi’s recent new best friend after the United States proved unreliable and apparently had joined the Iranians whose immediate plan is to take the Saudi oil fields thus neutering the Saudi influence and taking away their only real weapon. But the apparent newest friend of the United States has far more than taking merely oil, they want it all and the Saudis had best know about the other half of the Iranian plans, the half where they take the most valuable of the Saudi influences. The oil is only money and that can be taken back with force even if doing so heavily damages the fields as that too can be easily repaired and the Iranians do not wish to become merely the all but sole power over OPEC and thus be able to push the price of oil up or down according to their whims. But the oil fields, as such, are not even the primary goal because the Iranians have as their primary appetite which is to control Islam, something they find to be the more appealing and possessing a far more important goal requiring their attentions and that is to have the holy cities starting with Mecca and Medina. Some here believe that their backing of the Houthis to take control of Yemen is less about controlling the Bab el Mandeb Straights and more about providing them with a more direct route in reaching Mecca and Medina coming from the south which is often the least guarded area of Saudi Arabia and once the Iranians get past those tasked with guarding the southern borders it would become a three party race to control the holy cities, two being the Iranians closing from Yemen in the south and from Iraq in the north while the Saudi forces would need to be called from their concentration on the oil fields and transported the width of the country to join the fight. This lends to my answering those who have asked about what made me believe that World War III was on the horizon and this is my reply and explanation.

 

Once Iran controls the oil fields and both Mecca and Medina, and thus adding to the Shiite holy sites in Iran and in Iraq where their efforts will be directed in defending those near Islamic State borders or already swallowed by the Islamic State thus requiring liberation they can move to their next challenge. With their control over Mecca and Medina added to Damascus, Najaf, in Iraq with Qom in Iran they can then fortify any other Shiite holy places in Iraq from the ravages of the Islamic State and work towards returning Damascus and all of Syria which at the moment appears more like a pressing and difficult problem. Should the situation turn for the worst, as it appears that the Syrian and Hezballah forces are losing badly in Syria, Iran will need to interject some serious forces to reacquire all of Syria thus rejoining these lands with Iraq and thus attaining a direct land route for resupply. This will require the removal of Islamic State from their holdings and that may prove to be a most difficult task. None of these tasks are dependent on the Iranian production of nuclear weapons as those weapons can only be utilized in places which possess no natural or religiously important sites as such sites becoming uninhabitable due to radiation would defeat gaining their control. Taking out the Islamic State resources in open areas of lesser importance would be the perfect locations for tactical nuclear intervention providing breaking the treaty just negotiated would not prove advantageous as it would give the next President of the United States the perfect excuse to interfere with Iranian immediate plans to take control of the most prized and sensitive locations in all of Islam.

 

Fortunately for Israel and the United States these goals are more likely the primary goals for Iran as their gaining preeminence in the Muslim world and the display of Shia Islam as ascending and Sunni Islam as the weak and decrepit old and stale form of Islam would serve them well in converting the majority of Sunni adherents to Shiite doctrines. The fact that once the Iranians had defeated Saudi Arabia or at least gained the vital parts of the oil fields of the Gulf States and Saudi Arabia along with Mecca and Medina they could then set to establishing Madrassa throughout the Islamic and Western worlds replacing the Wahhabi schools and other centers with Shia schools and centers and will go a long way towards this goal. There are two other obstacles which Iran will need to overcome, Turkey and Egypt, both of which are well armed and have well trained militaries and will each pose their own necessary problems for the Iranians to address. Many might claim that the Kurds would also pose a problem but oddly enough, there are scenarios in which they could become allies if their ends were also considered. Should the Iranians prove to be the chess players they were at the P5+1 nuclear talks, not that President Obama desired to present any bit the real defender of the realm and actually desired to provide Iran with a perfectly clean route to nuclear weapons even to go so far as to provide United States assistance in designing the ultimate in centrifuges and potentially the actual plans, methods and procurement of equipment for the entire production of thermonuclear warheads and setting up multiple sites dispersed around Iran in German designed and build bunkers for their continued safety and Secretary Kerry as the clown at the talks being advised and encouraged all the while to simply give in at any sign of resistance and to make the demands in such a plaintive, diminutive and weak tone as to invite refusals, what could possibly go wrong as long as the American people were never aroused the plan would work, and it functioned like clockwork they will parley these gifts into further gains.

 

So, once Iran has cemented their control over the Arabian Peninsula, and the Shiite crescent through Iraq, Syria and Lebanon, the next two nuts to crack are Turkey and Egypt. Turkey can be defeated quickest and with minimal efforts providing they decide not to simply bow to Iranian hegemony and take the refusal to their retaining independence and instead becoming a semiautonomous district subject to the whims and necessities of Tehran, then Turkey will have been neutered and the Kurds circumvented and thus left alone for the time being as their threat is minimal as all they desire, much like Israel, is their little corner of the world and they will be content ad happy. Unfortunately for the people of Turkey, I do not see Erdogan capitulating and to subside his rule to Tehran which would make him an enemy. The best tactic for invading Turkey would be to seek the aid of the Kurds under the promise of granting them the eastern quarter of Turkey and the lands they already control even including Mosul as an autonomous region loyal to Iran. As long as the Iranians remain loyal to their promises the Kurds would do similarly. This would leave Egypt as the sole roadblock to hegemonic establishment of the Caliphate as the rest of North Africa would readily fall to Iran. There is no easy way to take Egypt but she could be weakened severely just by the loss of the Sinai Peninsula and grabbing control of the two ends of the Suez Canal thus taking from Egypt a major revenue source. Probably the best manner of taking Egypt is from within and by establishing Shia Islam as dominant and thus having them desire to join the strong and growing in power Iranians who are the true leaders of Islam and the emerging Caliphate.

 

After Egypt the goal changes immensely and the impossible must be considered, well, the impossible from the erudite scholars in the West, nobody told the Iranian or the Arab worlds that such was considered beyond acceptable, the seeking to conquer the entire world and willing to do whatever it takes and destroy half the world simply to rule the remainder. The United States has always practiced capture and release policy starting in the twentieth century and this molded their concept that any one nation conquering the world was out of the question. Europe, as we have seen, would be happy to unite Europe and have it ruled by a council of the nations and somehow find some formula that equalized Germany and Greece and the two completely foreign to each other lifestyles. Europe, in its self-imposed demilitarized European theater would pose little opposition should their Islamic populations approach thirty percent and decide that Europe should be required to join the Caliphate as the real and unadulterated authoritative force in the world. It is entirely possible that should there be rioting and mayhem with hundreds if not thousands murdered in the uprising that the European Union would desire quiet to such an extent as to capitulate and then the nations would call for a meeting of NATO and it is quite possible that most of NATO would claim their desire to join the Caliphate and desire all of NATO to simply recognize that this was the future of the world. The United States and possibly some of the eastern European nations would oppose such and NATO would effectively be dissolved allowing the majority of NATO nations and European Union nations would just surrender to Islam without a fight, the preferred method by the rulers of the Caliphate.

 

 

Could this be an Iranian Caliphate resulting from the concessions all are making in the here and now and their hungers being satiated by a weakened and war weary Western World, especially Europe and leftists in America?

 

 

At some point the remaining European powers, probably Poland and England and a few of the former Warsaw Pact nations resisting and uniting with the United States, and oddly enough, with China and Russia all unite in order to fight to prevent what they finally recognized was an actual intent to rule the entire globe. The unthinkable would finally begin to be realized that nobody had informed the Iranians that conquest of the world was an undesirable goal and totally unacceptable by what was formerly the civilized Western World. The problem is that only the Western World had ever adopted that concept. Unimaginable as it would be to think so, but even Kim Jong Un probably envisioned a world being ruled by him or one of his progeny. The remaining powers somehow included Israel, which had lost Tel Aviv to the Iranian hope that one bomb would end Israel. Instead that one bomb just steeled their steadfastness and lighted the resolve of one third of American Jewry who made Aliyah bringing with them their wealth, all under an emergency plan by Israel’s government calling for all Jews to male Aliyah immediately. This was stated to be the rallying for the safety of Israel and Jerusalem. This swelled the Jewish population even after the loss of almost two-million souls when Tel Aviv was struck; the Israeli Jewish population reached an unthinkable eleven-million Jews. This in-swelling of the Jews from around the world was seen by many younger Arab Islamists as a sign for them to move across the Jordan River and join with the Caliphate which had absorbed Jordan in a three day blitz. The Jordanian King was able to get his family inside Israel along with many of the ruling elites who desired the relative safety of Israel than to face the often unpredictable dictates of the Shia conquerors. Israel offered safety and provided an escape to the United States where they all took up residence in the Napa Valley and spent their days sipping wine on the various tours of the vineyards.

 

The alliance of Britain, Poland, Romania, Czechoslovakia, Russia, China, a number of other smaller former Soviet satellites and miraculously, Israel joined forces to end the rise of the Caliphate once and for all. It is inevitable given the divisions in this world which have irreconcilable differences and completely opposing philosophic views and precepts, the clash between the two once the weaker, Islam, could be united against the currently still stronger United States and the British commonwealth nations which includes Canada, Australia, the British Isles, Ireland (though they would deny it till the end), United States, India, New Zealand, and a few I probably missed, would band together in a response to any threat against a single state, especially if that threat was aimed at London and Ten Downing Street and Buckingham Palace as the world knows, there are but five Queens in this world and there are near countless versions of four and one stands apart. They are the Queen of Hearts, Queen of Clubs, Queen of Spades, and Queen of Diamonds and above them all is the Queen of England. That will be the next and hopefully final world war though I have my doubts about last. Let us pray that the deal struck with Iran does not make that final World War the one told of by Albert Einstein in the answer he presumably gave when asked what weapons World War III would be fought with and he replied “I do not know with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones.”

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

How Dark Could Our Future Become; A Possible Alternative

 

There have been a number of prognostications telling the writers’ many separate and often distinct predictions. These predictions span from gloom and doom to the thrills once we combine with our technological inventions enhancing our lives in remarkable ways. Then there is the possibility we will face threats due to the singularity from advanced artificial intelligent robots which will have surpassed us and begin to leap so far ahead of our own technological knowledge and abilities that we will become either their pets or a nuisance to be eradicated depending on who you ask. There are predictions on the political level where China becomes the new eight-hundred pound gorilla on the stage and the United States falls into a weak second class state in the shadows or China falls economically and the United States rebounds to Africa becoming the new European style power and Europe degrades into economic ruin even dragging down the last of the economic engines in Europe. The one comfort I take from all these prognostications, even by some very well recognized editorialists and experts of which many will be unfulfilled, is that even if I get everything wrong, all I will have done is join an elite group who are secure enough to be wrong and admit it. The benefit of doing predictions is people will tend to forget those you got completely wrong if you hit a few dead on correct as people want to believe that the future is not as daunting and unpredictable as it actually is and take comfort in those predictions which give them comfort or support, what they had themselves been predicting. So, with the comfort that I will probably not be any more wrong than some who have become wealthy despite being wrong more often than not, here is what I actually fear may be coming down the road over the remaining two years of the final term of President Obama’s Presidency.

 

First we need to see where the world is now and try to find some similarities from history and narrow down those similarities until we find the closest match and then interpolate using that history and see where that leads one. The first and most obvious parallel is the beginning of the fall of Rome and the withdrawal from the world’s scene by the United States with their retreats from Iraq and Afghanistan. This is a false parallel which despite being false it has garnered a serious following. Further consideration leads one to look more at the entirety of the Western world and culture and an initial retreat from the Middle East followed by an infiltration and assault by the powers of Islam and one realizes that the correlation is closer to the slow and unalterable fall of the Eastern Roman Empire which was also known as the Byzantine Empire, of which the greatest defeat was the fall of Constantinople. Using this as a base we would need to try and discern if in this modern period where things can happen at unbelievable and unprecedented speed, the item one needs to do is find where the two main turns of history which eventually served to turn back the thrusts into Europe by the seemingly unstoppable forces of Islam which we can parallel with the Battle of Tours where Charles the Hammer Martel routed the Moorish Muslim troops ending their invasion into western Europe and turning them back depleted and without any reserve supplies which made the restoration of Spain possible, though the method of the Inquisition would be something we should endeavor to avoid at all cost, and the Siege of Vienna where the King of Poland reached an agreement with his closest neighboring nations for their promises to refrain from invading his lands while he took his entire army and marched to Vienna and relieved the siege turning back the Islamic armies and ending their thrust into eastern Europe. These two turning points are impossible to predict without the power of clairvoyance, something I freely admit I lack no matter what some people have claimed in my stead.

 

Islam is unlikely to be attempting any invasions of Europe in the near future as much of the Muslim world is too wrapped-up in their own troubles and conflicts within Islam to be taking on any outside wars. Syria has been wrapped in a destructive civil war with numerous outside forces warring on both sides of this devastating conflict which will leave Syria incapable of any kind of action for decades as they eventually will try to rebuild almost from scratch and build a new Syria. Who will be leading the nation of Syria is still unknown though it does appear that somehow Bashir al-Assad will remain in power though only in charge of a shell of his nation will have survived and most of the Syrian people will have fled the nation and as many as are able will probably choose not to return. Libya has continue its spiral decent into internecine violence composed largely by inter-tribal violence with occasional challenges to the relatively weak central government which has thus far been able to hold on to power. Iraq and Syria are currently sharing a serious threat in the form of an ever-growing force which began as a terrorist entity in the Syrian civil war and has mutated into a wannabe caliphate which has since grown into a formidable force across central parts of Syria and Iraq and has made threats against Iran, Jordan, Israel, Saudi Arabia and other nations which ISIS (still pronounced ‘is is’) believes are not following the Quran and are not ruled by proper Islamic rulers which they swear they will replace as they build the next Caliphate. They also predict that once they have set the world of Islam on the correct path and united all of Islam into their Caliphate they will then complete the task of making Islam the sole religion in the world. Egypt is recovering from their experiment with the rule by the political arm of the Muslim Brotherhood and has returned to having elected a military leader as the President of Egypt. It remains to be seen whether President Sisi will remain a limited leader eventually stepping aside or if he will become the next military dictator of Egypt following the same route as his predecessors. Lebanon has been sitting on the sidelines of the Syrian conflict but has an investment in the Syrian war as Hezballah has, on the orders from their Iranian masters, been involved heavily in the fighting in support of Bashir al-Assad which has left Lebanon vulnerable, a vulnerability which may soon prove to be tested by some of the forces fighting against Assad in Syria as they view Lebanon as a fair target due to Hezballah fighting in Syria. Across most of the rest of the Muslim world there are no real nations which have the inclination or power to pose any real threat outside their own borders with a few exceptions. One exception is Pakistan which has a sizeable nuclear weapons stockpile but also has sufficient internal threats which prevent any adventurism and also Pakistan has one main adversary in India and is content to keep any violence between the two nuclear powered nations as quiet as is possible, a view shared by India. So, what might be the exception throughout the Islamic world?

 

Turkey and Iran are exceptions as both have avoided the kind of turmoil which has afflicted much of the rest of the Middle East and North Africa. Turkey under the rule of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has a modern military and enjoys membership in NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) which they served as an important role against the Soviet Union as Turkey controlled the access from the Black Sea into the Mediterranean Sea and from there into the Suez Canal to the Red Sea and on to the Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf or through the Strait of Gibraltar on into the Atlantic Ocean. Turkish roles within NATO had been challenging in recent years as they refused to cooperate with the United States in the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and more recently worked against the United States in their efforts against ISIS only recently begrudgingly permitting any use of Turkish resources such as airfields for strikes against ISIS and probably under guarantees that these actions would also serve to remove their nemesis Syrian Dictator Bashir al-Assad. As President Obama has formed a close relationship with President Erdogan, the difficulties which logistically separated the two nations were all the more confusing. Even more confusing was that these difficulties caused little damage to the relations between the two leaders. That leaves Iran which has been playing a cat and mouse game with the P5+1 nations (United States, Britain, France, China, Russia and Germany) in their ongoing and currently extended nuclear negotiations. These negotiations may soon be proven useless and no longer necessary and that has much to do with the potential future of our world.

 

The next items we face are China and Russia. China has hit upon some economic difficulties and is not expected to continue their high rate of financial growth for the ensuing years. A nation even with the governmental assistance given in China can continue to have a growth rate of over seven percent GDP growth forever as each year that level becomes that much more difficult to produce. The main item on China’s wish list is cheaper oil prices and a source of easily refined crude oil. China has a steady source at a decent price in Iraq but that oil is thicker and considered quite difficult to refine and does not have a high production quality. On the other hand, the sweet crude oil available from Saudi Arabia is more expensive. Meanwhile, Russia is completely dependent on their oil and gas sales to prop up their collapsing economy and nation. Russia is suffering from one of the highest rates of population decrease with projections placing their population numbers to be half of their current numbers by mid-century which is astonishing. Russia is thus dependent upon high oil prices, exactly the opposite from China. This is where the interesting predictions begin. The challenge is to find a solution to the problems of the three nations, China, Russia and Iran, which is possible and credible. While it may appear impossible to satisfy both the Chinese requirement for cheap oil and the Russian desire for high oil prices, but that is not entirely true. In order to satisfy both the Russian and Chinese demands one would need to control vast percentages of the supplies of crude oil. Enter the Iranians into the equation. Add the possibility that there has been a mutually beneficial arrangement since the beginning of the nuclear negotiations which have China and Russia on one side with Iran presumably as their adversary while China and Russia were part of the five nations presumably pushing Iran to give up most of their uranium enrichment program. Iran is suspected of having designs on the oil fields of their neighbors, especially those of Saudi Arabia, UAE (United Arab Emirates), Oman, Bahrain, and Kuwait. Iran has all but become the ruling party in Iraq and has access if required of the southern Iraqi oil fields while ISIS has control of some of the northern oil fields from Iraq. The possible scenario would have Iran launch a full scale operation assaulting ISIS once they attack Bagdad under the claim that they were responding to a desperate plea for assistance from the Iraqi government. Then the Iranian military could transport an extremely large military force with full armor and other support towards Bagdad. Then, as their forces have closed and routed ISIS forcing their retreat, then Iran, under air cover, could swing their entirety of forces and reinforcements southward coinciding with a general uprising throughout the Northwestern provinces of Saudi Arabia by the predominantly Shiite population with assistance and weaponry provided by the IRGC (Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps) with Russia and China both demanding the United States stand down. This attack would need to be launched before President Obama leaves office and the possibility that the next President of the United States might be more willing to come to the aid of their stricken ally. With Iran in control of the vast reserves of the oil wealth could then embargo the Western nations or simply the European nations allowing for Russia to be able to set their own price for oil and gas supporting their otherwise weak economy. Further, China could be provided with all the high grade cheap oil they could desire and Iran would be well on their way to establishing their hegemony over the Middle East and be close to ready for their assault to include the Muslim nations of North Africa into their control before then turning their attentions onto Europe and Israel. This is the potential nightmare which has a chance, hopefully smaller than it may seem in our nightmares, it is thoughts such as these which make me simply joyous when time passes and I am proven wrong, may that streak continue as every time I get one right I then spend weeks to years covering some relative disaster.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Formation of Palestinian State no Solution to Middle East Violence

For the entire twenty years since the fiasco named Oslo was perpetrated on Israel and the entire world we have heard the constant drumbeat droning out the mantra that the founding of a Palestinian State living side-by-side in peace and security with Israel will result in peace and calm over all of the Middle East ending all strife and violence. Even after experiencing over two years of unrest and turmoil of the Arab Spring, more aptly called the Arab Winter, we saw uprisings, violence, protests and revolution replacing longstanding dictators in the hope of founding something better all without even the mention of Israel or the Palestinians. How could it be that we had a popular uprising that replaced the government of Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, and Yemen with further unrest ongoing or soon to come in Syria, Jordan, Mali, and possibly Lebanon and others. Again, none of these will be about Israel or the Palestinians with the possible exception of Jordan whose population largely consists of Palestinians. Yet still we hear the drumbeat droning out the mantra that the Palestinian Statehood being established and carved out of Israel will end all Middle East problems and the world will enter a period of blissful peace.

 

How can anybody expect a thinking person to believe such foolery after witnessing the Middle East of the recent past? The Palestinian leadership itself has demanded that one of the conditions which must be granted when forming a Palestinian State in any form other than having it completely replace the State of Israel that they retain the right to resist and fight against the Zionist existence in the rest of their homeland until all of Palestine from the River to the Sea is liberated from the Zionist influences. So, by granting the Palestinians statehood a country established in all of the lands beyond the Green Line that includes every inch of land lost by Jordan in the West Bank, all of Gaza that Egypt lost, and half of Jerusalem including all of the Old City and the Temple Mount, there still will not be peace because as long as the Jews retain any land which was once under Muslim control there can be no peace. This is not my opinion but is the opinion of the PLO, Fatah, Hamas, Palestinian Authority, Arab League, Hezballah, al-Qaeda, and countless rulers, Imams, and Islamic leaders worldwide. So, it is obvious by their own words of intent that the two state solution as a final agreement is unacceptable to the vast majority of the followers of Islam and that they will only accept the entire eradication of Israel and replacing it with a Palestinian Islamic governance where the Jews will initially be allowed to remain as long as they accept the status of Dhimmi. But, even if this result were to be implemented, would that then lead to complete calm and peace throughout the Middle Easy? I think not and here is why.

 

Does anybody actually hold that should Palestine be formed and meet even the wildest of demands of the most radical of Palestinian leaders that this would result in the end of the violence and uprising in Syria? Of course not. That alone should be sufficient to disprove the claim that all of the violence in the Middle East has as its root cause the Palestinian/Israelii conflict. Would founding Palestine end the violence against Christians and other non-Muslims in Mali or Nigeria? No chance that would end simply because Israel and the Palestinians reached an agreement. Would all the terror induced violence in the West immediately terminate once the State of Palestine was founded and borders were established between the Israelis and the Palestinians? Nope. What about the eternal standoff which flares up with consistent levels of animosity and violence between Pakistan and India over the lands which were formerly Kashmir, would that come to a conclusion after the peace was signed between Israel and the Palestinians? That would rank as highly unlikely. Would stable governance and an end to the conflicts suddenly fall over all of Somalia, especially in its capital city of Mogadishu? Not a chance. Would Iran cease their drive to attain nuclear weapons and establish a Shiite crescent and hegemony over the entirety of Muslim lands and then spread this new caliphate to encompass the entire world? Never happen as their goals would remain unfulfilled. The simple fact is that most of the violence and terrorism which exists or is rooted in the Middle East has nothing to do with Israel or the Palestinians and whatever should come to pass between Israel and the Palestinians would have absolutely no effect on the rest of the Islamic world and those places where they have extended their influence or interests.

 

Solving the impasse between the Palestinians and the Israelis with the intent of solving all the violence and situations currently existing in the Middle East is a fool’s errand which only the most misguided would believe or expect such a result. That begs the question as to why in the world is it taken as fact that solving the Palestinian/Israeli conflict would be the cure-all of all the problems in the Middle East? The reason is the most obvious of reasons. An often used excuse for not addressing a difficult problem or not tackling a pervasive threat is to blame it on some unsolvable problem that is only loosely tied to the situation. The Middle East violence is a pervasive problem which would be extremely difficult to address, let alone solving. Much of the violence in the Middle East is of ancient origins with no resolution as long as the two sides of each conflict exist. The conflict between the Sunni and Shiite Muslims will not reach any conclusion in the foreseeable future. So, blame it on Palestinian/Israeli conflict and its lack of resolution. It does not matter if transferring the responsibility for tackling near impossible conflicts is a total ruse which anybody who takes even a moment to inspect would find the complete insanity of the claim as nobody wishes to see the truth. Seeing the realities as they truly are would require actions that nobody is prepared to undertake. Blaming the Palestinian/Israeli conflict for the entire bundle of turmoil, violence, and conflicts throughout the Middle East and related problems traceable to the Middle East is simply a way of kicking the can down the road, just somewhat more insidious.

 

This begs another question, what would happen if the Palestinian/Israelii conflict were to be resolved? Obviously, those blaming every ill or at least the majority of them, on the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinians are counting on that problem never ending which is why there is never any pressure placed on actually forcing a solution. The pressures for solving the Palestinian/Israeli conflict are almost universally placed upon Israel while the Palestinian side rarely has any pressures applied to make concessions towards solving the conflict. The reasons for this is that Israel is actively seeking to meet and solve the problem while the Palestinians do not wish a solution as they are only being paid great amounts of money for as long as their “difficulties” continue. The Palestinian society is setup as being dependent on large infusions of money and on not taking the responsibility for governing themselves and simply blaming Israel. This fits perfectly with the desired situation of an insolvable situation which will continue without end allowing for a plethora of other problems to also be avoided and left unsolved. Making the finding of a solution acceptable to both sides of the Palestinian/Israeli conflict as the prerequisite for tackling the other myriad of problems which is the Middle East is exactly the same as promising to weed your garden after the last rainfall had passed. There will never be a last rainfall within reason thus the garden never needs to be weeded. The Palestine/Israel conflict also will never be resolved as long as the actual only result the Palestinians will accept is the instillation of a Palestinian State over all of Israel replacing the Jewish State and subjugating the Jewish population of Israel at best and an unspeakable alternative at worst. Since the Israelis are never going to submit to Palestinian rule over their entire homeland, the problem will never be resolved. Even if a Palestinian State is formed with recognized borders, the conflict will continue if this recognition includes a Jewish State of Israel existing beside the Palestinian State. That insures that the rest of the world can simply kick the can down the road rather than making the difficult decisions to address the rest of the problems in the Middle East. Simply stated, it is much easier to blame Israel for not completely surrendering to the Palestinians while never expecting them to do so. That is the path of least resistance when one considers that all the other paths are just as insolvable and much more dangerous to become involved. That is why the claim exists that the Palestinian/Israeli conflict is the root of all evil in the Middle East and why there will be no truthful attempts to address any of the plethora of problems involving Islam.  

 

Beyond the Cusp