Gaza is a difficult place to distribute aid.

The Palestinian people themselves are interfering in the delivery of aid within Gaza. I am sure the aid is being met by people in need of supplies, but, the idea that all will go smoothly and to the people in most need does not carry guarantees.

May 21, 2024
By Michelle Nichols and Idrees Ali

A DoD-contracted driver transports humanitarian aid across the Trident Pier before entering the beach in Gaza May 19, 2024. U.S. Army Photo

The United Nations (click here) has planned new routes within the Gaza Strip to transport aid from a U.S.-built floating pier after crowds of desperate Palstinians intercepted 11 trucks, causing a halt to deliveries that continued for a third day on Tuesday.

The temporary pier was anchored to a Gaza beach last Thursday as Israel comes under growing global pressure to allow more supplies into the besieged coastal enclave, where it is at war with Palestinian militants Hamas and a famine looms.

Operations began on Friday and 10 aid trucks were driven by U.N. contractors to a World Food Programme warehouse in Deir El Balah in Gaza. But on Saturday, only five trucks made it to the warehouse after 11 others were intercepted.

“Crowds had stopped the trucks at various points along the way. There was … what I think I would refer to as self-distribution,” U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric told reporters in New York on Tuesday.

“These trucks were traveling through areas where there’d been no aid. I think people feared that they would never see aid. They grabbed what they could,” he said.

Distribution was paused as the U.N. planned new routes and coordination of deliveries in a bid to prevent more aid being intercepted, said Abeer Etefa, a WFP spokesperson in Cairo.

“The missions were planned for today using the new routes to avoid the crowds,” she said. Dujarric later said there had been no transportation of aid from the pier since Saturday.

‘WAITING FOR AMERICAN AID’

The pier has been met with hope and skepticism by residents in Gaza. The pier operation – announced by U.S. President Joe Biden in March – is estimated to cost $320 million and involve 1,000 U.S. service members....

The Dali shipping nightmare is primarily over.

Congratulations to all involved.

Great job! 

May 21, 2024
By Mike Schuler

In a significant development for commercial shipping (click here) in the Port of Baltimore, the Captain of the Port (COTP) has announced that the reopening of the Fort McHenry Limited Access Channel following the successful refloating and removal of the M/V Dali.

The channel, now available 24/7, now has a depth of 50 feet, a 400-foot horizontal clearance, and a vertical clearance of 214 feet, which is enough to accommodate deep draft vessels with ease.

However, vessels will need a Maryland State Pilot and two escort tugs. The Maryland Pilots have also mandated a 3 ft under keel clearance (UKC) requirement. Further, containerships exceeding 1,000 ft in length and over 125 ft in beam will only be permitted to transit when winds are under 15 knots. Other vessels are allowed transit when winds are under 20 knots.

Deep draft traffic is being prioritized for this channel. Tug and barge traffic are encouraged to utilize the three Temporary Alternate Channels. Non-deep draft commercial vessels planning to use the Fort McHenry Limited Access Channel are advised to coordinate with the Maryland Pilots.

The three smaller Temporary Alternate Channels, namely the Fort Carroll, Hawkins Point, and Sollers Point channels, are also open 24-hours daily, with varying depths and clearances to accommodate non-deep draft commercial and recreational vessels.

In a press conference Tuesday, Maryland Gov. Wes Moore praised crews for “achieving in matter of weeks what many thought would take months.”...

The Republican hypocrisy never ends.

May 22, 2024
By Brian Slodysko and Bill Barrow

In his bid to become North Carolina’s first Black governor, (click here) Republican Mark Robinson assails government safety net spending as a “plantation of welfare and victimhood” that has mired generations of Black people in “dependency” and poverty.

But the lieutenant governor’s political rise wouldn’t have been possible without it.

Over the past decade, Robinson’s household has relied on income from Balanced Nutrition Inc., (click here) a nonprofit founded by his wife, Yolanda Hill, that administered a free lunch program for North Carolina children. The organization, funded entirely by taxpayers, has collected roughly $7 million in government funding since 2017, while paying out at least $830,000 in salaries to Hill, Robinson and other members of their family, tax filings and state documents show.

The income offered the Robinsons a degree of stability after decades of struggle that included multiple bankruptcies, home foreclosure and misdemeanor charges — later dropped — for writing bad checks. In Robinson’s telling, the financial turnaround provided by the organization also allowed for his ascent into the North Carolina government....

There are some inconsistencies.

April 11, 2024
By Michael Hyland

...If Mark Robinson (click here) truly wants us to believe that he is THE MAN to properly steer and guide our ship of state for the next four to eight years, he and his people need to clear a few things up with us.

The decision by Republican Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson’s wife Yolanda Hill (click here) to end the primary work of her nonprofit Balanced Nutrition came as the state was set to conduct a compliance review of the organization this week, documents obtained by CBS 17 show.

The nonprofit, which Hill started in 2015, has been under scrutiny as Robinson campaigns for governor.

Balanced Nutrition serves as a sponsoring organization under the federal Child and Adult Care Food Program, which the state Dept. of Health and Human Services administers in North Carolina. According to Balanced Nutrition’s website, the nonprofit helps childcare providers navigate that program to get access to federal subsidies to help provide meals to children....

...So, between 2017 and 2021, (click here) at least five people IDed on Balanced Nutrition’s IRS filings as board members or key employees were related by birth or marriage: Yolanda Hill, her mother, her sister, her son, and her son-in-law....

Palestine

The entire world can recognize a Palestinian state, but, it does not change a thing when terrorists are its leaders.

Israel has a right to defend itself. Creating greater conflict is not helping to resolve this. Israel’s leadership has dug in its heels and will go forward to secure Gaza to its satisfaction for the citizens’ safety. 

For those that want to throw their importance behind a Palestinian state, they have no real proposal that will end the conflict. Arming terrorists is not a solution, but, an escalation in deaths and destruction.

It is best to realistically pursue a solution to Israel’s fear for its people and carve out a separate homeland for Palestine. 

Sanctions on the ICC will solve nothing.

(Click here) 

I was waiting for this one. Robert O’Brian couldn’t book his plane flight soon enough when talk turned to indictments of Israeli officials at the ICC. Trump’s extremists are becoming intractable in their lies and are doing their level best to legitimize them. This is one way they will try.

The ICC prosecutors are not corrupt. They are misinformed and believe they need to apply pressure to end the strife in Gaza. The problem is the prosecutors are placing their definition of the strife on a timeline after October 7th and not decades before. 

The American Republican Party has become a monster and it is out of control. O’Brien does not belong in this situation and is attempting to confuse wild allegations and ideas of sanctions with legitimate concerns and solutions. President Biden is correct in stating there is no moral equivalent between Israel’s leadership and Hamas terrorists. The ICC believing there is similar claims against Israel’s leadership is more confusion and misplaced values. The ICC prosecutor is wrong, but, not corrupt.

Israel was attacked on October 7th, not Hamas. Israel was left with no choice but to declare war in Gaza. There was no other way of securing Israel, but, to eliminate the cause. It was virtually impossible for Israel to carry out the destruction of tunnels and securing Hamas munitions in hospitals without involving the Gaza Strip infrastructure. Impossible.

The inhumanity within Gaza started long before Hamas decided to slaughter Israelis. The inhumanity in Gaza began with the Palestinian people being used as human shields. The Palestinians were never valued so much as owned as a method to secure power by terrorists pretending to benevolently govern. There was never one day of benevolent governance by terrorists in Gaza as experienced by the people themselves. 

The war theater was Gaza. It still is Gaza. The tactics employed by Israel were to end any aggression by the terrorists and in that were repeated issues of humanitarian concerns. 

Israel’s Defense Forces have one vision and it is to secure the citizens of Israel from certain death. That is something the accusers of Israel leadership refuse to see. The IDF and the country’s leaders were to protect the country’s people from death. If the ratio of dead in Gaza seems out of balance and the 

methods very deadly to achieve that goal it was the battlefield the IDF was faced with. The battlefield was not created by the Israelis. The battlefield was created by terrorists that have no value for human life even the citizens of Palestine.

The accusations by the ICC prosecutor of Israel’s leadership are wrong. The accusations must be rescinded to focus on the real perpetrators of the human rights violations and massive casualties in Gaza, the terrorists that still persist to carry out aggressions.

I repeat, none of this was Israel’s doing. Also, the idea that Gaza will revert back to what it was before October 7th is a very wayward idea that will never occur.

Gaza was supposed to be an icon of peace between the two peoples. Instead, Gaza became a shelter for terrorists. The Palestinian people have paid an enormous price while the world allowed terrorists a safe haven there. This was not Israel’s plan or hope for Gaza. Israel wanted a peace loving neighbor and to that end it never occurred. Why? Because Iran’s hate for Israel was expressed through the actions of its terrorist proxies.

Enough of accusing Israel for the world’s poor diplomatic judgement in allowing terrorists to rule the Palestinian people.

I believe the ICC prosecutor is misinformed.

From what I read so far much of the information to the prosecutor is coming from Hamas’ health ministry which has already been proven highly inaccurate. It also appears the prosecutor did not seek information beyond what a very few people provided. The advisors seem to be a bit naive about the combat area and what Israel is facing in securing their country.

There is an idea that seems to pervade understanding that somehow when Israel repelled attacks before it was with bulldozers and this was instead an unnecessary escalation and genocide. That is not a reasonable conclusion.

Israel does not occupy Gaza and the Palestinian Authority has no control because Gaza is occupied by terrorist groups that use the Palestinian people as human shields. There are no Israeli settlers in Gaza. That is by design as a peace treaty under the Late Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. So, Hamas has no claim that Israel is an occupier.

I think there needs to be a great deal of clarification to these ideas by the prosecutor and the USA should stand in defense of the victims attacked on October 7th. This is the first time I heard there were soldiers among the civilians targeted. I do not recall any military stance taking place as Hamas brutally attacked Israelis. The soldiers must have been off duty and unarmed. 

There seems to be a great deal of confusion to the prosecutor’s assertions and I am certain the members of the ICC look forward to clarification.

The Iranian helicopter crashed?

That is very sad. Very sorry to hear the sad news. I wish the nation of Iran peace at this time.

Let me make something clear. What is transpiring with Israel is due to compromise policy that did not achieve its goal. The tinderbox that is the Middle East was set in motion a long time ago. It ultimately would have the outcome we are looking at today if people and their leaders did not live up to expectations.

There is no hate. Not on the part of the free world. The wish for peace among all nations is always there. 

These are difficult times and losing a country’s leadership is not a way forward. The Iranian people need to address their loss. 

This appears to be the latest scam.

(Click here)

I hope people can read it. The video at “click here” is from 2022. According to good, ole Michael Stewart the winners of the lottery just don’t know how to spend all their money so they are giving it away and Michael is their generosity agent.

I don’t believe a word of it and ultimately the person responding to the text has to provide personal information. At one point Michael wants to show up at the door like the Publisher’s Clearinghouse Commercial. I think whoever this is can present a danger to the public. 

They still looking for Iran’s President?

I don’t know what the diplomatic channels are these days, but, perhaps Iran could ask Sweden for any possible coordinates picked up by USA satellites. 

American students are not doing enough.

(Click here)

It has been discovered there are outside aggregator elements among the Pro-Palestinian movement. That corruption must be purged and an honest and true delegation of leadership established. Any people facing a humanitarian crisis needs competent leadership that is organized and willing to do the tasks at hand well.

The Pro-Palestinian movement was making ridiculous demands to damage our ally. There was no clear understanding of what the outcome was supposed to achieve and how it would translate into real relief for the Palestinian people. 

I clearly mapped out on this blog the immorality of the current terrorist governance of the Palestinian people. The fighting that continues in Gaza is not lead by the only legitimate government of Palestine, the Palestinian Authority. The fighting that continues in Gaza are known terrorists with no regard for human life including the lives of the Palestinian people. The history leading to this ever unfolding strategy is completely clear. The world allowed it.

The students demonstrating that have not committed violence or property damage. The students that did not disrupt learning should seek to form a Congress and elect delegates to ask for meetings with Israel’s government, the United Nations, as well as military decision makers. It is unknown if any of them will consent to such meetings, but, it must begin. The terror facing the Palestinians is continuing and they are still trapped by the terrorists.

Now.

I believe it is the University of Wisconsin Board of Trustees that will be holding a session before the return to classes in the Fall to decide about their stock investments. The Board of Trustees welcomed the students statements and promised to consider all of them. If the University of Wisconsin campus is that open minded to its students concerns it is probably the place to organize a national student conference.

In making decisions on investments the issue with Israel will not be political so much as a decision about the stability of a very important ally to the USA in a region of the world unstable due to the sovereign power of Iran. There is a lot that goes into these decisions and politics is the least of them.

The student congress and delegation must not engage terrorists or their organizations as that will remove the legitimacy of their quest.

The Palestinian people are the focus. Their victimization legitimate. The resolve to bring about a benevolent society for them is the primary directive.

This is a monumental task that is long overdue. The global community must recognize the primary mission of ending the dominance of terrorists and Jihadists as any kind of governance and seek to bring about a lasting Mideast peace that will return learning to the Palestinian children and prosperity; not hatred; to the Palestinian society.

I would think the first place a peaceful delegation of American students should seek a legitimate foothold for their vision for the Palestinian people would be the American Ambassador to the UN, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin. 

The disruptions brought by agitators and ill intended valedictorians that can’t organize peacefully to actually MOVE POLICY that will change the face of Palestine are completely irrelevant to the new American Student Congress for the promotion of a prosperous Palestinian government.

The work is there to be done. There needs to be fund raisers and all sorts of organized support for the congress and its moral mission.

Good luck.

Missing Iranian president

(Click here) 

The area was experiencing severe weather. The helicopter went down in a forested area as well. 

Iran has plenty of drones, what are they waiting for?

No more space tourists touching NASA property.

The USA has tried to allow a great deal of activity with NASA property by private industry. When it comes to repairs and enhancements going forward that is to be handled by the design engineers at NASA and NASA astronauts. It is all a national security issue. 

(Click here) 

Repairs and enhancements are very expensive costs. The USA needs to have things their way without unwanted expertise from people that can do harm intentionally or unintentionally.

(Click here)

I think it best that NASA has a place within the National Security Agency. There has to be an understanding when investments are made by the American people, including contracts with private industry, to improve the security of the USA and their personal it automatically is a part of the national security structure. That means anyone involved with that investment has been trained and cleared through enhanced measures in redundancy of any presidential approval. 

Kindly get this right!

It is a lot of propaganda

(Click here)

Under Trump, Putin and Xi made a lot of ground with aggression of NATO and the USA. I think Iran influencing North Africa did well in moving toward autocratic governance. The more sovereign countries under Putin and Xi’s  power they believe the better chances they have at removing all democratic governments and taking over those economies and assets. 

I find the statement that Russia is establishing a buffer zone after months of neglect by the U.S. House a bit of an exaggeration. 

Putin likes to appear at least as powerful as the most powerful. So. Israel is appearing very strong in redirecting land use in Gaza with a buffer zone, then, Putin is very power as well with his new victorious buffer zone.

Putin likes to talk a good story in hopes to intimidate NATO and the USA from sending more aide and/or funding to Ukraine. Those North African countries can count in their Jihadists traveling to the Russian front and dying. Iran is already on board by sending their drones. 

These boys have plans now since the four years of capitalizing power under Trump.

Basically, Trump’s national security stance allows too much room for growth by our enemies.

“Bring it.”

(Click here)

Is there anyone on the Robert’s Court trustworthy enough to protect the rule of law? 

When an American fly is flown upside down it indicates an emergency that requires attention from others. It is a serious definition  in the use of our nation’s symbol.

The Alito household glibly decided they were above the actual and ethical use of our national flag. The Alito household should be charged with false and offensive use of the flag. The Justice should face ethics charges and considering his responsible position in this country penalties for the violation. It would be up to Fairfax, Virginia to charge the household with false emergency notification.

Enough of the elitist Alitos.

continued from previous entry.

From the previous entry on this blog it is obvious that Islamic Fundamentalism as practiced today in the Middle East in countries hostile to the Free World is an existential threat. Islamic Fundamentalism does not have to be full of hate and violence. Hate and violence are a combination in the way issues of Fatah is leveled to the people of the countries captured by Islamic Fundamentalism. The basic understanding of life in these countries with fundamental leadership is their governance. It is why the Iranian people demonstrate. They don't want their lives mired in hate and ultimately violence.

Countries like Iran that use religion as a basis for hate are not benevolent countries even to their own people. These countries, as Niger leadership worries, are turning peace into a bad word and instilling the ideas of hate as Arafat and his cohorts did in order to gain power. Arafat's PLO has been a model as a power structure and mimicked by every radical that wants power.

There have been coups taking place all over Africa. The point is that we are Israel's ally and we need to listen. We need to stand with Israel. The Palestinian people deserve a home, but, not one laced with hatred and violence as Hamas wants it. 

I have been sitting here for awhile to map out some of my thinking about the conflict of a dear friend and ally, Israel. I am going to take a break and continue this discussion later.

So, hey, isn't Nigel and "The Clever Cowgirl" great? They put a smile on my face and keep my happiness quotient intact. 

Later.

And.

Thank you for your interest.

What happened in 1979?

Talk about confusion of values. As the timeline of the Middle East spins forward the values instilled in the region by democracies were all well intentioned, but, never well received. 

“The Iranian people’s revolution (click here) is only a point in the start of the revolution of the great world of Islam.”

These words of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the founding father of the Islamic Republic and leader of the 1979 Iranian Revolution, marked the beginning of a project: to inspire and enable an Islamist revival across the Muslim world....

The word is FUNDAMENTALISM.

Iran's revolution that ousted the Shah and instilled an Imam began to mire the region in fundamentalism and violence. The hate propagated by the Ayatollah Khomeini was pure venom. The USA would eventually be labeled the "Great Satan."

U.S. is ‘Great Satan,’ Britain ‘evil’: Khamenei (click here)

Says Tehran has no intention of cooperating on regional issues with its 2 main enemies.

Nice.

Now, the United States has enemies according to Islamic Fundamentalist Leaders. These boys have attitude problems and it shows in their people. The Iranian people are some of the most disgruntled people in the world. Does their leadership care? Hell, no! The leadership of the Islamic Republic of Iran (did I get that right?) oppresses it's people and kills them as they seek to demonstrate in the streets.

Yeah, I got that right.

The Islamic Republic of Iran (click here)

A Dangerous Regime

Now, decades later, the demonstration of power of terrorists under Arafat (Nobel Peace Prize Winner) is amplified by the revolution within Iran. Iran is a sovereign authority.

I don't care about the idea that the Shah was a bad leader, that is up to history. Obviously, the Iranian Revolution is over, so all that Shah stuff in the year 2024 is mute. The hated of the civilized world by Iran is based in old scenarios of hate and violence. Basically, Islamic fundamentalism is dangerous to the global environment and as viewed through the lens of Ukraine reeking havoc on people that are no more interested in Islamic Fundamentalism than the "Man in the Moon."

There is one other thing I need to discuss before moving on and it is a huge picture yet to be appreciated in any social communication in hopes to inspire peace in the world that will interpret into the survival of a planet.

North Africa map (click here)

May 15, 2024
By Carla Babb

Pentagon - After nearly a two-week delay, (click here) U.S. and Nigerien officials are holding high-level follow-on meetings to coordinate the withdrawal of American troops from the country.

Christopher Maier, assistant secretary of defense for special operations and low-intensity conflict, and Lieutenant General Dagvin Anderson, joint staff director for joint force development, are meeting Wednesday and Thursday in Niamey with members of Niger’s new government, known as the National Council for Safeguarding the Homeland, or CNSP, two U.S. officials told VOA.

The CNSP posted on the social platform X Wednesday that Maier and Anderson met Wednesday with Lieutenant General Salifou Mody, one of the military coup members who was named minister of national defense.

The CNSP noted that the meeting comes two months after Niger denounced its military basing agreements with the United States and aims to “ensure that this withdrawal takes place in the best possible conditions, guaranteeing order, security and compliance with set deadlines.”

There are about 900 U.S. military personnel in Niger, including active duty, civilians and contractors, according to the U.S. officials, who spoke to VOA on condition of anonymity ahead of the conclusion of the talks. Most of the U.S. military personnel have stayed in the country past their deployment’s planned end dates, as details for their withdrawal are ironed out.

“We're still in a bit of a holding pattern,” Pentagon deputy press secretary Sabrina Singh said last week....

Mauritania, Mali, Niger, Chad, Sudan and continued movement east to the Arabian Peninsula, where is the Free World? These are the southern countries to North Africa. Where did ISIS call home? North Africa as they lined up on beaches to threaten the Free World on the other side of the Mediterranean Sea.

May 14, 2024

By Rachel Chason

...In an exclusive interview, (click here) Prime Minister Ali Mahaman Lamine Zeine put the blame for the breakdown squarely on the United States, accusing American officials of trying to dictate which countries Niger could partner with and failing to justify the U.S. troop presence, now scheduled to end in the coming months. Niger has been central to efforts to contain a growing Islamist insurgency in West Africa....

It is not the USA that is the problem. It is the shift in values that occurred in Niger that opens up the land to what the USA would consider enemies. Niger changed, the USA did not.

May 16, 2024

By Antonio Cascais

...Tensions between West African neighbors Niger and Benin (click here) began with the July 2023 military coup in Niger and the arrest of the country's democratically elected president, Mohamed Bazoum.

West African bloc ECOWAS condemned the coup and imposed sanctions on the Nigerien military regime led by General Abdourahamane Tiani.

In Benin, the protests against the coup leaders were particularly explicit. Beninese President Patrice Talon loudly demanded Bazoum's reinstatement and even advocated for a military intervention by ECOWAS troops against the coup leaders in Niger....

I mean where is China and Russia going to get reinforcements to defeat The Free World?

May 3, 2024
By Phil Stewart and Idrees Ali

Washington - Russian military personnel have entered an air base in Niger (click here) that is hosting U.S. troops, a senior U.S. defense official told Reuters, a move that follows a decision by Niger's junta to expel U.S. forces.
The military officers ruling the West African nation have told the U.S. to withdraw its nearly 1,000 military personnel from the country, which until a coup last year had been a key partner for Washington's fight against insurgents who have killed thousands of people and displaced millions more....

In thinking about North Africa...

April 2, 2015

More than nine-in-ten people in the Middle East and North Africa (click here) were Muslim as of 2010 (93%), and the share of the region’s population that is Muslim is expected to be slightly higher in 2050 (94%).

The Middle East-North Africa region’s Muslim population is expected to grow by 74% from 2010 to 2050, from 317 million to 552 million. Christians and Jews are projected to remain the second- and third-largest religious groups in the region, respectively, with more modest population gains of 43% and 46%....

...it is prudent to see Islamic Fundamentalism as a existential threat. Will our enemies see Islamic Fundamentalism as an existential threat? Hell, no! They want to harness it and propagate it and unleash it, ie: Iran and Russia and the drone. The USA military crashed a state of the art drone in Iran while surveying an Afghan border. Iran has copied USA technology and now at the USA built air base in Niger, they want to get their hands on the current technology.

The USA technology Iran copied are the drones reeking havoc in Ukraine. I believe we have a responsibility to Ukraine for that reason alone.

April 16, 2024

(see picture at the top of the article.) A Nigerien official explains to U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken the jihadist crisis facing Niger and the surrounding region in March 2023.

The United States was forced to stop (click here) its military operations in March 2024 in Niger – a landlocked, western African country in the Sahara desert. Niger may not immediately seem like a key ally for the U.S., but it served as a crucial staging ground for the U.S. military to carry out work and respond to terrorism in the region.

U.S. representatives are currently trying to negotiate a deal to maintain some sort of military presence in Niger. But, for now, Niger’s new ruling junta has declared that the U.S. military presence is a violation of Niger’s constitution. The fate of the U.S.‘ presence, including two military drone bases, remains uncertain....

continued in next entry

continued from the previous entry

The values we live by.

Entering into all these lands is the values we live by. At the top of those values is the "right to life." I am not talking about abortion, this is about the right to every living creature to a life as prescribed by birth. Only at birth does any creature have a right to breath. So, that said, all the people that live in the Holy Land have a right to breath the air, drink the water, eat the food, and have shelter. The very basics of "the values we live by," begins with essential needs for survival. All these are extremely well documented by doctors of mental health and the earliest father of all that is human, Wilhelm Wundt. He would eventually be followed not only in understanding human psychology, but, the definition and practice of psychoanalysis, by Sigmund Freud.

I am not interested in an in-depth understanding of psychology, psychoanalysis, or it history and development into the practices of today. That is a very different set of discussions. What I want to ring clear is that there is an in depth understanding as to what the values we live by means in definition and practice.

Do we understand our own needs? Do we practice survival tactics that protect our needs, hence, survival? Do our laws and the order brought by those laws reflect our needs that lead to improved and ongoing quality of life improvements. The answer, of course, is yes. Human beings like to live to survive and improve on that survival into high quality of that life. It is everywhere in societies around the world. Ultimately, there is an internal drive by most people in a society to achieve, COMFORT.

COMFORT.

COMFORT.

Coming to an understanding as to what comfort means to the people in the region of the Arabian Peninsula and the Mediterranean Sea begins to define CULTURAL difference. These are not differences in life itself or the allowance of human beings to breath the air, etc. Every ethnicity in this region of The Holy Land is allowed cultural difference, but, they are not allowed to achieve that with hatred for others in the region or their society.

What one of the most meaningful definitions of life brought by the British Empire and today's British Commonwealth is the right to difference, the right to live a comfortable life, and the RESPECT of lives of others with cultural differences.

I am not interested in tabloid answers.

Does that not reflect the values we live by? Nowhere in the world is there more difference than in the Middle East. There are world religions that call the Middle East home. There are an enormous number of ethnicity within that region of the world. There are language differences, sometimes considered barriers when understanding of difference is important to MAINTAIN domestic peace. The only other part of the world with greater language differences/barriers is Africa. I think that is reflected, especially in northern Africa with conflict and violence. Barriers to understanding cause résistance to acceptance between people. That confusion of values between people can become very threatening. When a people feel threatened it can very easily launch into war.

There is a difference between confusion of values and hatred and bigoty. Confusion of values is inherent, but, hatred and bigotry are learned and CHOSEN.

I asked at the beginning of this to remember the year 1979. Just previous to that year was a conference conducted by the late Secretary of State Henry Kissinger called the "Geneva Middle East Peace Conference (click here)." The style of that conference was that of civilized discourse. it was to bring about a deeper understanding by all parties to facilitate peace. There is that word again. 

...The detail of the future Israeli-Egyptian January 1974 Disengagement Agreement (click here) had been worked out prior to the conference. Indeed, Foreign Ministers from Israel, Egypt, and Jordan attended the conference “aimed at establishing a just and durable peace in the Middle East.” Syrian President Hafez al-Assad chose not to attend because the United States and Israel refused to recognize the PLO as the representative body for the Palestinians at the conference since the PLO refused to recognize Israel’s right to exist. And nothing that Assad heard from Kissinger made him believe that Israel was willing to leave any part of the Golan Heights. Syrian President Assad had correctly sensed that the coming conference was only a cover for an Egyptian-Israeli agreement....

Anyone remembering these years remembers the PLO. PLO stands for Palestinian Liberation Organization. There is a man affiliated with the leadership of the PLO named Yassar Arafat. He passed away November 11, 2004. There is controversy surrounding this man that will probably never die, but, that is for history to sort out and now me.

The Nobel Peace Prize 1994 (click here)

Yasser Arafat
Shimon Peres
Yitzhak Rabin

...In 1974, (click here) the PLO was officially recognised by the Arab League and the United Nations General Assembly as the “sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people”, and was invited to participate in all UN activities under observer status. In 1988, it endorsed a two-state solution to the conflict with Israel. Since 2012, the PLO sits at the UN as a non-member state, Palestine, and is a signatory to UN treaties as well as agreements with Israel....

The scenario of these two people never become peaceful. There have been document after document filed for attempts at peace and establishing homelands for them, but, from the time they are conceived by the League of Nations was there ever a two country solution because the way it was organized never separated sovereign borders. All the documents time and again demanded these people live with borders within each other. The organization of these two people into separate countries was never clearly established. On the ground, the actual living of the people developed into power conflicts and not clear understandings of "...this side of the line is your country and this side is mine." 

This confusion of values were not choices. They were inherent to the very lives of these people. The confusion turned into conflict and what resulted was a PLO defined as a terrorist organization. It would be the first time a terrorist organization in the Middle East actually represented people of The Holy Land. 

A political and military body formed in 1964 (click here) to unite various Palestinian Arab groups in opposition to the Israeli presence in the former territory of Palestine. From 1967 the organization was dominated by al-Fatah, led by Yasser Arafat. The activities of its radical factions caused trouble with the host country, Jordan, and, following a brief civil war in 1970, it moved to Lebanon and Syria. In 1974 the organization was recognized by the Arab nations as the representative of all Palestinians. The Israeli invasion of Lebanon (1982) undermined its military power and organization, and it regrouped in Tunisia. Splinter groups of extremists, such as the ‘Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine’ and the ‘Black September’ terrorists, have been responsible for kidnappings, hijackings, and killings both in and beyond the Middle East. In 1988 Arafat persuaded the movement to renounce violence, and its governing council recognized the State of Israel. Thereafter the PLO was accepted by an increasing number of states as being a government-in-exile. In 1993 Arafat became chair of the Palestinian National Authority, which administered the West Bank and the Gaza Strip from 1995. The PLO continued to be responsible for negotiations with Israel, but these broke down in 2000. In 2004 Mahmoud Abbas became leader of the PLO following Arafat's death.

The future simply has to "wait for it," because the war will start shortly. As the PLO began to gain power within the Arab League and ultimately the United Nations it would have an entanglement with religious leaders, namely the most powerful Sheikh Ahmed Ismail Hassan Yassin (click here). He is dead. He died in his car when it blew up as an Israeli missile hit. Anyone wanting peace in the Middle East didn't miss him.

Yassin was am Imam and the word Fatah came into the dialogue.

Fatah, political and military organization of Arab Palestinians, founded in the late 1950s by Yassir Arafat and Khalīl al-Wazīr (Abū Jihād) with the aim of wresting Palestine from Israeli control by waging low-intensity guerrilla warfare. In the late 1980s it began seeking a two-state solution through diplomatic avenues, and its leaders were prominent players in the Oslo peace process that established the Palestinian Authority.

Khalil al-Wazir (click here)

In 1952, Khalil al-Wazir joined the Muslim Brotherhood and was secretary of its Gaza student branch; he left the group when its leadership refused to endorse a proposal he had submitted to it regarding armed struggle. He then began to organize military cells that carried out several operations involving explosives in occupied Palestinian lands adjacent to the Gaza Strip; one of these operations destroyed the Zohar water cistern near Beit Hanun (on 25 February 1955). Among his colleagues during that period were Kamal Adwan, Abu Yusuf al-Najjar, Said al-Muzayyan, Abd al-Fattah al-Hamud, Ghalib al-Wazir, Abdallah Siyam, Muhammad al-Ifranji and Hamad al-Aidi.

The point of this is the INTRODUCTION of terrorist organizations as legitimate vehicles for ? human rights?

The United Nations is supposed to be a peace seeking organization where human rights has some of the highest values within it's charter. These boys didn't care about human rights in the same way the charter does. These boys were interested in their own idea of human rights and the world be damned.

Yassin would go on to form Hamas. This is the first time a terrorist organization known for violence would be guided by an Imam. Now, with Hamas as a leadership organization with rock solid hatred based in Jihad and Fatah as it's means of inspiring war and conflict the Middle East is completely lost to the peace process in a meaningful way that most of the world understands and understood. Instead, Hamas had a better method, let's just kill Israelis.

The cruelty and hatred that reigned over the Holy Land with the empowerment of terrorists resulted in real power. The Israeli Prime Minister with the most determined pursuit of ending that power saw a vision of a land called Gaza belonging to the Palestinian people. Now, Gaza at the time was occupied by Israeli settlements. When the word came down about Gaza being an icon of peace between the two peoples, there was a mad rush by every Rabi in Gaza to take possession of scrolls and head for the border. What occurred after Israel vacated Gaza was a complete expression of hate and continued conflict and never the peace the Late Prime Minister Sharon hoped and prayed for as an answer to the power of terrorists.

August 10, 2015
By Luke Baker

Jerusalem - It would, (click here) said then prime minister Ariel Sharon, a former major-general not given to self-doubt, "grant Israeli citizens the maximum level of security". Other optimists said it would turn Gaza into the Hong Kong of the Middle East.

Hong Kong (click here)

A decade on from Israel's unilateral withdrawal of around 8,500 Jewish settlers from the Gaza Strip, the legacy of that August 2005 "disengagement" still provokes angry debate in Israeli society....

Hong Kong is a very successful and beautiful city. It is a unique place on Earth. People and companies from all over the world congregate there and why? Because Hong Kong is a center of commerce. There is also wealth in Hong Kong. My intention in bringing this up is not to discuss China's inability to cope with such a wonderful city and it's people, but, to clearly understand the confusion of values between these two people and societies.

The hopes of the peace the Late Sharon envisioned was to provide a valuable piece of land to bring the Palestinian people the OPPORTUNITY to become a dynamo of society and join the rest of the world in celebration of life. That was a hope that was clearly confused with the actual hate that was propagated by The Sheik and his cohorts.

This is the confusion that is carried forward by ALLOWING terrorist organizations recognition as any form of leadership. Are their values the values we all inherently share? Hell no!

How in the right mind of diplomacy will there ever be an agreement that will result in sincere peace AND PROSPERITY so long as the very basis of governance is mired in hatred and violence? A peace can never exist with such confusion among the values sought in the process.

continued in the next entry

continued from previous entry

So, as to the Holy Land and the UK. 

As much as everyone wants to say the Europeans were defeated in The Crusades, that is not exactly correct. There were several Crusades and not all of them failed. The entire region where today's conflict occurs is one of the places the British Empire came to own. As a matter of fact Kuwait exists because the British Empire wanted to control the goods, including oil, coming out of Iraq. To some extent the sovereign borders of the lands affiliated with the Arabian Peninsula have nothing to do with The Holy Land so much as the power of the British Empire at the time of The Holy Crusades.

Why is that important? Because even today the United Kingdom sheds some of its land to create or allow a new sovereign right to lands that may or may not be affiliated with the United Kingdom. That is the case to a greater extent when the "Mandate for Palestine" as written by "The League of Nations" later to become "The United Nations."

While there is every justification for the country of Israel, there exists a clear understanding there are at the very least "the people of Palestine."

One of the reasons the British Empire existed was to carry out the Rule of Law within the lands it owned. Without an abiding law structure people are left to be tribal with chronic ideas about who and why that tribe has a right to be "ON THE LAND." What is somewhat interesting about the "past lives of land" is realizing how much herding of animals and migration through lands to feed those animals actually dominate the lands people occupy. That is an important understanding as well because while tribes migrated for survival, that scenario today may not hold up as a legitimate claim to the land. Migration of herds for survival is very, very different than living on the land in an agrarian lifestyle that is more stable. Migration of herds for survival is more or less a romantic character of history. The practical use of the land, IF THERE IS NO MORE MIGRATING HERDS, changes with invention and better quality of life.

Okay.

So we come to the "Mandate for Palestine." This mandate existed after WWI to administer the lands and people. The British Empire would come to control these lands through enforcement of law. This practice by the world governing bodies is not unusual, right? There was the splitting of land into four countries in Southeast Asia following WWII. Laos, Cambodia, North Vietnam and South Vietnam were all governed by different European countries to BE SURE there would be no return to war. So, The Mandate for Palestine was one of these documents following WWI.

What I want to have ring clear is that the world governing bodies lean heavily into law and order. The world governing bodies want the land to be used appropriately and the people be secure without governance by dictators or autocrats that cause problems for the people and the global population in general. In other words, from time beginning the world has almost a genetic need to law and order and PEACE.

While the Mandate for Palestine sounds very one-sided and a clear determination that the Palestinians have the upper hand, that is not correct. At the very same time the Mandate for Palestine was carved out, there was a parallel document entitled "The Balfour Declaration." This link will connect with the text of "The Balfour Declaration (click here)." This particular link is housed within the "Jewish Virtual Library." Why? Because the Balfour Declaration created Israel at the very same time the Mandate for Palestine was drawn up.

Foreign Office
November 2nd, 1917

Dear Lord Rothschild,

I have much pleasure in conveying to you. on behalf of His Majesty's Government, the following declaration of sympathy with Jewish Zionist aspirations which has been submitted to, and approved by, the Cabinet

His Majesty's Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavors to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.

I should be grateful if you would bring this declaration to the knowledge of the Zionist Federation.

Yours,

Arthur James Balfour

This is all very British. The is how the British COMMONWEALTH governs. This same pattern was seen with the North American British Colonies that will eventually become The United States of America. The Brits send some of their best and loyal people to be Governors, etc., for the sole purpose of bringing law and order to the people and the land. 

The clear understanding here is LAW AND ORDER. Since the early 20th century the idea of law and order has been an overriding theme of the Holy Land. Now, why would that be?

Law and order creates SAFETY for people, the society they build, the commerce they enjoy, and THE DOMESTIC PEACE demanded for a high quality of life. If nothing else in the world that can be appreciated about the British Empire is that they carried with them incredible and complicated values and managed to tame tribal lands into modern scenarios of peaceful commerce.

I am not interested in the discussion of commerce and/or capitalism as those are different topics. What is important here is the vital understanding that people are supposed to get along in a society, care about the well being of all the people that live on the land, and included in that is commerce that provides for the common good.

continued in the next entry

Please keep in mind the year 1979 as I progress through this topic.

It is very easy to say the turning point in establishing Israel as the Hebrew homeland was directly connected to the Holocaust and why Holocaust Deniers have propaganda to defeat the idea there was a Holocaust and the Jewish people were the victims. Anyone that understands the Holocaust knows there were other ethnic groups and prisoners of war in the practices of the Third Reich, but, most if not all the other ethnicities have sovereign countries to call home; the Jewish people did not. I also will say creating Israel was the best idea anyone every had. 

The first occupation of the lands that would become Palestine and Israel is of course "The Crusades (click here)." At the time of The Crusades war and conquest was a sport of the ruling classes. It was a way of life and a source of wealth to the monarchies. The Crusades were unique in that it was more than wealth the British Monarchy was looking for, but, control over the Holy Lands.

The Crusades (click here) were a series of religious wars, sanctioned by the Catholic Church, to take control of the Holy Land of Jerusalem (modern-day Israel) from the ruling Muslim Caliphate during the Middle Ages. With the First Crusade beginning in 1095, the call went out from the Vatican for Christian nations to send soldiers to fight. Britain’s contribution to the Crusades varied over the centuries from being only incidentally involved to being a major power in Jerusalem. We will examine the involvement of British nations in the various Crusades and the effects they had on the United Kingdom....

Why go all the way back to Medieval times? Because of the uniqueness of THIS LAND. The understanding these lands are special and coveted for religious understandings demonstrates a few things, but, primarily because of the birth of "Jesus Christ" and the long term value that event carried permanently to these lands. No one came along valuing these lands for their holy content from a Jim Jones Church idea. These lands have been valued as "The Holy Land" for millennium. The British Empire did not give the land it's value, it wanted to possess these lands. The religious value of these lands superseded any monetary value of them.

Also to note, there have been chronic values of these lands across all Abrahamic faiths.

I DO NOT SEE THE RELIGIOUS VALUE OF THESE LANDS CHANGING EVER!

It is vital to any conflict over land to understand the history and the value that history carries. In every Pacific island and atoll in dispute today there is a history. Some of the histories may have been rewritten for political outcomes and that should be detectable. But, in the case of the Pacific islands in dispute, the history especially where tampered with becomes a disabling event and needs to be regarded as toxic if it means a poor outcome to the land and the people that live on it. If the islands are manmade as with Dubai's sporting artificial islands, the history may or may not favor the creation of the island. Today, we know China seeks power by establishing artificial islands. 

May 14, 2024
By Karen Lema

Manila/Beijing  - The Philippines (click here) said on Monday that it would keep a closer guard on reefs, shoals and islets in its exclusive economic zone in the South China Sea, as China denied accusations of trying to build an artificial island in the disputed waters.

The Philippine Coast Guard said on Saturday it had deployed a ship to Sabina Shoal on the Spratly archipelago, where it accused China of building an artificial island, having documented what it said were piles of dead and crushed coral on the sandbars.

Jonathan Malaya, spokesperson of the National Security Council (NSC), said NSC chief Eduardo Ano had ordered a tighter guard at locations within Manila’s 200-nautical mile economic zone, as a long-standing diplomatic row with Beijing intensifies.

“No one will guard (these locations) except us. It is our responsibility under international law to guard (them) and ensure that the environment there would not be damaged and that there won’t be reclamation activities,” Malaya told a regular television program.

China claims almost all of the South China Sea, including parts claimed by the Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia, Taiwan and Vietnam, and has carried out extensive land reclamation on some islands, building military facilities, causing concern in Washington and the region....

These artificial islands built by China does not afford China a greater sovereign presence no matter what Beijing argues. They are artificial works with intention to impinge power over other sovereign countries. The artificial islands are meaningless and quite frankly an annoyance. The ONLY reason China gets away with it is because it has become a "Bully State."

With that nothing in the Middle East is artificial. Those lands are coveted through biblical proportions and every claim to them important to understand. The people living on Holy Lands and carrying out pilgrimages within The Holy Land have every right to be on those lands. The history of people and the Holy Land is incredibly documented. The Abrahamic test across those religions is highly accurate.

continued in next entry

The Nobel Peace Prize outcome.

Good afternoon. I took care of my personal life which I love more each day. I want to write about the Middle East and especially the chronic tensions between Israel and Palestine.

But, first I want to share something with you because I think it is important. I try tp prepare myself to write on this blog. Sharing a piece of me is important in this venue. I am sincere in every aspect of my writing. 

Sometimes to prepare for writing I participate in a distraction. One of the distractions I participate in is watching a "You Tube" channel called, "The Clever Cowgirl." She is amazing. She doesn't "break a horse into ride," she gentles them. She is happily married and has a great deal of freedom in that relationship. 

But, the video I watched on her channel today was about a small pony named "Nigel." No she is not British, she lives and works in Montana. She is an American girl. I do consider her You Tube videos and her care of the horses work. Absolutely. She loves the work and boy does it show.

She has several older horses. Horses are magnificent creatures. They think in "herd behaviors" and there is a pecking order among the herd. What impressed me in a different video than this is that she does ride the horses that are capable of being ridden. Horses can be happy being ridden. The one demonstration of that was when she decided to ride "Frisco Bill." He is an older horse she has owned him most of his life. He enjoys the attention she gives him and he absolutely loves being ridden. So, there is no inhumane anything going on in her videos. I mean none.

So this video posted here is what I watched today. The Cowgirl does DNA tests on these horses, and get this, to better understand some of their thinking and behaviors. She is amazing. I like her approach to gentling a riding horse very much. 

But, as to Nigel. He has three breeds found in his DNA. His strongest genes appear to be from the POA (Pony of America). It gives him a super color pattern. He is a stallion and was when she purchased him. He is an aged stallion. She won't geld him because he has been a stallion all his life and needs that physiology to carry him through the rest of his life. If The Cowgirl hadn't come into these horses lives they probably would be dead by now. She intends to take care and pamper Nigel until his end. 

Gentling a riding horse costs more in time and money than simply breaking a horse to ride and wanting a profit margin. The Cowgirl keeps detailed records on all her horses and what it costs to take care of each one of them. They all have a personalized care pattern and plan she measures and creates herself. She has an extensive understanding of horse physiology and no she is not a veterinarian. She does have credentials in the way of experience in life in the horse industry.

This scenario with Nigel is to clip his winter coat so he is not distressed. It is an amusing video all the way to the very end. And smart. This little pony is very smart. She has a great deal of patience and is smarter.

If you care to, enjoy this video of Nigel.