I've decided that if I begin with when God first spoke to Abraham this
might take a while. So you'll excuse me if I cut a few corners.
Despite claiming that they were responsible for the whole thing the
so-called "Arab Spring" caught the US by surprise and their reaction was
particularly chaotic. This is especially true of the decision to
support the invasions of Libya and Syria which set off chain reactions
across the entire region and beyond the effects of which are not yet
fully understood and constantly changing.
So in an effort to get back in the game the US decided to chair another
round of peace talks between Israel and Palestine. As this is a conflict
that involves pretty much everybody in the region and a fair few beyond
the true purpose of this exercise was to make the US the centre of
attention so they can work out where everybody stands as everybody tries
to work out what is going on in these talks.
Quite apart from all the usual problems of Palestinian/Israeli talks
this latest round has been plagued by more specific ones. For example
through the Rihanna operation and its support for the invasion of Syria
the US has lost all credibility with the Israelis meaning that the US
has very little influence over Israeli policy. The other major problem
is that the US has chosen the Fatah Party to represent the Palestinians
in these talks. Fatah only control the ever shrinking West Bank portion
of Palestine and they had to take control of this through force because
they failed to win the last election meaning that they do not have the
support of the majority of the Palestinian people. Also Fatah are stone
cold broke only continuing to exist through financial backing from Saudi
Arabia. As a result Saudi Arabia more or less controls Fatah policy
meaning that they are able to manipulate the talks with the US to
discuss a range of regional issues that have nothing to do with either
Israel or Palestine.
On January 1st 2014 (1/1/14) US Secretary of State John Kerry set off
for another round of talks with Israel and Fatah. After several days of
shuttling between Israel and the West Bank on Sunday (5/1/14) Kerry
headed off to Saudi Arabia via Jordan. Although they knew exactly what
was said between Kerry and Fatah Saudi Arabia were keen to use Kerry's
visited to find out what he had discussed with the Israelis. So in
preparation for his visit they decided to rough him up a bit.
This involved chartered passenger plane carrying pilgrims from Iran
making a crash landing at Medina airport injuring 29. This obviously
could have be a reference to any number of plane crashes the US have
caused in a effort to keep international interest in its Rihanna
operation going. However mainly it focused on the relationship between
Saudi Arabia and Iran who absolutely loathe each other. As a result
Saudi Arabia is very opposed to the US having direct talks with Iran
over its nuclear or any other issue and the two nations have been
engaged in a Sunni via Shia proxy war across the region. This is
probably most noticeable in Syria and Iraq. On Friday (3/1/14) Sunni
clerics in Iraq's Anbar province broke of their allegiance with the Shia
dominated Iraqi government allowing Sunni Al Qaeda fighters to force
the Iraqi government out of Anbar. This is a situation that warrants a
post all of its own but it goes without saying that the US is coming
under a lot of pressure to support the Iraqi government in retaking
Anbar but are waiting for permission from Saudi Arabia before making a
decision.
In response to the Saudi plane crash Egyptian authorities banned a group
of Shia pilgrims form Canada from entering the country in a effort find
out what was going on. Egypt obviously shares a land border with both
Israel and Palestine. More importantly Egypt shares a land border with
the bit of Palestine that is run by Hamas, the elected government of
Palestine. Although being a Sunni organisation Hamas used to enjoy a
long relationship with Shia Iran. This all changed when Mohamed Morsi
came to power in Egypt and Hamas broke of all ties with Iran in the hope
of forming a alliance with an Egypt run by its parent organisation the
Muslim Brotherhood. The fall of Morsi obviously left Hamas in a very
vulnerable position and they're certainly not stopping people crossing
into Egypt to help with the fight against the government.
In response to the Egyptian ban a passenger plane from Toronto, Canada
made a crash landing in New York. Apart from putting pressure on Saudi
Arabia to explain what was meant by its plane crash this was intended to
blind the Egyptians and allow the US to talk to the Canadians about
what they were saying to the Egyptians about the Saudi plane crash.
As it's now widely acknowledged that US foreign policy is written in
Riyadh rather then in Washington there was a lot of international
interest in what was being said during Kerry's visit. As result my
brother decided to pop up for dinner and while I was supposed to be out
at the pub with him and my father a "serious incident" occurred at the
G4S run HMP Oakwood prison in the UK This could have been interpreted in
any number of ways about personal safety and security and to say UK
authorities are remaining tight-lipped about the exact nature of the
incident is an understatement.
In an effort to throw up a smokescreen around the visit to Saudi Arabia a
private jet manufactured by Canadair crashed in the Aspen ski resort in
Colorado, US and was witnessed by at least one celebrity. There
probably isn't an alarm bell that this story did not ring because
Micheal Schumacher was injured whilst skiing, Colorado recently
legalised the sale of marijuana and Aspen is a resort used by the rich
meaning there was initial speculation about whether celebrities of
captains of industry had been killed in the crash. As it turns out all
the people on the plane were Mexicans which feeds into the immigration
debate. Also plane crashes have recently been used as a metaphor for the
Rihanna operation which quite a few people think has gone down in
flames - just like the plane did. Perhaps inadvertently by clouding the
Saudi meeting in this way the US also gave the impression that it feels
it needs to gain Saudi permission before making a decision on the
Rihanna operation.
The Aspen plane crash was followed up by a legal decision - coming two
days early - to release Jahi McMath "to her family who will be taking
her to an undisclosed location." This of course posed more questions
then it answered. For example does it mean that Rihanna is going to be
released wide 'family' that is opposed to the US' operation or does it
mean that Rihanna will be taken off 'life-support.' It also brings up
the issue of Rihanna's actual mother who by the sounds of things is a
key witness in the Berdon LLP case.
All it actually means of course is that Jahi McMath is going to be
transported to an unscrupulous nursing home in New York state who will
proceed to bleed the McMath family dry by charging them thousands of
dollars a month to essentially warehouse a corpse. Therefore this seems
to be morphing into a discussion about the infamous Obamacare death
panels because the compassionate part of me thinks someone should have
intervened to stop this by now. The problem is that California Courts
already provide that mechanism it's just as with Chris Brown the US
government feels it can unilaterally waive those protections as it sees
fit.
(Originally Posted) 12:25 on 6/1/14 (UK date).
No comments:
Post a Comment