If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
Israeli and Palestinian leaders have fallen victim to their own uncompromising public narratives. To facilitate the terms of an agreement, they need powerful and relentless pressure to provide them with political cover, which only the U.S. can exert.
I am an atheist because I tend to not believe in things I have no evidence for. Yet New Atheists believe scores of myths, with no evidence, about Muslims and Islam.
Make no mistake about it, Syria has become a proxy war, but neither the Americans nor the Russians are calling the shots. More significant roles are being played by competing regional groupings who are supporting, and even driving, their Syrian allies.
America's motives for intervening in Syria, as they were in World War II, might be a mix of humanitarian ideals and selfish agendas, but that does not mean that we should shy away from our responsibility to others or to ourselves.
There is no compelling national interest that requires American intervention in Syria's civil war. In fact, such an intervention would be a strategic error.
By attacking Syrian military targets, Israel has finally (if inadvertently) taken the conflict in the region to where it belongs -- to the doorstep of Assad's corrupt and bloody regime.
US President Barack Obama's "Will Not" has come across as half-baked compared to the Hezbollah secretary general's retort with an arrogant "Will Not" ...
This week Leon Panetta said America has "a responsibility to go after al Qaeda wherever they are." He was referring to U.S. efforts to assist the French in Mali. Yet, not that far away, the U.S. turns a blind eye to extreme Islamist policies and actions that threaten America's security.
An online clarion call last week halted -- if briefly -- a Lebanese Internal Security Force (ISF) request to poke into mobile phone data sessions, SMS traffic, citizens' browsing logfiles, IP addresses and passwords, chats, emails and apps used in a bid to decipher unsolved crimes.
The United States is now working to shape post-Assad Syria. But as many insurgents see it, Washington, having stood by watching the carnage, now presumes that it can decide which Syrian groups are legitimate and which are not.
Genuine efforts can and must be made to mitigate distrust through a peace process based on reciprocal and reinforced provisions, to which both Israelis and Palestinians must commit to reach a lasting peace agreement.
Now that the cease-fire between Israel and Hamas has begun to take effect (at least for now), it's time to begin to assess the outcome of the war, and where we go from here.
The recent flare up of violence between Israel and the Hamas has highlighted three specific game changes from wars past.
What lies behind this latest round of attacks and counter-attacks? Hard to say why Hamas decided to take on Israel's leadership on the cusp of a national election when anything short of unremitting Israeli retaliation would undermine Netanyahu's "security first" campaign platform.
Everyone's got a drone, or so it seems. It wasn't long ago that the U.S. had a monopoly on drones, but that is no longer the case.
As I watch Syria collapse into masses of stones, dust and mortar, do I even more keenly realize the importance of Carpe diem.
