Submitted by Brodsky on Mon, 12/29/2008 - 11:46
With the expiration of the six-month lull in Hamas rocket fire into Israel, the IDF is set to invade Gaza and attack Hamas’s terrorist infrastructure. There are several reasons for the timing of Israel’s operation. Firstly, many in Israel’s security establishment never signed on to the purpose of the cease-fire to begin with. It merely granted Hamas a respite from Israeli attacks while giving them the opportunity rearm and better train themselves. For two years, since Hamas’s takeover of Gaza in 2007, they have been working hard to develop their military power with Iranian assistance using Hizballah as a model. The new rockets they have smuggled in pieces through tunnels from Egypt now have the capacity to strike the outskirts Beersheba. Since more fighting is inevitable given Hamas’s pledge to destroy the Jewish state, it is better to attack when they have fewer weapons at their disposal. A ceasefire only works in Hamas’s favor.
With the expiration of the six-month lull in Hamas rocket fire into Israel, the IDF is set to invade Gaza and attack Hamas’s terrorist infrastructure. There are several reasons for the timing of Israel’s operation. Firstly, many in Israel’s security establishment never signed on to the purpose of the cease-fire to begin with. It merely granted Hamas a respite from Israeli attacks while giving them the opportunity rearm and better train themselves. For two years, since Hamas’s takeover of Gaza in 2007, they have been working hard to develop their military power with Iranian assistance using Hizballah as a model. The new rockets they have smuggled in pieces through tunnels from Egypt now have the capacity to strike the outskirts Beersheba. Since more fighting is inevitable given Hamas’s pledge to destroy the Jewish state, it is better to attack when they have fewer weapons at their disposal. A ceasefire only works in Hamas’s favor.
Submitted by Brodsky on Fri, 07/25/2008 - 16:05
Adopted: August 11, 2006
The Security Council,
PP1. Recalling all its previous resolutions on Lebanon, in particular resolutions 425 (1978), 426 (1978), 520 (1982), 1559 (2004), 1655 (2006) 1680 (2006) and 1697 (2006), as well as the statements of its President on the situation in Lebanon, in particular the statements of 18 June 2000 (S/PRST/2000/21), of 19 October 2004 (S/PRST/2004/36), of 4 May 2005 (S/PRST/2005/17) of 23 January 2006 (S/PRST/2006/3) and of 30 July 2006 (S/PRST/2006/35),
Submitted by Brodsky on Sun, 06/29/2008 - 11:18
By listening to the presidential campaign rhetoric or watching the nightly news, one would not guess that the reality on the ground in Iraq is changing.
Security has improved significantly. Last month, for the first time, fewer U.S. troops were killed in Iraq than in Afghanistan. The numbers of Iraqi citizens killed has also dropped markedly, though it remains unacceptably high. This change is clearly reversible but the people in Iraq and in the region are starting to believe in it.
By listening to the presidential campaign rhetoric or watching the nightly news, one would not guess that the reality on the ground in Iraq is changing.Security has improved significantly. Last month, for the first time, fewer U.S. troops were killed in Iraq than in Afghanistan. The numbers of Iraqi citizens killed has also dropped markedly, though it remains unacceptably high. This change is clearly reversible but the people in Iraq and in the region are starting to believe in it.
Submitted by Brodsky on Sun, 05/11/2008 - 21:08
This article is in response to Fedwa Wazwaz's Op-Ed piece, "Israel's 60th is not a reason for celebration," published in Minneapolis's Star Tribune on Saturday, May 10, 2008.
Wazwaz began her piece on why Israelis and Jews should not celebrate Israel’s 60th year of existence by quoting a letter published by British Jews in the Guardian. The small group who are wracked with guilt over the plight of the Palestinians turn to the writing of the late, Edward Said, who emphasized that “what the Holocaust is to the Jews, the Naqba [Catastrophe] is to the Palestinians.” True, Said delighted in this comparison and while there can be no doubt that Palestinians have suffered by the hands of Israelis and Arabs alike, such a statement requires no deep analysis to reveal its absurdity.
This article is in response to Fedwa Wazwaz's Op-Ed piece, "Israel's 60th is not a reason for celebration," published in Minneapolis's Star Tribune on Saturday, May 10, 2008. With great sadness I read Fedwa Wazwaz’s opinion piece on Saturday, May 10 entitled “Israel’s 60th is not a reason for celebration.” Sadder still is that she leads a program to foster dialogue and understanding between Muslims and non-Muslims. Her article moves the Palestinian cause backwards, not forwards.
Wazwaz began her piece on why Israelis and Jews should not celebrate Israel’s 60th year of existence by quoting a letter published by British Jews in the Guardian. The small group who are wracked with guilt over the plight of the Palestinians turn to the writing of the late, Edward Said, who emphasized that “what the Holocaust is to the Jews, the Naqba [Catastrophe] is to the Palestinians.” True, Said delighted in this comparison and while there can be no doubt that Palestinians have suffered by the hands of Israelis and Arabs alike, such a statement requires no deep analysis to reveal its absurdity.
Ottoman Holy War & Conquest: The Battle for Contantinople, 1453
"There were so many events in this war that the pen can't describe them all, the tongue can't list them all."
-Neshri, fifteenth century Ottoman chronicler[30]
It is clear from Wittek's thesis that the battle for Constantinople was a religious one, just as it is clear from Lindner's thesis that religious zeal had nothing to do with it. According to Princeton University Ataturk Professor, Heath Lowry, "the desire to see Islam spread among the conquered Christian peoples was a secondary factor."[31] He argues that once the Empire extended beyond Egypt, and included, Syria, Palestine, and parts of Iraq, (early-mid sixteenth century) the Ottomans began to perceive themselves as the inheritors of the great past Islamic dynasties. "This meant conveniently rewriting early Ottoman history. No longer was the state portrayed as what it had had been: a state with only a nominal regard for the niceties of Orthodox Islam. It was now projected as having always been a gazi state driven by the ideal of spreading Islam by sword into the reaches of Christian Europe...[they] were repackaged as devout Muslims who were driven by zeal to spread Islam in the lands of the unbelievers."[32] This revisionist interpretation is not supported by the surviving firsthand accounts.Ottoman Holy War & Conquest: The Battle for Contantinople, 1453
At the center of the ghazi debate are two diametrically opposed theses. The first is Paul Wittek's 1938 thesis that claims that ghazi tradition was the motivating factor in the formation of the Ottoman Empire. A relative consensus formed around his influential thesis and it remained largely unchallenged for half a century. In the 1980s, several scholars began to challenge Wittek's basic assumptions. Among them was Rudi Paul Lindner, whose elaborate, systematic, and anthropological approach to dismantling ghazi theory became the most recognized work in his 1982 article and subsequent book.[8] He claimed that ghazi ethos had nothing to do with the Empire's formation.
Both Wittek and Lindner rely on the issues of genealogy, migration, and the value of a fifteenth century chronicler's account - Ahmedi's chronicles. There are several other differences in approach leading to diametrically opposed conclusions. What follows is the essence of the two theories (they are to be kept in mind during the subsequent discussion - see "Conclusions" for this author's appraisal):
Iran and the United States: Foreign Policy during the Khomeini Years
The Iranian revolutionary cry to ‘liberate’ all lands for Islam and export the revolution was taken very seriously in the wider Middle East, and given Iraq’s majority Shi’a population (under the rule of the Sunni minority), the rhetoric from Tehran was perceived as a direct threat by Saddam Hussein. For his part, Hussein believed that Iran was militarily weak following the revolution and hoped to exploit the situation by attacking the oil-rich Iranian province of Khuzestan. The war, launched by Iraq on 22 September 1980, further radicalized Iranian politics as the Islamic Republic Party (IRP) – the most radical of Iranian political factions – was left at the uncontested helm of Iranian policy-making.