 I was waiting for the crew at my local car wash to finish drying my car when a young man approached and asked where he could get the US Army decal that I display on the rear window.
“The Army gives them to people who have served, veterans, and I assume to active duty members as well,” I told him.
“You were in the Army?” he asked. Oh yes, a very long time ago before you were born, I replied, noticing a distinct accent.
He was joined by another young man. “Did you fight in the Middle East?” No, I said, but there has never been an absence of wars for America. We have never been free to ignore the rest of the world even if we wanted to.
In a similar fashion, as much as Israel may yearn for peace, they have never been permitted to function as a normal nation. From the hour that Israeli sovereignty was proclaimed, the nation was attacked by its “neighbors” and has, for all intents and purposes, been on a war footing ever since.
The two young men talking with me said they were Palestinians. Both came to America to find peace.
I think that tells you everything you need to know about the reality of Israeli-Palestinian relations—--if one can call the one-sided determination of the Palestinian leadership to “drive the Israelis into the sea.” Or the Iranian pledge to “wipe Israel off the map.” Or the Hezbollah forces in Lebanon being re-armed by the Iranians for whom they are a proxy army against Israel.
In the course of our chat, they said they were both from Gaza and I was reminded that the Israelis, in their futile quest for peace, had forced out their own people from the Gaza strip and turned the area over to Fatah, also known as the Palestinian Liberation Authority.
What they got in return was an endless cascade of rockets from Gaza, not just for a few weeks, but for months and years. Meanwhile, in Gaza, Hamas forced Fatah to retreat to the West Bank where they could have the protection of the Israelis who continue to desperately look for anyone with whom to negotiate a real peace.
In January of last year, the Israelis initiated Operation Cast lead in which their military targeted the sources of the Gaza rockets and looked for Hamas leaders who cravenly hid in the midst the population. The rocketing has largely stopped since then, though ugly individual attacks on Israelis have continued.
The Israeli solution has been to build a very high wall between them and the Palestinians and to maintain tight control over who passes through it. To do otherwise would be to subject their people to suicide bombers and other killers.
“Would you accept peace with Israel?” I asked. I was greeted with broad smiles. Yes, Palestinians want peace I was told, but “Hamas will not permit it.”
So, there you are. It has nothing to do with Washington’s foreign policy with regard to Israel and it has everything to do with the bad intentions of those who continue to use the Palestinian people as pawns of resistance to any Western presence in what they regard as their sacred lands.
The Islamic jihad knows no boundaries, killing Jews, Christians, Hindus and even Muslims with abandon. It took President Obama a year to say out loud that the U.S. is at war with al Qaeda. It took three days to say anything about the Christmas bomber.
Israel was sacred to the Jews for two thousand years before there ever was an Islamic religion. It was sacred to Christians for a thousand years before Islam existed. Jerusalem is never mentioned even once in the Koran, but, for reasons known only to Israel’s “neighbors”, they cannot find any reason to make peace with them.
The two young Palestinians were very happy to be living and working in America. They treated me with the greatest of respect and with good will. That’s the way it should be.
 According to an article on Debka.com, Saudi King Abdullah has failed to put together a coalition similar to the coalition that allowed the current Lebanese government to be formed.
The articlemakes several points none of which are particularly good for the United States and the Middle East. 1. For the second time in three months, he embarked on an action that required Riyadh to publicly concede that nothing can be achieved in the Middle East these days without Iran’s nod. (Bold mine.) The Saudi monarch went ahead with his Palestinian maneuver, after listening politely to the visiting US National Security Adviser James Jones expounding on administration policy on Iran in Riyadh Tuesday, Jan. 13. Then too he was not convinced Washington would pursue any effective policy against Iran and its nuclear program, any more than he had trusted the assurances given him last year by President Barak Obama in person, defense secretary Robert Gates or presidential envoy Dennis Ross. This mistrust was summed up in Abdullah’s recent remark: “We have heard enough words from you [Washington]. Action we have yet to see.” (Bold Mine.) Analysis. The Saudis have severe problems on all of their borders as well as internally. DEBKAfile’s Saudi experts report that the Saudi military has meanwhile returned to the Yemen battlefield against Iran-backed Houthi rebels in the north, less than a month after striking a deal guaranteed by the Syrian president for a Saudi troop pull-out from Yemen to be matched by a Houthi withdrawal from Saudi territory. Abdullah made the mistake of counting on Assad’s word binding Tehran too as the Yemeni rebels’ sponsor. But the departing Houthis turned round and quickly regained their former positions in the southern Saudi provinces. The Saudis are doing their best to get the “Palestinians” unified so that they can negotiate with Israel over a Palestinian state. They really want to put an end to that festering sore. But Iran will not accept any Palestinian coalition that does not put the “rejectionist” faction foremost in the PLO. It is doubtful that the Fatah faction under Abbas would accept this and there is a whole lot of doubt that Israel would negotiate with Khaled Mashaal siting across the table from Benyamin Netanyahu. What the Saudis want to see is some action from the United States that implies American willingness to take a risk to shut down the Iranian nuclear program. Not from this administration.
This is not an administration that is willing to consider the judicious use of force when it is absolutely required. Nor is this administration willing to challenge the People’s Republic of China where their national interests in the form of energy are at stake.
There are news reports that the PRC is sending a low level diplomat to the advisors level 5+1 talks at the UN this weekend. The PRC has made its position quite clear that it does not support anything that resembles effective sanctions. The PRC will not support any actions that might cause the Iranians to even threaten to close the Straits of Hormuz. As long as the Saudis see Iran as the eventual winner in the contest between the United States and Israel against Iran, they will defer to the Iranians. The Saudis realize that this is a dangerous move for them in both secular and religious terms. The Wahabbist Saudis certainly do not want the Shiites to become the ascendant sect of Islam.
Nor do Arabs think highly of Persians. Both sides realize that eventually there must be another religious war on the order of Mutawiya against Ali. That war will not remain within the confines of the Middle East. World Threats
 A Middle Eastern country is building a massive thick steel wall as a barrier between themselves and a Palestinian regime. The country is being condemned for its actions across the Arab world, denounced by Islamist figures like Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah, and facing angry demonstrations at its embassies around the world. Signs with the president’s face daubed with a Star of David are waved, and furious slogans are chanted.
The new construction project, written about critically in the world press as “choking” Gaza, has been dubbed the “iron wall” and the “wall of shame.” Sound familiar? Nothing new? In fact, the situation is very new. The country that is being berated and condemned is not Israel.
The wall is being build by the Egyptian government to separate territory controlled by Egypt and the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip. Israel is routinely charged with inhumanely and heartlessly fencing off Palestinian Gazans in a “prison,” despite the fact that Egypt’s official crossing to Gaza is also clamped shut, with the exception of a few days each month.
But with the construction of this new wall, Egypt is taking some powerful hits from within the Arab world. The wall being constructed is designed to stop the flow of smuggling between Egypt and Gaza through the border town of Rafah, an underground economy that is not limited to — but certainly includes — major weaponry and ammunition being stockpiled for terrorist attacks and to help Hamas rearm for the next war between Gaza and Israel.
Along with the weaponry brought in to replace the stockpiles decimated in Operation Cast Lead, millions of dollars worth of other commerce flows through the tunnels on a daily basis. Everything from food, to gasoline, to machinery, to farm animals. The tunnels are a major source of revenue for Hamas, which charges a premium for the construction and use of the tunnels and puts a tariff on any goods that are brought in. The planned 10 kilometer-long wall will include steel sheets that will reach 60 meters underground — an attempt to cut off the tunnels and the commerce that flourishes there. In addition to weaponry, the tunnels are also a conduit for terrorists, both reasons that the tunnels themselves were targeted in Operation Cast Lead. Construction of the wall began in early December, with the Egyptian government doing its best to keep news of it quiet for as long as possible. By mid-December, it became impossible to hide such a massive project, and news of the construction broke and began to spread. Even as reports began appearing in the media, Egypt refused to acknowledge its existence. An AP article dramatically described the construction in the same judgmental terms normally reserved for accounts of Israel’s building of barriers: A jackhammer pounded large steel beams side by side into the sandy soil on the Egyptian side of Gaza’s border, putting in place an underground wall that could shift the balance of power in this volatile area. Once completed, the steel barrier would cut off blockaded Gaza’s last lifeline. In the wake of the media attention, demonstrations condemning the Egyptian action have ensued, beginning in Jordan, where an organization of unions and professional associations protested construction of the wall.
Some 150 people gathered outside the Egyptian embassy in Amman earlier this month and burned photos of President Hosni Mubarak. The photos depict Mubarak with a Star of David stamped on his forehead. More at Pajamas Media
 THE salient strategic fact in the Middle East today is the Iranian drive for regional hegemony. This Iranian objective is being promoted by a rising hardline conservative elite within the Iranian regime, centred on a number of political associations and on the Iranian Revolutionary Guards corps. This elite, which is personified by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has received the backing of Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. Their aim is a second Islamic revolution that would revive the original fire of the revolution of 1979. They appear to be aiming for the augmenting of clerical rule with a streamlined, brutal police-security state, under the banner of Islam. Building Iranian power and influence throughout the Middle East is an integral part of their strategy. The Iranian nuclear program is an aspect of this ambition. A nuclear capability is meant to form the ultimate insurance for the Iranian regime as it aggressively builds its influence across the region. This goal of hegemony is being pursued through the assembling of a bloc of states and organisations under Iranian leadership. This bloc, according to Iran, represents authentic Muslim currents within the region, battling against the US and its hirelings. The pro-Iranian bloc includes Syria, Sudan, Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas among the Palestinians, and the Houthi rebel forces in northern Yemen. Israel, despite lacking official diplomatic relations with Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states, is also a key member of this camp. Unlike the pro-Iranian bloc, which has a simple guiding ideology of resistance to the West, the countries seeking to counter Iran are united by interest only. The rivalry between these two camps now informs and underlies all-important developments in the Middle East. It is behind the joint Israeli-Egyptian effort to contain the Iran-sponsored Hamas enclave in the Gaza Strip. It is behind the fighting in north Yemen, as Saudi troops take on Shia rebels armed and supported by Iran. The rivalry is behind the face-off between pro-American and pro-Iranian forces in Lebanon. The insurgencies in Afghanistan and in Iraq are also notable for the presence of weaponry traceable to Iran in use by insurgents against Western forces. Who is winning in this ongoing Middle East cold war? The rhetoric of the Iranians, of course, depicts their advance as unstoppable. The reality is more complex, and the past year has seen gains and losses for both sides. First, within Iran the electoral victory of Ahmadinejad and the subsequent backing given to him by Khamenei represented a major advance for the Iranian hardline conservatives. Ahmadinejad subsequently confirmed his victory by forming a cabinet that is packed with conservatives and Revolutionary Guardsmen. But the refusal of large sections of the Iranian people to accept the possibly rigged election and the unprecedented scenes of opposition in the streets of Iranian cities in recent weeks have severely tarnished this achievement. The ongoing unrest in Iran probably does not constitute an immediate danger to the regime. But it surely indicates that large numbers of Iranians have no desire to see their country turned into the instrument of permanent Islamic revolution and resistance envisaged by the hardline conservatives. The domestic unrest thus hits significantly at the emerging regime's legitimacy, and their ability to promote their regime as a model for governance to the Arab and wider Muslim world. Iran made major advances in Lebanon last year. The formation of the new Lebanese government in November in essence confirms Hezbollah's domination of the country. Hezbollah is the favoured child of the Iranian regime and its partner in subversive activity globally. There is now no serious internal force in Lebanon able to oppose its will. In Gaza, the Iranian-sponsored Hamas regime is holding on. The Iranian investment is central to Hamas's ability to stay in power. The movement just announced a budget of $US540 million ($590m) for 2010. Of this, just $US55m is to be raised through taxes and local sources of revenue. The rest is to come from "aid and assistance". Hamas does not reveal the identity of its benefactors. But it is fairly obvious that the bulk of this funding will come from Iran. The Palestinian issue remains the central cause celebre of the Arab and Muslim world. The Iranian regime's goal is to take ownership of it. But there have been setbacks here too. The Iranian resistance model failed in a straight fight with the Israeli Defence Forces in the early part of the year. Hamas's 100-man "Iranian unit" suffered near destruction in Gaza. The Hamas regime in Gaza managed to kill six IDF soldiers in the entire course of Operation Cast Lead. This is a failure, recorded as such by all regional observers. In addition, someone or the other appears to be trying to demonstrate to the Iranians that the use of terrorism as an instrument of state policy is a two-way street. Hence the killing of 29 Revolutionary Guards in a bombing in October near the Iran-Pakistan border, and the mysterious explosion in Damascus last month that killed a number of Iranian pilgrims. So at the beginning of 2010, the lines are clearly drawn in the Middle East cold war, and the contest is far from over. Ultimately, like other totalitarians before them, the Iranian hardline conservatives are likely to fail through overreach. The inefficient, corruption-ridden and oppressive state they are coming to dominate is likely to prove an insufficient instrument to sustain their boundless ambition. Still, this process probably has a long way to run yet. Much will depend on the sense of purpose, will and resourcefulness of the Western and regional countries that this regime has identified as its enemies. This is a contest for the future of the region. It has almost certainly not yet reached its height. Jonathan Spyer is a senior research fellow at the Global Research in International Affairs Centre in Herzliya, Israel. The Australian
 "We now issue 370,000 student visas a year - almost the entire population of Bristol or Manchester - yet hardly any of the applicants ever see hide nor hair of an Immigration Officer." An update on this story. "Terror plot raises questions over student visas," by Martin Evans for the Telegraph, December 27: The latest airline bomb plot by a terrorist with British connections raises serious questions about the UK's controversial student visa system. Umar Farouk Abdul Mutallab, who comes from a wealthy family in Nigeria, was already showing signs of extremist views when he was granted a visa to study mechanical engineering at University College London in 2005. After completing his studies in 2008 he travelled to the Middle East before applying to return to the UK in May for another six month course. However, his request was refused by officials from the UK Borders Agency as he was attempting to enrol on a course being offered by an institution on the Government's list of bogus colleges. Despite the fact his entry was barred, questions still remain over the system which has seen more than one and a half million visas granted to overseas students during the last eight years. Earlier this year a report by the Home Affairs Select Committee criticised the Government for failing to deal adequately with the explosion in bogus colleges springing up across the UK. Keith Vaz, chairman of the committee said: "The government must restrict the term college to prevent any premises above a fish and chip shop from being able to claim it is a reputed educational institution." It is feared tens of thousands of foreign nationals have gained entry to Britain illegally under the scheme, with many avoiding detection and never leaving. In March tighter restrictions were introduced cutting the number of institutions allowed to recruit students from outside the UK. But critics believe the new points based register has done little to close the system's gaping loopholes. Around 3,000 educational institutions across the UK have been granted licenses under the points based system but there are only 62 officials employed to vet the colleges and their 13,500 employees. [...] MPs have welcomed efforts to improve the system, but in their report expressed concern that inspectors were giving notice to colleges before visits. Sir Andrew Green, Chairman of Migrationwatch has also been deeply critical of the system which he said provided a "gaping hole" in our immigration system. He said: "We now issue 370,000 student visas a year - almost the entire population of Bristol or Manchester - yet hardly any of the applicants ever see hide nor hair of an Immigration Officer." There is also widespread concern that many legitimate universities and colleges are providing fertile recruiting grounds for radical Islamic preachers and banned groups. Radicalisation among students has been a problem since the 1990s, with many of those involved in terror plots being highly educated graduates. Three of the July 7 bombers attended university as did most of the gang which planned a fertiliser bomb attack on the Bluewater shopping centre and the Ministry of Sound nightclub. Ahmed Omar Sheikh, convicted of the kidnap and murder of the journalist Daniel Pearl, was a former student at London School of Economics, and Waseem Mughal, convicted of running a website for al-Qaeda in Iraq, was a former biochemistry student at Leicester University. Mughal was a member of the university Islamic society, and the fertiliser bomber Jawad Akbar attended Islamic society meetings at Brunel University, while Yassin Nassari, convicted of smuggling plans for a Qassam rocket into Britain, was president of the University of Westminster's Islamic society at its Harrow campus in Northwest London. [...] A recent study by the Centre for Social Cohesion found that a third of Muslim university students believed killing in the name of religion could be justified. The disturbing findings of the survey also found a large proportion were in favour of the introduction of Sharia law in the UK. Following publication of the report, its co-author Hannah Stuart said: "Students in higher education are the future leaders of their communities yet significant numbers of them appear to hold beliefs which contravene liberal, democratic values. "In addition there are signs of growing religious segregation on campus.
These results are deeply embarrassing for those who have said that there is no extremism in British universities."
 Can we have peace in the Holy Land? Is there a plan that will work? What if that plan included dividing Jerusalem and was embraced by our new president? What if that plan is seen as surrender and weakness, and emboldens radical Islam? If Jimmy Carter and his Liberal Left friends succeed by sacrificing America s strongest ally in the Middle East, Israel, to appease Arab rage, it will, in fact, make Jerusalem the center of gravity of the war on terror while unifying radical Islam. The results will be catastrophic for the United States, for Israel and for the world, and will leave no doubt that the Liberal Left will do everything in its power to achieve its objectives. Former French President Valery Giscard d'Estaing said of Jimmy Carter: He [Carter] was a bastard of conscience, a moralist, who treats with total lightness the fact of abandoning a man [the Shah] that we had supported together. Former Empress of Iran Farah Pahlavi wrote: During the whole of his campaign, Jimmy Carter had proclaimed the theme of human rights, the freedom of the people, which in reality has to be treated with caution, taking the economic and cultural context of each country into account. The Iranian opposition saw an ally in Carter for future struggles... Jimmy Carter: The Liberal Left and World Chaos connects the dots and helps you understand how we have come to this crisis, and more importantly, how it can be resolved. This book contains information that has never been revealed by diplomatic sources worldwide. It divulges the agenda of Jimmy Carter and the Liberal Left: they plan to sell America and the Bible Land to the highest bidder. Why does the life and presidency of Jimmy Carter matter in the twenty-first century? Philosopher George Santayana said, Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it. The United States paid an exceedingly high price for the years Carter practiced being presidential. It is still not too late to learn from the Carter White House; perhaps we can avoid the plethora of mistakes made by the former President. Should we decide to play ostrich, to forget the past, our reward could very well be the whirlwind of destruction. Jimmy Carter: the Liberal Left and World Chaos is the new expose by #1 New York Times Bestselling Author Dr. Mike Evans, who documents these facts that President Jimmy Carter: Provided checks of $150 million each to Khomeini who plotted to kill the Shah of Iran and overthrow his nation. Provided $500 million to the Muslim Brotherhood freedom fighters who became the Taliban and al Qaeda. Wire-transferred $7.9 billion to buy-back the hostages after 444 days of humiliation. On Inauguration day 2009 Jimmy Carter released his Plan for Peace in the Holy Land to persuade President Obama to: Weaken Israel, America's strongest ally in the Middle East. To support terror regimes that have murdered scores of Americans and Israelis, To push to divide Jerusalem, giving East Jerusalem to the Palestinian Authority as its Islamic capital.
About the Author Dr. Michael D. Evans is one of America s top experts on Israel and the Middle East. For over two decades he has been a personal confidant to many of Israel s top leaders. Dr. Evans is an award-winning journalist and has been published in the Wall Street Journal, Newsweek, USA Today, The Washington Times, The Jerusalem Post, and newspapers throughout the world.
He is a member of the National Press Club and has been covering events in the Middle East for decades. Michael Evans is the author of eighteen books, including the #1 New York Times bestseller The Final Move Beyond Iraq, and New York Times bestsellers Beyond Iraq: The Next Move and The American Prophecies. Millions around the world have seen his award-winning television documentaries on Israel based on his books.
Dr. Evans is a top network analyst and is in constant demand. He has appeared on hundreds of network radio and television programs such as Fox, MSNBC, Nightline, Good Morning America, Crossfire,CNN World News, BBC, the Rush Limbaugh show, and others.
Michael D. Evans has spoken to over 4,000 audiences worldwide. In the past decade alone, he has addressed more than one million people per year at public events, from the Kremlin Palace in Moscow to the World Summit on Terrorism in Jerusalem. Mike Evans is a fighter for freedom in a world of darkening and narrowing horizons.
In his devotion to Israel, Mike has consistently demonstrated the moral clarity necessary to defend Israel against the lies and distortions of its enemies. (The Honorable Benjamin Netanyahu, Prime Minister of Israel) I have known Mike Evans for more than two decades.
I consider him to be a great friend of Jerusalem and the State of Israel. He has always been there for us in our time of need, speaking out with courage and compassion.
Mike Evans is a true Ambassador to Jerusalem representing millions of Americans. (The Honorable Ehud Olmert, Prime Minister of Israel.)
 Invited recently by the newly formed Pechter Middle East Polls to ask three questions of 1,000 representative Egyptians and 1,000 urban Saudis, the Middle East Forum focused on Iran and Israel, the countries that most polarize the region. The results are illuminating. (Technical note: Respondents were interviewed face to face in Arabic, in their own homes using a structured questionnaire during November by a credible, private, local commercial company with a solid track record. The margin of error is ±3 percent.) Iran: In today's Middle Eastern cold war, the Islamic Republic of Iran heads the revolutionary bloc, while the governments of Saudi Arabia and Egypt head the opposing status-quo bloc. How anxious are the Saudi and Egyptian populations of the Iranian nuclear weapons buildup? Pechter Polls asked two questions for MEF: "Assuming the Iranian government continues its nuclear enrichment program, would you support an Israeli strike against Iranian nuclear facilities?" and "How about an American strike against the Iranian nuclear facilities?" In Egypt, 17 percent support an Israeli strike and 25 percent an American one. In Saudi Arabia, the figures, respectively, are 25 and 35 percent. Backing for an Israeli strike is surprisingly strong, for an American one, roughly as I expected. These numbers confirm a just-completed review of polling data by David Pollock of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, who found "strikingly high levels of support—especially among Saudis—for tough action against Iran's nuclear program." These figures suggest that between a sixth and a third of the population in the two most important status-quo countries is agreeable to an Israeli or American attack on the Iranian nuclear infrastructure. Although not a negligible minority, it is small enough to give the Egyptian or Saudi government pause about being associated with a strike on Iran. In particular, giving Israeli forces permission to traverse Saudi airspace would seem to be out of the question. Israel: The Forum asked, "Islam defines the state of Egypt/Saudi Arabia; under the right circumstances, would you accept a Jewish State of Israel?" In this case, 26 percent of Egyptians and 9 percent of Saudi subjects answered in the affirmative. We posed this question to quantify the heart of the Arab-Israeli conflict, a conflict not about the size of Israel, its resources, armaments, sovereignty over holy sites, or the number of its citizens living on the West Bank. Rather, it concerns the fundamental goal of Zionism, the creation of a state defined by Jewish identity. To provide context: About 20 percent of Palestinians since the 1920s have been willing to live with Israel in a state of harmony.
The Egyptian response exceeds this slightly, the Saudi one comes in substantially below it. These results are in keeping with the more overtly religious nature of political life in Saudi Arabia than in Egypt. They confirm that the main source of anti-Zionism now is no longer nationalism but Islam. Drilling down into the survey numbers shows little demographic variation (by age, education, etc.). One difference runs along gender lines, with Egyptian females accepting a Jewish state of Israel more than Egyptian males, but just the reverse in Saudi Arabic, something not readily explainable. Geographic differences in Saudi Arabia are more consequential. Residents in the western part of the country, that closest to Israel, accept it as a Jewish state much more readily than do residents of the more distant central and eastern regions. Conversely, residents in the eastern and central regions are 50 percent more likely to endorse an American strike on nearby Iran than those of the more remote western region. The Saudi west (Hijaz, Asir) remains true to its pedigree as the most liberal part of the country, whereas the east (Al-Ahsa) has the most Shi'ites and the most fear of Tehran. These regional variations point to the utility of seeing Saudi Arabia not as a homogenous whole but as an amalgam of regions with historically different identities, and perhaps making policy with these distinctions in mind. In sum, these polling numbers point to a small but not trivial base of constructive views in countries largely hostile to the West and Israel. If this base has few prospects of driving policy anytime soon, it offers a kernel of common sense that, if given suitable attention, can be built upon to foster long-term improvements. Mr. Pipes is director of the Middle East Forum and Taube distinguished visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution of Stanford University. Daniel Pipes
 By Nina Lakhani Hundreds of British schoolgirls are facing the terrifying prospect of female genital mutilation (FGM) over the Christmas holidays as experts warn the practice continues to flourish across the country. Parents typically take their daughters back to their country of origin for FGM during school holidays, but The Independent on Sunday has been told that "cutters" are being flown to the UK to carry out the mutilation at "parties" involving up to 20 girls to save money. The police face growing criticism for failing to prosecute a single person for carrying out FGM in 25 years; new legislation from 2003 which prohibits taking a girl overseas for FGM has also failed to secure a conviction. Experts say the lack of convictions, combined with the Government's failure to invest enough money in education and prevention strategies, mean the practice continues to thrive. Knowledge of the health risks and of the legislation remains patchy among practising communities, while beliefs about the supposed benefits for girls remain firm, according to research by the Foundation for Women's Health, Research and Development.
As a result, specialist doctors and midwives are struggling to cope with increasing numbers of women suffering from long-term health problems, including complications during pregnancy and childbirth. Campaigners are urging ministers to take co-ordinated steps to work with communities here and overseas to change deep-seated cultural attitudes and stamp out this extreme form of violence against women. The author and life peer Ruth Rendell, who has campaigned against FGM for 10 years, said: "When I helped take the Bill through Parliament seven years ago, I was very hopeful that we'd get convictions and that would then act as a deterrent for other people. But that has never happened and my heart bleeds for these girls.
This mutilation is forever; nothing can be done to restore the clitoris, and that is just very sad for them. I have repeatedly asked questions of ministers from all departments about why there has never been a prosecution and why we still do not have a register of cases. But while they are always very sympathetic, nothing ever seems to get done. Teachers must not be squeamish and must talk to their girls so we can try and prevent it from happening." FGM is classified into four types, of varying severity; type 3 is the most mutilating and involves total removal of the clitoris, labia and a narrowing of the whole vagina. An estimated 70,000 women living in the UK have undergone FGM, and 20,000 girls remain at risk, according to Forward.
The practice is common in 28 African countries, including Somalia, Sudan and Nigeria, as well as some Middle Eastern and Asian countries such as Malaysia and Yemen.
It is generally considered to be an essential rite of passage to suppress sexual pleasure, preserve girls' purity and cleanliness, and is necessary for marriage in many communities even now. More at the Independent
 By James Delingpole This is a guest post by contributor Andrew30 (whose full name I’ll give you when he reminds me via email). He put it up in comments but it’s so interesting it really deserves a blog all to itself). Why would a Middle Eastern kingdom be funding a British Climate research business? Oman has just completed a massive investment in LNG, and developed and installed new CO2 removal technology in their process; this lowers the carbon footprint of their gas. So using their gas to drive electricity generation will be less costly once CO2 is taxed.
They have no problem with this whole thing.
Saudi Arabia, who have oil and not so much gas, are in a different position, they have a problem with this whole thing. Just an observation; a 4 degree rise in temperature in the Sultanate of Oman or Saudi
Arabia would change it from really hot to really hot. Maybe it is just good business. http://www.omanlng.com/ Oman LNG L.L.C
Formed: Set up by Royal Decree in February 1994.
Location: Head office: Muscat; Plant: Qalhat near Sur (approx 340 km from Muscat)
Products: Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG).
Shareholders: Government of Oman 51 %, Royal Dutch/Shell Group 30%, Total Elf Fina 5.54%, KOLNG 5%, Partex 2% Mitsubishi 2.77%, Mitsui 2.77%, ltochu 0.92%. The Climate Research Unit (CRU) in the UK was set up in 1971 with funding from Shell and BP as is described in the book: “The history of the University of East Anglia, Norwich; Page 285)” By Michael Sanderson. The CRU was still being funded in 2008 by Shell, BP, the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate and UK Nirex LTD (the nuclear waste people in the UK) This is important to know, for two reasons.
Firstly, the key institution providing support for Global Warming theories and the basis for the IPCC findings receives funding from “Big Oil” and the nuclear power industry.
Secondly, the research from the institution which is perceived to be independent publicly funded research, is actually beholden to soft money, CRU is in fact a business. The funders of the CRU are on the bottom of this page from their website:
http://web.archive.org/web/20080627194858/http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/cru/about/history/ So, there a business set up in the early 1970’s, so what? I thought that this might explain a bit about how we got to where we are. I am not a conspiracy theorist but to me it looks like this may have been a very, very long term plan. Of course it could all just be coincidental, but it does seem to fit the observable information. A few weeks ago I explained the apparent CRU fraud to a friend of mine, a believer in AGW; he said ‘Why would they do it?’ I indicated the Jones had received 22 million, etc, but he countered, ‘For a fraud this large, going on for this long, there would have to be billions of dollars to be made, not millions’. That made sense. So I looked into it a bit. First this is no short term thing, it covers two or three decades, involves many countries and government on both sides of the isle, the US alone has had 4 different presidents and the UK a similar number of prime ministers, Canada the same. So is it not political in the partisan sense of the word. If, and this is a big if, you make the assumption that the objectives were: 1. Provide a smooth replacement of the use of oil in power generation and transportation, so as to avoid a panic over Peak Oil.
2. Get people to buy into Nuclear Power so that base load electrical power generation would not consume the available fossil fuel supply.
3. Get the people to really want to pay for it all. Note: The IEA put a date on peak oil production THIS WEEK, so if the CO2 scare does not pan out they are already starting to put the ‘Peak Oil’ story into play. It is also the 2020 date, why am I not surprised. http://www.economist.com/businessfinance/displaystory.cfm?story_id=15065719 Then the following is not unbelievable. The newer scrubber technology for coal fired plants was moving along well back then, and in fact today their scrubbers can remove pretty much everything except CO2. However there is really not much money in coal, it is abundant, easy to handle, local in most instance to the base load demand for electricity, and a coal fired power plant is not much more complicated, or expensive, then a good steam engine. Since there was not enough money in coal it would not be financially rewarding to simply try to promote coal as a replacement for oil. So they looked at the situation and realized that the difference between the different technologies to replace base load power generation was the amount of CO2 per kilowatt/hour. At that point CO2 became the target. That happened sometime between 1985 and 1988. Now, the environmental movement is comprised mostly of followers, you can look up ‘dihydrogen monoxide’ (water), on many occasions at environmental conferences comedians and light news organizations have managed to get lots of environmentalists to sign a petition to ban dihydrogen monoxide. So apparently they do not do a lot of independent analysis before making a conclusion, they are mostly followers. So if you need a large number of followers, there is a ready supply, but you need people, a few leaders, to tell the followers what to think. The followers do not need to, or perhaps even want to, know the reason or the facts; they just need something or someone to follow. Now you gain control of a climate research business, and begin the task of demonizing CO2, you realize that it will take years but that is OK, there are billions of dollars waiting at the end. Slowly over time you manage to get control of the worlds climate data and begin adjusting it, you use what you have been told by the marketing people to present the information needed in as clear and scary manager as is possible. Remember the two biggest motivators are fear and greed, and in this case, because of the number of followers greed will not work. There are simply too many followers to pay them all off. More at the Telegraph
 At Family Security Matters, we know that these are uncertain times. In only a few years, we've lived through 9/11 and two subsequent wars. We watch the news and hear about nuclear weapons in the hands of our enemies and see the destruction wrought by terrorists in Europe, the Middle East, and Asia. We look at the faces of our children, wonder what the future holds for them, and hope that their future is more peaceful than our present. We try to understand why people would want to kill us and what we must do to stop them, but we are too busy to become experts and it seems like the news media are more interested in entertaining us, or persuading us, than informing us. Once upon a time, we were just like you, eager to understand the world and interested in helping to shape it, but without any real idea of how we could learn and what we could do. Family Security Matters was created to give Americans like us the tools to become involved citizens and powerful defenders of our homes, our families, and our communities. We believe in the power of everyday Americans to make this world safer and more secure.
We know that knowledge is most powerful when it is shared and so we are dedicated to bringing this knowledge directly to you. We want to equip Americans, women and men, with the information resources to become discriminating citizens who will demand the best out of their elected representatives.
And then we want to show you how you can influence national policy and community security directly, without waiting for government action. We want to be your best resource for accurate and practical knowledge that will make your families and communities safer, stronger, and more secure. This problem is too important to wait for someone else to solve it. So let us give you the information you need in order to become active participants in America's struggle for security and peace. Terrorist are on a mission . . . Terrorist attacks upon the United States are not indiscriminate and done merely to kill, without any larger purpose. The very definition of terrorism is the use of violence and intimidation to compel the people and government of a country to make certain policy decisions.
The objectives of groups such as Al Qaeda are quite clear. They seek to punish the United States and the West for perceived attacks upon Muslims worldwide, to secure control over the Middle East and its oil by forcing the withdrawal of Western military forces and cultural influences, and ultimately to establish Islam as the dominant force worldwide by undermining the Western institutions that restrict the ascendancy of radical Islam.
These objectives have been clearly articulated in the published writings and recorded statements of the movement's leaders.
In 1996, Osama bin Laden issued a fatwa, or religious statement, declaring war against the United States. Later statements indicate that he has calculated the number of Muslim deaths due to American policies at 4 million and is willing to kill an equivalent number of Americans, including women and children, in order to achieve his vision. FSM
 The US House of Representatives Tuesday adopted a bill asking the US president to report to Congress on incitement to anti-American violence on television networks in the Middle East. Lawmakers adopted the measure in a decisive 395-3 vote. The bill asks the US president to report, six months after the text has passed, "on anti-American incitement to violence in the Middle East, and for other purposes." "For years, media outlets in the Middle East have repeatedly published or broadcast incitements to violence against the United States and Americans," the bill read. "Given the dangers such incitement poses to American soldiers and civilians in the ... region and at home, it is long past time for the US and other responsible nations to stop this growing threat," said Republican Gus Bilirakis, author of the bill. It calls for punitive measures for networks deemed to be fueling terror. Among the networks mentioned are al-Aqsa, Hamas' television station, which broadcasts from Gaza, and Hezbollah's al-Manar. The US Senate has yet to weigh in on the issue. YNet
 Egypt’s foreign minister, Ahmed Aboul Gheit, warned Tehran yesterday against continued ambiguity surrounding its nuclear programme as it risks losing the trust of the international community and endangers the stability of the region.
“Iran is a co-signer of the [Nuclear] Non-Proliferation treaty and has the right to develop nuclear technology for peaceful purposes, but we tell Tehran from the Gulf that they need to be cautious about not losing the international community’s confidence through its actions,” Mr Aboul Gheit said during a joint press conference with the Bahraini foreign minister, Sheikh Khalid bin Ahmed al Khalifa, in Manama.
He said the building of secret nuclear installations contradicts Iran’s commitments under the treaty’s terms. “When there are suggestions that the programme could be of a military nature we find that to be deeply concerning because the Middle East will fail in its endeavor to be a nuclear and weapons of mass destruction free-zone,” he said. “Also concerning for us is that the Middle East would find itself under two nuclear umbrellas – one in Iran and another in Israel.” Mr Aboul Gheit, who said there was no such thing as an “Islamic” nuclear bomb, pointed out that the possibility of an attack either by the West or Israel against Iranian nuclear installations could drag the region into violence.
Sheikh Khalid bin Ahmed al Khalifa said Manama hoped to see the issue “resolved through diplomacy.” The National
 By Alan Caruba When President Obama delivers a speech on why he is going to send more thousands of U.S. troops and spend more billions on the eight-year-old conflict in Afghanistan, it would be a good idea to better understand why so much of what is reported from the Middle East suffers a great disconnect from the truth.
In 1998, Joris Luyendijk , a Dutch student who had studied Arabic at Cairo University for a year, was offered a job as a Middle East correspondent for a Dutch news agency despite having no experience as a reporter. What followed was his real education about the Middle East and the way it is presented to the West by the news media.
His book about that experience, “People Like Us: Misrepresenting the Middle East” was initially published in the Netherlands in 2006 and has since then it has been translated and published in Hungary, Italy, Denmark and Germany. In October an English edition was published by Soft Skull Press, an imprint of Counterpoint, a Berkeley, California publisher.
Having begun my career as a journalist, I was interested to learn what Luyendijk had taken from his years hopping around the Middle East before and after 9/11 and during the two Iraq wars waged by the U.S. to resolve a problem called Saddam Hussein.
For anyone digesting the news from his morning newspaper or watching it on television, suspecting that it might be biased or wrong, this book that focuses on reporting from the Middle East is a revelation because Luyendijk strives mightily to expose the way the news is manipulated by all the parties involved.
Covering his experiences from 1998 to 2003, the author is refreshingly candid, admitting that, despite his student year in Cairo, he had little or no real understanding of Egypt or the rest of the Middle East.
There is, however, one thing that anyone can understand. The Middle East is composed of dictatorships and the sole purpose of each one is to survive. To do that, their people must be constantly indoctrinated and fearful. That is made possible by rendering them, individually and as a group, powerless. There simply is no such thing as justice or the opportunity to express an opinion in opposition to the leader.
Significantly, those living in the Middle East cannot make an informed judgment of what is occurring around them because they operate two points of view that are very real to them. First is a widely accepted sense of victimhood, and, second, they believe that Israel, ultimately, is manipulating the entire world!
Conversely, Americans who have no contact with the Middle East beyond the headlines and snapshots of bloodshed and warfare are comparably unable to make informed judgments about a people who differ among themselves in many ways.
The Middle East is very different from the West and Luyendijk believes that few in the West are even vaguely aware that those who live there live in a parallel universe; one that functions by the rules of ruthless dictatorships, by tribes, and by a religion that is hostile to all others.
Democracy is not likely to take root in the Middle East and this can be traced to the prevailing religion of the region, Islam. The only reason democracy occurred in Turkey is because the founder of the modern state, Ataturk, isolated Islam from the conduct of governance and that has been backed up by an army that has, thus far, ensured the separation.
 ANKARA, - Turkish government's course of policy in the Israeli-Palestinian war has heightened expectations in the Arab world that Turkey should assume a more effective role in solving conflicts in the Middle East, results of a survey has shown.
The survey on 'Turkey Perception in the Middle East' was conducted by the Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation in seven Arab countries among 2006 interviewees in July.
The survey - as Anatolia news agency reports - showed a growing awareness for Turkey in the Arab world after 2002 when the ruling Justice and Development (AK) Party came to power as 79% of all participants and 89% of the interviewed Palestinians had said Turkey should engage in mediation efforts.
Over 75% of the interviewees said they had a positive view on Turkey and 80% of them said Turkey "treated the Arab countries well." "The elaboration of Turkey's foreign policy toward the Middle East especially during the AK Party government has created an awareness for Turkey among the people in the region," said Prof. Meliha Altunisik from the Middle East Technical University in Ankara.
Altunisik said Turkey was perceived as "a constructive country that contributes to stability and its role in the region has been boosted in a constructive way. This is a very positive result."
The Turkish scholar said the recent lifting of visa requirement between Turkey and Syria had also contributed much to the positive perception.
 In the movie, “Groundhog Day”, the main character wakes up day after day, trapped in the same events, desperately looking for a way out of that living nightmare. It’s a very good metaphor for the Middle East.
Here are some quotes from a book whose title I will reveal in a moment:
“The only truly transcendent law in the Middle East is that of unintended consequences.”
“Nation-building and the redressing of historic wrongs were in the air…”
“His fighters secured control of key rivers, recaptured Kut, and on (date withheld) stormed victoriously into Baghdad. Still undecided was how this famous city—and, indeed, most of Mesopotamia—would now be governed.”
“I suppose we have underestimated the fact that this country is really an inchoate mass of tribes which can’t as yet be reduced to any system. The Turks didn’t govern and we have tried to govern…and failed.”
And finally “Our armies have come into your cities and lands not as conquerors or enemies, but as liberators.”
All this and more was said in the 1920s by British imperialists. If it sounds like things being said by Americans, then you must assume that America has been repeating all the mistakes of Great Britain in the exact same places.
The book being quoted is “Kingmakers: The Invention of the Modern Middle East” by Karl E. Mayer and Shareen Blair Brysac ($18.95, W.W. Norton, softcover) and its five-hundred pages are devoted to the extraordinary personalities of the 1920s who, believing it was Great Britain’s duty was to bring civilization to India, Africa, and the Middle East, devoted themselves to “Pax Britannia”, the rule of distant colonies representing a fourth of the world’s population.
The book is a reminder that whatever passes for modernity in the Middle East has generally been imposed by the process of European colonization in quest of its oil and other riches to fatten the profits of various British, French, and American business enterprises such as the Suez Canal and the oil companies.
Left to themselves the polyglot of tribes would never have experienced anything resembling modernization.
Afghanistan today would look very much the same to the earliest invaders and explorers who passed through it. No roads. No hospitals. Few schools. No jobs except raising poppies for the heroin trade or serving in the army or police. Men raised from youth to fight anyone and everyone. Pushtuns, Tajiks, Hazarus, Uzbeks, Turkmen, and Qizilbash.
The Middle East had been ruled by the Turkish Ottoman Empire for centuries—from Egypt to Persia. Going back even further in history, the region was no stranger to European invasions. The Crusades were a response against the Islamic invaders that at one point had laid siege to Vienna.
As the authors note, “In his history of Jerusalem, the Israeli writer Amos Elon calculates that over four millennia the Holy City has known ‘twenty ruinous sieges, two intervals of total destruction, eighteen recent reconstructions, and at least eleven transitions from one religion to another.” In 1967 visitors could find the remnants of “Roman encampments, Crusader castles, Turkish parapets, and British pillboxes.”
To suggest, for example, that after more than sixty years of Israeli national sovereignty that Arab neighbor nations (and Iran) have the slightest intention of allowing it to exist is to ignore the history of centuries old intolerance directed against both Christian and Jew.
Following World War One, England and France divided the remains of the Ottoman Empire that had chosen to side with Germany. It would have died sooner or later of its own dead weight, but it was Sir Percy Zachariah Cox who would take out “a map and a pencil to draw the boundary between Iraq and the Nejd (now Saudi Arabia). The borders with Syria and Transjordan were defined similarly.”
There were Arab leaders, but they were generally the pawns of the great powers, frequently assassinated or deposed. With some exceptions, the nations of the Middle East continue to be ruled by monarchs and despots.
As the British Empire shrank in the wake of World War Two and American power grew only one thing is clear.
Neither of these imperial powers had any clue, nor way of dealing with the Middle East’s regressive Islamic fanaticism that remains a ceaseless threat to Western civilization. And, as in past times, the debates rage about staying in or getting out.
Every day in the Middle East is Groundhog Day.
 Debka.com is reporting here that the United States is apparently taking moves to be prepared for war in the Middle East. DEBKAfile’s US intelligence sources report indications of impending war preparations against Iran after Tehran’s rejections of the UN-brokered proposal to ship its enriched uranium overseas for further enrichment. These sources reveal that the administration is seeking congressional authorization to open America’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR).
Furthermore, the US-Israeli joint US-Israel Juniper Cobra ballistic exercise is in full swing. Finally, US and Israel officials have been instructed to warn Moscow that the military option is still on the table if Iran’s nuclear program is not halted by diplomatic means. These actions are apparently in response to Iran’s negative reply to sending the bulk of its enriched uranium to Russia and France for reprocessing into fuel rods. Analysis. Iran is button pushing again. They want the war and chaos it creates to provide the conditions for the “Hidden Imam” to reappear. They also want to be the defender in this scenario. They are willing to absorb whatever attack the Israelis , and others, may deliver against them to get that to happen. Expect Iran to continue the present course as long as the mullahocracy remains in power.
At some point the Israelis primarily and most likely in consultations and cooperation with their neighbors who will also be effected will attack Iran’s nuclear facilities and other military targets. Six months? Source: World Threats
 The 'statesman for hire' earns a fortune as he flips roles between public official and private consultant, writes Jon Ungoed-Thomas TONY Blair has cashed in on his contacts from the Iraq war and his role as Middle East peace envoy for a private business venture expected to earn him more than pound stg. 5 million ($8.9m) a year.
The former British prime minister has sold his political and economic expertise to Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates, via his fledgling private consultancy. He also represents the investment bank JPMorgan in the region. Mr Blair has been working pro bono in the Middle East as a peace envoy while amassing a fortune from the US lecture circuit. By offering himself to the Arab states as a statesman for hire, he could double his annual earnings. His consultancy, the London-based Tony Blair Associates, emulates the New York partnership Kissinger Associates, founded by Henry Kissinger, the former national security adviser to US president Richard Nixon. A friend of Mr Blair said: "TBA has been set up to make money from foreign governments and major companies. There's a focus on the Middle East, because that's where the money is." His expanding business interests as he roves across the Middle East mean he flips his roles on a daily basis in official meetings. One hour he is the official peace envoy meeting a Middle East minister or ruler, the next he is a representative of TBA or JPMorgan. In some meetings with Arab states, where Mr Blair is introduced as the peace envoy, he has been flanked by Jonathan Powell, his former chief of staff, who accepted a job with Morgan Stanley, another US investment bank, after leaving Downing Street. Mr Powell has no role in the peace process, but is a senior adviser to TBA and helps to win business in the Middle East. Peter Brierley, 59, from Batley, West Yorkshire, whose son Shaun, 28, was killed near the Kuwait-Iraq border in March 2003 and who refused to shake Mr Blair's hand at a memorial service this month, said: "This beggars belief. "It's absolutely scandalous that he's now trying to make money from his contacts in the region. It's money from the blood and lives of the soldiers who died in Iraq." Hours after he stepped down from No10 in June 2007, Mr Blair became the Middle East envoy, on behalf of the European Union, the UN, US and Russia. Four months after leaving office, Blair signed a pound stg. 5m book deal with Random House. He is working on his memoirs, which are pencilled in for publication this time next year. His fees for talks, along with contracts with JPMorgan and Zurich Financial Services, are estimated to put his earnings -- excluding the book deal -- well in excess of pound stg. 5m a year. TBA's annual earnings in the Middle East alone could be expected easily to double his current income, according to business sources in the region. Mr Blair disclosed last December that he had formed TBA to advise on "political and economic trends and governmental reform". One of his first recruits was Mr Powell. On January 17, Blair was in Saudi Arabia in his peace envoy role to hold talks with King Abdullah on the Gaza strip and the need to end Israeli aggression. Mr Powell was also on the trip. Two days later, Mr Blair and Mr Powell met the nephew of the king, Prince Alwaleed, the wealthiest businessman in the Middle East, with a fortune of more than $26 billion. Read more here,,,, Source: The Australian
 Many Egyptians had fallen in love with the new young American president with an Arabic middle name. Some even picked up the "Yes we can" slogan. His appeal was fueled by an almost unanimous dislike for his predecessor, George W. Bush, widely perceived in the region as a Christian fundamentalist leading an anti-Muslim crusade. But that was then.
Euphoria has a short shelf life in the Middle East, and Barack Obama is not exempt.
To gauge reaction among Egyptian intellectuals to the news, I called Hisham Qassim, a democracy and human rights activist I've known for many years. He was perplexed at the news from Norway. President Obama, he said, "is stumbling in the Middle East. He hasn't achieved any of his promises, and the Arab-Israeli conflict appears to be getting even nastier." In short, he said, "nothing is working." One winner of the Nobel peace prize Egyptians continue to admire is former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, who won the prize in 2002. After personally overseeing prolonged and painstaking negotiations between Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin, Carter brokered the 1978 Camp David Peace Accords. It was the first peace agreement between Israel and an Arab country, and one a majority of Egyptians still believe was a major landmark in their long history. Egyptians contrast Carter's intensive involvement in peace efforts with Obama's stab at peace-making between Israel and the Palestinians. After initially demanding Israel halt all settlement construction in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, the Obama administration softened its stand after running into a concrete wall of opposition from hard-line Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The Obama administration is seen, not only in Egypt but also across the Arab world, as following in the footsteps of so many previous American administrations, caving in to Israeli intransigence. It hardly augurs well for peace in the Middle East, especially at a time when tensions are simmering in Jerusalem, with some wondering if a third Palestinian intifada is in the making. Read more here,,,, Source: CNN
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