John R. Bolton fyrrum sendiherra Bandaríkjanna hjá Sameinuðu þjóðunum um ákvörðun Trumps

 

 

Trump að „skjóta sig í fótinn“

Múslímsk kona segir skoðun sína á Ísrael

Sjá myndbandið hér fyrir neðan. Enskur texti fylgir.

Merkel kanslari er ekki öfundsverð

Ekki er Merkel öfundsverð þessa dagana. Það hlýtur að vera erfitt að hafa staðið fyrir því að opna Evrópu fyrir "flótta" fólki og horfa uppá að þetta sama fólk sem hún vildi vernda er nú að ráðast á þýskan almenning til að drepa og eyðileggja innviði ríkis hennar.

Fólkið sem kaus hana og trúði henni fyrir heill þjóðarinnar og að standa vörð um Þýsk gildi og öryggi landsmanna er nú að fá sig fullsatt af gjörðum hennar og aðgerðarleysi.

Þetta síðasta dæmi er ekki hið fyrsta sem hún verður að horfast í augu við og örugglega ekki hið síðasta.

Merkel slegin yfir fréttunum

Var forsætisráðherra Kanada í læri hjá Hillary Clinton?

Líklegt er að Justin Trudeau hafi verið í læri hjá Hillary Clinton. Þau meintu framlög sem JT hefur þegið úr hendi auðmanna er reyndar bara skiptimynt í samanburði við það sem HC fékk.

Clinton leit ekki við smáaurum, menn þurftu að gera vel við hana ættu þeir að ná tali af henni og fengið greiða út á framlögin sem þeir veittu henni. Allt var falt eftir því sem fyrstu tölustafirnir voru hærri í hundruð milljóna dollara framlögunum.

 

Trudeau svari fyrir meinta spillingu

Hvað er að gerast með heimsmarkaðsverð á olíu? Er einhver með puttana í þessu? Af hverju?

Það eru eflaust margir sem velta því fyrir sér hvers vegna olíuverð á heimsmarkaði hefur lækkað eins og raun ber vitni.  Jú, OPEC ríkin hafa ekki komið sér saman um að draga úr framleiðslu eins og þau eru vön að gera þegar þau sjá fram á olíuverðslækkun.  En hvað veldur?  Hverjir hafa hagsmuna að gæta?  Hverjir fara verst út úr lækkuninni?

Í grein GlobalResearch eftir Mike Whitney segir frá því að í september s.l. hafi John Kerry utanríkisráðherra Bandaríkjanna, væntanlega eftir fyrirmælum Obama forseta, farið á fund Abdullah konungs Saudi Arabíu og samið við hann um að setja mikið af ódýrri olíu á markaðinn og þannig verða þess valdandi að olíuverð lækki all verulega.

Tilgangurinn með þessum aðgerðum er að koma höggi á efnahag Rússlands, þar sem Rússar eru háðir olíuútflutningi, en Obama telur sig eiga harma að hefna gegn Pútín sem hann þolir ekki, reyndar er Pútín ekki sá eini sem Obama þolir ekki, en það er önnur saga.

Ég held að Obama geri sér ekki grein fyrir þeirri hættu sem hann er að skapa með þessum aðgerðum.  Obama er búinn að særa björninn stóra í austri og króa hann af úti í horni.  Hvað gera særð dýr sem eru af króuð?  Þau snúast til varna og beita afli og eira engu sem á vegi þeirra verður.  Ætli Obama sér í stríð þá er þetta góð leið til þess að koma því á.  Sjálfsagt vill hann ekki verða sá sem hleypur af fyrsta skotinu svo fólk bendi ekki á hann og segi, "hann byrjaði", en hann ögrar Pútín eins og hann mögulega getur í von um að hann missi sig.

Hvað mun síðan gerast þegar Obama hefur náð sínu fram?  Mun þá olíuverðið ekki fara upp úr öllu valdi?  Ætli Saudar og önnur olíuríki vilji ekki ná aftur þeim fjármunum sem þau telja sig hafa orðið af vegna lækkananna nú?  Fer þá ekki tunnan, sem nú er um USD 60, upp fyrir USD 300 þegar þeir sjá sér færi á að endurheimta "tapaðar" tekjur?  Ég held við getum verið viss um það að sú lækkun sem við höfum séð undanfarið er ekki og verður ekki gefins, hún mun kosta okkur þó síðar verði.

Hér fyrir neðan er vefslóðin á grein Mike Whitney á Global Research.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-oil-coup/5420293

 

Beita Rússa frekari refsiaðgerðum

Hið rétta andlit Obama og Obamacare kemur sífellt betur og betur í ljós!

Obama er strengjabrúða elítunnar.  Á hans embættistíð hafa persónunjósnir margfaldast og er svo komið að ekki er einvörðungu fylgst grannt með Bandarískum þegnum heldur langt út fyrir landamæri BNA.

Obamacare snýst ekki um velferð Bandaríkjamanna, heldur er verið að koma á fullkomnu eftirliti með einstaklingnum, þannig að ríkið getur á augabragði sótt allar þær upplýsingar sem stjórnvöldum dettur í hug um hvern og einn eftir "þörfum".

Obamacare flaug í gegnum þingið þar sem enginn þingmaður nennti að lesa sig í gegn um þær 3000 blaðsíður sem frumvarpið hljóðaði uppá.  Þó reyndu nokkrir repúblikanar að malda í móinn en fengu bágt fyrir.

Michael Connelly, fyrrum lögmaður er var sérhæfður í stjórnarskrár tengdum málum, las sig í gegnum þessar 3000 blaðsíðu lög og var ekki skemmt.  Það er ýmislegt gruggugt sem kemur í ljós við lestur á því sem Mr. Connelly hefur að segja.

Hér fyrir neðan er úrdráttur úr áliti hans á þessum lögum, á ensku.

 Hið rétta andlit Obama og Obamacare kemur sífellt betur og betur í ljós!

The Truth About the Health Care Bills - Michael Connelly, Ret. Constitutional Attorney

Well, I have done it! I have read the entire text of proposed House Bill 3200: The Affordable Health Care Choices Act of 2009. I studied it with particular emphasis from my area of expertise, constitutional law. I was frankly concerned that parts of the proposed law that were being discussed might be unconstitutional. What I found was far worse than what I had heard or expected.

To begin with, much of what has been said about the law and its implications is in fact true, despite what the Democrats and the media are saying. The law does provide for rationing of health care, particularly where senior citizens and other classes of citizens are involved, free health care for illegal immigrants, free abortion services, and probably forced participation in abortions by members of the medical profession.

The Bill will also eventually force private insurance companies out of business, and put everyone into a government run system. All decisions about personal health care will ultimately be made by federal bureaucrats, and most of them will not be health care professionals. Hospital admissions, payments to physicians, and allocations of necessary medical devices will be strictly controlled by the government.

However, as scary as all of that is, it just scratches the surface. In fact, I have concluded that this legislation really has no intention of providing affordable health care choices. Instead it is a convenient cover for the most massive transfer of power to the Executive Branch of government that has ever occurred, or even been contemplated. If this law or a similar one is adopted, major portions of the Constitution of the United States will effectively have been destroyed.

The first thing to go will be the masterfully crafted balance of power between the Executive, Legislative, and Judicial branches of the U.S. Government. The Congress will be transferring to the Obama Administration authority in a number of different areas over the lives of the American people, and the businesses they own.

The irony is that the Congress doesn’t have any authority to legislate in most of those areas to begin with! I defy anyone to read the text of the U.S. Constitution and find any authority granted to the members of Congress to regulate health care.

This legislation also provides for access, by the appointees of the Obama administration, in direct violation of the specific provisions of the 4th Amendment to the Constitution, of all of your personal healthcare information, your personal financial information, and the information of your employer, physician, and hospital. All of this is a protecting against unreasonable searches and seizures. You can also forget about the right to privacy. That will have been legislated into oblivion regardless of what the 3rd and 4th Amendments may provide.

If you decide not to have healthcare insurance, or if you have private insurance that is not deemed acceptable to the Health Choices Administrator appointed by Obama, there will be a tax imposed on you. It is called a tax instead of a fine because of the intent to avoid application of the due process clause of the 5th Amendment. However , that doesn’t work because since there is nothing in the law that allows you to contest or appeal the imposition of the tax, it is definitely depriving someone of property without the due process of law.

So, there are three of those pesky amendments that the far left hate so much, out the original ten in the Bill of Rights, that are effectively nullified by this law. It doesn’t stop there though.

The 9th Amendment that provides: The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people;

The 10th Amendment states: The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are preserved to the States respectively, or to the people. Under the provisions of this piece of Congressional handiwork neither the people nor the states are going to have any rights or powers at all in many areas that once were theirs to control.

I could write many more pages about this legislation, but I think you get the idea.

This is not about health care; it is about seizing power and limiting rights. Article 6 of the Constitution requires the members of both houses of Congress to “be bound by oath or affirmation to support the Constitution.” If I was a member of Congress I would not be able to vote for this legislation or anything like it, without feeling I was violating that sacred oath or affirmation. If I voted for it anyway, I would hope the American people would hold me accountable.

For those who might doubt the nature of this threat, I suggest they consult the source, the US Constitution, and Bill of Rights. There you can see exactly what we are about to have taken from us.

Michael Connelly (First published in June 2012)
Retired attorney,
Constitutional Law Instructor
Carrollton, Texas

- See more at: http://www.lindseywilliams.net/#sthash.lktn6Lyz.dpuf

The Truth About the Health Care Bills - Michael Connelly, Ret. Constitutional Attorney

Well, I have done it! I have read the entire text of proposed House Bill 3200: The Affordable Health Care Choices Act of 2009. I studied it with particular emphasis from my area of expertise, constitutional law. I was frankly concerned that parts of the proposed law that were being discussed might be unconstitutional. What I found was far worse than what I had heard or expected.

To begin with, much of what has been said about the law and its implications is in fact true, despite what the Democrats and the media are saying. The law does provide for rationing of health care, particularly where senior citizens and other classes of citizens are involved, free health care for illegal immigrants, free abortion services, and probably forced participation in abortions by members of the medical profession.

The Bill will also eventually force private insurance companies out of business, and put everyone into a government run system. All decisions about personal health care will ultimately be made by federal bureaucrats, and most of them will not be health care professionals. Hospital admissions, payments to physicians, and allocations of necessary medical devices will be strictly controlled by the government.

However, as scary as all of that is, it just scratches the surface. In fact, I have concluded that this legislation really has no intention of providing affordable health care choices. Instead it is a convenient cover for the most massive transfer of power to the Executive Branch of government that has ever occurred, or even been contemplated. If this law or a similar one is adopted, major portions of the Constitution of the United States will effectively have been destroyed.

The first thing to go will be the masterfully crafted balance of power between the Executive, Legislative, and Judicial branches of the U.S. Government. The Congress will be transferring to the Obama Administration authority in a number of different areas over the lives of the American people, and the businesses they own.

The irony is that the Congress doesn’t have any authority to legislate in most of those areas to begin with! I defy anyone to read the text of the U.S. Constitution and find any authority granted to the members of Congress to regulate health care.

This legislation also provides for access, by the appointees of the Obama administration, in direct violation of the specific provisions of the 4th Amendment to the Constitution, of all of your personal healthcare information, your personal financial information, and the information of your employer, physician, and hospital. All of this is a protecting against unreasonable searches and seizures. You can also forget about the right to privacy. That will have been legislated into oblivion regardless of what the 3rd and 4th Amendments may provide.

If you decide not to have healthcare insurance, or if you have private insurance that is not deemed acceptable to the Health Choices Administrator appointed by Obama, there will be a tax imposed on you. It is called a tax instead of a fine because of the intent to avoid application of the due process clause of the 5th Amendment. However , that doesn’t work because since there is nothing in the law that allows you to contest or appeal the imposition of the tax, it is definitely depriving someone of property without the due process of law.

So, there are three of those pesky amendments that the far left hate so much, out the original ten in the Bill of Rights, that are effectively nullified by this law. It doesn’t stop there though.

The 9th Amendment that provides: The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people;

The 10th Amendment states: The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are preserved to the States respectively, or to the people. Under the provisions of this piece of Congressional handiwork neither the people nor the states are going to have any rights or powers at all in many areas that once were theirs to control.

I could write many more pages about this legislation, but I think you get the idea.

This is not about health care; it is about seizing power and limiting rights. Article 6 of the Constitution requires the members of both houses of Congress to “be bound by oath or affirmation to support the Constitution.” If I was a member of Congress I would not be able to vote for this legislation or anything like it, without feeling I was violating that sacred oath or affirmation. If I voted for it anyway, I would hope the American people would hold me accountable.

For those who might doubt the nature of this threat, I suggest they consult the source, the US Constitution, and Bill of Rights. There you can see exactly what we are about to have taken from us.

Michael Connelly (First published in June 2012)
Retired attorney,
Constitutional Law Instructor
Carrollton, Texas

The Truth About the Health Care Bills - Michael Connelly, Ret. Constitutional Attorney

Well, I have done it! I have read the entire text of proposed House Bill 3200: The Affordable Health Care Choices Act of 2009. I studied it with particular emphasis from my area of expertise, constitutional law. I was frankly concerned that parts of the proposed law that were being discussed might be unconstitutional. What I found was far worse than what I had heard or expected.

To begin with, much of what has been said about the law and its implications is in fact true, despite what the Democrats and the media are saying. The law does provide for rationing of health care, particularly where senior citizens and other classes of citizens are involved, free health care for illegal immigrants, free abortion services, and probably forced participation in abortions by members of the medical profession.

The Bill will also eventually force private insurance companies out of business, and put everyone into a government run system. All decisions about personal health care will ultimately be made by federal bureaucrats, and most of them will not be health care professionals. Hospital admissions, payments to physicians, and allocations of necessary medical devices will be strictly controlled by the government.

However, as scary as all of that is, it just scratches the surface. In fact, I have concluded that this legislation really has no intention of providing affordable health care choices. Instead it is a convenient cover for the most massive transfer of power to the Executive Branch of government that has ever occurred, or even been contemplated. If this law or a similar one is adopted, major portions of the Constitution of the United States will effectively have been destroyed.

The first thing to go will be the masterfully crafted balance of power between the Executive, Legislative, and Judicial branches of the U.S. Government. The Congress will be transferring to the Obama Administration authority in a number of different areas over the lives of the American people, and the businesses they own.

The irony is that the Congress doesn’t have any authority to legislate in most of those areas to begin with! I defy anyone to read the text of the U.S. Constitution and find any authority granted to the members of Congress to regulate health care.

This legislation also provides for access, by the appointees of the Obama administration, in direct violation of the specific provisions of the 4th Amendment to the Constitution, of all of your personal healthcare information, your personal financial information, and the information of your employer, physician, and hospital. All of this is a protecting against unreasonable searches and seizures. You can also forget about the right to privacy. That will have been legislated into oblivion regardless of what the 3rd and 4th Amendments may provide.

If you decide not to have healthcare insurance, or if you have private insurance that is not deemed acceptable to the Health Choices Administrator appointed by Obama, there will be a tax imposed on you. It is called a tax instead of a fine because of the intent to avoid application of the due process clause of the 5th Amendment. However , that doesn’t work because since there is nothing in the law that allows you to contest or appeal the imposition of the tax, it is definitely depriving someone of property without the due process of law.

So, there are three of those pesky amendments that the far left hate so much, out the original ten in the Bill of Rights, that are effectively nullified by this law. It doesn’t stop there though.

The 9th Amendment that provides: The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people;

The 10th Amendment states: The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are preserved to the States respectively, or to the people. Under the provisions of this piece of Congressional handiwork neither the people nor the states are going to have any rights or powers at all in many areas that once were theirs to control.

I could write many more pages about this legislation, but I think you get the idea.

This is not about health care; it is about seizing power and limiting rights. Article 6 of the Constitution requires the members of both houses of Congress to “be bound by oath or affirmation to support the Constitution.” If I was a member of Congress I would not be able to vote for this legislation or anything like it, without feeling I was violating that sacred oath or affirmation. If I voted for it anyway, I would hope the American people would hold me accountable.

For those who might doubt the nature of this threat, I suggest they consult the source, the US Constitution, and Bill of Rights. There you can see exactly what we are about to have taken from us.

Michael Connelly (First published in June 2012)
Retired attorney,
Constitutional Law Instructor
Carrollton, Texas

- See more at: http://www.lindseywilliams.net/#sthash.lktn6Lyz.dpuf

Er dauðvona evran á gjörgæslu komin úr lífshættu????

Ummæli Olli Rehn þess efnis að evran sé komin úr bráðri hættu, minnir óþyrmilega á yfirlýsingar yfirvalda í Grikklandi, Írlandi og víðar þess efnis að þeir muni ekki þurfa á hjálp að halda, svona rétt áður en allt fór í kalda kol hjá þeim.

Evran er sem sagt dauðvona á gjörgæslu, en komin úr lífshættu.  Þannig les ég út úr yfirlýsingu peningamálastjóra Evrópusambandsins.

 

Evran „undir eftirliti og á lyfjagjöf“

AGS beitir blekkingum

Alþjóðagjaldeyrissjóðurinn, Evrópusambandið og Seðlabanki Evrópu hafa litlar áhyggjur af atvinnuleysi og fátækt.  Svo framalega sem farið er að vilja þeirra er þeim sama um almenning.  Líðan og hagur einstaklinga, almennings, er nokkuð sem þessar stofnanir láta sig litlu skipta, fjármagnið hefur forgang. 

Bak við þessar stofnanir eru fólk, einstaklingar, sem tekur ákvarðanir fyrir hönd þessara stofnana og í þeirra nafni.

Af hverju eiga fjármunir alltaf að njóta vafans og almenningur alltaf skilinn eftir, látinn blæða?? 

Í þeirri efnahagskrísu sem nú gengur yfir hinn vestræna heim sjáum við berlega hvernig fjármálaöflin vaða yfir einstök ríki, knúin af græðgi og yfirgangi.  En í Biblíunni, Guðs Orði, stendur "fégræðgin er rót alls ills".  Kröfur eru gerðar um áframhaldandi niðurskurð og fækkun opinberra starfsmanna, sem eykur enn á vandann.  Það virðist eiga að ganga að þessum þjóðum dauðum.

Þegar AGS segir að jákvæð teikn séu á lofti í Grikklandi, þá er bara verið að reyna að blekkja fólk.  Jákvæð teikn verða ekki fyrr en fólk fær húsaskjól, en margir Grikkir eru húsnæðislausir, vinnu, laun, mat á borðið og getur farið að lifa sæmilegu lífi.  Fyrr verður ekki hægt að tala um jákvæð teikn.

 

Jákvæð teikn á lofti í Grikklandi

"Hatur araba á Ísrael er knúinn af öfund og ótta" skrifar Lee Habeeb arabi af Líbönskum ættum.

Lee Habeeb er ungur Arabi af Líbönskum ættum er ólst upp í New Jersey, USA.  Lee skrifaði grein í National Review Online og var grein hans endurbirt á Aish.com.

Greinin ber fyrirsögnina Arab Like Me [Arabi eins og ég].

Þar segir Lee að hatur araba á Ísrael sé tilkomið af öfund og ótta.

Leyfum Lee hafa orðið, grein hans er hér fyrir neðan, á ensku.

 

Arab Like Me

Arab hatred of Israel is driven by envy and fear.

by Lee Habeeb

There are two kinds of Arabs in this world. Those who hate Jews, and those who don’t. And in my life, I have met more of the former than the latter. I am not proud to say that. Arabs will not like me for admitting it. But it is true. And it is something I wish the Obama administration understood. It is something Americans should know as the “Arab Spring” enters its second year.

I didn’t know much about any of this as a Lebanese kid growing up in New Jersey. But I found out about it when I wrote my first pro-Israel column for my college paper as a young student journalist. I defended Israel on some point I’ve long forgotten, but what I’ll never forget is the backlash I received from fellow Arabs. Some were Americans, others were students from Arab countries, many of whom I counted as friends.

First came the letters to the editor, then the personal insults. It was as if I’d broken a secret code I didn’t know existed. Some secret blood oath, which goes something like this: Arabs don’t speak unkindly of Arabs in public, or kindly about Israel.

The backlash stunned me. I pondered the pounding I had taken, and floundered a bit. I even thought for a short time of writing something negative about Israel the next time I had a chance, just to balance things out and reestablish my Arab bona fides.

I was accused of being a self-hating Arab.

One friend accused me of being a self-hating Arab. He explained to me that I was exploiting my ancestry to ingratiate myself with white America and the Jews who controlled white America. I explained to him that I was white. And that I was an American. And that I didn’t believe that Jews controlled America. The Jewish men I knew had a hard enough time controlling their own families! But nothing I said helped relieve the tension, not even my stab at humor.

I also explained that many of my Jewish friends did not like my column. Most were liberals from New York or northern New Jersey who assumed I was with them on the politics of the Middle East, that I was in agreement with the governing thesis that drives most Arabs and liberal Jews: that it is Israel that is the problem in the region, not the Palestinians, and not the Arab world itself.

I also explained to him that I was mostly Lebanese, but also part German and part Italian, and that I was raised by parents who didn’t much care for the whole notion of hyphenated America. They taught me to think for myself, and have the courage to challenge authority. Even theirs, if I could make the case.

       Arab Groupthink

The fact is, Arabs don’t all look alike or think alike. But we are often pushed into a kind of groupthink, a kind of self-censorship that hinders our development and our understanding of ourselves and the world around us. We are not a universal group. But some of us believe in a simple universal truth: that every Arab deserves to live in freedom, wherever he or she might call home. Some of us want Arab countries to be more like America and Israel, places where the individual can flourish.

Say those words to many Arabs and they are shocked and angered. Soon, words like imperialist are thrown about, and the subject turns to Israel. Always, it seems, it turns to Israel.

Why the anger when I hint that America and Israel might have something to teach the Arab world? I thought about it for the longest time, and only recently stumbled upon the answer.

Arabs fear they will never measure up to America or Israel.

It is all about Arab self-doubt. It is all tied to a profound lack of cultural self-confidence, and a deep-seated fear that maybe, just maybe, Arabs won’t be very good at the self-governance thing. That Arab nations won’t be capable of building democratic cultures that engender the flourishing of human freedom, and that these nations won’t have the ability to tap the God-given talents of their people the way Americans and Israelis do. That maybe, just maybe, the Arab world will never measure up to America or Israel.

Better, goes the logic, to cling to anger over the plight of the Palestinians. Better to cling to international policy disputes and to a deep-seated hatred of Israel. Better to play the role of victim, and the role of self-righteous critic, than to do the hard work of lifting up the conditions of your people.

An Arab American friend of mine who works for a large NGO is a case in point. He is Jordanian, he’s well educated, and he speaks five languages. But mention the word Israel, and watch his blood boil immediately. He will go into a lengthy diatribe about the injustices perpetrated against the Palestinians by Israel. When Prime Minister Netanyahu’s name is mentioned, I worry that he will have a seizure on the spot.

       Fear and Envy

Why is this? Why is all of his passion, all of his anger and rage, directed at this one country, this one people? Why is it not directed at Syria, I ask him? By all accounts, the Syrian government orchestrated the assassination of one of the Arab world’s great men of peace, former Lebanese prime minister Rafic Hariri. And President Assad continues to terrorize his own people.

Why not at Hezbollah, which orchestrated the takeover of Lebanon? Why not at Hosni Mubarak when he was in power? Or Saddam Hussein? Why not at the ways in which Islam degrades women in the Middle East, trapping them in a life of servitude? Why not at the ways some Muslims are persecuting Christians throughout the Middle East, as reports pour in about atrocities upon atrocities? Why not a critique of the Koran itself, which regrettably finds little separation between mosque and state, thus relegating the majority of Arabs to life under theocratic regimes?

       Two reasons: fear, and envy.

To the dismay of Arabs around the world, Jewish people turned an ancient piece of real estate in the Middle East into a thriving oasis of intellectual, political, religious, and commercial activity, where people are free to do as they please. One of the oldest places on earth — a place where Abraham walked — Israel is as thoroughly modern as any place on earth, with a functioning government that respects religious and economic freedom.

A young person in Israel can choose to work in some of the best high-tech companies in the world, or can pursue a life dedicated to Talmudic studies. A woman has an equal right to pursue any career she likes, and people of different sexual orientations are not driven underground — or worse.

The fact is, the God-given talents of the people of Israel are allowed to flourish in ways Arabs should want to emulate, and replicate.

This smart, dynamic Jordanian friend instead focuses on border disputes and the acts of the Israeli government. He performs Houdini-like intellectual twists to dodge my questions, which are always gentle, but cut right through to his very clear — and almost programmed — bigotry.

I ask him why he is obsessed with the 1967 border dispute, and not some other border grudge, as it would not take long to find other countries unhappy with the ways in which territories were allocated as spoils of various 19th- and 20th-century wars. I tell him that using his logic, Mexican terrorists should be blowing themselves up in Houston and El Paso. And they should have his unwavering support to compel America to return Texas to its rightful, original owner.

I now ask Arabs who show such a knee-jerk reaction to Israel a simple question, one that cuts to the heart of all this nonsense: Why do you hate Jews? They first get angry, but then quickly point out that they have no beef with Jews. It’s Israel they hate. To which I reply, “If Israel had been handed over to Bolivians or Albanians or Estonians, would you still hate it?”

It is a none-too-subtle question, but it makes the point: Despising Israel the way Israel is despised in much of the Arab world is all about anti-Semitism. And most anti-Semitism anywhere in the world has its origins in envy.

       National success is built on love, trust and hard work.

Benjamin Netanyahu once gave a speech in which he pointed at a map of the Middle East. He rattled off many of the countries in the region, and the relative size of those nations to Israel. Jordan is four times the size of Israel, Iraq 20, Egypt 46; Saudi Arabia is nearly 90 times the size of Israel. “Big countries,” he said. “But small accomplishments.”

He then went on to describe Israel, which is just slightly bigger than one of America’s smallest states, New Jersey. “Little country,” he concluded. “But big accomplishments.” And there you have it, in one perfectly formulated binary.

Today, Arabs are at a crossroads. The “Arab Spring” is an opportunity like none the region has ever seen. The people who live there are no more or less capable than the people of Israel or the United States. But it is up to them to build functioning democracies, and a culture that breeds and rewards hard work and success. It is up to Arabs themselves to take advantage of their newfound freedom, and unleash the productive capacities of their people.

Countries aren’t built on spite and hate, but on love, trust, shared sacrifice, and hard work. Maybe, just maybe, Arabs in the Middle East will be so busy working, yearning, and striving to make their own lives better that they will have little time left to burnish old grievances.

Maybe, over time, Arabs will build governments worthy of their people, as Israel and America have done. Maybe, Arabs will come to see Jews not as their enemies, but as their neighbors, and as their trading partners. And maybe, just maybe, as their friends.

Here is one Arab praying that will happen.

© 2012 National Review, Inc. Reprinted by permission.

 

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"Ísrael er ekki óvinur okkar" segir Saudi Arabinn Abdulateef Al-Mulhim, fyrrum yfirmaður í sjóher Saudí Arabíu.

Saudi Arabinn Abdulateef Al-Mulhim skrifaði grein sem birtist fyrst á ArabNews.com og var endurbirt hjá aish.com undir fyrirsögninni: Israel Is Not Our Enemy [Ísrael er ekki óvinur okkar].

Abdulateef er fyrrum yfirmaður í sjóher Saudi Arabíu þar sem hann býr.

Hann ræðir um stríðin sem hafa átt sér stað milli Araba og Ísraela og hinar stöðugu uppákomur milli þessara aðila og ber saman við það sem hefur verið að gerast í arabaheiminum þar sem Ísraelar hafa hvergi komið nærri.

Grein Abdulateef er hér fyrir neðan á ensku og tekin af aish.com.

• Israel is Not Our Enemy

The real enemies of the Arab world are corruption, lack of education and freedom, and the Arab dictators who suppress their own people. by Abdulateef Al-Mulhim

Thirty-nine years ago, on Oct. 6, 1973, the third major war between the Arabs and Israel broke out. The war lasted only 20 days. The two sides were engaged in two other major wars, in 1948 and 1967.

The 1967 War lasted only six days. But, these three wars were not the only Arab-Israel confrontations. From the period of 1948 and to this day many confrontations have taken place. Some of them were small clashes and many of them were full-scale battles, but there were no major wars apart from the ones mentioned above. The Arab-Israeli conflict is the most complicated conflict the world ever experienced. On the anniversary of the 1973 War between the Arab and the Israelis, many people in the Arab world are beginning to ask many questions about the past, present and the future with regard to the Arab-Israeli conflict.

The questions now are: What was the real cost of these wars to the Arab world and its people? And the harder question that no Arab national wants to ask is: What was the real cost for not recognizing Israel in 1948 and why didn’t the Arab states spend their assets on education, health care and the infrastructures instead of wars? But, the hardest question that no Arab national wants to hear is whether Israel is the real enemy of the Arab world and the Arab people.

I decided to write this article after I saw photos and reports about a starving child in Yemen, a burned ancient Aleppo souk in Syria, the under developed Sinai in Egypt, car bombs in Iraq and the destroyed buildings in Libya. The photos and the reports were shown on the Al-Arabiya network, which is the most watched and respected news outlet in the Middle East.

Related Article: Arab Like Me

The common thing among all what I saw is that the destruction and the atrocities are not done by an outside enemy. The starvation, the killings and the destruction in these Arab countries are done by the same hands that are supposed to protect and build the unity of these countries and safeguard the people of these countries. So, the question now is that who is the real enemy of the Arab world?

These dictators’ atrocities against their own people are far worse than all the full-scale Arab-Israeli wars.

The Arab world wasted hundreds of billions of dollars and lost tens of thousands of innocent lives fighting Israel, which they considered is their sworn enemy, an enemy whose existence they never recognized. The Arab world has many enemies and Israel should have been at the bottom of the list. The real enemies of the Arab world are corruption, lack of good education, lack of good health care, lack of freedom, lack of respect for the human lives and finally, the Arab world had many dictators who used the Arab-Israeli conflict to suppress their own people.

These dictators’ atrocities against their own people are far worse than all the full-scale Arab-Israeli wars.

In the past, we have talked about why some Israeli soldiers attack and mistreat Palestinians. Also, we saw Israeli planes and tanks attack various Arab countries. But, do these attacks match the current atrocities being committed by some Arab states against their own people.

In Syria, the atrocities are beyond anybody’s imaginations. And, isn’t the Iraqis are the ones who are destroying their own country? Wasn’t it Tunisia’s dictator who was able to steal 13 billion dollars from the poor Tunisians? And how can a child starve in Yemen if their land is the most fertile land in the world? Why would Iraqi brains leave Iraq in a country that makes 110 billion dollars from oil export? Why do the Lebanese fail to govern one of the tiniest countries in the world? And what made the Arab states start sinking into chaos?

On May 14, 1948 the state of Israel was declared. And just one day after that, on May 15, 1948 the Arabs declared war on Israel to get back Palestine. The war ended on March 10, 1949. It lasted for nine months, three weeks and two days. The Arabs lost the war and called this war Nakbah (catastrophic war). The Arabs gained nothing and thousands of Palestinians became refugees.

It is time to stop the hatred and wars and start to create better living conditions for future Arab generations.

And in 1967, the Arabs led by Egypt under the rule of Gamal Abdul Nasser, went in war with Israel and lost more Palestinian land and made more Palestinian refugees who are now on the mercy of the countries that host them. The Arabs called this war Naksah (upset). The Arabs never admitted defeat in both wars and the Palestinian cause got more complicated. And now, with the never ending Arab Spring, the Arab world has no time for the Palestinians refugees or Palestinian cause, because many Arabs are refugees themselves and under constant attacks from their own forces. Syrians are leaving their own country, not because of the Israeli planes dropping bombs on them. It is the Syrian Air Force which is dropping the bombs. And now, Iraqi Arab Muslims, most intelligent brains, are leaving Iraq for the West. In Yemen, the world’s saddest human tragedy play is being written by the Yemenis. In Egypt, the people in Sinai are forgotten.

Finally, if many of the Arab states are in such disarray, then what happened to the Arabs’ sworn enemy, Israel? Israel now has the most advanced research facilities, top universities and advanced infrastructure. Many Arabs don’t know that the life expectancy of the Palestinians living in Israel is far longer than many Arab states and they enjoy far better political and social freedom than many of their Arab brothers. Even the Palestinians living under Israeli occupation in the West Bank and Gaza Strip enjoy more political and social rights than some places in the Arab World. Wasn’t one of the judges who sent a former Israeli president to jail an Israeli-Palestinian?

The Arab Spring showed the world that the Palestinians are happier and in better situation than their Arab brothers who fought to liberate them from the Israelis. Now it is time to stop the hatred and wars and start to create better living conditions for future Arab generations.

This article originally appeared on ArabNews.com