Forecasting is never easy, especially about the future, which is one reason I've had nothing to say about where the Iranian attempt to develop nuclear weapons is going to lead: I haven't the faintest idea.
Alas, it's not clear the Obama administration is in any better position than I. Which is a bit unsettling.
And no, don't say there wasn't anything that could ever have worked. This is not true.
Michael Oren says I don't predict the future as a historian I find it difficult enough to predict the past.
ReplyDeleteas to Iran:
no one who'd dare to say "Boys will be boys!" in sight (as with Ozirak)
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/07/opinion/07allen.html?hp
instead German radio tells me the New America Foundation
(coincidence or mentally or otherwise related to New Israel Fund) *)
is going after drone operators who take the threat seriously - more at link below
*) (all these self-labelled new ones have in common that they give me déjà-vue creeps - Weltregierung - when did that concept first come into being?)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/06/07/AR2010060701986.html
also the news on whether Russia will supply the 300 missiles seem to alternate between yes and no every ten minutes or so.
Silke
Meet the three Jews on the World Cup squad
ReplyDeletehttp://www.tabletmag.com/category/scroll/#post-36035
Sergio I want to know all about that Adonis/Apollo/Poseidon look-alike
Silke
Obama and Abbas
ReplyDeleteObama at one point misspeaks says Palestine and right afterwards the hopefully correct thing
- that makes me suspect that when behind closed doors they talked about Palestine
- also why this man is hailed as an surpassable rhetoric talent eludes me completely, but at other occasions the crowds cheer themselves horse no matter how platitudonous the offering is
- I haven't listened to George W. Bush while he was in office, was he as vacuous as Obama?
I listened to all of Abbas because I got too disgusted by how dominated his words were by repeating "suffering", "victim" and I forgot which other buzz words continuously. (does he maybe impress reporters because he has such a non-screaming kind of soothing voice?)
Silke
this is this audio on iTunes
http://itunes.apple.com/de/podcast/president-obama-meets-palestinian/id282345679?i=83964842
and this is the iTunes link to the whole White House Package
http://itunes.apple.com/de/podcast/white-house-speeches-audio/id282345679
Saudi Arabia gives Israel clear skies to attack Iranian nuclear sites
ReplyDeletehttp://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article7148555.ece
Silke
Is anyone really surprised that Saudi Arabia would let Israel do its dirty work for it? The Sunnis aren't any less scared of Iranian nukes than Israel, just too reliant that Israel will act for them. The Arabs internalized Israel's willingness to preemptively attack (and do it well) better than Israel itself. (Of course, from what I've heard about Saudi pilots, I think that the Saudi officials trust the Israeli bombers more than they trust their own.)
ReplyDeleteObama's a pretty good speaker when he has a teleprompter, but he's awful when asked to speak contemporaneously.
Bryan
ReplyDeletefor now I guess that that Saudi thing is more PR than substance (if there is substance than it would hopefully be so top-secret that nobody would dare to leak it) and so I find it remarkable as a PR-balloon testing the air for what the rest of Sunni-world says about it.
BTW I read that book from the US-doctor who was a POW during the first Iraq war - she told that when she wanted to write to her Israeli helicopter colleagues she had to send the mail to the US to be forwarded from there to Israel and back via that route also - no direct postal service from Saudi territory to Israel (that was still pre e-mail times)
So if they let out even as little as an easily deniable leak that may hopefully be something. In my book Iran is really after Mekka/Medina i.e. settling that age old score once and for all.
as to Obama I'm also surprised that when talking to crowds he reminds me of TV-show hosts, endless thank yous as if he was about to give a show performance while his voice is not transporting any pleasure not like the Pope who always gets a chuckle to his voice if he gets cheered by crowds (which sounds strange in its own way)
Silke
I don't know, Silke. I don't think the Saudis--meaning the people who actually run Saudi Arabia--really care what the "Arab street" thinks about this issue. I suspect that they want a "Persian bomb" about as much as the Israelis do, but blaming it on Israel is much easier for them.
ReplyDeleteBryan
ReplyDeletenot the Arab Street ...
- other Arab governments i.e. how does their press react
- if I knew their language I'd look for clues in editorials but Goggle is no help because one would have to know the language and how it uses euphemisms etc. equally well as subalterns know the language of their superiors.
Silke
Here is my plann. Get out of the Middle East. Stop wasting our blood and treasure. Nobody believes your silly mythology, not even yourselves-see Peter Beinart and Richard Silverstein
ReplyDeleteChanging the topic:
ReplyDeleteHere is a different type of Israel song.
Check out at Jeffrey Goldberg this link to a Peruvian pop-song - almost 2 million you-tube hits - "En tus tierras bailare" Goldblog links to an article with more information about the singers. The lady in the tiger suit is 65! The little girl is 14!
The words mean:
Israel, how beautiful Israel!
I will dance in your lands.
I guess Peru and Ecaudor will be the next big Israeli tourist destination, now that Turkey has removed itself from the desirable list.
Here is the link:
http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2010/06/a-brief-possibly-drug-induced-peruvian-chasidic-interlude/58048/
Nycerbarb
Nycerbarb
ReplyDeletethe group I was hanging out with in 1967 included quite a number of German/Latin-American Jews who were in Germany for some advanced industrial schooling program. The group consisted mostly of people who had met at city-financed evening school get-together class and included guys from Argentina, Peru, Ecuador you name it and they were all amazed at how well they got along while when in South-America they would all strictly refuse to be friends with eachother due to superiority and inferiority issues.
So maybe this song has its roots in those ex-German communities somewhere. Since they were so fiercely nationalistic already in 1967 in their early 20s why not. But no matter how fiercely patriotic Latinos they were they were also maniacally trying to get info on how to get to Israel in June to join the war effort.
Silke