Attacks On Christians In The Middle East

I've criticised Rowan Williams before, pretty recently when he was guest editor of the New Statesman, but I like to think I'm nothing if not fair. So it's only right to applaud the Archbishop for highlighting the increasingly desperate situation of Christians during this 'Arab Spring'.

He claimed there had been more killings of Christians and burnings of churches in Egypt than people were aware of and that life was unsustainable for Christians in northern Iraq, and tensions in Syria were nearing breaking point.

It's good to see a public figure telling it how it is and not how they'd like it to be.

I came across this on the eChurch Blog.

A Reluctant Sinner has an excellent post on Christian persecution and martyrdom around the world.

Twitter And The Middle East

I've said it before and I'll say it again, I am very dubious about what is going on in the Middle East. Gaddafi giving his troops Viagra so that they can go out and rape the populace? Do me a favour. Who then, while his troops are busy forcing themselves on the women of Libya, is actually killing the men women and children we read about in the next news story about Libya? I've no doubt Gaddafi and his troops are committing barbaric acts, and that the man is mad, but let's keep a sense of proportion.

Now it has come to light that the lesbian supposedly kidnapped by Syrian security forces, was actually a fat bloke with a beard in Edinburgh who claims to be an expert on the Middle East. Yes, he produced a fake identity, and the gullible of the world were getting all excited at how this poor defenceless girl had been abducted by the evil Syrians for complaining about them on Twitter and 'her' blog.

So all the mugs who foolishly thought they were witnessing the uprising in Egypt first hand, because they were following it on Twitter, might like to be a bit more reticent in future before slagging off the more cynical who are less easily fooled. Remember, young Haji fighting for freedom in  Al-Hasakah, might just be a fat cockney in a Wetherspoon's in East London taking the piss.

The Coming Crisis in the Middle East

As soon as events started unfolding in Tunisia, Egypt and elsewhere that led to the so called 'Arab Spring' I feared what the future may hold in that region, and the impact on the rest of the world. I didn't share the seemingly unbridled joy that others felt that all would soon be sweetness, light, democracy and freedom in the Middle East.

What shocked me was the naive ecstasy of certain libertarian commentators who really should know better. I still can't believe that they, unless they are completely and utterly ignorant of the region's history, could celebrate the overthrow of Mubarak as the unconditional overthrow of an authoritarian regime being replaced by liberal democracy. How terribly naive.

Therefore I commend Barry Rubin's excellent article The Coming Crisis in the Middle East if you want a more dispassionate assessment of the 'Arab Spring' than we are currently being fed by the mainstream media.

Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center and editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal.

Refugees from Arab Countries and the European Union

In a fine example of typical European Union hypocrisy France, Italy, Denmarks and others are desperately trying to quit the Schengen Agreement because of the flood of refugees from North Africa, proof that the EU is nothing more than a sham. It's great when the members states are growing fat off the subsidies, but rules and agreements are quickly ignored or broken when they don't suit them. Let' hope it proves to be another nail in  the coffin of the EU.

Italy has done a smart thing and is issuing the current wave of migrants from North Africa with papers allowing them to travel throughout the EU. Italy knows full well the aim of the majority is to get to France and the UK.

But there is a real problem for Britain to face too. How many more immigrants can this country absorb without reaching a major crisis? Why is it that when countries are supposedly liberated people suddenly jump ship and flee the supposedly liberated countries? Why is that the boatloads of refugees we see on TV news are virtually 100% young males? Have they fled such dangerous situations without regard for their women and children? If you don't trust the TV news I suggest a tip to Calais where you can see the queues of young males trying to get into this country.

Of course those bleeding heart liberals at The Guardian blame Italy for the refugee crisis.  Of course the Independent blames the UK for the perceived refugee crisis. How very typical. Maybe those who were getting carried away at the supposed overthrow of tyrants in the Middle East in recent months might like to consider why so many people are now fleeing the new freedom loving and tolerant regimes in Tunisia and elsewhere.

And if our bombing of Libya was to protect innocent people, who are these thousands of people fleeing the bombing, the guilty?

Osama bin Laden and the Middle East

Am I the only one who woke up this morning to the news of bin Laden's death to feel distinctly underwhelmed? If it is bin Laden, and bin Laden has been running the worldwide terror network we call Al-Qaeda, is it really such a big deal? Do we really think the Islamist terrorists are all going to throw away their weapons and go back to their home towns and villages? Or will there be any number of men just waiting to carry on the work started by bin Laden?

My view has always been that we, the West, have used bin Laden and blown his image out of all proportion because we like to personalise our wars. We don't like to say that we were at war with Germany any more, it was Hitler. The worst excesses of the Soviet Union were not carried out by Russians, they were carried out by Stalin. Cambodians didn't slaughter each other by the million, that was Pol Pot. Cubans haven't oppressed Cubans over the decades, that was Castro.

It is easier to keep the population on side if we create an evil being to target rather than accept that thousands if not millions of people actually follow the doctrine and carry out the attacks and mass murders quite happily. It's especially convenient when you don't want a whole swathe of people blamed, in this case Islamists or Muslims generally. Western governments are walking a tightrope, we are fighting Islamist extremists in Afghanistan and elsewhere, but don't want to turn Western people against Muslim people in the West.

My feeling is that the death of bin Laden is largely irrelevant, he will have laid plans for this scenario years ago, things will continue as if nothing has happened. There may well be a spate of attacks to show their anger at his death, if they even publicly accpet his death, which I wouldn't do if I were an Al-Qaeda leader. There must be any number of lookalikes they can  trundle out to show what a bunch of liars we in the West have in charge.

I am much more fearful of what could happen in the Middle East. When people in the West were coming over all giddy about events in Tunisia, Egypt and elsewhere I couldn't help a deep sense of foreboding. Helping get rid of dictators is one thing, but what fills the vacuum? Already attacks on Christians have increased in the region and the Muslim Brotherhood is reported to be organising themselves very effectively to make huge strides in public and political life in the new Egypt. The West seemed to be in some kind of mass delusional state. Baddies in the Middle East gone one day, liberal western style democracy installed the next. It doeswn't work like that, never has and never will.

Whether we accept it or not, chaos in the Middle East is what militant Islamists will thrive on and garner support from. If we in Europe end up with militant Islamist states across the Middle East, then we should be very afraid, whether bin Laden is dead or alive.

The Madness of the Middle East

Shalom!

If you thought the Middle East was on the verge of shaking off tyranny and heading for democracy, or at least something resembling sanity, remember Iran.

Iran is now calling for a boycott of the 2012 Olympics because the logo chosen is actually code for the word 'Zion'. They claim that it indicates that the dark forces of Zion will take over the world in 2012.

The Full Story.

Islamic Extremism in the Middle East

As events unfolded in Tunisia, then Egypt I couldn't get as excited as many people in this country and elsewhere. Only those who have little life experience, or little awareness of history, could become excited as though there would be revolution on Monday, elections on Tuesday and good old fashioned democracy established on Wednesday. I was astounded at the naivety of the media and so many other people in this country.

It is arrogant of people in the west to assume that people elsewhere in the world are all desperate for our style of democracy. They are obviously not. What the demonstrators want in the Middle East is a whole range of things, as diverse a range of hopes and needs as millions of people in any part of the world.

But if we choose to ignore the danger of militant Islam taking an even tighter grip in the Middle East then we are stupid beyond belief. What did these people think the demonstrators holding images of Mubarak with the Star of David imposed on his face were trying to say?

Here is the report of the murder of a Catholic priest in Tunisia amid a rise in Islamist violence since the revolution there.

Here is an article from the Daily Telegraph by Anne Applebaum about the attack in Cairo on Laura Logan and the biased reporting of recent events in Cairo.

I'm amazed at the naivety and downright stupidity of people in this country who were so excited at events in the Middle East. I fear what may happen there, and its impact on the rest of the world in the next few years.

We can only hope.

Egypt, The Middle East and Mealy Mouthed Liberals

The World's Greatest Democracies!

I only saw a few minutes of BBC Question Time last night thankfully. As usual it seemed to be Dimbleby allowing the liberal left panellists to talk crap, and then shout down anybody talking sense, such as Douglas Murray.

Last night the most guilty ideoligical nutter was Mehdi Hasan of, no surprises  here, the New Statesman. This character has such deep seated loathing for this country, and the West in general, I wonder why he doesn't just pick another country and get the hell out of here. If I loathed this country as much as he does I'd certainly be elswhere now.

Then there was the old dinosaur of social demoracy Menzies Campbell. For a total failure and utter nonentity to be regarded as the grand old man of the Liberal Democrats really says all you need to know about the junior coalition partners currently governing this country. No wonder he pronounces his name Ming. No, not the Chinese dynasty, although he is very old. I would add an "er" on the end actually.

Let's get Minger out of the way first. Talking about Islamic extremists he obviously had to make excuses for it by likening it to homegrown terrorists. So he set off on one of his rambling, patronsing spiels about what we experienced as a result of homegrown terrorists. Here we go, I thought, trundle out the IRA for a bit of moral equivalence with the Muslim nutters. But no, he stumped us all by declaring these terrorists to be waving Union Flags. Jackpot, Minger was talking about Loyalists in Ulster, not the IRA at all. Proof that the old fool really is going senile.

Now for Hasan the patronising, hateful, Western hating journalist from the New Statesman. Yes, I feel very strongly about idiots like this. He attacked this country for being patronising, pot and kettle that one, and being arrogant in thinking that Egypt and the Middle East are incapable of democracy. Apparently, according to Hasan this is obviously not the case. Oh really!

Perhaps we in the West should take a leaf out of the glowing haven of freedom, enlightenment and democracy that is the Middle East. You know, countries like Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Yemen and all the rest.

Or perhaps he was referring to Israel, the only parliamentary democracy, as we would recognise it, in the Middle East. But I doubt it, accepting a reality that goes against the left's ideological daydream isn't in their scheme of things. No, they don't like democracies that actually do what their people want them to do.

So what I saw on QT last night hit the two things that really annoy me at the moment. The inability of the political class in this country to condemn Islamic terrorism without drawing some moral equivalence with terror, perceived or otherwise, from non-Islamic groups. Even the English Defence League were attacked as violent, right-wing extremists in an effort to put them on a par with Islamic nutters. Whatever you may think of the EDL I'm not aware of them blowing up buses, trains, foreign embassies or flying planes into skyscrapers. Even Cameron was at that game in Munich when he made his feeble attack on multiculturalism, made feeble by his drawing of moral equivalence whenever he mentioned Islamic terrorists.

The second thing that is annoying me is the curent nonsensical drooling about events in Egypt. What it has shown is how damn tedious 24 hour news channels are. Do we realy need permanent pictures of Tahrir Square and the same old report being told repeatedly by some shirt sleeved reporter in a hotel overlooking the square. It's worse than being in a shop with music on a loop so you end up brainwashed with the same old sound  over, and over, and over again. This,  and Twitter, has produced instant experts. Deluded individuals who think Mubarak will step down on Monday, elections will be held on Tuesday and democracy will be entrenched on Wednesday. There you are, simple really, Egypt marching into the arms of democracy a la Saudi Arabia, Syria and all those other beacons of liberty in the Midde East. We in the West should really look on and learn, shouldn't we?

Daily Mirror-Breaking News

I can't believe that the Daily Mirror has only just realised that Tony Blair is an abject failure. But this is in the breaking news section of their website:

Tony Blair’s failed attempts to secure peace in the Middle East have cost British taxpayers at least half a million pounds.

Foreign Office figures reveal £400,000 was put towards office costs and expenses for the former Prime Minister.

Four civil servants and a political analyst have also been sent to work with Mr Blair, costing at least £100,000.

The hefty bill emerged as discontent grows over his job representing the UN, America, the EU and Russia in the war-torn area.

That's nothing compared to what he did to Britain.