Middle East landscape rapidly changing

[Tony Baloney]

I can't help feeling the optimism is misplaced. Another regime will be installed of one flavour or other will be installed and the lives of the people will be unchanged while some other hoor fills his coffers.

[mylestheslasher]

Ye don't think a popular rising leading to elections will work?  Granted its a long road and who knows what is on it but many a dictator has been felled and a strong democratic country taken its place, see Spain, Italy and Germany.

[seafoid]

I can't help feeling the optimism is misplaced. Another regime will be installed of one flavour or other will be installed and the lives of the people will be unchanged while some other hoor fills his coffers.

There is no reason why Egypt should  end up like Ireland   

[Orangemac]

I can't help feeling the optimism is misplaced. Another regime will be installed of one flavour or other will be installed and the lives of the people will be unchanged while some other hoor fills his coffers.

Have to agree with Tony. In an ideal world there would be free elections with weeks and a democratically appointed leader.

Have the majority of people's lives in South Africa improved after apartheid? "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss".

[seafoid]

There is a demographic boom in the Arab world and a lot of FT and investment types think the region could have a huge growth burst so if the people get a vote that would help a lot. 

[seafoid]

The Middle East economy is going to grow massively over the next decade and Israel is not going to be part of it because Israel has done nothing to build any meaningful links in the region in 63 years. Look at what Turkey is doing (thanks to the morons at AIPAC for the info)

Turkey Increases Its Trade Ties with Iran

Turkey has increased its diplomatic and military ties with Iran.
Turkey and Iran will triple their bilateral trade to $30 billion over the next five years, Ha'aretz reported Monday. "There is a political determination in the two countries to develop relations further," said Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi. Turkish State Minister Cevdet Yilmaz also set a target of $30 billion in trade volume. Trade between the two nations rose to $10.7 billion last year from about $1 billion in 2000. It's the economy, Israel.

[give her dixie]

Firstly, the fact that ordinary people from all walks of life got together and said "Enough Is Enough", is amazing. 82 million people who have suffered horric ordeals at the hands of Mubarak, rose up and in 18 days sent him packing. Each and everyone of them are true heroes. No one can deny them their freedom. Not least a brutal dictator. Plus, the fact that western leaders supported him in his brutality is shameful, and their dirty dealing have been laid bare for the world to see.


Personally, on 2 occassions I witnessed their coruptaion and brutality. We had aid taken from our vehicles, were baton charged, and were hit with hundreds of rocks from the police and the secret police. The ordinary Egyptians that we had a chance to talk to, were terrified of the regime. They knew the consequences of speaking out. Egypt, along with the US and Israel enforced the siege on Gaza, now in it's 4th year,  by keeping the Rafah border closed. Over the course of the 22 day attack on Gaza by Israel 2 years ago, Egypt kept the border closed, and people had no where to escape from the brutal attacks that left 1,400 people dead. Mubarak followed his orders from Israel and the US. I can't wait to go back to Gaza through a free Egypt, and through a border that is open to Gaza without restrictions.


What happens next? Well, lets just let the Egyptians enjoy this historic moment, and tomorrow they can start to plan their future. They truely deserve their day in the sun. The military are now in charge, and so far they have totally supported the people. Lets hope they stay like that. The constitutaion will be changed, the state of emergency laws will be lifted, and hopefully in 2-4 months, free and democratic elections can be held. It is up to the 82 million Egyptians to elect who leads them, not any outside forces.


What we have witnessed over the past month in the middle east have changed the course of history. For so long the people have been brutally ruled by horrible dictators, and it was all done to protect Oil sources, and Israel. Plain and simple. Several dictators in the region are very nervous, and so are their backers, the US.


Israel had many chances to make peace with their neighbours, and when they did with Jordan and Egypt, it was at the expense of the Palestinians, and a mighty financial contribution from the US. That day is now over. No one will miss the US dollar in Egypt, because it all went on military spending, and Mubaraks back pocket. The people know what the US dollar did to them, and it wasn't for their benefit.


It's a new dawn, its a new day, and personally i'm delighted for the people who showed incredible courage and said goodbye to Mubarak. In a couple of weeks, the Irish people will go to the polls, and they will no doubt re elect the gombeens who have sold Ireland out. The Egyptians will not make the same mistake.

[Mike Sheehy]

Stew, take a look at the recent revelations exposed by Wikileaks that show Abbas and the PA offered practically everything to Israel, and they rejected them.

Israel want the land, end of story. It's the Zionist plan. Plus Stew, ctritism of Israel is not critism of Jews.
Don't confuse the 2 please.

You are not fooling anyone.

Why don't you believe what he is saying? What evidence do you have to the contrary?

Oh, don't get me wrong, I wouldnt class him as an outright anti-semite, however if looks like a duck, walks like a duck, quacks like a duck.....I would say its a duck.

[Mike Sheehy]

Stew

I speak arabic and I spent 2 years in the Middle East. How long did you spend in the region? The only reason Israel survives  is because of Western support and the oppression of the Palestinians. 

Israel is the only country in the world that needs nuclear weapons and a US veto to continue in business. Israel is the last colonial state.  Take away the special privileges Israeli Jews have and see how many stay. Most of them will leave.  Very few have made any attempt to understand the neighbours.  Israeli Jews have GNP per head of USD 30,000 and the Gazans down the road live on 2 dollars per day. It is not sustainable.   

I dont speak arabic and I have not spent 2 years in the middle east. However, I have worked in Israel for a few months and also Oman so I have some experience of interacting with people who are coming at it from both sides of the argument and the conculsion I came to is that taking sides is pointless. I used to be very anti-Israel and pro palestinian but eventually I grew out of that black and while view of the conflict.

Also, I do have an interest in history and in fact I just finished reading a biography of Lawrence of Arabia..he also spoke fluent arabic. I hope you don't see yourself in his mould do you ? You certainly give off that "westerner knows best" vibe

[seafoid]

Mike Sheehy

Zionism is an ideology. It is not a religion.    Judaism is about doing to others as they would do to you.
The stranger who dwells amongst you treat him as if he dwells amongst you.

http://vimeo.com/19395262

If the bible had been written in Kerry this is what could happen to you under Zionism. Some bird in a control tower could shoot you
by remote control for the crime of trying to access your family land. It is simply not sustainable.

Israel paves the way for killing by remote control
Jonathan Cook
Last Updated: Jul 13, 2010

NAZARETH // It is called Spot and Shoot. Operators sit in front of a TV monitor from which they can control the action with a PlayStation-style joystick. The aim: to kill. Played by: young women serving in the Israeli army. Spot and Shoot, as it is called by the Israeli military, may look like a video game but the figures on the screen are real people - Palestinians in Gaza - who can be killed with the press of a button on the joystick.
The female soldiers, located far away in an operations room, are responsible for aiming and firing remote-controlled machine-guns mounted on watch-towers every few hundred metres along an electronic fence that surrounds Gaza. The system is one of the latest "remote killing" devices developed by Israel's Rafael armaments company, the former weapons research division of the Israeli army and now a separate governmental firm.
According to Giora Katz, Rafael's vice president, remote-controlled military hardware such as Spot and Shoot is the face of the future. He expects that within a decade at least a third of the machines used by the Israeli army to control land, air and sea will be unmanned. The demand for such devices, the Israeli army admits, has been partly fuelled by a combination of declining recruitment levels and a population less ready to risk death in combat.
Oren Berebbi, head of its technology branch, recently told an American newspaper: "We're trying to get to unmanned vehicles everywhere on the battlefield … We can do more and more missions without putting a soldier at risk." Rapid progress with the technology has raised alarm at the United Nations. Philip Alston, its special rapporteur on extrajudicial executions, warned last month of the danger that a "PlayStation mentality to killing" could quickly emerge.
   
According to analysts, however, Israel is unlikely to turn its back on hardware that it has been at the forefront of developing - using the occupied Palestinian territories, and especially Gaza, as testing laboratories. Remotely controlled weapons systems are in high demand from repressive regimes and the burgeoning homeland security industries around the globe. "These systems are still in the early stages of development but there is a large and growing market for them," said Shlomo Brom, a retired general and defence analyst at the Institute of National Security Studies at Tel Aviv University.
The Spot and Shoot system - officially known as Sentry Tech - has mostly attracted attention because it is operated by 19- and 20-year-old female soldiers, making it the Israeli army's only weapons system operated exclusively by women. Female soldiers are preferred to operate remote killing devices because of a shortage of male recruits to Israel's combat units. Young women can carry out missions without breaking the social taboo of risking their lives, said Mr Brom.
The women are supposed to identify anyone suspicious approaching the fence around Gaza and, if authorised by an officer, execute them using their joysticks. The Israeli army, which plans to introduce the technology along Israel's other confrontation lines, refuses to say how many Palestinians have been killed by the remotely controlled machine-guns in Gaza. According to the Israeli media, however, it is believed to be several dozen.
The system was phased-in two years ago for surveillance, but operators were only able to open fire with it more recently. The army admitted using Sentry Tech in December to kill at least two Palestinians several hundred metres inside the fence. The Haaretz newspaper, which was given rare access to a Sentry Tech control room, quoted one soldier, Bar Keren, 20, last week saying: "It's very alluring to be the one to do this. But not everyone wants this job. It's no simple matter to take up a joystick like that of a Sony PlayStation and kill, but ultimately it's for defence."
Audio sensors on the towers mean that the women hear the shot as it kills the target. No woman, Haaretz reported, had failed the task of shooting what the army calls an "incriminated" Palestinian. The Israeli military, which enforces an unmarked no-man's land inside the fence that reaches as deep as 300 metres into the tiny enclave, has been widely criticised for opening fire on civilians entering the closed zone.
Rafael is reported to be developing a version of Sentry Tech that will fire long-range guided missiles. Another piece of hardware recently developed for the Israeli army is the Guardium, an armoured robot-car that can patrol territory at up to 80km per hour, navigate through cities, launch "ambushes" and shoot at targets. It now patrols the Israeli borders with Gaza and Lebanon. Its Israeli developers, G-Nius, have called it the world's first "robot soldier".
But Israel is most known for its role in developing "unmanned aerial vehicles" - or drones, as they have come to be known. Originally intended for spying, and first used by Israel over south Lebanon in the early 1980s, today they are increasingly being used for extrajudicial executions from thousands of feet in the sky. foreign.desk@thenational.ae

[Arthur_Friend]

Stew, take a look at the recent revelations exposed by Wikileaks that show Abbas and the PA offered practically everything to Israel, and they rejected them.

Israel want the land, end of story. It's the Zionist plan. Plus Stew, ctritism of Israel is not critism of Jews.
Don't confuse the 2 please.

You are not fooling anyone.

Why don't you believe what he is saying? What evidence do you have to the contrary?

Oh, don't get me wrong, I wouldnt class him as an outright anti-semite, however if looks like a duck, walks like a duck, quacks like a duck.....I would say its a duck.

Ok then, could you please define the difference between an outright anti-semite and a whatever type of anti-semite you class him to be? Then could you provide evidence of looking, walking and quacking like this type of anti-semite? Thanks.

[mylestheslasher]

Stew, take a look at the recent revelations exposed by Wikileaks that show Abbas and the PA offered practically everything to Israel, and they rejected them.

Israel want the land, end of story. It's the Zionist plan. Plus Stew, ctritism of Israel is not critism of Jews.
Don't confuse the 2 please.

You are not fooling anyone.

Why don't you believe what he is saying? What evidence do you have to the contrary?

Oh, don't get me wrong, I wouldnt class him as an outright anti-semite, however if looks like a duck, walks like a duck, quacks like a duck.....I would say its a duck.

Well I'm not sure what type of idiot to class you as. Could you point out one instance on this thread where anyone has said something anti semitic (ie anti Jewish as opposed to anti Israel) go on, just one? Its the usual Israeli defence you are adopting - anyone who says anything bad about Israel should be slurred as being sectarian.

[mylestheslasher]

The future of Egypt is not what is worrying me at the moment it is the reaction of Israel that is of concern. Here we have a dangerous country with a concentration camp full of palestinians who in time may actually have a proper border crossing due to a new regime in Egypt. Sure the yanks will throw money at the new Egyptian regime and try and maintain the status quo but what if the new regime is not interested? What will Israel do then? There are many possibilities but an act of violence is normally what Israel does in this situation.

[give her dixie]

Stew, take a look at the recent revelations exposed by Wikileaks that show Abbas and the PA offered practically everything to Israel, and they rejected them.

Israel want the land, end of story. It's the Zionist plan. Plus Stew, ctritism of Israel is not critism of Jews.
Don't confuse the 2 please.

You are not fooling anyone.

Why don't you believe what he is saying? What evidence do you have to the contrary?

Oh, don't get me wrong, I wouldnt class him as an outright anti-semite, however if looks like a duck, walks like a duck, quacks like a duck.....I would say its a duck.

Right Mike, why don't you post evidence of anywhere I have said anything anti Jewish. You can go through this thread or others. Living in Israel has certainly rubbed off on you, whereby any critism of Israel is "anti semitic."

Plus Mike, a semite refers to someone of middle east origin, so I don't think I could be accused of been anti semitic! Did they not teach you that in Israel?

[Denn Forever]

A definition.

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/Semite

Sem·ite (smt)

1. A member of a group of Semitic-speaking peoples of the Near East and northern Africa, including the Arabs, Arameans, Babylonians, Carthaginians, Ethiopians, Hebrews, and Phoenicians.
2. A Jew.
3. Bible A descendant of Shem.