Mount Damavand is the highest peak in the Middle East with an elevation of 5,610 m (18, 405 ft). It is located in Iran in the middle of the Alborz mountain range, near the southern coast of the Caspian Sea. In Zoroastrian texts and mythology, the three-headed dragon Aži Dahaka is chained within this dormant volcano, there to remain until the end of the world. In Persian mythology, the mountain is where Zahhak the Dragon King is slain by what hero? More… Discuss
One of history’s great polymaths, Kircher was a German archeologist, mathematician, biologist, astronomer, musicologist, and physicist who knew Hebrew, Aramaic, Coptic, Persian, Latin, Greek, and various modern languages. He tried to decipher one of the most ancient writing systems—Egyptian hieroglyphics—but most of his thoughts on the subject proved incorrect. An avid inventor, he built playful devices including a talking and eavesdropping statue that used a primitive intercom, and what else? More… Discuss
Posted in Educational, PEOPLE AND PLACES HISTORY, GEOGRAPHY, Special Interest, Uncategorized
Tagged Abraham Ortelius, Alexandria, Aramaic, archeologist, Athanasius Kircher, Atlantic Ocean, Atlantis, Earth, Egyptian hieroglyphics, Kircher, mathematician, Middle East, Morocco, old testament, Plato, today's birthday: Athanasius Kircher (1601?)
The Spel van Sint Evermarus, or the Game of St. Evermaire, is a dramatic reenactment of the slaying of eight pilgrims in Rousson (Rutten), Belgium, on their way to the Holy Land in 699. This event is portrayed by the townspeople of Rousson each year on the first day of May in the meadow near the Chapel of St. Evermaire. Following a procession around the casket believed to contain the saint’s bones, costumed villagers representing St. Evermaire and his companions are attacked by 50 “brigands” led by Hacco, the legendary assailant. By the end of the drama, the saint and the seven pilgrims lie dead. More… Discuss
Refugees who have fled from ISIS and arrived in Ankawa, in the northern part of Erbil, Iraq. Credit: http://www.ankawa.com. Refugees who have fled from ISIS and arrived in Ankawa, in the northern part of Erbil, Iraq. Credit: http://www.ankawa.com.
Raad Salam Naaman, a Chaldean Catholic and professor of Islamic Studies, sees a “totally deplorable and very strange” attitude on the part of the United Nations and the international community in the face of “the murders and crimes” of the Islamic State.
He told CNA that the international community is acting “as if Middle Eastern Christians mean nothing to them,” despite their sufferings under the violent Islamic radicals.
“They don’t care about the expansion and growth of this group,” said Naaman, who teaches Arabic philology and Islamic Studies at Complutense University of Madrid.
Born near Mosul, the professor has lived as a political refugee in Spain since 1991.
For Naaman, the Islamic State group, also known as ISIS, is not a state but a “band of murderers and thieves.”
He charged that the group is “the fruit of the so called ‘Arab Spring,’ one of the many mistakes made by the West.” He said the Arab Spring uprisings “aided these revolts and protests pulled off by Islamic radicals.” Many of the radicals had ties to the Muslim Brotherhood and helped overthrow governments run by secular Arab dictators, he argued.
The year 2010 marked the beginning of several popular “Arab Spring” uprisings that has toppled the governments of Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Yemen. Political instability and sometimes violence followed. An uprising against Syria’s President Bashar Al-Assad unleashed a civil war now in its fourth year.
The Islamic State group, especially active in Iraq and Syria, witnessed significant successes in 2014 when it took the major city of Mosul. The group’s leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, then proclaimed an Islamic caliphate in its territory in both countries. The group has imposed a strict version of Islamic law and persecuted Christians, other religious minorities, and Muslims they consider to be apostate. The group has enslaved women, murdered children, and destroyed churches.
It has encouraged radical groups such as the Libyan group Ansar al Sharia to join them. The Libyan group in February released a video of the beheading of 20 Coptic Christians from Egypt and a non-Christian from Chad.
Naaman said the Islamic State group “threatens our Western civilization and is a danger for the future of our human rights, for liberty and democracy which western society was able to attain after centuries of struggle.”
He said that the West should “correct its mistakes” and eliminate “this radical gang of Islamic murderers.”
In that respect, the Iraqi refugee echoes the call of the Vatican’s Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin, who warned that rise of the caliphate in Libya demands “quick intervention.”
However, the cardinal said any military intervention should be “under the auspices of the U.N.”
Naaman’s statements came as the Islamic State perpetrated a mass kidnapping of more than 200 Assyrian Christians in northwestern Syria. While at least 19 of the victims were released, it is feared the rest will be executed en masse.
Posted in Educational, IN THE SPOTLIGHT, MEMORIES, MY TAKE ON THINGS, PEOPLE AND PLACES HISTORY, GEOGRAPHY, QUOTATION, Special Interest, SPIRITUALITY, Uncategorized
Tagged Catholic News Agency: For Middle East Christians, Iraq, Islamic state, Middle East, Persecuted Christians, Raad Salam Naaman, UN indifference is deadly, United Nations
Millefiori is a glassmaking technique in which a bundle of colored glass rods is heated, fused, drawn out thinly, and then cut to create flower patterns. Millefiori is of ancient origin and was used in Anglo-Saxon jewelry and decoration. The process was revived in 16th-century Venice, and then again in 19th-century France and Britain, where it was used for objects like paperweights. It was during this period that the technique was given its name, which combines two Italian words that mean what? More… Discuss
Bosnian indicted over recruiting militants for Syria and Iraq
By Info on December 31, 2014 worldNews
SARAJEVO (Reuters) – A Bosnian court indicted a Muslim priest on Wednesday for recruiting people to fight for the Islamic State group in Syria and Iraq, using a new law aimed at stopping people traveling to fight alongside militants in the Middle East.
Husein Bosnic, known as an unofficial leader of the ultra-conservative Salafi movement in Bosnia, was arrested in September along with four other men who were later released but who had their passports confiscated.
The indictment accused Bosnic of urging members of his community to join Islamic State militants, saying he had “publicly encouraged others to join terrorist organizations during 2013 and 2014, consciously and from a position of religious authority.”
It was the first use of a law adopted in April which sets jail terms of up to 10 years for financing terrorist activities and recruiting and fighting abroad.
Bosnic, who is in custody, was not available to comment on the indictment. He has not yet been required to enter a plea.
Police say up to 180 Bosnians, including women and children, have left for Syria over the past three years, of whom more than 50 returned to Bosnia while more than 20 were killed.
Paragliding is a recreational and competitive flying sport that has its roots in parachuting. Unlike parasailing, in which a water-skier wearing a parachute becomes airborne while being towed by a speedboat, paragliding uses a free-flying, foot-launched aircraft. Paragliding took off in the 1970s, and today, the world’s best paragliding pilots compete in the Paragliding World Cup and other competitions. What do pilots do to reduce their chances of injury in this extreme sport? More… Discuss
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Eastern Christianity comprises the Christian traditions and churches that developed in the Balkans, Eastern Europe, Asia Minor, the Middle East, Africa, India, and parts of the Far East over several centuries of religious antiquity.
The term is generally used in Western Christianity to describe all Christian traditions that did not develop in Western Europe. As such, the term does not describe any single communion or common religious tradition, and in fact some “Eastern” Churches have more in common historically and theologically with “Western” Christianity than with one another. The various “Eastern” Churches do not normally refer to themselves as “Eastern,” with the exception of the Assyrian Church of the East and its offshoots.
The terms “Eastern” and “Western” in this regard originated with divisions in the Church mirroring the cultural divide between the Hellenistic east and Latinate west and the political divide between the weak Western and strong Eastern Roman empires. Because the most powerful Church in the East was what has become known as the Eastern Orthodox Church, the term “Orthodox” is often used in a similarly loose fashion as “Eastern”, although strictly speaking most Churches consider themselves part of an Orthodox and Catholic communion.
Countries by number of Orthodox Christians in 2010
Eastern Christians do not share the same religious traditions, but do share many cultural traditions. Christianity divided itself in the East during its early centuries both within and outside of the Roman Empire in disputes about Christology and fundamental theology, as well as national divisions (Roman, Persian, etc.). It would be many centuries later that Western Christianity fully split from these traditions as its own communion. Today there are four main branches or families of Eastern Christianity, each of which has distinct theology and dogma.
In many Eastern churches, some parish priests administer the sacrament of chrismation to infants after baptism, and priests are allowed to marry before ordination. While all the Eastern Catholic Churches recognize the authority of the Pope, some of them who having originally been part of the Orthodox Church or Oriental Orthodox Church closely follow the traditions of Orthodoxy or Oriental Orthodoxy, including the tradition of allowing married men to become priests.
The Eastern churches’ differences from Western Christianity have as much, if not more, to do with culture, language, and politics, as theology. For the non-Catholic Eastern churches, a definitive date for the commencement of schism cannot usually be given (see East-West Schism). The Church of the East declared independence from the churches of the Roman Empire at its general council in 424, which was before the Council of Ephesus in 431, and so had nothing to do with the theology declared at that Council. Oriental Orthodoxy separated after the Council of Chalcedon in 451.
Since the time of the historian Edward Gibbon, the split between the Church of Rome and the Orthodox Church has been conveniently dated to 1054,though the reality is more complex. This split is sometimes referred to as the Great Schism, but now more usually referred to as the East-West Schism. This final schism reflected a larger cultural and political division which had developed in Europe and southwest Asia during the Middle Ages and coincided with Western Europe’s re-emergence from the collapse of the Western Roman Empire.
Christ Pantocrator, detail of the Deesis mosaic in Hagia Sophia – Constantinople (Istanbul) 12th century
The Orthodox Church is a Christian body whose adherents are largely based in the Middle East (particularly Syria and Iraq), Russia, Greece, Eastern Europe and The Caucasus (Armenia, Georgia, Ossetia etc), with a growing presence in the western world. Orthodox Christians accept the decisions of the First seven Ecumenical Councils.
Orthodox Christianity identifies itself as the original Christian church (see early centers of Christianity) founded by Christ and the Apostles, and traces its lineage back to the early church through the process of Apostolic Succession and unchanged theology and practice. Distinguishing characteristics of the Orthodox Church (shared with some of the Eastern Catholic Churches) include the Divine Liturgy, the Mysteries or Sacraments, and an emphasis on the preservation of Tradition, which it holds to be Apostolic in nature.
The Orthodox Church is organized into self-governing jurisdictions along geographical, national, ethnic, and/or linguistic lines. Orthodoxy is thus made up of 15 or 16 autocephalous bodies. Smaller churches are autonomous and each have a mother church that is autocephalous.
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The Orthodox Church includes the following jurisdictions:
All Orthodox are united in doctrinal agreement with each other, though a few are not in communion at present, for non-doctrinal reasons. This is in contrast to the Roman Catholic Church and its various rites. Members of the latter are all in communion with each other, parts of a top-down hierarchy (see primus inter pares).
The majority of Catholics accept both the Filioque clause and, since 1950, the Assumption of Mary. This puts them in sharp contrast with the Orthodox. Yet some Catholics who are not in communion with the Roman Catholic Church side with the Orthodox here and reject these teachings, putting them in theological disagreement with the others.
It may also be noted that the Church of Rome was once in communion with the Orthodox Church, but the two were split after the East-West Schism and thus it is no longer in communion with the Orthodox Church.
It is estimated that there are approximately 240 million Orthodox Christians in the world.[1] Today, many adherents shun the term “Eastern” as denying the church’s universal character. They refer to Eastern Orthodoxy simply as the Orthodox Church.
Oriental Orthodoxy refers to the churches of Eastern Christian tradition that keep the faith of the first three Ecumenical Councils of the undivided Church: the First Council of Nicaea (AD 325), the First Council of Constantinople (381) and the Council of Ephesus (431), while rejecting the dogmatic definitions of the Council of Chalcedon (451). Hence, these churches are also called Old Oriental Churches.
Oriental Orthodoxy developed in reaction to Chalcedon on the eastern limit of the Byzantine Empire and in Egypt and Syria and Mesopotamia. In those locations, there are also Eastern Orthodox Patriarchs, but the rivalry between the two has largely vanished in the centuries since the schism.
The following Oriental Orthodox churches are autocephalous and in full communion:
The Oriental Orthodox churches which are autocephalous but not in communion with other Oriental Orthodox churches are :
English: Official portrait of United States Attorney General Eric Holder Español: Retrato oficial de Fiscal General de los Estados Unidos Eric Holder (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
(CNN) — President Barack Obama’s administration is pushing other countries to overhaul their laws to make it easier to prosecute fighters who return after being involved in terrorism. Attorney General Eric Holder said Thursday that the Justice Department has dispatched lawyers to 14 countries — four in the Balkan region and 10 in North Africa and the Middle East — to work with policymakers there. “These personnel will provide critical assistance to our allies in order to help prosecute those who return from the Syrian region bent on committing acts of terrorism,” Holder said at press conference Thursday.
From the Study:”Many scholars attribute the rise of radical Islamist organizations in the Middle East, like al-Qa’ida and its successors, to the US military operations in Afghanistan (Operation Enduring Freedom, 2001) and Iraq (Operation Iraqi Freedom, 2003). According to the Center for Strategic and International Studies’ (CSIS) report, Al Qaeda in Iraq, the operations1 radicalized Iraqi Sunnis, who viewed foreign occupation as a justification for self-defense in the form of ‘jihad.’ The “US Military Operations” timeframe further highlights the amount of AQI activity—the precursor to the Islamic State—following the start of both operations. Scandals such as the Abu Ghraib prison incident,2 in which American soldiers were shown taking disparaging pictures of prisoners, further radicalized and mobilized moderate Iraqis, CSIS adds.:
via Timeline of ISIS in Iraq | Timestream | Ntrepid.
Posted in News, Uncategorized
Tagged France, Islamism, Jean-Yves Le Drian, Le Figaro, Libya, Middle East, Muammar Gaddafi, Niger
| Definition: | (adjective) Marked by stubborn resistance to and defiance of authority or guidance. |
| Synonyms: | refractory |
| Usage: | Neither could he mobilize his army to go forth to war, nor could he punish his recalcitrant subjects. Discuss. |
Pomegranate Fruits. Español: Una granada, fruto del granado (Punica granatum). Eesti: Granaatõun. Français : La grenade, fruit du grenadier. Русский: Плод граната. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
The pomegranate is a reddish-yellow fruit native to semitropical Asia. Slightly larger than an orange, it has a tough rind, juicy pulp, and many seeds. The fruit is eaten fresh, the juice is a key ingredient in grenadine syrup, and the rind has been used as a medicinal astringent for centuries. The pomegranate has long been a religious and artistic symbol as well, appearing in ancient Asian literature, the Bible, and Greek mythology. Which Greek goddess was tricked into eating pomegranate seeds? More… Discuss
Will Iraq or Syria Survive? UN Envoy Lakhdar Brahimi on Sectarian War and the Disastrous 03′ Invasion. (click to access program)
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: Sunni militants have seized part of Iraq’s largest oil refinery located in the northern Iraqi city of Baiji. The militants reportedly now control three-quarters of the refinery complex. Meanwhile, Shiite families are leaving the city of Baquba in droves out of fear the militants from ISIS, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, will soon seize the city. Baquba is located just 40 miles from Baghdad. Many analysts say the fighting in Iraq has become a proxy war between the Sunni-led Saudi Arabia and Shiite-led Iran. On Tuesday, Iran’s president, Hassan Rouhani, vowed on live television to protect Shiite shrines in Iraq. Rouhani said many Iranians have already signed up to go to Iraq to fight. This came as Iraq’s Shiite-led Cabinet accused Saudi Arabia of promoting genocide in Iraq by backing Sunni militants.
In Washington, President Obama is scheduled to meet today with the four top congressional leaders. There are conflicting reports of his plan of action. The Wall Street Journal reports Obama has decided against immediate airstrikes in Iraq, but The New York Times reports Obama is considering what the paper described as a “targeted, highly selective campaign” of airstrikes. One official told the Times the campaign would most likely use drones and could last for a prolonged period.
Joining us to discuss the situation in Iraq and across the wider region is Lakhdar Brahimi, who resigned his post last month as the United Nations-Arab League special envoy for Syria. Brahimi has been deeply involved in Middle Eastern diplomacy for decades. He’s a former Algerian freedom fighter who went on to become Algeria’s foreign minister. As a diplomat, he has worked on many of the world’s biggest conflicts, from Afghanistan and Iraq, from Haiti to South Africa. He’s a member of the Elders, a group of retired statesmen formed in July 2007 at the initiative of Nelson Mandela; it was originally chaired by Archbishop Desmond Tutu, now by Kofi Annan.
Democracy Now!’s Nermeen Shaikh and I interviewed Lakhdar Brahimi on Tuesday. He’s in Paris, France. I started by asking him to respond to what’s happening in Iraq right now.
LAKHDAR BRAHIMI: Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham have invaded and taken control of the second-largest city in Iraq, which is absolutely extraordinary. That is the city of Mosul. I understand that they went down also and took a part—or, you know, maybe they are still there—of the city of Tikrit, the birthplace of Saddam Hussein, and that they were marching on Baghdad, and they have been stopped somewhere. And I doubt very much that they will enter Baghdad in any significant manner. But this indicates the fragility of the state of Iraq that has been created by the Americans after they invaded the country in 2003. It’s really extraordinary that the state, as important and as rich, as a matter of fact, as Iraq, cannot protect the second-largest city in the country.
It also vindicates what the secretary-general of the United Nations and myself have been saying for months, years even. And that is that the situation in Syria is like an infected wound: If it is not treated properly, it will spread. And this is what is happening. You know, the secretary-general has very often warned that if Syria is not attended to properly, then most, if not all, of its neighbors were in danger. And this is one of the neighbors of Syria.
Of course, it had—it has its own problems. And this latest development is an addendum, something that has come on top of the problems that were there. Those problems were that the country was more and more divided along sectarian lines, and the corruption was rife, and the government was not capable—has not been capable of re-establishing services, like water, electricity, sewages and so on, at the level they existed under Saddam, when the country was under extremely severe sanctions.
So, this is where we are. Syria is—you know, there is fighting there. There is killing. There is—bombardments are taking place. And people are—you know, there is no development taking place, and people are leaving their homes, their villages, their cities, either remaining inside the country as internally displaced people or going to neighboring countries like Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey, in particular. And quite a few of them have gone to Iraq, actually.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: Ambassador Brahimi, you mentioned the complicity of the United States invasion of 2003 in the present situation in Iraq.
LAKHDAR BRAHIMI: Yes.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: I want to turn to comments made by former British Prime Minister Tony Blair over the weekend. He said, in fact, the 2003 invasion of Iraq was not responsible for the violent insurgency now engulfing the country. He was speaking on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show. Let’s just go to a clip.
TONY BLAIR: So my point is very simple: Even if you left Saddam in place in 2003, then, when 2011 happened and you had the Arab revolutions going through Tunisia and Libya and Yemen and Bahrain and Egypt and Syria, you would have still had a major problem in Iraq. Indeed, you can see what happens when you leave the dictator in place, as has happened with Assad now. But if you say to me, would I prefer a situation where we’d left Saddam in place in 2003—do I think the region would be safer, more stable, if we’d done that—my answer to that is unhesitatingly no.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: Ambassador Brahimi, that was former British Prime Minister Tony Blair speaking over the weekend.
LAKHDAR BRAHIMI: Yes.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: Could you respond to the comments he made about the 2003 invasion?
LAKHDAR BRAHIMI: You know, the situation in Iraq was extremely bad, and definitely it was called the “Republic of Fear” with reason. You know, you cannot justify post facto an invasion that was absolutely horrible. I mean, first of all, it was unjustified. Second—I mean, it was built on a lie. You know, the weapons of mass destructions were just in the imagination of some people who wanted to invade Iraq. Second, things have—I mean, justifications were invented after—democracy, getting rid of a dictator, and I don’t know what. That very dictator, when he was just as a dictator as he was in 2003, was a very good friend of the United States and of Britain when he was fighting Iran in the ’80s. But let’s, you know, forget about that for the moment. So, the invasion was absolutely horrible.
And this—you know, it has—I mean, let’s talk about what is—what is important to talk about now: terrorism. There was no terrorism. There were no terrorists in Iraq in those days. Terrorism was sucked in, brought in, by—as a direct consequence of the invasion. And it flourished, first of all, in Iraq, and then it went to Syria, and now it is back in Iraq. So, to say that 2003 had nothing to do with what is happening now is a little bit an—I don’t know—overstatement, understatement. Certainly not reality.
AMY GOODMAN: Ambassador Brahimi, Paul Bremer, the first head of the so-called coalitional—Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq, one of the first things he did in that role was to sign the Coalition Provisional Authority Orders 1 and 2, completely dismantling Iraq’s government and military. During your tenure as U.N. special envoy for Iraq, you referred to Bremer as, quote, “the dictator of Iraq.” Writing in The Wall Street Journal over the weekend in the wake of the present violence that’s engulfing Iraq, Bremer said, quote, “It is time for both American political parties to cease their ritualistic incantations of ‘no boots on the ground,’ which is not the same as ‘no combat forces.’ Of course Americans are reluctant to re-engage in Iraq. Yet it is President Obama’s unhappy duty to educate them about the risks to our interests posed by the unfolding drama in Iraq.” Can you elaborate, Ambassador Brahimi, on your comments about Paul Bremer being dictator of Iraq and what that meant for Iraq?
LAKHDAR BRAHIMI: You know, I was just repeating something that he said himself. I think he said—and he has written, I think, in his memoirs—that nobody in the history of Iraq had as much power as he had. For my money, that is equivalent to being a dictator. And he was doing everything he wanted.
And you have mentioned, you know, the dissolution of the army. Every American who knew anything about Iraq, and there were quite a few, many of them in government—former ambassadors, people who know Arabic, who know the country, who know the region—they were all unanimous: Don’t touch the army. There are definitely, you know, 10, 15, 100, 1,000 officers that have, you know, blood on their hands, that are corrupt, that should be taken off the army. But keep the army. This is the backbone of the country, and it is going to cooperate with you. And as a matter of fact, a lot of people, including in the military, were already talking to some of the Iraqi militaries to see how they can come back and reorganize themselves and work with the occupying power. But Mr. Bremer—and he was saying that he was under instructions from the secretary of state for defense, Mr. Rumsfeld—said, “No, no, no. We will dissolve the army.” And they went ahead and did it. I think that—you know, I don’t think there is any, any, any argument that that was a mistake then.
Should—what should the Americans do today? I fully understand the hesitation of President Obama to send foreign troops in, American troops into Iraq again. As a principle, foreign troops meddling in an internal situation like this is not a very good idea. I also hear that there is a possibility that they will be talking to Iran, and I’m sure that they will be talking to other neighbors of Iraq, chief of them—amongst them, Saudi Arabia, to see what needs to be done to help Iraq solve its problems and perhaps stop these terrorist organizations from making more progress. But be careful that this help from outside does not make things worse. I think that it’s—you know, there is a lot of sectarianism in Iraq. I don’t think there is a secret—that’s a secret or anybody ignores that fact or says it doesn’t exist. So, please, if you help face this ISIS, that’s great, but make sure that you don’t make things worse by making—by supporting more sectarianism, not less sectarianism.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: Ambassador Brahimi, on the question of sectarianism, there have been several reports that suggest that in the initial days of the Iraq invasion in 2003, there were some neoconservative members of the Bush administration that actively fostered sectarianism between Sunnis, Shias and Kurds as a way of—as a policy of kind of divide and rule. Could you comment on that?
LAKHDAR BRAHIMI: I have told my American friends several times, of course, I am not privy to what was taking place in the Pentagon, where responsibility lied for Iraq. President Bush had given full, total responsibility to the Pentagon over Iraq. What was discussed there and what they did there, I don’t know. But as somebody from the region just looking at what was actually taking place, it was extremely hard not to believe that sectarianism was being promoted and that the people that were being put in charge were—I mean, of course the Kurdish region was given to Kurds 100 percent, and no—the rest of the Iraqis had no part in it. But in the rest of Iraq, the impression one had was that the people that were preferred by the occupying powers were the most sectarian Shia and the most pro-Iranian Shia, so, you know, that Iran—that Iraq is now very, very close to Iran. Again, from the point of view of somebody who looks at things from outside, I have absolutely no knowledge of what went on in the high spheres of power in Washington. The impression we had is that these people were put in charge either out of total ignorance—and that is extremely difficult to accept—or intentionally. But the fact is, you know, that the system that was established was very sectarian.
AMY GOODMAN: Ambassador Lakhdar Brahimi. He resigned his post last month as United Nations-Arab League special envoy for Syria. We’ll be back with him in a moment.
[break]
AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman, as we continue our conversation with Ambassador Lakhdar Brahimi. He resigned as U.N.-Arab League special envoy to Syria last month. Democracy Now!’s Nermeen Shaikh and I interviewed him yesterday. He’s in Paris, France. I asked him what the gravest error of the U.S. was in its 2003 invasion of Iraq.
LAKHDAR BRAHIMI: The biggest mistake was to invade Iraq. Having invaded Iraq, you know, I would be probably very, very unfair, but I am tempted to say that every time there was a choice between something right and something wrong, not very often the right option was taken.
If you want one instance of what was wrong, it’s probably the dissolution of the army, because the army was the backbone of the country, because the army was nonsectarian. You know, the majority of the soldiers were Shia. And I think in the officer corps—it would be very interesting to take a look back—you would find that there were a lot of Shia in it. Saddam was not—you know, I mean, didn’t care about who was Sunni or who was Shia. What he cared for is who was with him and who was not, you know, who would—whom he considers as loyal 1,000 percent and whom he does not. You know, I asked some American friends, couple of times—I don’t know if you remember that deck of cards with Saddam being the ace of spades. Out of those 54 bad guys in Iraq, I used to ask my American friends whether they knew how many Shia were in that deck of cards. One of them said zero. One of them said four or five. Actually, the number of Shia in that deck of cards was 35.
During the war, I mean, Saddam was terribly unfair. Although a lot of Shia were fighting in the ranks of army of their country against Shia Iran, I think he was extremely suspicious of the Shia, because they were Shia. And he has killed a lot of religious leaders, a lot of—so, you know, there was—there was that, but nothing like what existed after that and what exists today.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: Ambassador Brahimi, you’ve suggested that sectarianism was excarcerbated following the 2003 invasion of Iraq by the U.S.
LAKHDAR BRAHIMI: Yeah, sure.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: One of the other effects, which you mentioned earlier, was the spread of terrorism, and in particular, of suicide attacks in Iraq, which prior to 2003 were unprecedented. In other words, neither Iraq nor Afghanistan nor Pakistan nor Syria had ever witnessed suicide attacks before 9/11 occurred and, subsequent to that, the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan. So could you talk about some of the implications of that, what the effects of that have been, and how you think that phenomenon, which is now so widespread, should be dealt with?
LAKHDAR BRAHIMI: It did not exist in Iraq. And, you know, this al-Qaeda did not exist at all. It had no dormant cell in Iraq. It was brought in after the invasion as a way of people coming to fight a crusader, a power, invading a sister Muslim country. That is when al-Qaeda came in and started to recruit Iraqis and to bring in non-Iraqis. The ancestor of ISIS was created as a direct consequence of the invasion of Iraq, nothing else. And, you know, it developed and so on, and you remember 2005, 2006, 2007 were absolutely horrible years in Iraq, when civil war was really taking place, with the Americans at the receiving end themselves. And, of course, they destroyed Fallujah completely; the Americans destroyed the city of Fallujah completely.
Car bombs and so on did exist before, but it did no exist in Iraq, and al-Qaeda had absolutely no presence in Iraq before the invasion. It really became a reality as a direct consequence of the invasion in 2003 and developed from there. And what you see today there is the son or the grandson of what happened in—I mean, you know, I’m sure some of your viewers may remember the name of Zarqawi, a Jordanian, very, very cruel man who was one of the leaders of the al-Qaeda in Iraq in those years, 2005, 2006. So, this is it. Al-Qaeda and what—the terrorist organizations that exist today in—as far as Iraq is concerned, and Syria, as a matter of fact, their origin is definitely post-2003.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: I want to turn to comments made by the former U.S. ambassador to Syria, Robert Ford. He resigned from his position in May. He was speaking to Christiane Amanpour on CNN earlier this month.
ROBERT FORD: I was no longer in a position where I felt I could defend the American policy. We have been unable to address either the root causes of the conflict, in terms of the fighting on the ground and the balance on the ground, and we have a growing extremism threat. And there really is nothing we can point to that’s been very successful in our policy, except the removal of about 93 percent of some of Assad’s chemical materials. But now he’s using chlorine gas against his opponents, in contravention of the Syrian government’s agreement in 2013 to abide by the Chemical Weapons Convention. The regime simply has no credibility, and our policy is not addressing the Syrian crisis as it needs to.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: That was Robert Ford, the former U.S. ambassador to Syria. Ambassador Brahimi, could you comment on what he said and also what you see the flaws with U.S. policy vis-à-vis Syria being today?
LAKHDAR BRAHIMI: I was very, very surprised when I heard him say that he left because he couldn’t support the American policy anymore. Very, very surprised that—you know, of course, I’m not familiar with what was going on inside the government and what discussions he had with the secretary of state and others before he left, but the impression I had was that he left because he reached retirement age and he was tired of dealing with a very, very difficult problem in Syria. That was understandable. This is—this is something, you know, very surprising to me, what he said about him not capable of supporting the U.S. policy anymore. Again, the view in the region was that he was making the policy, or at least he was taking a very, very important part in making that policy.
You know, what was wrong with American policy, I think every single party that dealt with Syria over the last three years have made mistakes. The United States, like everybody else, misjudged the meaning and the—you know, what was happening and, you know, where things were going. You know, mistakes were made in Tunisia, when everybody thought that, you know, President Ben Ali was so strong, so well organized, that these demonstrations are going to last two days, three days, three or two weeks, and then they will be over and the men will be there. He left after less than a month. Mubarak in Egypt—you know, Egypt is a stable country, a very well-organized country. Their police was tremendously strong and well equipped. They will manage to—you know, to ride this storm. And to be fair, the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, they took quite a while. They were telling those young people, I mean, “Go home. You know, you are going to be killed for nothing. The regime is not going to fall.” This is—this was—so, everybody made a mistake there. So when the—you know, and Libya, Libya, the country, you know, everybody thought that Libya would fall in a matter of days. It took several months and several billion dollars spent by the Americans, the French, the British and others in bombarding and destroying the country. And, by the way, look at the results: They are not great.
When the turn of Syria came, I think, understandably, everybody said, “Ah, OK, you know, this is now the trend. People—I mean, this regime resist one month, three weeks, six months. So this will be the case in Syria.” So I think that the Americans, like everybody else, thought that the regime was going to fall, and everybody started talking about the day after. And people were afraid that they would not be ready for the day after, that the regime will fall, and we will not be ready how to help the country rebuild and so on and so forth. It has taken maybe almost three years, three, four years, before people started to realize that this was different. And by the way, the Russians were the first who said this—Syria is not going to follow suit to what happened in Tunisia and Egypt; the regime is not going to fall. And nobody listened to them. I think if we had, perhaps it would have been better for all of us.
AMY GOODMAN: Why did you quit as former U.N. and Arab League envoy for Syria?
LAKHDAR BRAHIMI: You know, I wanted to quit one year before I did, because in these kind of jobs, you come and try a few ideas and then move on. This is not a 9:00 to 5:00 job that you do for years and years. That is one reason.
The second reason is that, you know, we organized that conference in Montreux, Switzerland, and we moved from there to what we thought was going to be negotiations between the opposition and the government. And that was a failure, mainly because of the government. And then the government announced that they were organizing presidential elections, meaning that they were going a totally different way from what we were discussing in Geneva. So I think it was the normal thing for me to do.
I have tried this working with the Russians and the Americans. Together, the three of us have organized the Geneva II Conference. I led those discussions, two rounds of discussions in Geneva. That has taken us nowhere. I think it is time to tell the Syrian people we are not delivering, and we—I apologize to them for that, but also to tell everybody else, “Please be careful. This is—this is a very, very bad, very complicated, very dangerous situation, and you have got to pay more attention to it.” I hope that, you know, they will pay a little bit more attention and that they will help the secretary-general, Ban Ki-moon, who is really devoting a great deal of attention to Syria. I hope that he will be helped to do a better job than I have been able to do until the end of May.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: Ambassador Brahimi, you’ve also suggested, in an interview you gave to the German news magazine Der Spiegel earlier this month, that the situation in Syria is so much worse than it was in Afghanistan in 1999 when you resigned your U.N. position there. Could you explain why you think that’s the case?
LAKHDAR BRAHIMI: You know, in Afghanistan, there was a, yeah, civil war, but the factions in Afghanistan were not over-armed the way the parties that are involved in Syria are. There was—you know, nobody had the aviation that the Syrian government has or the tanks and the artillery that they have. It was, you know, this horrible war, low-intensity civil war. And, you know, the Afghans were, in their way, much better organized and also much more open in their discussions with us. For example, we never had, in all those wars of civil war—you know, after the Russians left, anyway, that’s the part I know—we never had any problem going for the vaccination in spring. All the factions knew that teams from the United Nations were going to go all over the country and vaccinate kids. And that happened. It hasn’t been that easy in Syria.
You know, the Russians had destroyed quite a little bit of the country, and the Afghans, very early on, before the Taliban, destroyed Kabul when the Russians left. But after that, there wasn’t that kind of destruction that you see in Syria now. Homs—friends who went to Homs recently told me that it looks like the pictures we see of Berlin in 1945. So the level of destruction is absolutely horrible. You know, when I arrived on the scene in ’97, with the years of Russians and the—of the internal civil war between the factions, there was something like five million refugees from Afghanistan. In three years only, in Syria, we have two million and a half refugees, six or seven million internally displaced. And by next year, if things continue the way they are, we are going to have four million refugees—population being about the same, 23 million in Syria, maybe 25 or 26 [million] in Afghanistan. So, the level of violence and destruction is much higher in Syria than it was in Afghanistan.
AMY GOODMAN: Lakhdar Brahimi, who resigned his post last month as United Nations-Arab League special envoy for Syria. We’ll be back with him in a minute.
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Bell was a British traveler, author, and one of the builders of the modern state of Iraq. After graduating from Oxford, she journeyed throughout the Middle East and, in World War I, placed her unmatched knowledge of Middle Eastern conditions and her fluent Arabic and Persian at the disposal of the British government. In 1915, she became the first woman appointed to the British intelligence service and later helped determine Iraq’s borders. Bell worked closely with what famous adventurer? More… Discuss
Mehndi is a form of temporary skin decoration popular in the Middle East, North Africa, and South Asia. Henna paste—made from the leaves of a shrub native to these regions—is applied to the skin, typically on the palms of the hands and soles of the feet. The decorated area is then wrapped to lock in body heat and create a more intense color, usually a reddish brown. Traditionally, mehndi adorns the skin of brides, and occasionally grooms, at their weddings. How long does the color last? More… Discuss
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged Body art, Bodyart, Bodypainting, India, Mehndi, Middle East, north africa, skin decoration, South Asia
The lowest body of water on the surface of the Earth, the Dead Sea is a landlocked salt lake bordered by Israel, the West Bank, and Jordan. One of the saltiest water bodies in the world, the Dead Sea hosts few life forms. The high salinity makes bathing here a unique experience, as one cannot help but float in its waters. It is also common practice when visiting the Dead Sea to coat one’s body with its mineral-rich mud. What health issues do some people believe the Dead Sea and its mud can cure? More… Discuss
Excepts from the article: Growing Humanitarian Crisis Published June 12 TweetThe United Nations estimates that at least 500,000 Iraqis were displaced by the takeover of Mosul. Food supplies are low and there is limited fresh water and little electricity. An additional 430,000 people were displaced by fighting In Anbar Province, which insurgents have controlled for more than six months.
Libertyville High School Choir performing at St. Peters Basilica – Spring Break Tour, March 2011
Dr. Jeffrey Brown, conductor
Adoramus Te Christe,
Et benedicimus Tibi:
Adoramus Te Christe,
Et benedicimus Tibi:
Quia per sanctam crucem tuam
Redemisti mundum.
Adoramus Te Christe,
Et benedicimus Tibi,
Adoramus Te Christe
Obesity Weighs Heavily on WorldThe burden of obesity has grown considerably in recent decades, with about 30 percent of the global population—a whopping 2.1 billion people—now overweight or obese. Over the past 33 years, obesity rates soared 28 percent in adults and 47 percent in children, and the number of overweight and obese people more than doubled. For now, the US retains the unenviable distinction of hosting the largest portion of the world’s obese—13 percent. Though obesity was once limited to rich nations, more than two-thirds of the world’s obese now live in developing countries. In the Middle East and North Africa, more than half of adult men and nearly two-thirds of adult women are overweight or obese. More… Discuss
Posted in Educational, Fitness, running, biking, outdoors, Health and Environment, IN THE SPOTLIGHT, News, PEOPLE AND PLACES HISTORY, GEOGRAPHY, Uncategorized
Tagged Developing country, global population, MENA, Middle East, north africa, obese, Obesity, obesity rates, Overweight, United States, World population
Just a thought: “Captivating: Advertizing is all we are about profitsprofitsprofits:
Do you remember a time when the internet was full of information, but advertizement free?
Well now is just the opposite!”
Captivating: Advertizing is all we are about profitsprofitsprofits
Historically, combating infectious diseases and malnutrition have been the primary concerns of health workers in refugee camps. Unfortunately, this leaves those refugees with equally deadly but non-communicative and expensive-to-treat diseases, like cancer, with few treatment options. This is a growing problem, say researchers, as refugees today remain displaced for substantially longer periods than in the past and the numbers of those displaced have swelled considerably in recent years. Between 2010 and 2012, the UNHCR Exceptional Care Committee, which funds costly medical care for refugees, approved and funded just half of the applications from refugees in Jordan with cancer. More… Discuss
Posted in Educational, Health and Environment, IN THE SPOTLIGHT, News, PEOPLE AND PLACES HISTORY, GEOGRAPHY, Uncategorized
Tagged Cancer, cancer care, Cancer Treatment, Infectious Diseases, Jordan, Lancet, Middle East, Paul Spiegel, Refugee, Refugee Camps, Syria, UNHCR Exceptional Care Committee, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
[youtube.com/watch?v=tbVhz5SUmtw]
Published on May 11, 2014
©2014 Leigha Cohen Video Production http://www.leighacohenvideo.com/
Noam Chomsky talks about: What is the Meaning of the Term National Interests as it refers to those who have impacted and created United States domestic policies? Secondarily, Chomsky talks about how these interests;are often of those who are economically the most advantaged who have impact also on our foreign policies in the Middle Eastern in countries such as Egypt, Israel and Saudi Arabia and other countries like Cuba since 1945.
This was part of a larger program that Noam Chomsky gave “Prospects for Palestine” that was held at MIT in Boston, Ma. on May 5, 2014 which was sponsored at MIT by the Palestine@MIT group pal_exec@mit.edu & http://palestine.mit.edu/ and https://www.facebook.com/palestineatmit and can be seen at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UEpn6…
Unless otherwise indicated, all materials on in this video are copyrighted to Leigha Cohen Video, All rights reserved. No part of this video may be used for any purpose other than educational use and any monetary gain from this video is prohibited without prior permission from me. Therefore, reproduction, modification, storage in a retrieval system is prohibited. Standard linking of this video is allowed and encouraged.
Posted in Educational, FILM, Health and Environment, IN THE SPOTLIGHT, MEMORIES, PEOPLE AND PLACES HISTORY, GEOGRAPHY, Uncategorized, YouTube/SoundCloud: Music, Special Interest
Tagged Boston, Cuba, Israel, massachusetts institute of technology, Middle East, Noam Chomsky, Saudi Arabia, United States
Jordan’s King Hussein reigned from 1953 until his death in 1999, ascending the throne after his father was declared mentally unfit to rule. Hussein generally espoused a pro-Western policy that brought him into conflict with Arab leftist leaders and Palestinians in Jordan. His neutral stance during the Gulf War and a 1994 peace treaty with Israel secured his reputation as a moderating force in Middle Eastern politics. As a teen, Hussein survived an attempt on his life. What allegedly saved him? More… Discuss
Dubai is one of the seven emirates of the United Arab Emirates. It is also the name of the emirate’s main city. Dubai is distinct from the other emirates in that oil revenues account for only a small part of its gross domestic product, although they did play a key role in transforming the sheikhdom into the international trade, business, and travel hub it is today. In recent years, Dubai has also made headlines for its ambitious building projects and now boasts what record-breaking structures? More… Discuss
Johnny Cash Hymns From The Heart 1962
Johnny Cash
Archbishop Chullikatt: Flagrant and widespread persecution of Christians in Middle East §RV http://t.co/mXOZVPvsqs
— Vatican – news (@news_va_en) February 13, 2014
St. Maron (also spelled St. Maroun), the patron saint of Lebanon, was a monk who died in 410 CE. The Feast of St. Maron, as it is known in Lebanon, does not have the cultural significance for its citizens that it had in past eras—today, Maronites only make up one-quarter of the Lebanese population (between one-half and one million). In Lebanon and abroad, the most common ceremony of the feast day is the Maronite liturgy, which is a distinctive blend of Catholic doctrine, Arabic music, and singing inSyriac-Aramaic, a classical language that was spoken by Jesus. More…Discuss
Israel bought the INS Dakar from the UK in 1965. The submarine departed for Israel on January 9, 1968, but disappeared en route with its entire crew. An international search mission yielded no answers. Over a year later, a fisherman found the stern emergency buoy marker from the Dakar on the coast of what is now the Gaza Strip, but further searches failed to turn up anything. The exact cause of the submarine’s sinking remains unknown. Where and when was its wreckage finally found? More… Discuss
The situation in Syria is dire. According to UN estimates, half of the Syrian population is in urgent need of aid. The bloody uprising that began in 2011 has claimed more than 100,000 lives and displaced millions. Some 2.3 million people have fled Syria for neighboring countries, and more than twice this number are displaced within the country. About 9.3 million Syrians, nearly half of whom are children, are now in desperate need of assistance. The UN is appealing to the international community for $6.5 billion (£4 billion), the largest UN appeal for a single cause to date. More… Discuss
Posted in Educational, IN THE SPOTLIGHT, PEOPLE AND PLACES HISTORY, GEOGRAPHY, Uncategorized
Tagged António Guterres, bashar al assad, International community, Middle East, Syria, Syrian population, UN estimates, United Nations, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, urgent need, World Food Programme
The snow storm that hit the Middle East two weeks ago has affected people from Beirut to Cairo. In the Gaza Strip, thousands have been left unable to return to their homes, as torrential rains and melting snow flooded the streets. Christmas is coming too to some parts of the enclave; of the 1.7 million Gazans, there are 176 Roman Catholics and 1200 Orthodox Christians – fewer than 1% of the population. Our correspondent found out what kind of Christmas they’ll be having this year.
12/24/2013 REPORTS
An in-depth report on a major news issue.
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The people of the world have many superstitions, but one in particular is shared by a number of cultures, especially those of the Mediterranean and Middle East: the evil eye. Traditions and beliefs surrounding the evil eye vary, but it is generally thought to stem from envy and malice toward prosperity and beauty. Thus, in many cultures, unguarded praise of one’s possessions or children is thought to invite misfortune. Who is typically thought to be most vulnerable to the evil eye? More… Discuss
Posted in Educational, News, PEOPLE AND PLACES HISTORY, GEOGRAPHY, Uncategorized
Tagged Allah, Evil eye, Health, Mediterranean, Mediterranean Sea, Middle East, Nazar, Ophthalmology
According to the World Health Organization, each person requires about 5 gallons (20 liters) of water per day to adequately meet drinking and hygiene needs. Yet billions live without sufficient water resources. The Middle East, for instance, shares about 1 percent of the world’s available water among 5 percent of the world’s population, and its major rivers cross international borders. Such discrepancies can lead to conflict. Which Middle Eastern conflicts have been fueled by water politics? More… Discuss
Predator Nation on Democracy Now (Click to follow the smell of money…)
Posted in Educational, IN THE SPOTLIGHT, MY TAKE ON THINGS, PEOPLE AND PLACES HISTORY, GEOGRAPHY, Uncategorized
Tagged gambling, gaming, Libya, Middle East, nhl, Politics, Sports
Posted in Educational, IN THE SPOTLIGHT, MY TAKE ON THINGS, ONE OF MY FAVORITE THINGS, PEOPLE AND PLACES HISTORY, GEOGRAPHY, Uncategorized
Tagged Arts -Architecture, sculpture, Arts and Entertainment, Chamber music, London, Ludwig van Beethoven, Middle East, Music, Orchestra, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
| Hussein | |
|---|---|
| Pronunciation | Arabic: [ħuˈseːn, ħiˈseːn, ħuˈsajn] Egyptian Arabic: [ħeˈseːn, ħoˈseːn] |
| Gender | Male |
| Origin | |
| Word/Name | Arabic |
| Meaning | Handsome |
| Other names | |
| Related names | Hassan |
 |
Look up Hussein in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. |
Hussein (also spelled Husein, Husain, Hussain, Husayin, Hussayin, Huseyin, Husseyin, Huseyn, Hossain,Hossein, or Husseyn) (Arabic: حسین, Ḥusayn), is an Arabic name which is the diminutive of Hassan, meaning “good”, “handsome” or “beautiful”. It is commonly given as a male given name, particularly among Shias.[1] In some Persiansources the forms Ḥosayn, Hosayn, or Hossein is used.[2] On the Subcontinent or South Asia, the form used is “Hussain” or “Hossain” in the Bengal region.
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged Arabic language, Bengal, bengal region, egyptian arabic, Hussein, Libya, Middle East, Persian language, Politics, Shia Islam, South Asia, wikipedia, Wiktionary
| John Kerry | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| 68th United States Secretary of State | |
| Incumbent | |
| Assumed office February 1, 2013 |
|
| President | Barack Obama |
| Deputy | William Joseph Burns |
| Preceded by | Hillary Rodham Clinton |
| United States Senator from Massachusetts |
|
| In office January 3, 1985 – February 1, 2013 |
|
| Preceded by | Paul Tsongas |
| Succeeded by | Mo Cowan |
| Chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations | |
| In office January 6, 2009 – February 1, 2013 |
|
| Preceded by | Joe Biden |
| Succeeded by | Bob Menendez |
| Chairman of the Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship | |
| In office January 4, 2007 – January 3, 2009 |
|
| Preceded by | Olympia Snowe |
| Succeeded by | Mary Landrieu |
| In office June 6, 2001 – January 3, 2003 |
|
| Preceded by | Kit Bond |
| Succeeded by | Olympia Snowe |
| In office January 3, 2001 – January 20, 2001 |
|
| Preceded by | Kit Bond |
| Succeeded by | Kit Bond |
| 66th Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts | |
| In office March 6, 1983 – January 2, 1985 |
|
| Governor | Michael Dukakis |
| Preceded by | Thomas O’Neill |
| Succeeded by | Evelyn Murphy |
| Personal details | |
| Born | John Forbes Kerry December 11, 1943 (age 69) Aurora, Colorado, U.S. |
| Political party | Democratic |
| Spouse(s) | Julia Thorne (1970–1988) Teresa Heinz (1995–present) |
| Children | Alexandra Vanessa John (Stepson) André (Stepson) Christopher (Stepson) |
| Alma mater | Yale University Boston College |
| Religion | Roman Catholicism |
| Signature |  |
| Website | http://state.gov/secretary |
| Military service | |
| Allegiance |  United States of America |
| Service/branch |  United States Navy |
| Years of service | 1966–1978 |
| Rank |  Lieutenant |
| Unit | USS Gridley (DLG-21) Coastal Squadron 1 |
| Commands | PCF-44 PCF-94 |
| Battles/wars | Vietnam War |
| Awards |  Silver Star Bronze Star Medal Purple Heart (3) |
John Forbes Kerry (born December 11, 1943) is an American politician who is the 68th and current United States Secretary of State. He served as a United States Senator from Massachusetts from 1985 to 2013, and was chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Kerry was the presidential nominee of the Democratic Party in the 2004 presidential election but lost to incumbent George W. Bush.
The son of an Army Air Corps veteran, Kerry was born in Aurora, Colorado. He attended boarding school inMassachusetts and New Hampshire and went on to graduate from Yale University class of 1966, where he majored inpolitical science and became a member of the Skull and Bones secret society. He enlisted in the Naval Reserve in 1966, and during 1968–1969 served an abbreviated four-month tour of duty in South Vietnam as officer-in-charge (OIC) of aSwift Boat. For that service, he was awarded combat medals that include the Silver Star, Bronze Star, and three Purple Hearts. Securing an early return to the United States, Kerry joined the Vietnam Veterans Against the War in which he served as a nationally recognized spokesman and as an outspoken opponent of the Vietnam War. He appeared before the Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs where he deemed United States war policy in Vietnam to be the cause of “war crimes.”
After receiving his J.D. from Boston College Law School, Kerry worked as an Assistant District Attorney and co-founded a private firm. He served as Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts under Michael Dukakis from 1983 to 1985, where he worked on an early forerunner to the national Clean Air Act. He won a tight Democratic primary in 1984 for the U.S. Senate and was sworn in the following January. On the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, he led a series of hearingsfrom 1987 to 1989 which were a precursor to the Iran–Contra affair.
In 2002, Kerry voted to authorize the President “to use force, if necessary, to disarm Saddam Hussein“, but warned that the administration should exhaust its diplomatic avenues before launching war. Kerry based his 2004 presidential campaign on opposition to the Iraq War. He and his running mate Senator John Edwards lost the race, finishing 35electoral votes behind the Republican ticket headed by President George W. Bush (just 19 short of the 270 required for election). Subsequently, he established the Keeping America’s Promise PAC.
Kerry became chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in 2009, and in 2011 he was appointed to the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction. Having been nominated by President Barack Obama to succeed outgoing Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and then confirmed by the U.S. Senate by a vote of 94–3 on January 29, 2013, Kerry assumed the office on February 1, 2013
A common practice in places such as the Balkans, the Middle East, South Asia, Latin America, and some parts of the US, shooting a firearm into the air in celebration occurs most often on holidays such as New Year‘s, Christmas, and Eid. Falling bullets are responsible for damaged roofs and shattered windows. Worse, they can result in injury and even death. Why is the mortality rate among those struck by falling bullets much higher than the mortality rate normally associated with gunshot wounds? More… Discuss
Posted in Educational, IN THE SPOTLIGHT, PEOPLE AND PLACES HISTORY, GEOGRAPHY, Uncategorized
Tagged Balkans, bullets, Celebratory gunfire, Christmas, eid, extreme care, gunfire, gunshot wounds, latin america, Middle East, Mortality rate, New Year, parsimony definition, roofs, South Asia, United States
Syria gov’t: “No evidence has been shown” they are responsible for attack
September 3, 2013, 12:22 AM
Syrian Deputy Foreign Minister tells CBS News‘ Elizabeth Palmer that “armed groups” were behind Damascus attack which killed hundreds, and Washington should put forward credible evidence to prove their case that the Syrian government used chemical weapons.
Scientists believe they have finally figured out what is causing the extensive dolphin die-off along the US east coast: a measles-like virus. In the past two months, more than 300 bottlenose dolphins have washed up dead or dying on beaches stretching from New York to North Carolina, about 10 times the average for this period. An outbreak of cetacean morbillivirus, which suppresses the immune system and leaves those affected vulnerable to other diseases, is thought to be responsible for the “unusual mortality event,” as it has been designated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. More… Discuss
Posted in Educational, IN THE SPOTLIGHT, News, Uncategorized
Tagged Bottlenose dolphin, bottlenose dolphins, climate, current-events, Death, Dolphin, dolphin deaths, Environment, gaming, Literature, Measles, Middle East, morbillivirus, national oceanic and atmospheric administration, New York, North Carolina, Politics, science, United States east coast, videogames
No man’s land is territory whose ownership is unclear or under dispute and is often unoccupied. The term—then spelled “nonesmanneslond”—was likely first used in medieval Europe to describe a contested territory or refuse dumping ground between fiefdoms. During WWI, it was used to refer to the land between enemy trenches too dangerous to occupy, and during the Cold War, it became associated with territories near the Iron Curtain. What stretch of no man’s land is known as the “Cactus Curtain“? More… Discuss
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged Barack Obama, Cold War, History, Iron Curtain, Libya, Middle East, No man's land, Twentieth Century, Wars and Conflicts, World War I
As reports emerge of another alleged chemical weaponattack by the Syrian government against its own people, the flood of refugees out of the war-torn country has continued. This week, the one millionth child refugee fledSyria. Another two million children are displaced within the country. The UN High Commissioner for Refugeesworries that an entire generation of Syrian youth is now at risk, as even those that escape physical harm may well suffer psychological trauma as a result of the violence and losses they have endured. The current refugee crisis is the worst in decades, reaching levels not seen since the Rwandan genocide. More… Discuss
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