Sonja, do you remember the US overthrowing Iran’s democratically elected Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh in the 50’s? It all started there - and it was done in defiance of direct orders! And it was done for England!
Do you remember how ruthless the Shaw was to some of his citizens? How splendidly the Shaw’s family lived? Do you remember what a US puppet the Shaw was?
And yes, I remember when US citizens were taken hostage and I remember Iranian women in Houston protesting against the Khomenie take over. It was a terrible big backwards step to go to a religious leader, but we don’t like secular leaders in the ME, either. Syria was secular. Libya was secular. And so was Iraq!
I’m sorry to say, we have fucked around, and fucked around and fucked around in the ME sooooo long and so hard, the finding out part is going to really bite.
Y’all who insist that blind support be given to any particular human or group of humans sure are a strange lot. Whether it’s Fauci or Bibi, it’s a mystery how people cannot see the failed and flawed humans (demons?) before them. It’s plain as day to me.
The modern nation state of Israel is not acting in accordance with any of the most basic of strategic or moral imperatives.
I’m capable of separating things into more than two mental and philosophical buckets. The old “you’re either with us or against us” is a tired old trope.
If your only contribution here is going to be griping about how I am not sufficiently saying things to your peculiar liking, then this isn’t the right place for you.
So here’s something to chew on…Bibi and his magic shot mandates killed and injured more jews in Israel than Hamas has over the past decade by a factor of 10, minimum. How come y’all skip right over that? As far as I can tell, it’s because the media hasn’t told you to see things that way yet. Or maybe there’s some other reason, but either way, your silence on the matter shouts at high volume.
Why are you entirely consumed by what Iran might do at some future point versus what the Israeli government has already done? It’s something of a massive tell.
I see a lot of people pretty inflamed over what they purport Iran has said, but when you add up who has actually done what, the record is painfully clear.
In the U.S. we did 9/11 to ourselves, killed a million Iraqis over false-witnessed WMDs, turned Libya from the most prosperous BRIC level country into an open air slave market run by Islamic extremists, ruined Syria and are now turning a blind eye as Christians and Alewites are tortured and murdered by other Islamic extremists, and on and on and on.
I consider the US neocon-led foreign policies of the past 50 years to be completely against the interests of my country. We are vastly poorer and much less safe than if we’d pursued policies of mutual aid and trade.
The reason we have such shitty infrastructure? Foreign policy. We simply cannot afford to both be constantly at war with somebody and have nice things.
It’s almost like actions have consequences. /s
Meanwhile Iran calls the US ‘the great Satan’ and you know what? I have to agree. After all, we’re a place that feeds its children poisons in such quantities that 50%+ have serious chronic diseases and neurodevelopmental disorders. And we have a legal-medical-financial machine in place to physically and permanently sexually maim children.
I have a hundred other examples of failing to act wisely or morally, but that one fractal of how little we care for the well-being of our own children is sufficient.
Could someone peer into that cauldron and conclude that maybe Lucifer was running the show? Sure, I have sympathy for that view because I hold it myself.
My view is simply that one must get one’s own house in order as a first order of business. The U.S. has NO leg to stand on as it tries to lecture and bomb other countries into being better countries.
We’ve got our own problems, and that’s why I am a true America First kind of guy.
Same as becoming resilient - you get your own house in shape as the first order of business.
Sorry Chris. This response is a total red herring. I won’t attempt to litigate Isreal, Palestine or Iran because I don’t think anyone has enough insight or verifiable information to draw definitive conclusions as to what’s going on given that most of the media coming out of the region is propaganda, coupled with the fact that some images are blatantly manufactured.
What’s glaringly to me is the sympathy for Gaza and Iran while Israeli death and injury go completely unrecognized. That’s a tell. With respect, I think you’re cherry picking your sources on this issue and you’re not being objective.
Great. Impressive. I’m just a student of the Bible without portfolio. I don’t agree that because Jesus went to Egypt and back the way Israel should have, makes Him Israel. I think the twelve got a pretty big clue of Jesus’ deity and who He was at His baptism. I’m pretty sure none of His disciples or JtB ever saw space and time ripped open and God’s voice tell And, yes, I agree with them who He was. I agree with you about ANE thinking. I wish I had that same ability.
Unlike you and so many others, I actually care about everybody including the jews of Israel who have been harmed by the Israeli government. You seem to be overlooking that part for some reason I can’t quite grasp.
Equally bad, the larger strategy of the current Israeli government apparently is to bomb everyone around them into submission, but that’s not a viable long-term strategy.
Someday there won’t be enough energy for that project. The US will sink into historical obscurity dragged down by the expense of endless war, same as every single other empire in history.
Then what? What’s the Israeli government’s plan for that era? Suddenly make nice with everyone around them?
A good strategy, a sound strategy lifts it’s head out of the present and peers into the future.
Israel is operating without a viable long-term strategy. I find that concerning.
The twelve weren’t at Jesus’ baptism per the context. Please reread the baptism passages. You’re reading them into the passage.
For example, in John 1, the baptism occurs BEFORE the call of the disciples.
I will grant that it is possible, indeed, likely, that a few may have been there. Possibly those following John.
The understanding of Jesus was not instant. The Gospels make that clear. How many times to they say… “but we did not understand what he meant.” Much of that was his upcoming death. Of course. Messiah’s don’t die. That made no sense to them. The understanding comes after the resurrection.
Clearly by JtB’s question while he was in prison. He saw the servant, not the king. Why wouldn’t Peter have said, “You are Israel” instead of “you are the Christ, the son of the living God”?
Explain the valley of dry bones, the sweat on the priests in Ezekiel’s new temple, who sits on the throne in that temple.
Forget Israel for a moment, let’s talk about LA where we have a group of people claiming the land was stolen, just like the Gazans. The people causing trouble in LA have financial backing from elsewhere, just like the Gazans. Swap MS13 and TDA for Hamas and Hezbollah.
The Middle East and Israel aren’t special or unique, they are human. These clashes between human have been going on forever and the same train wreck we see in the ME is forming here in the US. What can we learn? Israel has spent decades trying to be conciliatory, heck that is why Gaza exists. They could have pushed people of different religions out, like Jordan and Egypt did.
Part of resilience is contemplating where those red lines are. If you have a group of people that have a very different culture, one in which things like pressing 13 yo into gangs or forced labor are acceptable, where do you stand up and say no? Your property line, your city, your county, your state?
We also have the Muslim caliphate issue, that too is spreading to Europe and the US. Where is the red line, when you have a housing development where part of the HOA fees goto build a Mosque? Or the 50 yo down the street has a new 12 yo wife?
And I have no idea what is going on in Efland, NC. Small town of about 1000 where 16% are of Arab ancestry, this isn’t just a Dearborn, MI issue. I stumbled across that statistic by accident when looking into why there was a Mosque being built in Henderson, NC.
Me too. Farrier will be here in an hour. Got to get the horses ready. Thanks for the chat. Forgive my flippant-ness. Nothing you wrote convinces me there won’t be a thousand year real kingdom. To be continued?
Would you say Israel is focused on the specks in their “brother’s” eyes when they have a plank in their own? And maybe those you refer to are doing the same…
I’ve realized in the last few years that one of Jesus’ primary criticisms of Israel in the first century are totally applicable today. Israel was hyper nationalistic and constantly violent. Jesus opposed this.
If one is aware of the israeli Samson Option then I recommend adult diapers. We may all me pissing in our pants soon:
The Samson Option is Israel’s deterrence strategy of massive retaliation with nuclear weapons as a “last resort” against a country whose military has invaded and/or destroyed much of Israel. Commentators also have employed the term to refer to situations where non-nuclear, non-Israeli actors have threatened conventional weapons retaliation.
And maybe those you refer to are doing the same…