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Thursday, August 07, 2014
When Will Barack Obama Say Something About The Genocide Of Christians?
The lives of Christians in the Middle East are becoming a horror story, at least everywhere but in Israel.
In Syria, the Christians have been almost entirely driven out. Murders, rapes, kidnappings and forced conversions abound. Some have fled to Jordan, others to Lebanon where they have taken refuge with what's left of the local Maronite population.
“We are facing real genocide, but all the world has been silent, especially what we call the ‘First World,’” said Syriac Catholic Bishop Barnaba Yousif Habash, based in New Jersey, who has written President Barack Obama and visited both the State Department and Capitol Hill, pleading for U.S. action.
Now, Bishop Habash said during an Aug. 5 interview with the Register, “I don’t trust anyone in the American administration. I don’t have any expectations that they will help.”
Syria's Christians have been mainly targeted by Islamic State (formerly known as ISIS) as well as the other Sunni factions. The Christians are being murdered using arms from Libya or from Qatar via Turkey that Islamic State and the other rebels got courtesy of the Obama Administration. President Obama has been supplying arms and training to ISIS and the al-Qaeda affiliates covertly for quite some time now, while lying about it numerous times publicly and without bothering to clear it with congress
In Iraq, the news is even worse.Over 1500 civilians were slaughtered yesterday by Islamic State. Qaraqosh, the largest Christian town in northern Iraq’s Nineveh province was attacked by Islamic State, and all of its 60,000 residents who could manage to get away fled to Erbil in Kurdistan.
The Kurdish Persh Merga had managed to hold out against IS so far and literally begged the Obama Administration for arms to defend themselves. The response was that Washington was 'considering it' but they got no arms or aid because of President Obama's relationship with Turkey's Erdoğan and because the Obama Administration was concerned about upsetting the Maliki government in Iraq.
To add insult to injury, a $100 million cargo of Kurdish oil in a tanker off the Texas coast that would have provided the money to the Kurds to buy arms was ordered seized by U.S authorities which honored a demand from the Baghdad government who claimed the oil belonged to them. The Obama Administration supported this on the grounds that helping the Kurds might result in a break up of Iraq.
According to one of my sources Israel, who has a long standing relationship with the Kurds and supports an independent Kurdistan would be willing to help, but have no way to get any arms to the landlocked country. They helped arm and train the Persh Merga during the No Fly Zone era, but that was when Turkey had a very different relationship with Israel and could be used as a transit point. That's no longer possible.
The latest I hear is that Islamic State managed to push the Persh Merga back with the aid of all those gently used U.S. weapons the Iraqi Army dropped when it ran away and are advancing on Erbil,the capitol.Islamic State considers the Kurds 'apostates' because of their moderate Sunni beliefs but more importantly, this gives IS easy access between Iraq's second city of Mosul, which they overran on June 10, and the Syrian border. Even more importantly, IS gained control of Mosul Dam, Iraq's largest and the Ain Zalah oil field.Control of the dam would allow Islamic State to flood major cities or cut off significant water supplies and electricity.
Even worse is what is happening to the Yazidis, an ancient people whose religion mixes elements of Zoroastrianism, Christianity and Islam. IS considers them devil worshipers and infidels. The largest community of them lived in Ninevah and when that was overrun by IS about 200,000 Yazidis and some Christians fled for Erbil, but about 40,000 people are now trapped on Mount Sinjar and surrounded by th Islamic State.The Washington Post today is quoting a UNICEF spokesperson as saying “There are children dying on the mountain, on the roads. There is no water, there is no vegetation, they are completely cut off and surrounded by Islamic State. It’s a disaster, a total disaster.”
The ones who were captured by Islamic State in Sinjar, Tal Affar and Zummar are even worse off. Here is a description from a report by Christiana Patto of the Assyrian Aid Society of Iraq:
Yesterday 45 children died of thirst. Some families throw their children from the top of Sinjar mountain in order not to see them die from hunger or thirst, or not to be taken by the terrorists. 1500 men were killed in front of their wives and families, 50 old men died also from thirst and illness. More than 70 girl and women including Christians were taken, raped and being captured and sold. More than 100 families are captured in Tel afar airport. There is about 50 Christian families in Sinjar. The terrorists were able to control the Syriac church there and cover the Cross with their black banner. Till now we do not know anything about those Christian families.
Others are apparently being help as prisoners and human shields by IS in Tel Afar.
And President Obama? Silence, although our UN Ambassador did make a statement:
I condemn in the strongest possible terms the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant’s (ISIL) recent attacks on Sinjar and Tal Afar in Ninewa province that have reportedly led to the displacement of tens of thousands of people, many from vulnerable minority communities, deepening Iraq’s already acute humanitarian crisis. ISIL’s reported abuse, kidnapping, torture and executions of Iraq’s religious and ethnic minorities and its systematic destruction of religious and cultural sites are appalling.
The United States supports the Iraqi Security Forces and Peshmerga Forces working to defend these areas against ISIL. We urge all parties to the conflict to allow safe access to the United Nations and its partners so they can deliver lifesaving humanitarian assistance, including to those Iraqi families reportedly encircled by ISIL on Mount Sinjar. The United States is committed to helping the people of Iraq as they confront the security and humanitarian challenges in their fight against ISIL. Iraq’s leaders must move swiftly to form a new, fully inclusive government that takes into account the rights, aspirations and legitimate concerns of all of Iraq’s communities. All Iraqis must come together to ensure that Iraq gets back on the path to a peaceful future and to prevent ISIL from obliterating Iraq’s vibrant diversity.
Just compare this language with some of the rhetoric the president and the ObamaState department have used to describe Israel defending itsaelf.
The Iraqi Army that cost $25 billion of your tax dollars to create is doing nothing, people are fleeing Erbil ahead of the Islamic State's US equipped armies and the Obama regime is still backing the corrupt and inept Maliki government! No arms for the Kurds and no US military support to stop the jihad of Islamic State. The answer is to wait for Maliki to form that magical 'new and inclusive government.'
Maliki whose been essentially a 'caretaker' since a fraudulent and inconclusive election in April has continued to defy any notion of doing anything like that and the Obama regime continues to support him for some reason, while Islamic State just gets stronger. So, stalemate.
Just compare this with the Obama team's quick action,pledges of vast amounts of money and support and florid language and outrageous demands on behalf of Hamas. Or the president's unilateral war on behalf of jihadis in Benghazi, Libya.
None of this, by the way came out of nowhere. President Obama and his team were fully aware of what was likely to happen. They just had other concerns,like partisan politics, fundraising and flooding America with illegal aliens:
Three weeks ago, a group of leaders from the opposition Free Syrian Army warned U.S. officials that a strategic city along the Iraqi border was about to fall to ISIS. It was the latest in a long series of increasingly anxious cries for help. The rebels never heard back from the Americans.
Five days ago, the predictions came true. Free Syrian Army units in the city of Der al Zour handed over their territory to the Islamic State of Iraq and al Sham, following weeks of desperate requests for help to international officials, including a direct appeal in a private meeting with U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power.
“[The U.S. officials] showed an understanding of the situation but there was no movement at all,” the commander of the FSA battalion near Der al Zour told The Daily Beast in an interview. “There’s no clear American position in that part of Syria. We told the Americans we are going to fight ISIS and ISIS is close to us, but they did nothing.” [...]
For several weeks prior, FSA leaders had tried to sound the alarm. If Der al Zour fell to ISIS, the extremist group would have control of the transportation routes from their stronghold in Raqqa, Syria to their new territories in northern Iraq. The area is also rich in oil and gas resources and was the last FSA stronghold along the rapidly disappearing Iraq-Syria border.
About six weeks ago, a group of representatives of the FSA and the Syrian Opposition Coalition went to Jordan, and met with the international committee coordinating aid to the FSA based there. They presented a detailed urgent request for money, food, and weapons to be sent to the FSA in and around Der al Zour. Three weeks ago, just days after Mosul fell to ISIS, a group of FSA and SOC officials met with Power in Turkey and briefed her about the impending disaster on the Syrian side of the border. But after the meeting: nothing.
Again, the FSA are not exactly free of Islamists themselves, but the point is that the president and his team knew all about what was going on, and did nothing about it. They still haven't.
President Obama makes a very big deal about being a Christian. So do his followers. But whether it's Pakistan, Nigeria, Iraq, Sudan, Egypt, Syria or Darfur, President Obama has done nothing concrete to stop the jihad against Christians by Muslims.
In fact, if you actually look at his foreign policy, he appears to be aiding and abetting it.
The hard question, the one no one seems to want to ask is why.
The reason why is likely twofold. 1.) He cares little about Christians. He actually has tacit support for Islamists. 2.)There's little to nothing he or America can actually do about any of this. America's military is worn down and badly depleted from continuous operations around the world and a combination of fruitless nation building endeavors to the point that even basic national defense is problematic. As such, there's little possibility of America actually doing anything to curtail ISIS or anyone else of significance at this point in time. The US economy is in the tank, the infrastructure in many cases is crumbling, and there's not enough money to seriously address any of this right now.
ReplyDeleteAs such, it's a wasted endeavor for certain groups to ask America for aid it is essentially incapable of providing at this point in time and is unlikely to be able to provide in the foreseeable future. If America did attempt to defy certain powers that be, the punishment leveled against America by these groups and nations would be most dire indeed.
In summary, the current bunch running things likely don't want to do things like help the Kurds, fight ISIS, and provide military support to the beleaguered Christian population. Even if they did, America lacks the capability of doing so right now and is unlikely to be able to do so in the near to mid term. This reinforces the notion that they don't really want to do it anyway, as they can easily justify such a position!!
The Kurds and others have to know America is incapable of helping them right now and any attempts to do so would bring the wrath of certain powers that be in the ME and elsewhere down on America quite hard further wrecking our economy and facing our citizens in even greater peril than they already are.
Why are they asking us for help we can't provide? I suspect it is partly because anti-Americanism is like mothers milk in much of the world. Even those who might be inclined to support America are exposed to this and are somehow led to believe America is some magical country that can do whatever. IT ISN'T!!
With that said much of our misguided policies led to the current situation. I had no idea our leadership especially the Bush Administration would be this incompetent.
At this point, the best approach for us would be to withdraw our forces and financial support for various government entities entirely from the Middle East and most of the world and redeploy our forces to defensible positions along our borders and off of our coasts. At least this way, we'd have a fighting chance to defend our country.
As for the part of the question about why Mr. Obama and his followers make a big deal about their Christianity but seem not to act in such way, this is curious. In America today, being anti-Christian costs nothing and likely results in political gains except in certain extremely red states like TX which has little influence over the country as a whole, however, leftist propaganda would have us believe that Christians run EVERYTHING in America. Perhaps they believe the propaganda and believe it necessary to obfuscate when it really isn't!!
If only Christians did have significant influence in America, things would be much better.
The US needs to begin developing all of its own oil and gas reserves immediately. This would include greater drilling on government lands, greater use of fracking technologies, coal to oil technologies, and anything else that might be available. Additionally the refining capacity should be added to handle all of this. If we do this, in time, we may be able to avoid being caught in the middle of disputes like this.
ReplyDeleteApparently, from the article, the Iraqi government made use of the US courts to pull block the Kurds. While I think the Kurds can likely find other buyers for this, after all the US ain't that important. This really is not convenient for them. Given that the would seem to be being treated unjustly, this seems a bad situation all the way around.
While it'd be difficult for the Administration or Congress to override the courts at this point, at least without ENORMOUS costs from groups and nations who can hurt us VERY, VERY badly/ It should be done. I'd much prefer leadership who will do the right thing even if this means risking further wrecking the US economy or placing the lives of millions of Americans in even greater peril than they already are.
Again, develop our own reserves to a greater extent so perhaps we don't get caught in the middle of things like this in the future. This will take time though. In the mean time, a redeployment of our military assets to more sensible positions should be in order forthwith.
To assist ISIS means to assist Al Qaeda. To fight ISIS means to assist Iran in holding onto it's Iraqi colony. Furthermore assistance to Iran means assisting Russia who seems to be Iran's puppet master along with, to a lesser extent, China. Furthermore due to horribly botched policy making either deliberately or by design there's not much we can do at this point.
the question is not when, but, what would hussein say?
ReplyDeleteif they weren't christian, this wouldn't be a problem.