And, Still, They Die

Obama and Clinton condemn Assad. Assad condemns the US for condemning him. Really, what else was expected? And still they die whil Obama dithers http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2011/08/19/bloomberg1376-LQ81D01A1I4H01-3UCMJ86N4F4U087RIKG7MPDOCE.DTL

BLUF

It is more expedient and safer for Obama and Clinton to build a stronger international outcry against Assad than to actually do anything. By safer I mean that his ratings will take a straight line drop if he gets us into another messy spot right now. Libya is still going on and Obama cannot take the pressure of getting into another war, particularly after having lambasted Bush for doing that.  I also do not believe that Obama will do anything until the Organization of Islamic Countries tells the UN to get America into the game.

BACKGROUND

Syrian troops have continued their assault on the Syrian people. In events that are frighteningly similar to those of 1993 in Bugojno where Croats were rounded up and held captive at the Iskra Soccer Club before being tortured and executed, Syrians are undergoing a mass arrest and detention that is most likely to end in mass murder.

The people being rounded up and held in the stadium in Latakia were simply trying to escape the onslaught from the government forces. Many people have been killed trying to run away. Perhaps now that a Palestinian camp in Latakia has been shelled and evacuated the Arab Street (read Gutter) will rail against Assad. Why not? Israel gets slammed for defending themselves against Palestinian rockets, why not Assad getting a slap on the wrist for shelling a Palestinian refugee camp?

The White House said the US was working with other countries to pressure Assad to end the "outright murder of his own people." This statement has come from Jay Carney, but still no real action. Carney says that Obama is talking with other countries about what to do. "The Syrian people deserve a peaceful transition to democracy; they deserve a government that doesn't torture them, arrest them and kill them. And we are looking, together with a broad array of international partners, to increase pressure on President Assad"

Obama is going on a three day bus tour that has already cost more than $2.2 million dollars. Assad is using naval bombardment, snipers, and tanks against his own citizenry. Where is the outrage? Where is the disgust? Edmund Burke said that when good men do nothing, evil triumphs.

I can, to a point, understand the reluctance of the UN and its lackeys to not get involved in or say anything about Syria. The UN is already bleeding out in Sudan and have been for years. The UN suffered assault after assault along the Ethiopia/Eritrea border. They proved utterly useless in Bosnia in protecting citizens with “gun free” and UN safe zones like Prijedor and Srebrenica. So, why get into it with Assad? Why do anything without the permission of the OIC (the largets voting bloc in the UN)? Why go to Syria when there is no shelling, sniping, or bombardment of rural areas and cities in Burma?

Burma? Really, UN? I thought that sub continent Asian country ceased to exist and has for years been called Myanmar. I know the UN is going to just waste time and dither while people are slaughtered, raped, murdered en masse globally. These crimes are being committed daily by their own member states while we, the people of the US, pay them with our tax dollars.

So, Obama and Clinton feel that it is better for all if Assad hears more and more nations say that he has to go. Fine; what happens if, in six months, all the countries in the Middle East, North Africa, and Central Asia say that Assad has to go. Will he? Will he just step down to accept a trial for war crimes and crimes against humanity? Omar al-Bashir and Khadafy are both under warrant for war crimes such as slaughtering their own people.

In my opinion it is easier and more expedient for Obama to say little and do nothing about Assad. Obama’s ratings plummeted as the Libya intervention lingered, and lingers, on. Assad will continue, unfettered, unchecked, until he has completely cleansed his country of anyone who would dare say that he was not a kind and benevolent leader.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/17/world/middleeast/17syria.html?_r=1

http://blogs.voanews.com/breaking-news/2011/08/16/un-rights-investigator-to-visit-burma-next-week/

http://www.alaskadispatch.com/article/united-nations-needs-harsh-sanctions-against-syria

US Tax Dollars For Mosques

Could the mosques being rebuilt with your tax dollars be proven to have been used as weapons storage, training centers, and/or points from which to stage violent attacks from be proven? Using any religious building in such a manner is illegal under international and religous law. If we are rebuilding mosques that had been destroyed because they were used in such a manner, is this giving aid to the enemy?
On August 4th I posted a summary of the US giving $33.486 BILLION dollars to the Middle East. Paying for mosques and NOT paying for rebuilding of churches is, to many (including me), a blatant discrimonatory act. Our First Amendment says that Congress shall make no law in the repsect of establishing one religion over another. What about this? Can the president say build that mosque and have Congress pay for it while ignoring the slaughter of Christians in Niger and Nigeria? Is this administration going to reimburse for the reconstruction of churches throughout the Balkans? Absolutely not.

The other issue with paying for mosques to be built is how many of the mosques destroyed had been selected as targets because of ongoing activities that were deadly to US Forces. This would include housing and training insurgents and weapons/munitions storage.

Recently, Libyan snpiers were firing from mosques roof tops. NATO operations chief denounced Qaddafi for his use of mosques as firing positions. When the US went in to take down Hussein, there were weapons and gunmen on and around mosques. When we went into Kuwait, in the first Gulf War, there were gunmen and weaponssystems on mosques. In Israel (a country where Arabs have more rights and freedoms than in Arab countries) Hamas uses mosques for everything that can be tied to attacking Israel. In January a mosques that had been used as a rocket storage facility to attack Israel was struck. This resulted in "a lengthy series of secondary explosions and a large fire caused by the ammunitions stockpiled in the mosque."

Written on August 8, 2011 by Giacomo

US Tax Dollars Building Mosques Overseas

A debt plan passed that doesn’t cut debt or spending and now the Standard and Poors has lowered the US credit rating because they believe the plan failed to accomplish what was needed. The President continues to talk about increasing taxes on the wealthy and other politicians are looking at cutting Social Security and Medicare benefits.

All the while, the US State Department, headed by Secretary of State Hillary ‘Spendem’ Clinton is spending hundreds of millions of  US taxpayer dollars to repair and rebuild mosques in the Middle East. They are also providing internet service to Islamic Imans as seen in the following news report:

The same State Department would not dare spend a penny on Christian churches or internet service for Christian pastors here in the US as it would be a violation of the supposed separation of church and state. Why are we spending our money on a religion that has vowed to destroy us when we have people in our own country that are losing their jobs and homes?

This is an outrage to the American people and we need to make our outrage known to our political leaders and tell them to take Clinton’s government checkbook away from her and her colleagues.


http://www.usf-iraq.com/?option=com_content&task=view&id=9614&Itemid=21


Read more: US Tax Dollars Building Mosques Overseas | Godfather Politics http://godfatherpolitics.com/412/us-tax-dollars-building-mosques-overseas/#ixzz1UWrL8E1M

http://idfspokesperson.com/2009/01/02/iaf-strike-on-mosque-used-as-weapon-storage-site-2-jan-2009/

Somali Militias Recruiting Child Soldiers

 

 

 A few years ago, after seeing children like this one fighting in Somalia, I was met with disgust. Now, see it.

 

A young boy leads the hard-line Islamist Al Shabab fighters as they conduct military exercise in northern Mogadishu's Suqaholaha neighborhood, Somalia. (File)

Children as young as eight years old have been recruited to fight in Somalia's ongoing civil war, according to a report published by Amnesty International, Wednesday.
Recruiters lure or kidnap children
Amnesty says most of the young soldiers recruited are between the ages of 10 and 17. Some, it says, are lured from their homes by promises of gifts like mobile phones. Others, it says, are kidnapped.

Amnesty's Benedicte Goderiaux told VOA that one girl said her school was raided by the militant Islamist group al-Shabab.

“One child told us for instance that she was at school and her school was raided by armed groups  so that they could take children away, presumably to take them to a training camp and to train them into fighting. She said that one teacher who tried to oppose the abduction of children was killed,” Goderiaux said.

Basis for report

The 90-page report is based on 200 interviews with Somalis who had fled to neighboring countries.

Civil war and lawlessness have plagued Somalia since the fall of the last stable government in 1991.  The situation has been made worse by severe drought and high food prices that have led to famine conditions in parts of the country.

“A combination of conflict, drought, and lack of access to humanitarian aid is really making the situation absolutely unbearable for children,” Goderiaux explained.

The Amnesty report says most child soldiers are recruited by al-Shabab.  But it says the Transitional Federal Government, TFG, which is supported by the international community, also has children fighting for it.  The TFG denies this.

African Union

Roger Middleton, a Horn of Africa expert at the London-based research group Chatham House, says the African Union should use its influence with the TFG.  The AU Mission in Somalia, or AMISOM, is the only international peacekeeping force in Somalia.

“The AU needs to put as much pressure as it can on the TFG to make sure it is not recruiting child soldiers and to use its influence. Because the reality is if AMISOM were to leave - highly unlikely scenario, but if it were to leave -- that would be the end of the TFG,” Middleton said.

He says the broader international community, which funds the TFG, should also be making sure children are protected.  At this point though, he says, international governments have few options.

"The problem for the international community is that they do not have a Plan B beyond the TFG, they have not got that far. And they need to start thinking about it," he stated.

The Amnesty report cites the recruitment of children by armed groups as one of the reasons so many Somalis are fleeing southern and central Somalia.