Tag Archives: Kuwait

The History Explains A Lot

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Obviously there will be a lot of refugees from the war in the Gaza Strip. The infrastructure has been destroyed and peoples’ homes have been destroyed. So why are the other Arab nations in the area unwilling to take in the Palestinian refugees?  The history of the refugees explains a lot. Understand that the refugee problem began in 1948 when Arabs who were living peacefully in Israel were told that if they left their homes to fight Israel they would get their land back plus land owned by the Jews who would be ‘driven into the sea.’ Well, it didn’t work out that way. The refugee problem was further exacerbated in 1967 when Israel reclaimed more of the land it had been promised in agreements with the League of Nations.

On Sunday, Townhall posted an article that explains some of the reasons the neighboring Arab countries are unwilling to take in the refugees from the Gaza Strip.

The article notes:

As the Left rages against Israel, hurling antisemitic slurs and chanting for more Jews to die, some might want to consider why the civilians have nowhere to go. Okay, maybe these folks do know but don’t care, but liberals are historically illiterate, so who knows? It goes beyond geography. The Palestinians bring trouble and have a long, sordid history of fomenting mayhem and terrorism in other Arab nations. 

…Egypt is the logical destination for these Palestinians, but Cairo doesn’t want them, and for good reason: terrorism. The border crossing at Rafah remains closed, with tanks now deployed to ensure their border is secure. Egypt’s prime minister even said his country is willing to sacrifice millions to ensure no Palestinians ever enter Egypt en masse (via WSJ):

The article concludes:

If Hamas and the Palestinians aren’t freely moving into Egypt, they’ll be okay with it. Also, Israel has resisted ceasefires and has continued to chip away at the terror group’s infrastructure in Gaza, but a humanitarian crisis could still emerge. 

As the tweet above mentioned, the Palestinians tried to take over Jordan in the 1970s, leading to the late King Hussein declaring war on them and driving them out. They were booted from Kuwait after collaborating with Saddam Hussein’s forces before the Gulf War. They set off a powder keg in Lebanon, a nation that has yet to recover from its brutal civil war that lasted 15 years. No Arab country wants these people because they bring instability and trouble. They’re not importing terrorism; that’s what we’re doing wholesale.

What country wants to import a bunch of dedicated terrorists?

Questionable At Best

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Yesterday Front Page Magazine posted a rather disturbing article about some of the Biden administration’s policies in the Middle East.

The article reports:

Iran and its proxies have targeted the US with missile strikes in Iraq. Its Houthi proxies have struck at Saudi Arabia from Yemen. So even as Biden is helping lubricate the flow of money to Iran’s terror machine, is pulling anti-missile batteries out of Iran’s way.

You’ll have to navigate some media spin for the story.

The Pentagon is pulling approximately eight Patriot antimissile batteries from countries including Iraq, Kuwait, Jordan and Saudi Arabia, according to officials. Another antimissile system known as a Terminal High Altitude Area Defense, or Thaad system, is being withdrawn from Saudi Arabia, and jet fighter squadrons assigned to the region are being reduced, those officials said.

…US forces in Iraq have come under fire from Iranian and proxy missiles. Either pull all the troops out of harm’s way or keep protecting them. Removing missile defenses while keeping thousands of American forces there just invites Iran to attack our troops.

…Iran is escalating. Biden is appeasing. As usual.

A senior defense official said the equipment withdrawals amount to a return to a more traditional level of defense for the region. Under former President Donald Trump, the U.S. actively deployed defensive systems as well as troops, jet fighter squadrons and naval warships to support its maximum pressure campaign against Iran.

By traditional, the echo chamber spinners mean Obama’s old appeasement policies.

Sometimes I wonder if the Biden administration isn’t simply trying to see how much damage they can do to America in a short time.

Trouble In Paradise

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The Middle East oil countries have done very well during the past thirty or so years. The have combined to form the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and have raised the price of oil from somewhere near $5 a barrel to over $100 a barrel (although the cost of oil is currently dropping).

The Wall Street Journal reported today that as the Western countries begin to develop their oil resources, OPEC members are fighting over production quotas and prices.

The article reports:

But even modest cooperation between many members has broken down, and Saudi Arabia, in particular, has moved to act on its own. While it cut output earlier this summer, other members didn’t go along. Since then, it has dropped its prices.

Each member has a different tolerance for lower prices. Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia generally don’t need prices quite as high as Iran and Venezuela to keep their budgets in the black.

Late Friday, Venezuelan Foreign Minister Rafael Ramirez, who represents Caracas in the group, called for an urgent meeting to tackle falling prices. The group’s next regular meeting is set for late next month.

But on Sunday, Ali al-Omair, Kuwait’s oil minister, said there had been no invitation for such a meeting, suggesting the group would need to stomach lower prices. He said there was a natural floor to how low prices could fall—at about $76 to $77 per barrel—near what he said was the average production costs per barrel in Russia and the U.S.

The history of oil prices has often been that when the Middle East begins to drop their prices, Americans stop looking for cheaper oil in their own country. Considering the current instability in the Middle East in the OPEC nations, that would be a big mistake.

America needs to be energy independent for both economic and security reasons. It is time to develop our own resources.

Is It Time To Start Treating People The Way They Treat Us ?

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I am not (I don’t think) a mean person, but how many times do you let someone apply rules to you that they break themselves before you simply say, “No, I don’t want to play anymore”?

CNS News reported on Friday that ten days ago the top Saudi Arabian Muslim cleric called for the destruction of all churches on the Arabian Peninsula and no one is paying attention.

The article reports:

On March 12, Grand Mufti Sheikh Abdul Aziz Al-Asheikh was quoted in Arabic media reports as telling a visiting Kuwaiti delegation that it was “necessary to destroy all the churches of the region.”

Lawmakers in Kuwait are mulling a ban on the new construction of any non-Islamic places of worship in the small Gulf state, and the delegation asked Asheikh for his opinion. The grand mufti, a member of the ruling royal family, is the undisputed Sunni spiritual arbiter in Islam’s birthplace.

In his response, Asheikh cited a hadith (a saying or tradition of Mohammed), in which the 7th century founder of Islam was recorded to have said on his deathbed, “There are not to be two religions in the [Arabian] Peninsula.”

Don’t panic–I don’t want to see any Mosques, temples, houses of worship of any religion destroyed in the United States. However, I do wonder why we let Muslims build Mosques here when they don’t let us build churches in their countries. Where is the reciprocity?

The article concludes:

In its annual report released this week, the U.S. Commission for International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), which provides independent advice to the government, expressed concern about the situation, saying that as a result of the indefinite waiver, “the United States has not implemented any policy response to the particularly severe violations of religious freedom” in the kingdom.

“USCIRF has concluded that U.S. policy in Saudi Arabia does not adequately prioritize issues of human rights, including freedom of religion or belief,” the report said.

I think it is time for America to say to all Muslims, “You cannot build a Mosque here until Christians and Jews are allowed to build churches and temples in your country.” It would be interesting to see what would happen next.

 

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