As America seeks to preserve its hegemony, in this case in the Middle East, it has more and more continued to run into obstacles that have either directly or indirectly been erected by Russia’s activity in the region through its policy to eradicate ISIS and to provide stability to the Syrian nation in helping to preserve its territorial integrity.
There are currently three global superpowers, three nations that lead the world: China, Russia, and US.
By all accounts, wherever the Islamic State has gained and held territory, its residents suffer terrible oppression and deprivation. Unless you are on their wavelength, you most likely agree that ISIS rule has been calamitous for its subjects. Both Obama and Trump have pointed out their badass nature on numerous occasions, not so much in sympathy for those they oppress but to raise fear levels of ISIS-inspired badassery here at home.
Since time immemorial, it has been an article of faith of every Muslim that suicide is ‘Haram’ (prohibited) in Islam. There is a well-known Islamic precept that whoever commits suicide will go straight to hell. But the Takfirists (those who declare others as heretics) have invented a new interpretation of Islam in which suicide is glorified as ‘martyrdom’ and suicide bombing is employed as a weapon to cause widespread fear.
I’m in my mid-thirties, which means that, after the 9/11 attacks, when this country went to war in Afghanistan and Iraq in what President George W. Bush called the “Global War on Terror,” I was still in college. I remember taking part in a couple of campus antiwar demonstrations and, while working as a waitress in 2003, being upset by customers who ordered “freedom fries,” not “French fries,” to protest France’s opposition to our war in Iraq.
On Tuesday, Intelligence agency directors testified at a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on “Worldwide Threats” that Russia has been meddling in US elections “for years”, and will continue doing so, including the 2018 midterm elections.
A new Department of Homeland Security report has come out which calls for the long-term surveillance of Sunni Muslim immigrants.
Initially sold as an initiative to combat terrorism, certain nations have collaborated in various military activities within the sovereign borders of Syria, including the United States, Israel, Turkey, Russia, and others. But even with the defeat of terrorist ISIL forces in Syria this past year, many of these nations are continuing their military activities in the region.
On December 4, 2001, less than three months after 9/11, President George W. Bush issued Executive Order 13224, which designated Holy Land Foundation (HLF) as a terrorist organization. On February 27, 2002, the Wall Street Journal quoted Bush as having said:
