As the Syrian Arab Army dug in for a fight against the self-declared Islamic State on September 17, they were struck by an air raid that killed 62 soldiers and injured 100 more. The culprit was a foreign military that has never been attacked by, and has not declared war on, Syria.
An ambassador is a … gentleman sent to lie abroad for the good of his country.
— Attributed to Sir Henry Wotton, 1568-1639
Jamila Assi
JamilaEyes
The best title for our contemporary history, we can never find a better slogan to promote our reality, a reality where showing compassion and solidarity replace real action to help those we sympathize with.
“Je Suis Hypocrite”
The exoneration of a man accused of the worst of crimes, genocide, made no headlines. Neither the BBC nor CNN covered it. The Guardian allowed a brief commentary. Such a rare official admission was buried or suppressed, understandably. It would explain too much about how the rulers of the world rule.
The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague has quietly cleared the late Serbian president, Slobodan Milosevic, of war crimes committed during the 1992-95 Bosnian war, including the massacre at Srebrenica.
Words matter, my friends. And if you are running to be president, or you are president of the United States, words can have tremendous consequences.
— Hillary Clinton, August 10, 2016
There is an ugly anti-Russian mood in various Rio Olympic venues. When the Russian swimmers entered the pool for the 4 x 100M Freestyle team event, they were loudly booed. When the Russian team barely lost 3rd place, the announcer happily announced that Russian had been “kept off the medal stand”.
The Democratic National Committee under Debbie Wasserman Schultz, in fact, served as the Hillary Clinton Coronation Organizing Committee, operating, step by step, to ensure that the front-runner would become the party’s nominee.
Despite a backlash evocative of those who defended the Jim Crow US South, Green Party members recently voted in favor of a resolution calling on Ottawa to stop subsidizing racist land covenants. Next weekend the Greens will make a final decision on whether they support the principles underlying a half-century old Supreme Court of Canada decision outlawing discriminatory land-use policies.
Caveat one: Wishful thinking is considered bad, pollyannish, naïve, deluded, etc. Fine. I will plead “guilty” to all of these and boldly proceeded to express some terminal wishful thinking. I
Recently I went on a 15 day visit to Russia organized by the Center for Citizen Initiatives. The group visited Moscow, the Crimean peninsula, Krasnodar (southern Russia) and St. Petersburg. In each location we met many locals and heard diverse viewpoints. CCI has a long history promoting friendship and trying to overcome false assumptions between citizens of the USA and Russia. The founder Sharon Tennison has focused on making people-people connections including the business community, Rotary clubs, etc..
