Middle East Politics

Foxbatt

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My intake is that the last 20 to 30 years is where the nasty side of things have come out especially with the Saudi version of Islam. The 'ayaths" of the Quran are written in different time and for different occasions. Some could be harsh while others are very merciful and I think everything has to be taken in context as in every other religion.
What surprised me was the commonality between Judaism and Islam. It is really ironic the fight between both as it could almost be the same religion.
What also makes me laugh is when a lot of western commentators ( I mean on the news channels) talk about the Judeo Christianity. In fact there is not so much commonality between Christianity and Judaism while there is a lot more commonality between Islam and Judaism.
 

André Dominguez

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Foxbatt said:
My intake is that the last 20 to 30 years is where the nasty side of things have come out especially with the Saudi version of Islam. The 'ayaths" of the Quran are written in different time and for different occasions. Some could be harsh while others are very merciful and I think everything has to be taken in context as in every other religion.
What surprised me was the commonality between Judaism and Islam. It is really ironic the fight between both as it could almost be the same religion.
What also makes me laugh is when a lot of western commentators ( I mean on the news channels) talk about the Judeo Christianity. In fact there is not so much commonality between Christianity and Judaism while there is a lot more commonality between Islam and Judaism.
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Have to agree. During the crusades Christians pretty much killed everyone who weren't a christian. The Siege of Jerusalem executed by the crusade armies was a blood bath, and they would take no prisoners (the would immediatly execute anyone who surrendered). The number of casualties is calculated to be between 30K - 70K, which is a lot if you bare that the world population was hundred times smaller than nowadays.

Quoting:
Jews had fought side-by-side with Muslim soldiers to defend the city, and as the Crusaders breached the outer walls, the Jews of the city retreated to their synagogue to "prepare for death".
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Even in old Europe, most of the Hebrews had to fled to Flanders (not the Simpsons character) who was a much friendlier place, mainly at Antwerp, to escape death and torture. As the diamonds business were mainly hold by Jews at the time, Antwerp became the world's diamonds trade capital, and it still remains the title as we speak.

The whole modern conflict is due to how things were done after WWII. A lot of unilateral decisions combined with nationalist movements surging at a lot of middle east countries during those decades turned a fixable problem into a war.
 

Foxbatt

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Yes Andre. The most violent Palestinians initially were not the Al Fatah group of Arafat but George Habash who was not a muslim. So it was a national movement of the Palestinians who eventually got taken over by the radicals due to geopolitics. You take out the Saudis from the equation and probably the Mullahs in Iran would fall in that case and there would be a bit of peace in the Middle East.
I remember once a Jew who was flying forget about ordering his Kosher meal and when he knew that it was Halal he accepted the choice. I was very surprised by this.
 

André Dominguez

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Foxbatt said:
Yes Andre. The most violent Palestinians initially were not the Al Fatah group of Arafat but George Habash who was not a muslim. So it was a national movement of the Palestinians who eventually got taken over by the radicals due to geopolitics. You take out the Saudis from the equation and probably the Mullahs in Iran would fall in that case and there would be a bit of peace in the Middle East.
I remember once a Jew who was flying forget about ordering his Kosher meal and when he knew that it was Halal he accepted the choice. I was very surprised by this.
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The bigger challenge we are facing now is not only the return of nationalism movements.
People should had learned from the past that these guys were already in power for several times and the end product was usually poor, and curiously the corruption actually rises, because these kind of parties use an oligarchic system, and contrary to popular believe, concentrating the power in less people is usually a receipt for conflicts. One just need to look at the time of monarchies where wars were started by ridiculous petty reasons (and some of those wars were really big!).

We cannot say that the whole situation is in a non-return point, just look at Portugal and Spain: our ancestors would almost kill each other in a lot of border areas, and nowadays the Iberian rivalry is much more a banter than anything else. Thousands of Portuguese work/spend their vacations in Spain and vice-versa. Off course, we handled each other for more than a thousand years, while Palestine and Israel are still babies as countries.
 

RedTiger

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Foxbatt said:
Yes Andre. The most violent Palestinians initially were not the Al Fatah group of Arafat but George Habash who was not a muslim. So it was a national movement of the Palestinians who eventually got taken over by the radicals due to geopolitics. You take out the Saudis from the equation and probably the Mullahs in Iran would fall in that case and there would be a bit of peace in the Middle East.
I remember once a Jew who was flying forget about ordering his Kosher meal and when he knew that it was Halal he accepted the choice. I was very surprised by this.
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Maimonides told jews that it's acceptable to pray in a mosque if no synagogue is available, but they are not allowed to pray in a church.
 

Foxbatt

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It is the most fecked up region in the world. And then when you throw in someone like Trump it is more than fecked up. The Egyptians and the Saudis are always trying to undermine each other. Egypt of course being more secular and the Saudis being the extremists and exporting wahabism.
 

Foxbatt

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Good one 2cents but the Syrian issue is not a local uprising but a foreign inspired regime change due to the refusal of Syria to have the Qatar pipeline through Syria. Can you imagine if the foreign countries did not pump in money and brought in mercenaries from outside, this thing would have lasted maybe a week at most and with about 1000 dead at the most and everything would have calmed down and there would have been no ISIS in Syrian, No Iranians in Syria and No Russians there either.
 

DoomSlayer

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Foxbatt said:
Good one 2cents but the Syrian issue is not a local uprising but a foreign inspired regime change due to the refusal of Syria to have the Qatar pipeline through Syria. Can you imagine if the foreign countries did not pump in money and brought in mercenaries from outside, this thing would have lasted maybe a week at most and with about 1000 dead at the most and everything would have calmed down and there would have been no ISIS in Syrian, No Iranians in Syria and No Russians there either.
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I think Syria has turned into a huge geopolitical loss for USA, it has also allowed Russia to gain bigger influence in the region, created tension with Turkey and further exposed one of the biggest American allies for their action, by which I mean Saudi Arabia and Israel.
 

2cents

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2cents

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There should be streets all over Syria named after this guy:

 

Hanks

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Surprised no mention of this.

29 year old Iranian women who was sentenced to 2 years in prison for going to football stadium, disguising as a man, died after setting herself on fire.

Lots of high profile tweets from likes of Pogba, AS Roma Official about her (Sahar Khodayari, nicknamed "Blue Girl" because of the team she supported), etc....but nothing will happen.

FIFA needs to grow a pair and BAN us from international competitions and qualifiers altogether. Honestly, just ban us. It's better to be banned to let shit like this go on again. Her death can't go in vain...

Iran's national team Captain put this post on Tuesday on Instagram after winning 0-2 in Hong Kong in first match of WC Qualifiers:

"Today was the bitterest and saddest win of all time for the National Team. We scored 2 goals and won on the field, but we didn't really win. We lost because Sahar isn't with us anymore. Shame on me for not being able to do anything for her and curse on those who took away her most basic of rights and freedoms. Condolences to her family and all the girls in Iran"



 

Adisa

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I despise the leadership of SA with a passion but Iran is really no better. Women can't watch a game of football...wtf?
FiFA will chicken out.
 

2cents

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VidaRed

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2cents said:
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Whats there to see in SA except the kaaba and the mosques in mecca and medina (and the haj already covers that) ?

I long to see the day the saudi regime is toppled and the wahabis beaten through the streets (preferably by women).
 

2cents

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VidaRed said:
Whats there to see in SA except the kaaba and the mosques in mecca and medina (and the haj already covers that) ?

I long to see the day the saudi regime is toppled and the wahabis beaten through the streets (preferably by women).
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I'd imagine Red Sea diving and the Empty Quarter would attract a certain type of tourist. They also have a kind of mini-Petra in the north-west. Apart from that I'd personally be interested to visit Jeddah and the Asir region, although I agree the country isn't exactly teeming with mainstream tourist attractions, especially considering its size.
 

Organic Potatoes

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2cents said:
I'd imagine Red Sea diving and the Empty Quarter would attract a certain type of tourist. They also have a kind of mini-Petra in the north-west. Apart from that I'd personally be interested to visit Jeddah and the Asir region, although I agree the country isn't exactly teeming with mainstream tourist attractions, especially considering its size.
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I know via YouTube Red Sea fishing via SA is trying to become a thing...

 

Skills

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VidaRed said:
Whats there to see in SA except the kaaba and the mosques in mecca and medina (and the haj already covers that) ?

I long to see the day the saudi regime is toppled and the wahabis beaten through the streets (preferably by women).
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Non Muslims aren't allowed there anyway, so I guess this will fall flat if they're opening up visa free travel for Europeans and Americans.
 

Adisa

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Pound for pound, Saudi Arabia must have the worst army on the planet
 

Kaos

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Adisa said:
Pound for pound, Saudi Arabia must have the worst army on the planet
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They’ve never had their troops battle hardened, their modus operandi in war seems to be to get on their knees and beg the US to fight their battles for them. It’s no surprise that they’re getting humiliated by 14 year old Yemeni villagers.
 

Foxbatt

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Maybe show the tourists first hand experience of war? Package tours to experience the dramatic and exhilarating experience of fighting the Houthis?
A new army corp called The Tourist Corp?
 

2cents

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Strange things happening in the Kingdom. First there’s this, which could not look more suspicious:

Bodyguard to Saudi king reportedly shot dead by friend
State TV offers few details on death of Maj Gen Abdulaziz al-Fagham in ‘personal dispute’

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/sep/29/bodyguard-saudi-king-reportedly-shot-dead-friend-abdulaziz-al-fagham

And also this:


Huthis have now started releasing images from the raid showing some of the captured and seemingly predominantly non-Saudi soldiers:

(Loads throughout this thread)
 

RedTiger

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2cents said:
Strange things happening in the Kingdom. First there’s this, which could not look more suspicious:

Bodyguard to Saudi king reportedly shot dead by friend
State TV offers few details on death of Maj Gen Abdulaziz al-Fagham in ‘personal dispute’

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/sep/29/bodyguard-saudi-king-reportedly-shot-dead-friend-abdulaziz-al-fagham

And also this:


Huthis have now started releasing images from the raid showing some of the captured and seemingly predominantly non-Saudi soldiers:

(Loads throughout this thread)
Click to expand...
Bloody hell that's ridiculous, how large was the Houthi force? Moral must be nonexistent if that many coalition fighters just surrendered like that.
 

Foxbatt

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Most of the so called Saudi force was in t shirts and shorts. Is that how an army look like? I think they are a bunch of mercenaries picked up somewhere and then decided to surrender as soon as they can.
 

2cents

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RedTiger said:
Bloody hell that's ridiculous, how large was the Houthi force? Moral must be nonexistent if that many coalition fighters just surrendered like that.
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I don’t see much reason to believe the Huthi claims on this based on those photos.
 

Foxbatt

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2cents said:
I don’t see much reason to believe the Huthi claims on this based on those photos.
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It wasn't just one day. It was over a period of time and that one day was the largest defeat. They are not Saudis mostly but poor guys from Somalia, Sudan, Ethopia and the likes. Mercenaries mostly. Did you see how they looked? They look like a rabble instead of a regular army.
 

VidaRed

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Foxbatt said:
It wasn't just one day. It was over a period of time and that one day was the largest defeat. They are not Saudis mostly but poor guys from Somalia, Sudan, Ethopia and the likes. Mercenaries mostly. Did you see how they looked? They look like a rabble instead of a regular army.
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and they're still more capable than the saudis.
 
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