Wars in the middle East; | Page 3 | Vital Football

Wars in the middle East;

All so bloody futile isn't it? And in the meantime, more and more innocent folks are being slaughtered.
 
I guess the Western fear is that leaving the Middle East to it's own devices would mean conceding it to Russia or China. Without the oil, that might not be a problem but...

Saudi Arabia's toxic regime is a big problem. Even with a magic regime change today, you still have a few generations who have spent all of their time in school learning about the Qoran and not much else. Backing those guys means supporting Isis and their horrifying perversion of Islam.
 
It turns out that the Americans have been arming and training terrorists in Jordan to fight Assad in Syria.

What a mad bunch of bastards.

Anyway, I guess we can expect civil war in Jordan shortly once Syria sorts itself out. Assad will try to overthrow King Abdullah, the American puppet.

I wonder what the Americans would give to have Saddam back in Iraq and the Arab Spring to have never happened?
 
In a World of fake news, alternative facts and biased media, do we trust Amnesty International?

I ask, as they release reports of 13,000 hanged in Syrian prisons. They were opponents of Assad and secretly hanged in one of Syria’s prisons in the first five years of the country’s civil war, as part of an extermination policy ordered by the highest levels of the Syrian government.

Does anyone still think Assad isn't responsible for atrocities?
 
I don't think anyone believes that Assad is a 'good guy'. Unfortunately, when the other option is ISIS, he's the best option.
 
ISIS isn't the only other option, though. There are many factions in Syria, including the rebels who oppose Assad. There have been atrocities on all sides, agreed, but Assad was torturing and killing children - the catalyst for the war.

I am getting a bit distracted here. My main question is, can we trust Amnesty International? If so, what makes them more reliable? If not, where do we get the truth from?
 
Is there a reason NOT to trust them? After all, everyone knows Assad is a complete bastard, so they have nothing to gain by exaggerating the allegations.

Speaking for myself, I'd be far more inclined to trust Amnesty than our own intelligence services, for instance. And I most certainly wouldn't trust 95% of the media either.
 
Yep, I can agree with that JPA. Why not trust them?

There was a discussion on something causing cancer, and I found something from Cancer Research that said it was rubbish. I unquestionably believed it, mainly because what would be their motive for lying? It's similar here.

That being the case, does it justify the arming of the rebels by the US and UK?
 
HeathfieldRoad1874 - 7/2/2017 16:19

That being the case, does it justify the arming of the rebels by the US and UK?
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Well to be honest, I'm a lover not a fighter and can NEVER justify the selling of arms by anyone to anyone.

I'm sure it would have been far more effective, and the war far shorter and less destructive, had the US and UK stood up to Assad in the first place. But that was never going to happen.
 
I think that Iraq has shown that direct intervention is not a viable solution. Any solution needs to involve the local communities.

The UN seems so toothless, doesn't it. The veto just ruins any chance of actually helping these countries achieve justice.

Maybe we should just have stayed out. Russia's involvement is just terrible, though. How can you back such a regime and protect them for so long?
 
HeathfieldRoad1874 - 7/2/2017 18:18

I think that Iraq has shown that direct intervention is not a viable solution. Any solution needs to involve the local communities.
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I agree; I didn't mean we should have stood up to Assad in a military sense, we should have used more forceful diplomatic means.

The UN isn't fit for purpose any more; as you say, it's a toothless organisation and as we showed with the Iraq debacle, they can be easily circumvented them if needs be with fictitious information - their scrutiny doesn't seem up to much.
 
Aid agencies have warned that Yemen is “at the point of no return” after new figures released by the UN indicated 17 million people are facing severe food insecurity and will fall prey to famine without urgent humanitarian assistance.

A total of 6.8 million people are deemed to be in a state of emergency – one step from famine on the five-point integrated food security phase classification (IPC), the standard international measure – with a further 10.2 million in crisis. The numbers reflect a 21% increase in hunger levels in the Arab world’s poorest state since June 2016.
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https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2017/mar/16/yemen-conflict-7-million-close-to-famine

6.8 MILLION people on the brink of famine? Just unbelievable that humans can act in such a way as to cause this kind of misery.

Not content with killing or making destitute all of his own people, Assad is busy leading a coalition backing the Yemeni government leading to a humanitarian crisis for 80% of the population.

Great job.
 
And Trump has already authorised more missions in Yemen, killing more civilians, than Obama did in 8 years.

I don't think we're going to see peace any time soon.
 
JuanPabloAngel - 16/3/2017 20:31

Aid agencies have warned that Yemen is “at the point of no return” after new figures released by the UN indicated 17 million people are facing severe food insecurity and will fall prey to famine without urgent humanitarian assistance.

A total of 6.8 million people are deemed to be in a state of emergency – one step from famine on the five-point integrated food security phase classification (IPC), the standard international measure – with a further 10.2 million in crisis. The numbers reflect a 21% increase in hunger levels in the Arab world’s poorest state since June 2016.
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https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2017/mar/16/yemen-conflict-7-million-close-to-famine

6.8 MILLION people on the brink of famine? Just unbelievable that humans can act in such a way as to cause this kind of misery.

Not content with killing or making destitute all of his own people, Assad is busy leading a coalition backing the Yemeni government leading to a humanitarian crisis for 80% of the population.

Great job.
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I'd imagine Assad is very busy at the moment with his own civil war.

Syria and Yemen are the same conflicts; Sunni Vs Shia. Iran and Saudi Arabia won't face each other directly so they are fighting proxy wars wherever possible.

The US (and so Britain) supports the Saudis and are encouraging these conflicts. The British media reflects the American side so they paint Assad as an evil dictator just as they did with Saddam and Gaddafi but they dare not report on life in Saudi.
 
BodyButter - 16/3/2017 13:33

I'd imagine Assad is very busy at the moment with his own civil war.

Syria and Yemen are the same conflicts; Sunni Vs Shia. Iran and Saudi Arabia won't face each other directly so they are fighting proxy wars wherever possible.

The US (and so Britain) supports the Saudis and are encouraging these conflicts. The British media reflects the American side so they paint Assad as an evil dictator just as they did with Saddam and Gaddafi but they dare not report on life in Saudi.
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Yes, my bad. I was reading Saudi Arabia and thinking Syria - obviously Assad is not (as far as we know!) anything to do with the Saudi government.

:12:
 
Nearly 70 children were among those killed when a suicide car bombing tore through buses carrying evacuees from besieged government-held towns in Syria, a monitoring group has said.

Saturday’s blast hit a convoy carrying residents from the northern towns of Fuaa and Kafraya as they waited at a transit point in rebel-held Rashidin, west of Aleppo.

At least 68 children were among the 126 people killed in the attack, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said, updating a previous toll of 112 dead.

At least 109 of the dead were evacuees, the UK-based monitoring group said, while the rest were aid workers and rebels guarding the convoy.
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Horrendous.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/apr/16/sixty-eight-children-dead-suicide-bombing-syria
 
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