Never Thought

Last week I sat glued to a television that displayed images of an America that I never thought would be displayed to a shocked world.   This was not the first time the world witnessed an orchestrated attack on Jews.  It was also not the first time that the world would witness an orchestrated attack on American values.  It was also not the first time that both Jews and Israel and America were painted with the same brush.  What was the first time was that the criticism of both Israel and the United States took place on American soil.  Many felt like crying, many felt anger and a few, a small few, cheered.  It seems that the group that cheers the loudest is seen as the popular choice while the truth resides with the silent majority.

There are so many questions and so many varied answers to the on-campus protests that an analysis of the events that culminated with riots across America will fill volumes on library shelves around the world at some time in the future.  The one thing that is certain is that riots should have never taken place.  The root causes date back to a society that was built on the backs of those that went to war to save the world for democracy and to fight the demons that wanted no less than total destruction of the Jewish people.  These are the men and women that made life easy for those that came after them and unfortunately many of their values were not infused into the children.

In the late 1970s I arrived in a peaceful Saudi Arabia.  The only enemy we heard of was Israel and the hatred was all ways present.  The term “Israel” could not be applied to the current country.  Instead the local news would refer to Israel as “occupied Palestine”.  The Jews did not take Israel from the local Arabs.  Israel was carved out by the United Nations in and effort to provide a homeland to the Jewish people to ease an uneasy conscience following an attempt to exterminate the Jewish people when six million were sent to death camps.  For those that deny that the Holocaust existed, look at the photos and movies of the liberation of these camps.  Piles of corpses, rotting on the ground, walking skeletons and bodies still lying in crematoriums tell a different story.  To those that find it politically expedient to deny the truth, the truth is in front of you.

The year after I arrived in Arabia the Shah of Iran was deposed and a radical Islamic government took its place.  Fueled by hatred for America due to the undying support of the deposed Shah, mobs flooded the streets of Iran and chanted “Death to America” while declaring this it would also destroy Israel.  These chants are continued to today but with one despicable change; they are being chanted in America. 

It is apparent that beautiful minds in America have been corrupted and changed into a cesspool of hatred of corruption.  We have witnessed students rioting, intimidate the innocent and destroy beauty as they are tainted by the warped minds of those that desire to see our great nation fall and then rebuilt in the image of Nazi Germany or Communist Russia. As bad it has appeared when chants of Death to America echo across some of the premier schools of higher education, there is cause to reflect on and be proud of our country and young people that embellish the principles that have made us great. 

At Columbia University rioters stormed Hamilton Hall, broke it open and occupied the building.  It appeared to be same situation as what took place on Capitol Hill on January 6^th, 2024; however, following arrests the perpetrators were charged with trespassing and released to go back to the riots.  The rainbow to this horrid storm was two young men standing at the door to the building trying to hold the mob back.  Both were students and one seemed to be a young naïve child.  Both stood up like true men; patriots.  `

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill also was under siege.  At one point the disrespectful rioters took down the American flag and raised the Palestinian flag over the university.  Then a group of students surrounded the flag pole, drove down the Palestinian flag and re-raised the American flag; daring someone to challenging them.  This single act reinforces one’s encouragement that America still has a bright future.

It is important that we don’t let the riots tear us down.  It is important that we look to the good.  We have had our problems before and survived and we will survive this.  The University of Florida handled their protests with leadership and it is unfortunate that the other schools did not act as quickly as Florida.  As soon as it started it was over and as the University said, don’t send you children to be baby sat.  Pro-Palestinian demonstrators would be suspended and banned from the University for three years.  Employees or professors breaking the rules would be fired.  These notices posted early and there was no negotiations with any student group.  As the proverb says “he who hesitates is lost”.   As the Romans said, “Carpe Diem” which translates to “Seize the Day” which means hit hard and hit fast.

Let us hope and pray that we continue to have the patriots among us that will display the courage and internal fortitude as those young men at UNC. God Bless America, God Save the Ukraine and Pray for Israel.

CIVILIANS – TO KILL OR NOT TO KILL

Civilians; in the time of war they are viewed as collateral damage while others view them as precious pieces of life on earth  that must be protected at all costs regardless of the consequences to a battle or war.  Today this dilemma is playing itself out around the world but only one crisis has garnered any comment or negative response from the press.  What are the facts of our current world as we must make the ultimate decisions; to kill or not to kill.

On January 30, 1945 the Russian army was on the verge of pouring into Germany.  The German army had not been kind to the soldiers and civilians of Russia when it had invaded.  The Germans knew that the Russian advance would be nothing short of rape, pillage and genocide.  The Germans had to escape the onslaught.

The MV Wilhelm Gusti was a German transport that had originally been built as a cruise ship to transport families for some rest and relaxation.  It was called into service to evacuate a thousand military and nine thousand civilians and transport them across the Baltic to safety.  This grossly over populated ship was traveling in the dark of a bitter cold night on the Baltic when a Russian submarine spotted the ship traveling with all navigation lights on.  The submarine commander tracked the ship and when the time came he fired three torpedoes into the liner.  The Gusti quickly sunk and took all but a thousand people to a frigid  watery  grave.  The best guess is that 9,400 people died making this the single largest loss of life in maritime history; six times greater than the sinking of the Titanic.  So this begs the question, was the sinking of an apparent cruise ship justified when the submarine captain thought there was a possibility the ship could be carrying military personnel.

In August of 1945 the war with Germany was over.  Many American airborne and other troops had volunteered to go to the Pacific and help with the invasion of Japan.  It was understood that this would be a costly invasion and possibly half a million servicemen would become casualties.  It has since been discovered that the civilians would fight with anything they could carry to repel the American invasion.

On August 6^th  of 1945 the United States dropped the first atomic on Hiroshima.  Three days later a second bomb was dropped on Nagasaki.  Between 129,000 and 226,000 people were killed, the vast majority being innocent civilians.  The civilians were collateral damage in an effort to bring Japan to its knees and end the war before America had to commit a million men and women to another battle.  So again we have to ask the question, was the killing of civilians worth the cost for an expedited end to a bloody war.

On October 7^th of 2023, a terrorist commando team composed of Palestinian fanatics invaded Israel.  To insure shock and awe women were raped and shot as babies were cooked alive in ovens.  Beheadings happened while young concert goers were executed.  For almost eighty years Israel took the fight to terrorist groups in the region only to stop and hope for peace.  The stopping only led to a period of peace that allowed the terrorist to regroup, rearm and relaunch assaults against the civilians of Israel.  The last invasion was the straw that broke the camels back and Israel launched an all-out attack that would finally destroy the terrorist group Hamas and possibly escalating to destroy Hezbollah in Lebanon.  Much of the world, including America, has called for a cease fire to prevent civilian casualties.  Then on April 13^th, Iran fired 300 drones, ballistic missiles and cruise missiles into Israel.  At the time of this writing America had not called for an Iranian ceasefire though we did ask that Israel to notify America before it hits Iran.  The only way for Israel to finally end this cat and mouse eighty year old war is to fully crush the terrorist organizations.  So this begs the question, should Israel continue the battle with Hamas in southern Gaza and incur more casualties or should it stop fighting and ultimately allow Hamas to regroup.

Nothing is simple when it comes to war and there is no simple answer when it comes to civilian deaths or for that matter, what are acceptable limits of civilian casualties.

God Bless America, God Save the Ukraine and Pray for Israel.

STATE OF WAR

THIS WILL APPEAR IN THE BERNICE BANNER THE WEEK OF 1/27/2024

The world is in a perilous place.  Not since the end of Desert Storm has the world been in such a state of war; a state that threatens to expand and grow to a world wide conflict.  All ready we see powerhouses of military locked in armed conflict.  Russia is battling the Ukraine and Ukraine is being fueled with arms and equipment from the United States and other NATO countries.  The United States is at the front of a true war at the mouth of the Red Sea and risks pulling Iran into the fray.  American troops are coming under fire in Iraq and Syria and it is only a matter of time before we have had enough and training bases in Iran will be hit.  Then when we have depleted military resources we will see either North Korea crossing the 38^th parallel and invade South Korea or watch mighty China invade Taiwan or, the worse of both worlds, both happening in concert.  The most fundamental question that we must ask ourselves is, “Does America have a right to kill his fellow man when friends, allies and American resources are attacked and can this justification be applied in the day to day lives of Americans at home?”.  The answer is a resounding “yes” and the reasoning comes from an English doctor almost four hundred years ago.    

Our writer states that the state of war is a state of “enmity and destruction” and thus identifies how dire a state of war is.  An earlier writing of his where he addresses his “state of nature” or peace is a polar opposite to a state of war.  He goes on to say that man has a right to defend himself if threatened and kill those that threaten him just as he would a lion or a wolf.  If a man does not respect the “commonwealth of reason” he must be treated as if he or they are wild beast. 

At the time our writer put pen to paper Europe was controlled by monarchies and the American colonies was under the rule of England, Florida and the Gulf Coast was under Spanish rule and France controlled what would someday be known as the Louisiana purchase.  Monarchies were the way of the world and it is clear that the author of “State of War” was an advocate of freedom of the individual and a clear critic of monarchs and those that want to have total control over others.  If a monarch or leader has absolute control on the life of an individual, the natural state of nature has been violated and the killing of the monarch is justified.   The world has come a long way in the last 400 years and monarch assassination is not the preferred method to remove a monarch or a person that controls others; however, we have witnessed these political executions in our lifetimes.  Case in point is the execution of the Viet Nam president in the 1960s, King Faisal of Arabia in the 1960s, Ghandi of India in 1948 and our own Martin Luther King, John Kennedy and Abrham Lincoln and who will forget the executions of the German High Command and Saddam Hussein.  In a free world it is important that killing a leader is not an option and we must use the vote to address our discontent.  

The Treatise, a written work dealing with a specific subject, goes on to say that “In this way, it is also lawful to kill a thief even if said thief has not caused any physical harm. In taking another’s money or possessions, a thief takes another into their power, and it can only be reasonably assumed that they will not stop at that. As the thief has thus entered into a state of war, it is lawful to kill a thief.”  This is very controversial in a day that we see looters taking another man’s property only to see a store clerk fired for trying to stop the thief.  This is a contradiction to our author’s interpretation that to live in a world of peace and harmony a person has a right to kill anyone that is trying to take his property.  He states that taking a man’s property is truly an act of war and throws the person’s world that is being robbed into chaos and war.  This holds true if someone is entering another mans home with the intent of stealing the home owners property or an army entering another country with the intent to steal the land and placing the citizens under the control of the invading army and its ruling nation.

So, who was this author.  His name is John Locke and he is noted as being an influencer of the founding of a small backwater country filled with backwoods men with little education that would grow to be known as the United States of America.  Though he had been dead for many decades he influenced our founding fathers.  A member of the Masonic Lodge of England, his writings were broadly read by the men that would craft both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States.  Thomas Jefferson said that Locke was one of the two most important figures of Liberalism in the world. 

We’ll take other looks at Locke’s writings and see what our country began as and then see where we have made some turns in our country’s journey.

FLOODING THE TUNNELS

THIS WILL APPEAR IN THE BERNICE BANNER THE WEEK OF DEC 25TH.

We have just completed the most wonderful holiday of the year, a period that warmth and love envelop us as we look at blessings instead of material holdings and love takes the place of animosity.  Though much of these good feelings remain with us today, they will certainly wain as we move back to a more hurried world.  Unfortunately, we will be witnessing the horrors of war and the killing of our fellow man as 2024 unfolds before our eyes on television and internet.

One major area of angst will be in Israel and neighboring Gaza.  The war against terrorism has disclosed a network of tunnels under the streets of Gaza that rivals the systems built by the Nazis in Germany prior to World War II.  This is not the only places to have tunnel systems.  Tunnels run under the temple mount in Jerusalem leading many to believe that hidden treasures of ancient Judea are waiting to be discovered while Rome is full of catacombs that were used for burials and secretive Christian worship sites.  Tunnels, Muslim Catacombs, run under the Kabbah of Mecca, Islams holiest city, a place so religious to the Muslim faith that a non-Muslim is not allowed within the limits of the city.

This leads us to the subject of our discussion, tunnel flooding.  Israel is at war with the terrorist organization Hamas.  Hamas resides in Gaza, a neighbor of Israel and the vast tunnel network has proven to be a challenge to the Israeli soldiers.  Israel is testing on a limited basis the flooding of tunnels to flush out the Hamas terrorist.  This is not the first time that flooding of tunnels has been used to remove subversive forces. 

In 1979 I had been in Arabia for my first year of work.  My family and I awoke one morning to hear that insurrectionist had taken over the Holy Kabbah and had proclaimed that the king of Saudi Arabia should be overthrown and the government replaced with a regime that is less tolerant of the United States and Europe.  The battle within Mecca continued for days and finally it was over with little detail of what went on.

A friend I worked with in Dhahran was a Pakistani American engineer that had immigrated to America to work and live.  He told me he was visiting his family in Pakistan, had taken a train and met a man that was trapped in the Kabbah when it was attacked and he was held hostage.

The Pakistani on the train had been on a pilgrimage to the holy shrive when terrorist burst in and took everyone hostage.  The huge gates were closed and no one could leave.  According to the man, the attackers took position along the walls and their fire toward the Saudi military was deadly accurate. War is hell and in the fog of war confusion takes place. The Pakistani man said that the majority of the casualties were not due to the terrorist but instead the military mistakenly thought  the hostages were terrorist when the terrorist opened the gates to let the hostages go free.  Unfortunately the Saudi military shot them as they ran through the gate. The military causality list published in the Saudi papers disclosed a disproportionate number of officers killed as compared to the enlisted troops and hints that the Saudi officers were trying to rally their troops.

Finally, after days of fighting the ground forces were successful in entering the holiest of holies for the Muslims; however, many of the terrorist had gone underground and were hiding in the catacomb tunnels below Mecca.  There were stories circulated that the French Foreign Legion had been recruited to take on the insurgents.  This was in conflict to the entrance of non-Muslims into Mecca but was a necessity to obtaining a solution to the fighting.  Soon after the revolt was over the French were awarded a multi-billion dollar contract to build a naval base on the Saudi Coast.

This is not the end of the story.  The entrance of forces into the Kabbah was not the end of the conflict.  Insurgents had moved underground and fighting underground is not a good option if other actions could be taken.  The Saudi’s flooded the catacombs and ultimately forced the terrorist to surrender or drown.  Our Pakistani that witnessed this said that water poured through the streets of Mecca for days.  This action saved the lives of many military and ended the takeover much quicker.

The Saudis used this as an opportunity to discourage other insurrections.  Many terrorists were captured and stood trial. They were quickly dispersed to cities and towns around the country where they were summarily executed by beheading in the town square near the mosques.

Israel can follow the same practice but it is weighing all options.  Unlike Mecca, the tunnels also contain much of Gaza’s infrastructure and Israel does not want to destroy the city, only the Hamas infrastructure.  There is also a concern that the salt water used to flood the tunnels will contaminate the fresh water of the country.  The biggest concern is that many of the Israeli hostages are being held  in the tunnels and will ultimately be drowned.

One thing is for certain, Israel will destroy Hamas just as the despicable ISIS was destroyed and there will eventually be peace.  Wouldn’t it be wonderful to celebrate Christmas next year when we can feel that there is lasting peace.

God Bless America, Pray for the Ukraine and God Protect Israel.

PALESTINE – THE VOLCANO

This will appear the week of July 14th, 2014 in the Bernice Banner, Bernice, Louisiana, USA.

The Mid-East is once again a volcano, pressure building, waiting to explode and the tip of the volcano is once again the Israeli-Palestine zone. As I watched the Israel military aircraft hit Palestinian Hamas targets in retaliation for the murder of three Israeli teen agers I questioned if this will ever end. Then as the body of a young Palestinian who had been burned alive was shown it finally sunk in that this is the norm and the best we can hope for is a truce and only if it is controlled by a third party. My first recollection of the Palestinian/Israeli conflict was the award winning movie Exodus. The true story meant little to a very young child and once outside the Joy Theater on Farmerville’s Main Street the significance of the story was over. Then in the summer of my junior year reality really sunk in. The six day war took place and tiny Israel, surrounded by countries bent on the destruction of the country, defeated the armies of the Mid-East in just six days. We aren’t talking about a small assault; we are talking about armies from British trained Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Iran and Iraq. Saudi Arabia was smart enough to stay out of the fight and even moved their fighters from Jeddah to the eastern province and thus out of reach of the Israeli air craft. Israel won the war and captured the Golan Heights and parts of the Gaza Strip and the West Bank of the Jordan River, the Sinai Peninsula plus East Jerusalem.
Ten years later I arrived in Saudi Arabia and met the true meaning of the Mid-East conflict. The word Israel was never mentioned. The term Occupied Palestine was used instead. When Israel performed some sort of military action it was referred to as Zionist aggression. After ten years living in Arabia, Iraq invaded Kuwait and for the first time in the history of the Kingdom, live television was beamed into the country; courtesy of CNN. Then as Israel came under SCUD attack we witnessed the Israeli’s present Prime Minister throw on a gas mask as missiles slammed into the country. Later, when Israel was attacked the live television cut to a picture of flowers and Arab music came across the television. Israel would not be seen on Saudi television again.
So after fifty years of seeing the glass as being half full, I now realize that the glass is really half empty. The conflict between Arab and Hebrew is not limited to this generation, or a few generations. It has been manifested over a hundred generations. The first conflict between Arab and Jew was approximately 1300 BCE when the Hebrews left Egypt. There has been conflict ever since. In 960 BCE Solomon’s temple was completed only to be destroyed in 586 BCE by invading Babylonians from the country we now know as Iraq. Then in 460 BCE Persia sent an army to restore order in Judea. Persia is now known as Iran. By 1095 AD the crusades began and continued for two hundred years. Christians and Muslims fought bloody battles over Jerusalem. Conflict continued between Muslims and Jews until 1917 when Britain defeated the Muslim Turks and took control of Palestine. By 1929 Jewish and Arab conflicts exploded in a massacre of Jews but finally in 1947 the Jewish state of Israel is formed. This land carved from Muslim territory started a series of wars and unrest up until today.
Britain had carved out a part of the territory it held and under a United Nations resolution, Israel was born. Finally after a thousand years of persecution, slaughter and destruction the Jews finally had a homeland. They were finally home and home for good. There was one problem, the land that provided the Jewish homeland was home to Palestinian Arabs and had been so for a thousand years. They were uprooted and had their own exodus. Since then the Palestinians have fought to regain what they consider to have been stolen from them and the Jews are fighting to keep what they say was originally theirs thousands of years earlier. There is no easy fix to this situation. The Palestinians want their homeland back and the United States, France and England are felt to also be at fault for the U.N. resolution that uprooted them.
Despite attempts at peace and many false starts the fact is that there is no peace in the Mid-East and at best we can expect only brief periods of calm. I am a dyed in the wool optimist but reality has set in and truly the glass is half empty.
Enter the United States and this is the only true hope for the region. We don’t need to bring in military units and we don’t need to commit forces but we do need to apply diplomacy at every opportunity. We must act as a diplomatic buffer. Our goal is single minded, keep the two sides apart and defuse potential hot spots. Then and only then is there any chance of future healing, but this is a long way off. It took 3,500 years to get to where we are today so we are looking at many generations of healing to even hope at peace where the lion will lie down with the lamb. Let us hope that the wisdom of the United States State Department will make the right decisions to keep the area calm and at least allow a tranquil life for the two diverse occupants.