The Greens this week has decided to offer every support short of real help to those being massacred and brutalised by ISIS
“The NZDF deployment to Iraq does not make us safer, but puts New Zealand troops at risk and makes New Zealanders unnecessary targets of ISIL.
“We condemn the horrific violence of ISIL. New Zealand should be using its leverage as a member of the UN Security Council to curb ISIL’s access to funding and arms, not keeping our troops in danger for another year and a half,” said Mr Shaw.
This is straight out of the Yes Prime Minister episode on how the Foreign & Commonwealth Office explains how it helps foreign nations in trouble from invasion and tyranny. A 4 stage plan on how to do nothing.
In his recent speech before the House of Commons on further assistance to those fighting ISIS since Syria, Labour Party foreign office spokesman Hilary Benn described this as walking to the other side of the road.
Listening to this video reminds me of the performance evaluation General MacArthur gave of Major Eisenhower in the 1930s. He said that in a war this man should go straight to the top. I can see why he also quickly and easily became president when he wanted to such is his remarkable insight.
Oxfam inadvertently left the neighbour on the western border of Gaza off the map in its YouTube clip but not on its eastern border. An honest mistake despite the Arab Spring drawing the attention of Egypt and its politics to everyone’s ears including ODA activists.
The Gaza Strip has two borders: both Egypt and Israel restrict trade with the Gaza. Through this honest mistake in map reading, Oxfam blames Gaza’s problems on the Israeli blockade. I am sure it will correct its position once it reads a map such as the one adjacent which is identical to that in its YouTube clip in all but one detail. It has all of the Gaza’s neighbours on it.
Any blockade of Israel of the Gaza Strip is not grounds to attack Israel because it can always trade across its border with Egypt but Hamas backed the wrong side in the recent Egyptian presidential election.
After the military coup, the military leaders closed 95% of the tunnels that connected Egypt to Gaza. In 2013-2014, Egypt’s military has destroyed most of the 1,200 tunnels which were used to smuggle food, weapons and other goods into Gaza, including flooding them with sewage. Egypt is setting-up a 13-mile buffer zone with the Gaza Strip. The includes clearing 10,000 residents from 800 houses.
Hamas derived 40% of its tax revenue from tariffs on goods that flow through those tunnels with Egypt. One estimate puts the economic losses at nearly a fifth of Gazan GDP.
The Israeli blockade of the Gaza may have something to do with Gaza firing missiles randomly at civilian targets in Israel. Hamas now murders Israeli citizens in the street in knife attacks.
The Gaza strip may have political differences with the Egyptian military dictators but it is not actually committing acts of war against them.
There is no good reason why Oxfam is not protesting against Egypt’s blockade of the Gaza in the same way they protest against breaches of international law involved in the Israeli blockade!Passing references to the Egyptian blockade in press releases is not enough.
No peace convoys attempt to break the Egyptian blockade. Plenty were launched against Israel. One reason is the Egyptians are rough customers. There is rule of law in Israel, none in Egypt.
I will worry about terrorists in a more serious way when they stop using their mobile phones. I worry even more when they stop blabbing to everyone at the local mosque about their intentions.
Why Evolution is True is a blog written by Jerry Coyne, centered on evolution and biology but also dealing with diverse topics like politics, culture, and cats.
In Hume’s spirit, I will attempt to serve as an ambassador from my world of economics, and help in “finding topics of conversation fit for the entertainment of rational creatures.”
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