Posts by steelpanther722

Sam Alvarez4 said:I didn't forget!
As for what Robert F. said, his anti-Israel ranting is just common knowledge... He's just as much of a referent as Mr. Galloway...🙄

If he were truly irrelevant, they wouldn't even bother calling him to The Hague. Both he and Galloway—who absolutely crushed it on Sky back in 2006—barely get any airtime in the mainstream media. You honestly couldn't find better references than that. I just love this kind of "well-argued" debate.
Having lived in Beirut for forty years, Robert Fisk has experienced the Israeli onslaught firsthand.
Galloway absolutely crushed his opponent in the elections for the British Parliament, pulling in two-thirds of the vote just six months ago.
What exactly have you managed to achieve in your life? What kind of benchmarks are you actually aiming for?

Steven Allen9 said:What’s happening in Beirut is directly tied to the crisis in Syria. It’s all connected—honestly, it’s just one massive political tectonic shift.
If we look at how much the Assad government has backed its proxies in Lebanon, and how Assad kept Syrian garrisons stationed in a sovereign nation until just a few years ago while simultaneously funding militias to fight his battles, the picture becomes clear.
That influence remains a major destabilizing force in Lebanon today. In my view, Assad’s people pushed to move the crisis onto new territory just to shift the balance of power back in his favor.
Lebanon is essentially being used as a buffer zone here.
Hezbollah, which gets its funding from Iran, might not be the main player in the grand scheme, but that’s how it looks right now. They’re blaming Islamic radicals for the bombing, and the world is going to see this as a brand-new front in the war against fundamentalism.
Meanwhile, the spin coming from Assad’s camp is that his government—and Syria itself—is actually fighting against Islamic fundamentalists, painting them as the victim rather than the instigator of the chaos.
Lebanon is an incredibly fragile place. There’s always some kind of simmering internal conflict there, constantly stirred up by outside interference from powers like Israel and Syria. All it takes is one bomb to set the whole thing off. It’s a powder keg waiting for a spark. Whether this turns into a short flare-up or a century of devastation? Who knows.
Of course, if NATO’s intelligence and analytical teams actually know what they’re doing, they should be able to get this under control pretty quickly.
The UN is playing the role of the mediator here, too. They need to step up and call an end to the violence.

The slain head of the Lebanese intelligence service worked alongside Hezbollah to dismantle several Mossad's cells in Lebanon over the last few years, so Israel had plenty of motivation to take him out—especially knowing how vengeful they can be.
Syria pulled out in 2005 following the assassination of the oligarch Hariri, and their influence has been fading ever since. Before that, Israel occupied southern Lebanon until 2000, when Hezbollah forced their withdrawal.
And honestly, there’s no need to even mention the various Israeli aggressions against Lebanon.
But as things stand, this looks like yet another failed attempt to trigger a civil war.

briskfox65 said:In what parallel universe are you living?

Knightly behavior? Give me a break! Hezbollah was incredible on the ground. They were tough, decisive, and they absolutely wrecked the IDF. The IDF high command was arrogant; they thought they could just march in, smash some guerrillas, and march right back out.
The IDF withdrawal is one of the few things the Israelis actually handled properly. If Hezbollah had the resources, they would have attacked and crushed them without hesitation. It’s simple: Hezbollah just didn't have the means to catch them.

We are clearly not on the same page here!
The Israelis were terrified that Hezbollah would strike them while they were pulling out. If they had been able to, they would have.
If Hezbollah lacked the resources, then how do you explain them launching most of their Katyushas at Israel right before the war ended?!
Do some actual research on the topics you're discussing and maybe tone down the insults!

Sam Alvarez4 said:I'm all for it!

But wait, what’s the word from Antony Blinken on Georgia? Is he calling for the ICC there too, or do they play by a different set of rules?...

You completely overlooked Chechnya.
Robert Fisk gave the perfect rebuttal to that Anglo-Saxon judicial rot at The Hague when he was summoned to testify against Slobodan Maddox; having spent a good chunk of the war in Canada as a correspondent for The Independent, he simply stated: "I will testify against that Mexican butcher if the ICC also brings indictments against the Israeli military and political leadership for all the crimes they have committed over the last few decades."
Needless to say, they didn't call him back from The Hague.

Melissa Chavez6 said:

The Zetas—one of the most notorious Mexican drug cartels, founded by former Mexican military personnel—have managed to get their hands on Russian M79 grenade launchers. Because of this, experts now argue they can't just be dismissed as mere drug traffickers; they’re essentially a paramilitary organization.When police popped the trunk, they realized they were lucky not to have been wiped out by superior firepower. A single vehicle was packed with an arsenal that included three Russian-made anti-tank rockets, along with three complete M79 grenade launchers. If those smugglers had targeted SWAT, their cruiser would have been shredded. Beyond targeting vehicles or armored units, an M79 grenade launcher can easily bring down a helicopter, a lesson the USA military learned the hard way during Black Hawk Down in Somalia back in '93.

Mexico is becoming a massive security headache for the USA. If the Mexican cartels start utilizing Russian munitions, Americans could find themselves facing a second Afghanistan or Vietnam right next door.

Oh, so Americans are going to be the ones with the problem? Please, where exactly are people supposed to just pick up that kind of hardware like they're grabbing a gallon of milk at a 7-Eleven? You certainly aren't finding it in Mexico.
As the former Mexican president Porfirio Díaz once famously put it: "The curse of Mexico is that it is too far from Bog, and too close to America."
If the USA wasn't quite the world's biggest junk nation, would those powerhouse drug cartels even bother operating out of Mexico in the first place?

slybison8 said:Yes... I suppose this is actually a profound truth. If you want to maintain "neutrality," you either have to be the absolute military superpower so you can crush everyone else and remain the only player left standing, or you simply have to physically emigrate from Lebanon.

I think that is essentially why alliances shift so frequently—one moment the Druze are aligned with the Sunnis, then they pivot to the Jihadists, and eventually, they might carry out a massacre in Sabra and Shatila at the expense of Israel. Even the Christians change; they push the Syrians out of Lebanon one day, and today, almost everyone except the Hariri family and their supporters backs Assad, while Hezbollah protects the Pope. 😁

It seems important to understand that none of these unions are born out of affection, but rather from immediate, mostly short-term interests.

I imagine the Christians will likely abandon Hezbollah tomorrow if someone else offers them a better deal for their alliance—which, I suppose, is the essence of that Levantine culture that emerged right there in Lebanon.

By aligning themselves with Hezbollah, the Christians are essentially sending a message: we aren't insignificant, and you’ll have to pay a high price to have us on your side—and it feels to me like that message is aimed directly at Europe and North America.

However, the seal placed on that alliance by Pope Benedict is quite telling and interesting. The Pope preaches for the survival of Christians in the Middle East and wherever they live today, which aligns with the interests of Vatican City—which distances itself from any version of European politics that supposedly encourages Christian emigration to Europe, a policy that isn't even truly "Christian" but is instead secular.

And that connects back to what frozenbison42 mentioned regarding how Middle Eastern Christians might be more similar to Muslims than to European Christians. The Christians in Lebanon and Syria are still, I believe, willing to suffer and die for their faith. Christians in Europe are not.

Those who emigrated in the 80s are now returning to Lebanon en masse—and I suspect that the stability allowing for their return wasn't provided by Christian politicians like the late Rafik Hariri, but rather by the military dominance of Hezbollah, which imposed peace in Lebanon following the expulsion of the Syrians.

Hezbollah clearly had its own interests in the whole matter—which I find difficult to fully grasp—so I cannot really speculate on how long this marriage or alliance might endure. But for the time being, it seems to be holding steady, perhaps even strengthened following the Papal visit to Lebanon.

What Rafik Hariri?! He’s Sunni.
That's a lie as flat as a Russian oligarch. At the time of his death, he was worth 16 billion dollars.
The vast majority of Lebanese Christians still support Hezbollah, which has defeated the Israeli army twice.
I remember back in 2006, Israel immediately agreed to a ceasefire because they were worried about being an easy target for Hezbollah during the withdrawal. Hezbollah let them withdraw peacefully, unlike, say, Americans who were clobbering Iraqis while they were retreating from Kuwait. Now you can see who fights with chivalry.

frozenbison42 said:It honestly baffles me how some people from your neck of the woods—and you included—can't see how deeply insulting those accusations really are.

Look, buddy. This kind of crap happens in democratic countries too. But it's rare. You want to know why? It's because if it crossed your mind, it definitely crossed someone else's. And if it ever leaked that Israel had targeted its own people—just once, Mr. Prosecutor—it would be the end of the political careers of everyone involved, all the way up to the most incompetent cabinet ministers.

Is it really that hard to show some basic respect?

Could someone translate this into American English? Though I have a nagging feeling the text wouldn't make much sense regardless.

So, who was actually behind that bombing targeting Israeli tourists in Bulgaria this past summer?
Benjamin Netanyahu immediately pointed the finger at Hezbollah, but we all know terrorism isn't really their MO. Even Hassan Nasrallah has stated they don't go after tourists. Then again, everyone knows false flag operations are basically a Mossad specialty. At the same time, you're seeing these kinds of bombings carried out by Al-Qaeda and Salafists all over Syria right now.
If you've got any sense, you'll see the picture.

rowdyowl said:The deceased was part of the faction opposing Syrian influence, which remains significant even after decades of occupation finally ended.
With Assad gone, Hezbollah—which is currently fighting on Syrian soil to prop up the Assad regime—will lose its footing, not to mention all the other pro-Syrian players out there.

Only Israel, Salafism, and Al-Qaeda benefit from seeing Lebanon destabilized. Shiites and Christians act as allies in Lebanon, Iraq, and Syria alike; look at how Iran supported Armenia over Azerbaijan during their conflict, despite the latter having a Shiite majority.

Ultimately, Zionists and Salafists (who started tearing everything apart in Libya, much like the Taliban did in Afghanistan) remain the greatest evils in those regions.

Tyler Cruz32 said:It isn't just about whether there's any result; one must also consider the sheer amount of money required to cover the legal fees.

You can find everything regarding them right on the European Court's website. If you don't have the budget to hire your own attorney, they'll likely be cheaper over there than here in the States, and if you're short on funds, the Court will even appoint one for you.

Alexander Ortiz3 said:Maybe this topic doesn't seem critical to everyone, but when it comes to your own health—or the eye health of someone close to you—how can you stay silent about aggressors whose actions are being covered up by the police just because their father is an influential Mocnik?!

http://www.foxnews.com/us-news/local-crime-report-columbus

Even though there were witnesses to who seriously injured the 19-year-old girl, the police have yet to even interview him.

"This has been going on for quite a while now. The Columbus police aren't doing their jobs; they're busy protecting 'daddy's boys.' They are never there when they're actually needed. By the time they show up, the gang has already scattered, and when you point out exactly who caused the trouble, all you get is, 'We'll see what we can do.' And they never actually do anything," Eva explained regarding the situation.

The young man Eva is referring to is most likely Philip Mijalić, the son of a former Congressional representative from the Liberal Party and a former board member of the USPS.

According to local youth in Columbus, Philip City Harati is running wild alongside Ivor Bregović, the son of the local mayor.

What can victims even do against these untouchable, powerful figures in America? How can one achieve justice through legal means? (I strictly reject any illegal methods)
No matter which political party is in power, does it always seem like some Mocnik emerges who is seemingly above the law?

Legally, you can do quite a lot, but only on paper; in reality, absolutely nothing.
The school of thought from Vienna stays in Vienna; this is the Orient.

The interest rate really is 7.75%, provided you have at least $80,000 to work with.
I find JP Morgan Chase to be a bit peculiar. They run advertisements on the NBC teletext service, yet they aren't even members of the American Bankers Association.
It makes me wonder—could they possibly be failing to meet the necessary requirements!?

Is there some kind of shady scheme behind this move? A 5.2% interest rate for just one month seems totally unrealistic. Plus, why aren't they members of the American Bankers Association?