by Todd Johnson: While many Americans have been consumed over the last couple of weeks with the coverage of stories pertaining to either Hurricanes Harvey and Irma, there was a noteworthy event that took place in the Middle East. It didn’t receive a lot of coverage, but it has the potential to inflame diplomatic relations across the region. It was reported without much fanfare on Sept. 7 that the Israeli Air Force launched several airstrikes into a Syrian military compound around Masyaf, reputedly a warehouse for short and mid-range missiles, as well as a home for the development of chemical weapons. The strikes, neither confirmed nor denied by Israeli officials, mark a significant milestone as they represent a ratcheting up of operations against the Syrian government and its partners, primarily Iran.
Bashar al-Assad’s brutal regime, once seen as international public enemy number one following its use of chemical weapons against the Syrian people, is now on the verge of defeating Islamic State forces. The head of the Russian army in Syria, a staunch ally of Assad for many years, said as much in an interview with a British newspaper over the weekend. This radical shift in fortunes for Assad is one of the main reasons for the Israeli attack earlier this month and is seen as a preemptive strike by many military experts. And who can blame the Israeli government for being concerned?
Two of Assad’s main allies in the fight against the Islamic State, other than Russia, have been Iran and its proxy Hezbollah, a Lebanese Shiite group considered by the United States to be a terrorist organization. Iran has provided weapons and political support to Hezbollah for many years, and most recently, supplied numerous resources to it in its fight against the Islamic State.
With the impending defeat of the Islamic State in both Lebanon and Syria, Iran has gained a lot of credibility among certain sectors of the Levant and it is anxious to build upon these successes.
Indicators of this long-term strategy include signing deals with Syria to rebuild the latter’s power grid as well as creating a mobile telephony license and right to build a new network. These enterprises will not only provide some badly needed revenue back to Iran but, more important, they will enable the Iranian government to extend its sphere of influence in the region. After all, regional hegemony is Iran’s strategic goal.
Which leads back to the Israeli strikes of Sept. 7. The aerial attacks against Syrian infrastructure were just as much a shot across the bow of Iran as they were against the Assad regime.
On numerous occasions, most recently on Monday, the Hassan Rouhani-led government of Iran has threatened military action against Israel, and the Jewish state is getting tired of being in the crosshairs — hence its actions earlier in the month.
The threat of a proxy or full tilt conflict between Iran and Israel continues to metastasize and the Trump administration has been quiet about the situation for too long. It’s expected that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will address his concerns about Iran at the United Nations later today, and it’s no secret that he wants the United States to take a more active role in thwarting Iran’s influence in the Middle East. We’ll also see what Trump himself has to say in his first address to the UN.
While President Trump may have no desire to become more involved in the region, he has little choice. Trump and his national security and diplomatic teams must craft a strategy to counter Iran. The price of inactivity is too high and the world will become a more dangerous place if Iran can spread its tentacles of influence.
~The Patriot Post
https://patriotpost.us/articles/51363
VIDEOS
{townhall.com} ~ Natural disasters are no laughing matter, but you’d never know that recently watching God-denier Bill Maher and his “Real Time” show audience. Maher appeared giddy with delight that homes of certain high-profile man-controlled climate change “deniers’ were in the path of destructive hurricanes.
Meanwhile, during an interview, actress Jennifer Lawrence suggested hurricanes were “signs of Mother Nature’s rage and wrath” for not believing in man made climate change and electing Donald Trump.
Maher and Lawrence and other global warming barkers always fail to factor in the God-factor. Natural disasters aren’t left wing attack dogs who target those who dare question the cogency of man-caused and man-controlled climate change.
We know this because while Maher and Lawrence and others were superciliously wagging accusatory fingers, hurricanes Harvey and Irma wreaked havoc on some predominantly left wing metropolises that went for liar-Hillary Clinton: Houston and Harris County, Texas and Key West and Miami and Palm Beach and Orange County, FL.
Using Lawrence’s illogic, “mother nature” must have it out for liar-Hillary Clinton supporters!
It is both arrogant and ignorant to cast blame for natural disasters on people, let alone people smart enough to question something that is quickly morphing into what seems like an autocratic religion across the globe.
Man-caused warming is questioned because there is indisputable scientific evidence this isn’t the Earth’s first rodeo when it comes to cyclical cooling and warming.
The Earth experienced periods of glaciation followed by melting long before Leonardo DiCaprio’s excessive use of private jets and the construction of Al Gore’s energy devouring Nashville dream home.
Robert Ballad, the world-renowned underwater archaeologist who discovered the wreckages of the Titanic, the Bismarck, RMS Lusitania, USS Yorktown and others, has linked one of those previous melting periods to Noah’s Great Flood.
In 2012, Ballard told ABC News, “Where I live in Connecticut was ice a mile above my house, all the way back to the North Pole, about 15 million kilometers, that’s a big ice cube.” “But then it started to melt,” he said. “We’re talking about the floods of our living history.”
Ballad said he believes he discovered proof of Noah’s flood in the Black Sea off the coast of Turkey when he discovered “traces of an ancient civilization hidden underwater since the time of Noah.” Ballad said his group discovered evidence of “not just a slow moving, advancing rise of sea level, but a really big flood that then stayed” and “the land that went under stayed under.”
Ballad carbon-dated unearthed shells discovered 400 feet below the surface, establishing a timeline which happened to occur around the same time as Noah’s flood. Ballad described his discovery as what was like “a bad day…at some magic moment it broke through and flooded this place violently, and a lot of real estate, 150,000 square kilometers of land, went under.”
If Ballad’s Black Sea discovery is as accurate as his other findings, he’s likely uncovered evidence which leads to the Bible. And the God-factor. The Bible says Noah’s Great Flood was a natural disaster sent by God in response to a world gone sinfully-bad.
Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson recently posed this question: “Why did Harvey dump unprecedented, almost biblical amounts of rainfall on Houston and its environs?
Asking why is a good start. Acknowledging “biblical amounts of rainfall” is a good step toward having an intelligent conversation.
Robinson and Maher claim they are science guys. And Lawrence, well, she has a loud mouth and nice face. Rather than pointing judgmental fingers at fellow humans, they should consider Ballad’s discovery and then open the Bible, which speaks to both God’s judgment and grace poured out on a world filled with God not science deniers.
Comments