All you need to know about the chaos in the Middle East.
So. Whose side are we on in Iraq?
Well may you ask.
Let’s see. There’s Iraq (the Shi’a part) and we’re training the Iraqi army to fight ISIS which is sort of made up of other Iraqis (the Sunni part). Iran is also training and supplying the Iraqis (the Shi’a ones) so I suppose we’re on their side too. Except that Iran is supposed to be a rogue state and the declared enemy of two of America’s best friends, Israel and Saudi Arabia.
And President Obama has recently done a deal with Iran in spite of demands from the American Extreme Right for a war on Iran as well. So maybe Iran is now a friend.
We’re definitely on the side of the Shi’a part of Iraq and maybe some of their friends.
Syria, the bit still controlled by Bashar al Assad is the enemy too, except that our new friend Iran supports him because his part is the Shi’a part. There are other bits of Syria that we think are our friends but we don’t know who they are, and other bits that we think are our enemies but we don’t really know who they are either. ISIS is also in Syria and they’re definitely our enemy.
ISIS is really now a country of its own and is definitely our enemy until it isn’t, like when sometime in the future we need them to be our friends.
But they behead people!
Well so do our sheep eating Saudi friends. Maybe if we sold sheep to ISIS they’d be our friends too.
We wouldn’t do that would we?
Why not. Friendship has nothing to do with human rights. Trade trumps human rights every time.
Now in the north there’s Turkey and that’s a friend except that we don’t know which side Turkey is really on, except its own side. So we could be on Turkey’s side too.
And the Kurds. We’re on their side. But Iran, Iraq, Turkey, Syria and ISIS are all against them.
From Lebanon there is Hezbollah who are Shi’a supporting Bashar al Assad and are themselves supported by Iran. They’re sworn enemies of Israel so they are probably our enemies too.
The Saudis are on their own side, on our side, and probably on the side of some of the Sunnis involved in the chaos, including maybe ISIS. They’re definitely the sworn enemy of all the Shi’a. And they’re having their own little war with some Shi’a in Yemen. They just beheaded a Shi’a cleric and have set the place alight. Well their embassy in Tehran for starters.
Russia is in there too supporting Bashar al Assad so it might be an enemy except that none of us is game enough to say so except for Turkey when they shot down a Russian fighter plane.
Jordon is keeping its head down.
Israel is studiously keeping out of it (well maybe, and maybe not, you never can tell what they’re up to). For the moment they’re mainly just killing Palestinians and stealing their lands.
Egypt has kept out of it and has a peace treaty with Israel. The basis of that treaty might be a promise by Israel to nuke Egypt back into the dark ages if it tries to invade Israel again.
Libya fell apart after its own version of an Arab Spring and doesn’t look a threat to anyone for the moment.
So, whose side are we on?
That’s easy. America.
But, whose side is America on?
Um.
Let’s ask some different questions.
Why did America invade Iraq in 2003 and cause all of this chaos?
Good question. It definitely wasn’t for the reasons they gave at the time.
Well who benefits from all of this chaos, from the degradation and weakening of all of these countries?
Another good question.
Well then, who benefits from the fragmentation of all of Israel’s neighbours? Lebanon, Syria and Iraq?
Ah. I see where you’re going. Israel I suppose.
So who propelled America into Iraq in 2003 causing all of this fragmentation?
Well it wasn’t George W. Bush. It was Vice President Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and the neo conservatives who drove that policy agenda. The Neo-cons. They wanted to invade Iran next.
Neo-cons? Who are they?
Ah. Good question. They’re ardent and committed American Zionists, all of them.
So whose side are we on?
America.
And whose side is America on?
Um. Israel?
And who is New Zealand’s leading politician of Jewish descent?
Um. Prime Minister John Key?