As reported earlier in The Real Axis, a major threat that is not sufficiently explored or countered is the alliance between drug gangs, terrorists, and the authoritarian regime of Hugo Chavez. Now Colombia has uncovered a Hezbollah-linked drug ring that was trafficking drugs and laundering cash. Hezbollah-led drug stashes seized in Colombia REUTERS, Colombia smashes [...]
Can you guess what is the meaning of this picture? Hint: It happens in Gaza. And it is part of a network that Hamas has been managing, quite lucratively and preferentially, to allow smuggling of anything – from weapons to lambs – with strict controls, and fees. It is depressing to see that the closure [...]
A silver lining to the recession may be that oil prices are going down, though still at far higher levels than they were just a couple years ago. The bravado of Ahmadinejad, Chavez, and Putin may be at least slightly tamed. Authorized Authoritarianism has gone hand in hand with oil wealth in Iran, Venezuela and [...]
Some powerful precepts from a conversation I had with Chief Rabbi David Rosen, President of the ICJRC and the pre-eminent leader in relations between different faiths: There is a lot that divides us [of different faiths], but more which unites us [as human beings with a shared destiny]. If we affirm an omnipresent deity that [...]
My friend Eytan Heller conceived this fantastic inspirational video and campaign (sponsored by PeaceWorks Foundation) allegorically calling for the 2018 World Cup to be co-hosted by Israel and Palestine – to help Palestinians and Israelis visualize what a peace agreement could bring about. It is part of the Imagine 2018 campaign of the OneVoice Movement. [...]
Hamas has started oppressing Gazans to a deeper degree. It is ferreting out freedom of assembly – even for innocuous civil society groups that are non-partisan and non-political. Here are emails from other groups of friends that circulated what they encountered: The town hall meeting in [city name removed for protection] scheduled for today had [...]
Is it just me, or are these logos clearly like Hebrew letters? They are supposed to be icons for Exchange, Powerpoint, Word, and Excel. But they have very little connection to that. They are NOT supposed to be connected to hebrew letters – pei, kuf, shin, and alef. But they are identical to that…
Amr Hamzawi provided an unusually frank self-admonition in Al Ahram Weekly about writing what his audience wanted to read, rather than what he truly felt, resorting to common scapegoats (ie, the West) rather than piercing through tougher truths. This problem is particularly acute amongst Arab academicians and commentators, but it plagues all societies to some [...]
This article by Nathaniel Fick and Vikram Singh provides very practical and sensible prescriptions for progress in stabilizing Afghanistan. Winning the battle, losing the faith By Nathaniel C. Fick and Vikram J. Singh Monday, October 6, 2008 WASHINGTON: ‘The lion of the people will turn on you," warned Mullah Wakil Ahmed Muttawakil, a former [...]
And on the very negative side, as reported here, small mistakes led to what is already a tragedy: 3 days of violent attacks between Arabs and Jews in the ancient site of Akko (Acre), within Israel. If it is not managed through political and communal leadership into an aberration in an area normally known for [...]