Beware of Dog!

[bemildred]

Not buying all of it, but Uri has some interesting comments
and perspective on the Middle east here.

(Mods: this seemed general enough to go outside I/P, move it
if you think you must.)

<snip>
The same week, something quite unexpected happened: Ariel Sharon sent the chief of staff, Moshe Ya'alon, packing. His successor will most probably be General Dan Halutz.

Halutz is, of course, a pilot, and one who played his part in the 1981 attack on the Iraqi reactor. If he succeeds Ya'alon, it will be the first time in the annals of the Israel Defense Forces that an airman is appointed chief of staff. That is rather curious. In the coming year, the army will be called upon to carry out a very difficult operation on land: the evacuation of the Gaza Strip settlements. The appointment of an Air Force general as chief of staff may hint that the IDF is planning something even more important in the air.
</snip>

<snip>
Second, the failure does indeed cost a lot of lives and destroys the infrastructure of life in Iraq, but that doesn't matter for the planners of the operation. The main aim – establishing a permanent garrison in the country - has been achieved. Outside of Iraq, nobody is demanding that the American soldiers leave. And, whatever the acts of sabotage, the Iraqi oil is controlled by the U.S. The oil barons, who are the patrons of the Bush family, can be well satisfied.
</snip>

<snip>
This week, the Muslim leader Fariq al-Hariri, who lately joined the opposition, was assassinated in Beirut. It is not yet known who did it. The huge American propaganda machine, which includes the Israeli media, has pointed at the Syrians. If they are indeed guilty, it was an act of supreme folly, since it was obvious that it would help the Americans build up the Lebanese opposition and arouse a storm of anti-Syrian sentiment. It happened at exactly the right moment for anyone interested in starting a campaign against Syria, under the slogan "End the Syrian Occupation!"
</snip>

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