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Trump attempts to stir up more Middle East troubles

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Kiwithrottlejockey
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« on: December 07, 2017, 01:52:16 pm »


from The Washington Post....

Trump to recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital
in policy shift that could spark unrest


Several countries warned that the move could also disrupt hopes for a Mideast peace deal.

By DAVID NAKAMURA, LOVEDAY MORRIS, RUTH EGLASH and ANNE GEARAN | 10:41PM EST - Tuesday, December 05, 2017

Muslim tourists from India view the Old City of Jerusalem on December 5th, 2017, with the golden Dome of the Rock, one of Islam's holiest sites, in the distance. — Photograph: Jim Hollander/European Pressphoto Agency/Agencia-EFE/Rex/Shutterstock.
Muslim tourists from India view the Old City of Jerusalem on December 5th, 2017, with the golden Dome of the Rock, one of Islam's holiest sites, in the distance.
 — Photograph: Jim Hollander/European Pressphoto Agency/Agencia-EFE/Rex/Shutterstock.


PRESIDENT TRUMP on Wednesday plans to upend decades of U.S. policy by formally recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and ordering the relocation of the U.S. Embassy to that city, senior aides said, a decision that could derail the White House's peace efforts and spark regional unrest.

Trump will make his pronouncement in a midday speech after months of deliberation within his administration and consultations with governments in the Middle East. But in a sign of the complexities of such a shift, White House aides emphasized that Trump will sign another six-month waiver maintaining the embassy's current location in Tel Aviv because the process of moving it will take at least three or four years.

Without the waiver, which has been signed by every U.S. president for more than two decades, crucial State Department funding to the embassy would be cut off.

The president began informing his counterparts in the region of his decision on Tuesday, prompting warnings from several countries that the move would inflame Muslims and disrupt progress toward a peace deal between the Israelis and the Palestinians. U.S. allies in Europe, including France, also have opposed such a change in policy, and the State Department sent a classified memo to embassies in the Middle East late last month warning of potential anti-American protests.

“Our president said, ‘You don't have anything that would make up for this on Jerusalem’,” said Nabil Shaath, an adviser to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas who said Abbas had personally briefed him on the call. Abbas told Trump that he would “not accept it” and warned that the president was “playing into the hands of extremism.”

But Trump “just went on saying he had to do it,” Shaath said.

In Riyadh, the Saudi Press Agency, using the Arabic name for Jerusalem, said King Salman bin Abdul Aziz warned Trump “that such a dangerous step of relocation or recognition of Al-Quds as the capital of Israel would constitute a flagrant provocation of Muslims, all over the world.”

The backlash from other Middle East nations mounted on Tuesday.

Speaking to the Turkish parliament, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said American recognition of Jerusalem would be a “red line” for Muslims, possibly forcing Turkey to cut diplomatic ties with Israel that were recently renewed after a six-year hiatus.

Senior White House officials described Trump's decision as the fulfillment of a key campaign promise that has broad bipartisan support in Congress. They emphasized that the move will not fundamentally change other aspects of U.S. policy. For example, they said, Trump remains supportive of a two-state solution, if that's what the parties agree to, and the administration is maintaining the status quo on Jerusalem's holy sites.

The officials said Trump is simply recognizing the reality that Jerusalem has historically been Israel's capital and that most of the nation's government — including the prime minister's office, the Supreme Court and the legislature — is based there.

“For a long time, the U.S. position held ambiguity or a lack of acknowledgment in hopes of advancing the process of peace,” said one senior administration official, who along with two others spoke on the condition of anonymity at a briefing for reporters at the White House on Tuesday. “It might have been reasonable under certain circumstances and times. Certainly, it's been tried. But … it seems clear now that the physical location of the American embassy is not material to a peace deal.”

Another U.S. official said after the briefing that while Trump will reiterate his commitment to the peace process during his speech, the White House recognizes that “some parties” might react negatively.

“We are still working on our plan, which is not yet ready,” said this official, who was not authorized to speak on the record. “We have time to get it right and see how people feel after this news is processed over the next period of time.”

Former CIA director John Brennan on Tuesday called recognizing Jerusalem as the Israeli capital and moving the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv “reckless and a foreign policy blunder of historic proportion.” In an email statement, he said the action “will damage U.S. interests in the Middle East for years to come and will make the region more volatile.”

No other countries have their embassies in Jerusalem, under a long-standing international consensus that the city's status should be decided in a peace deal between the Israelis and the Palestinians.

Palestinian factions jointly announced three “days of rage,” beginning on Wednesday, to protest the potential U.S. Embassy move and recognition of Jerusalem. In a statement, they called on supporters around the world to gather in city centers and at Israeli embassies and consulates to voice their anger.

In a statement late on Tuesday, the U.S. Consulate in Jerusalem urged American citizens in Israel to avoid large crowds or areas where security had been increased, and ordered its staff members and their families to avoid Jerusalem's Old City and the West Bank except for “essential” business.

Israel annexed East Jerusalem, which contains most of the important holy sites for Jews, Muslims and Christians, after the 1967 war with Arab powers. Palestinians claim East Jerusalem as the capital of a future state, while many Israelis and some in the United States consider the city sector to be already and irrevocably under Israeli administration. Some of Trump's prominent Jewish backers appear to hold that view, although he has said he wants to honor Palestinian sovereignty through a mutual settlement.

U.S. officials did not identify any prospective location for the new embassy, and said it will take years to plan and build to meet security concerns for the roughly 1,000 diplomats currently headquartered in Tel Aviv. But the officials emphasized that the move will not prejudice Palestinians' claims to East Jerusalem, strongly implying that only sites on the western side of the pre-1967 Green Line will be considered.

“This doesn't speak to final-status issues,” a third administration official said, referring to the thorniest disputes in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict — those that are assumed to be in limbo until completion of a final peace settlement.

The officials said the decision was made with the support of Trump's envoys seeking a long-elusive peace deal, an assertion meant to counter warnings that the change would unleash fresh Arab violence. They offered no specifics to support the claim that the move would not spoil the peace initiative headed by presidential son-in-law and adviser Jared Kushner.

The aides said, however, that Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and other State Department officials were closely involved in the deliberations.

The White House said a call was also scheduled with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. A spokesman for his office declined to comment.

Other advocates of recognizing Jerusalem as the Israeli capital have pointed to Russia as an example. Moscow declared West Jerusalem to be the Israeli capital earlier this year, and the announcement produced no wave of violence or diplomatic backlash.

The U.S. position is more charged, however, because of Washington's historic role as a peace broker.

Jordan's King Abdullah II said the move would undermine U.S. efforts to resume the peace process, according to news reports.

The Egyptian government said President Abdel Fatah al-Sissi, in his conversation with Trump on Tuesday, “reiterated Egypt's unwavering position with regard to maintaining the legal status of Jerusalem within the framework of international references and relevant U.N. resolutions.”


Loveday Morris and Ruth Eglash reported from Jerusalem. Anne Gearan reported from Berlin. Adam Entous in Washington and Heba Farouk Mahfouz in Cairo contributed to this report.

• David Nakamura covers the White House for The Washington Post. He started at The Post as a summer intern in 1992 and is amazed he once did this job without the Internet, a cell phone, GPS, Wikipedia or a laptop computer. After four years as a sports reporter, he moved to the local news staff and wrote about education in Virginia and Maryland and city government in Washington, D.C. In 2004, he was part of a team that uncovered high levels of lead contamination in D.C. tap water, a series that won the 2005 Selden Ring Award for investigative reporting. He has reported from Afghanistan, Pakistan and Japan.

• Loveday Morris is The Washington Post's Jerusalem bureau chief Before moving to Jerusalem in 2017, Loveday spent three years in Iraq as Baghdad bureau chief covering the country's battles against ISIS, from Fallujah to Ramadi and Mosul. She started with The Post as Beirut correspondent in 2013, largely covering Syria's civil war. Prior to that she freelanced from the region for publications including the UK's Independent newspaper. She began her career at Bloomberg News, covering financial news in London, before moving to the Middle East for The National newspaper in Abu Dhabi.

• Ruth Eglash has worked as a correspondent for The Washington Post in Israel and the West Bank since 2013. During that time, she has intensely covered the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Israel's elections and a wide range of other political and social topics. Originally from Britain, Ruth previously worked as a senior editor and reporter for The Jerusalem Post. Her main beat was social welfare issues such as the immigration of Jews from Ethiopia, poverty and women's rights in Israel. She was appointed the newspapers' first Social Media Editor in 2012. Ruth has also freelanced for numerous international websites, newspapers and magazines, including the Huffington Post, USA Today, Hadassah Magazine and the Christian Science Monitor. In 2010, Ruth won the United Nations X-Cultural Reporting Award for her joint reporting work with a Jordanian journalist.

• Anne Gearan is a national politics correspondent for The Washington Post. She joined the paper in 2012 from the Associated Press, where she served as chief diplomatic correspondent, White House correspondent and national security editor.

__________________________________________________________________________

Related to this topic:

 • VIDEO: Trump plans to move U.S. Embassy, recognize Jerusalem as Israeli capital

 • Kushner says Mideast peace is essential to thwarting Iran and Islamist extremism

 • Inside the Trump administration debate over declaring Jerusalem to be Israel's capital

 • As the U.S. mulls recognizing Jerusalem as Israel's capital, here's what some Palestinians and Israelis think

 • When will Netanyahu wake up and see Palestinians are part of Jerusalem, too?


https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/uncertainty-anger-as-trump-keeps-alive-dispute-over-moving-us-embassy-to-jerusalem/2017/12/05/e514b852-d9ab-11e7-b859-fb0995360725_story.html
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« Reply #1 on: December 07, 2017, 01:52:46 pm »


Hahaha....WAR in the holy land, eh?

Jolly good stuff....must get in stocks of beer & popcorn.
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« Reply #2 on: December 07, 2017, 01:53:59 pm »


from The Washington Post....

Trump recognizes Jerusalem as capital of Israel
in reversal of longtime U.S. policy


The president said he remains fully committed to a peace deal between the Israelis and Palestinians
even as his announcement brought recriminations in the Middle East.


By DAVID NAKAMURA | 6:54PM EST — Wednesday, December 06, 2017

Vice President Pence watches as President Trump on Wednesday holds up a proclamation to officially recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, in the Diplomatic Reception Room of the White House. — Photograph: Evan Vucci/Associated Press.
Vice President Pence watches as President Trump on Wednesday holds up a proclamation to officially recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel,
in the Diplomatic Reception Room of the White House. — Photograph: Evan Vucci/Associated Press.


PRESIDENT TRUMP on Wednesday formally recognized Jerusalem as Israel's capital, defying warnings from other Middle East countries and some U.S. allies in a politically risky move that he insisted would not derail efforts to broker a peace deal.

But in a sign that the move could backfire, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas slammed Trump's announcement as a “declaration of withdraw” by the United States from the peace process, according to the Associated Press.

In a midday speech at the White House, Trump defended his decision as “long overdue” recognition of reality given that Jerusalem is the seat of Israel's parliament, supreme court and prime minister's office. He argued that an agreement between the Israelis and Palestinians has remained elusive for more than two decades even as his predecessors declined to recognize the contested Holy City as Israel's capital.

“Some say they lacked courage, but they made the best judgment based on the facts as they understood them,” Trump said, speaking in the Diplomatic Reception Room. “Nevertheless, the record is in. After more than two decades, we're no closer to a lasting peace agreement.”

Trump added that “it's folly to assume that repeating the exact same formula will produce a different or better result.”

The announcement came a day after senior White House aides previewed Trump's decision, and the president also ordered the State Department to begin planning to move the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, a process that administration officials said would take several years. After his remarks, Trump signed another six-month waiver to maintain the embassy compound in Tel Aviv, which senior aides said was meant to ensure funding was not eliminated under a 1995 law even as planning for a new embassy would commence.

Trump emphasized that despite his decision he remained committed to helping broker a peace agreement. The White House is working on a peace plan to be unveiled sometime next year.

“The United States remains deeply committed to helping facilitate a peace agreement that is acceptable to both sides,” Trump said. “I intend to do everything in my power to forge such an agreement.”

The announcement set off a flurry of reactions in Washington, Europe and the Middle East. Trump spoke with Abbas on Tuesday to inform him of the decision and Abbas told him his government would not accept the move.

In Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hailed the president's announcement, calling it “a historic day” and stating that his nation is “profoundly grateful for the president for his courageous and just decision.”

Other Middle East nations and some U.S. allies condemned the decision ahead of Trump's speech, suggesting the shift in policy would inflame regional tensions and make the process of brokering a peace deal between the Israelis and Palestinians more difficult.

“We think it's an unwise step and a counterproductive step. If we want to solve at some moment the conflict between the Palestinians and the Israelis, we need a two-state solution, and a one-sided step is not going to help,” Dutch Foreign Minister Halbe Zijlstra said Wednesday.

“I don’t think we can use another conflict in this very explosive region,” Zijlstra said, adding that he had conveyed his concerns to U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson in Brussels, during a NATO meeting.

But Tillerson insisted such concerns were misguided. Attending the meeting in Brussels, Tillerson said: “We continue to believe there is a very good opportunity for peace to be achieved.”

“The president is very committed to the Middle East peace process,” Tillerson said. “He has a team he put into place. That team has been working very diligently.”

Trump campaigned on a promise to move the embassy to Jerusalem, a move popular among evangelicals. A slew of evangelical leaders, including former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee and Robert Jeffress, senior pastor at First Baptist Church in Dallas, released statements of praise on Wednesday.

In Washington, Trump drew bipartisan support on Capitol Hill from Republicans and some Democrats.

In a statement, Senator Marco Rubio (Republican-Florida) called the announcement “an important step in the right direction” and added that “unequivocal recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital will be complete when the U.S. embassy is officially relocated there.”

Representative Eliot L. Engel (New York), the top Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said the decision “helps correct a decades-long indignity.”

Yet House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (Democrat-California) said that Trump's move was premature and warned of “mass protests.” Late last month, the State Department sent a memo to embassies in the Middle East warning of potential unrest.

“In the absence of a negotiated settlement between Israel and the Palestinians, moving the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem now may needlessly spark mass protests, fuel tensions, and make it more difficult to reach a durable peace,” Pelosi said.

White House aides emphasized that Trump's decision would make clear to Middle East countries that the president, who campaigned on promises to move the embassy, keeps his word. Senior adviser Jared Kushner and other top administration officials are working on a proposed peace plan for the region, but aides said it is not imminent and the team would have time to factor in public reaction to Trump's speech.

One administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity, acknowledged that the Palestinians would likely threaten to reject peace talks. But this person said the White House recognized that peace deals often are not linear in how they are negotiated and that such deals are often presumed dead more than once before they reach the finish line.

“By overturning a decades-long policy adopted by administrations of both parties, President Trump is casting aside America's role as a mediator in the Middle East conflict [and] harming our Muslim allies,” said Nihad Awad, executive director of CAIR, the nation's largest Muslim civil rights group.

In his remarks, Trump acknowledged that “there will of course be disagreement and dissent regarding this announcement, but we are confident we that when we work through our disagreements we will arrive at a peace and a place of far greater understanding and cooperation.”

The Jerusalem municipality announced ahead of Trump's speech that it would illuminate the ancient walls of Jerusalem Old City with an Israeli and an American flag, “as a token of appreciation to President Trump for his recognition of Jerusalem.” The city said that American flags would be hung on the streets surrounding the U.S. consulate.


Rick Noack in Berlin, Ruth Eglash in Jerusalem and Carol Morello in Brussels contributed to this report.

• David Nakamura covers the White House for The Washington Post. He has previously covered sports, education and city government and reported from Afghanistan, Pakistan and Japan.

__________________________________________________________________________

Related to this topic:

 • VIDEO: President Trump's speech on Jerusalem as Israel's capital, in 3 minutes

 • GRAPHIC: How Trump is changing American foreign policy

 • In Jerusalem, Trump's announcement sparks scenes of joy, fury

 • ‘It's catastrophic’: U.S. allies reject Trump's Jerusalem pronouncement


https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/in-white-house-speech-trump-recognizes-jerusalem-as-capital-of-israel-in-reversal-of-longtime-us-policy/2017/12/06/de9322e6-da9d-11e7-a841-2066faf731ef_story.html
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« Reply #3 on: December 07, 2017, 01:54:21 pm »


I'll be backing Iran when the shit hits the fan.

Simply because I regard Trump as my enemy, so therefore Trump's enemy will be my friend.

Hopefully the Palestinians (with backing from Iran) will find a way to tunnel deep beneath the eventual new American embassy and blow it up with a huge bomb.
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« Reply #4 on: December 07, 2017, 05:11:30 pm »

Have you booked in for psych help yet? 😁
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« Reply #5 on: December 07, 2017, 05:16:51 pm »

Israel is a sovereign, civilised, sane and democratic nation.It has every right to  decide on any city it likes within it's own country can be the capital.l
Would you want the meddling moonbats of the UN telling NZ how to run it's affairs?

The UN is a joke. It gives sicko despot nations veto power over international issues. WTF???
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« Reply #6 on: December 07, 2017, 05:49:38 pm »

"Hopefully the Palestinians (with backing from Iran) will find a way to tunnel deep beneath the eventual new American embassy and blow it up with a huge bomb."

Now think about what you wrote. Pretty sick and fucked up really.
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« Reply #7 on: December 07, 2017, 07:56:41 pm »


Face facts....Israel is a terrorist nation.

It is also full of people who are so delusional that they think they are the chosen people of some god delusion inside their heads.

The world is already full of enough stupid people without having stupid delusional jews thinking bullshit like that.
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« Reply #8 on: December 07, 2017, 09:53:03 pm »

Oh dear. You must hang out with idiots 😁
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« Reply #9 on: December 07, 2017, 09:58:45 pm »

The problem with Israel-hating western dingbats is that they have a fictious version of the history of Israel lodged inside their heads (usually planted there by other moonbats).
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« Reply #10 on: December 08, 2017, 12:15:18 pm »


I'll be backing Iran when the shit hits the fan.

Simply because I regard Trump as my enemy, so therefore Trump's enemy will be my friend.

Hopefully the Palestinians (with backing from Iran) will find a way to tunnel deep beneath the eventual new American embassy and blow it up with a huge bomb.


Please go to iran and help them yes moonbat is a good name
the left are pc mindfuck terrorists


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« Reply #11 on: December 08, 2017, 05:00:56 pm »

There is no sense in debating people this messed up. Good to see clear proof of how dangerously stupid they are though 😁
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« Reply #12 on: December 08, 2017, 08:57:59 pm »

the left
they already had a good play with the world bossing around the people and messing everything up their new problem being is the people have woken up and deemed them all as daft backward trolls
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« Reply #13 on: December 09, 2017, 11:23:03 am »


from The Washington Post....

Trump's embassy decision isn't diplomacy. It's pandering.

This action will lead to greater polarization and discord in the Middle East.

By FAREED ZAKARIA | 7:27PM EST - Thursday, December 07, 2017

A U.S. flag flies behind a tall fence within the U.S. Consulate building complex in West Jerusalem. — Photograph: Holland/European Pressphoto Agency/Agencia-EFE/Rex/Shutterstock.
A U.S. flag flies behind a tall fence within the U.S. Consulate building complex in West Jerusalem.
 — Photograph: Holland/European Pressphoto Agency/Agencia-EFE/Rex/Shutterstock.


WITH his decision to move the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem, President Trump did something puzzling for a person who claims to be a great dealmaker. He made a massive, preemptive concession to one side in a complicated negotiation without getting anything for it in return. If that's how he operates, it's no wonder so many of his former colleagues think he isn't a very successful businessman after all.

Jerusalem is Israel's capital and will remain so. I don't dispute the facts or its merits. But the reason that all 86 countries that have embassies in Israel have so far located them in Tel Aviv is that Jerusalem is an integral part of the final settlement between Israelis and Palestinians. The Palestinians claim the city as their capital as well. It contains sites sacred to all three of the world's Abrahamic faiths. It has within it a large Arab population that, even after decades of new Israeli settlements, comprises more than a third of the city's total. So, the formal status of Jerusalem has always been seen — by Republicans and Democrats, Europeans and Asians — as a matter to be codified in the context of peace between Israel and the Palestinians.

If this move were part of a larger strategic plan, that would be one thing. In that case, Trump's announcement would have been carefully plotted out, coupled with serious policy changes from Israel, or it would have been part of a series of measures to reassure both sides. Instead, it appears to be a one-off decision, designed largely to delight core elements of Trump's base at home — evangelical Christians and pro-Israel donors. The only strategic aspect appears to be that it will help shore up the GOP base on the eve of Roy Moore's senatorial contest in Alabama. That's not diplomacy; that's pandering.

There are ways to solve the Jerusalem problem, such as by carving out some neighborhoods in the eastern part of the city and allowing the Palestinians to claim those as their capital. Trump's announcement did not specifically foreclose this possibility, which makes the choice even more puzzling. It actually achieves little on the ground, all while offending millions of Palestinians, hundreds of millions of Arabs and public opinion almost everywhere. When China, European allies, the pope, and the kings of Saudi Arabia and Jordan all voice strong opposition, it is surely worth questioning the wisdom of the policy.

The potential relocation of the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem has always been a symbolic gesture, designed more to appeal to Americans than to advance peace and stability in the Middle East. The Israeli scholar Yoav Fromer points out that in 1995, as Bob Dole was planning his campaign to challenge Bill Clinton for the presidency, he wanted to present himself as ardently pro-Israel. His voting record did not demonstrate this, so he decided to latch on to a symbolic issue instead. Thus was born the law that requires the United States to move its embassy, though it provided for a six-month waiver that every president has continually renewed, not wanting to give away a chip that could be crucial in the negotiations for a peace settlement.

While many people have predicted violence in the Middle East, it's likely that this will be contained. Israel is now the regional superpower, and its neighbors know it. It also has tight control over the Palestinian territories, with a network of barriers, checkpoints and intelligence operations. Terrorism, for most Israelis, is a problem that has gone away.

The danger is really that this decision only adds to the mounting despair of Palestinians, who are already weak, divided and dysfunctional. They have never had good leadership, but they barely have any leadership right now. They live in an unusual, almost unique condition in the modern world: citizens of no state, without a country of their own.

Meanwhile, Israel will continue to prosper economically and maintain its genuinely democratic character, but with one large caveat: It will rule over lands with millions of people who lack full political rights. That cancer at the heart of Israel's democratic system and culture will remain and might intensify as Israeli Arabs grow in numbers. There will be an Israel that looks like Switzerland, surrounded by a Palestine that looks like Bangladesh. It's possible that at some point this inequality of income, status and political rights will lead to some kind of explosion. It will certainly lead to greater polarization and discord. And America's action this week will have deepened these fissures and exacerbated the tensions.


• Fareed Zakaria writes a foreign affairs column for The Washington Post. He is also the host of CNN's Fareed Zakaria GPS and a contributing editor for The Atlantic.

__________________________________________________________________________

Related to this topic:

 • Mairav Zonszein and Aziz Abu Sarah: Israel already controls Jerusalem. Trump's speech only confirmed that.

 • Josh Rogin: State Department sets up emergency task force for Jerusalem fallout

 • The Washington Post's View: Trump's Jerusalem move is a big risk

 • Dana Milbank: Doesn't Trump ever get tired of losing so much?


https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/global-opinions/trumps-jerusalem-decision-isnt-diplomacy-its-pandering/2017/12/07/6be883c0-db93-11e7-b1a8-62589434a581_story.html
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« Reply #14 on: December 09, 2017, 11:58:12 am »

No not at all. Here's a clue for the lefty cult members; Trump is telling a sovereign civilised Democratic nation who is an ally "We support your decision to chose your own capital and not be bullied by nefarious religious fanatics who have no right to interfere in your country". This makes sense to rational people!

Lefties love causing division and civil war. They are mentally sick immature people.
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« Reply #15 on: December 09, 2017, 04:55:06 pm »


Trump is just a stupid wanker who is pandering to his stupid supporters in the swamps of America's ignorant south where they still believe the god delusion inside their heads is real.
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« Reply #16 on: December 09, 2017, 07:30:27 pm »

"where they still believe the god delusion inside their heads is real."

And you support the Iranian regime. Do you know what day it is today? 😁
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« Reply #17 on: December 11, 2017, 10:28:12 am »


Yep....Trump's America is now the “pariah nation of the world” and they're starting to be treated as such.

Oh well, Trump has made their bed……




from the print edition of the Los Angeles Times....

Tillerson's cold week in Europe

EU and NATO allies shared with him their anger over Trump's Jerusalem decision.

By TRACY WILKINSON | Sunday, December 10, 2017

U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, left, and French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian address reporters last week in Paris. — Photograph: Christophe Petit Tesson/European Pressphoto Agency/Shutterstock.
U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, left, and French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian address reporters last week in Paris.
 — Photograph: Christophe Petit Tesson/European Pressphoto Agency/Shutterstock.


WASHINGTON — It was Secretary of State Rex Tillerson's bad luck that he was in Europe meeting with dozens of U.S. allies last week when President Trump announced formal U.S. recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, a move that angered much of the world.

Tillerson, who wound up a five-day, four-city, three-country tour on Friday, got an earful from one foreign minister after another. The Jerusalem decision announced on Wednesday was opposed by nearly every U.S. ally — except Israel — as well as by Russia and the Arab and Muslim world.

The ultimate status of the contested city “must be the subject of discussion between Israelis and Palestinians,” said French President Emmanuel Macron, one of the friendlier leaders Trump has gotten to know. Macron spoke on Friday at a ceremony in Paris with Tillerson in the audience.

Speaking to reporters later, Tillerson tried to stress areas of general agreement, such as the dangers posed by a nuclear-armed North Korea and the importance of fighting terrorism. But he had to admit he had faced what diplomats politely call “candid” discussions.

Of the French, he said, “On almost all things, we agree, but on those that we don't, we are very open to express those disagreements, and I think both of us benefit from the richness of those discussions.”

Tillerson is generally unflappable, at least in public, and he made the trip days after multiple White House leaks indicated Trump was planning to replace him in the new year. Perhaps as a result, Tillerson appeared to take the criticism from foreign leaders in stride.

After Trump announced U.S. recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital and ordered the State Department to start making plans to move the embassy there from Tel Aviv, a White House official told the Los Angeles Times that Tillerson had argued against such a move during discussions at the White House.

Tillerson was said to have argued that he agreed in principle that Jerusalem was Israel's capital. But he said making that pronouncement, which ran counter to decades of U.S. policy and international consensus, deprived Washington of its ability to serve as an honest broker in any future peace talks in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

When Trump rejected that view, Tillerson publicly supported the president — although he appeared less than enthusiastic.

He urged the public to listen to the entire speech, both to what was said and what was not said. For example, he noted, Trump did not refer to Jerusalem as Israel's “undivided” capital, as many Israeli Jews do. And he made clear his decision did not presume to set the city's borders for the future.

That left open possible diplomatic wiggle room for eventually ceding part of the ancient city to the Palestinians, who claim East Jerusalem as their capital in a future independent state.

Trump also said he would support a two-state solution, assuming the Israelis and Palestinians do. Earlier this year, he appeared to jettison that proposal, which long had been the linchpin of U.S. and international peacemaking efforts.

During the week, Tillerson met with European Union and NATO allies in Brussels and Vienna and went to Ramstein Air Base in Germany for a briefing from U.S. military commanders who oversee counter-terrorism and other operations in Africa, ahead of the secretary’s planned trip to that continent early next year.

Except for the U.S. air base, by all accounts Tillerson got a chilly reception just about everywhere he went.

“A way must be found through negotiations to resolve the status of Jerusalem as a future capital of both states,” Federica Mogherini, the European Union's de facto foreign minister, said as she stood beside Tillerson in Brussels a few hours before Trump’s announcement.

Tillerson's aides acknowledged his welcome at times could have been warmer. “Allies have been very frank in sharing some of their views,” senior advisor R.C. Hammond said. “Dialogues only work if they go two ways.”

Jerusalem was only the latest irritant in U.S. relations with traditional allies in Europe.

Much of the continent disagrees with Trump's decision to tell Congress that he could not certify Iran's compliance with the 2015 nuclear arms control deal, even though the United Nations nuclear watchdog agency says Iran is meeting its nuclear obligations.

Allies also were stunned by Trump's decision to pull the United States out of the landmark Paris climate accord — it is now the only country in the world that is not part of the pact.

British Prime Minister Theresa May was harshly critical of Trump's retweeting of three anti-Muslim videos recently. The videos were originally tweeted by a British ultranationalist fringe group.

In response to Trump's decision on Jerusalem, the U.N. Security Council held an emergency session on Friday. Britain, one of America's closest allies, made its views clear.

“The United Kingdom does not agree with the U.S. position on this issue,” said the British ambassador to the U.N., Matthew Rycroft. “Our view is that the final status negotiations are the place to decide between the Israelis and the Palestinians on the important questions, including on Jerusalem.”


http://enewspaper.latimes.com/infinity/article_popover_share.aspx?guid=e9a30a6d-7e7c-4408-a83f-0a5d4270e35e
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« Reply #18 on: December 15, 2017, 09:57:41 am »

People who are not mentally stunted kidults can see the both the silly and the sensible sides of Trump.
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« Reply #19 on: December 26, 2017, 10:51:50 pm »


from The Washington Post....

Lorde canceled her show in Israel over politics.
Here's how other musicians have handled it.


Many have canceled on Israel for political reasons, but others keep their
concert and use it to address politics, such as Roger Waters and Madonna.


By LIS BONOS | 3:51PM EST — Monday, December 25, 2017

Lorde performs at the Coachella festival in Indio, California. She recently canceled an upcoming concert in Israel. — Photograph: Amy Harris/Invision/Associated Press.
Lorde performs at the Coachella festival in Indio, California. She recently canceled an upcoming concert in Israel.
 — Photograph: Amy Harris/Invision/Associated Press.


IN ISRAEL, even concerts are political. For international superstars, deciding whether to show up might imply what side you’re on: Israel's or Palestine's. And over the weekend, the singer Lorde became the latest musician to cancel a performance in Tel Aviv after fans pressured her to do so.

Last week, two of Lorde's fans in New Zealand — one of them Jewish and the other Palestinian — published an open letter to the Grammy-award-winning singer, asking her to cancel a performance planned for June 5th, 2018. It cited “the Israeli government's policies of oppression” and “apartheid,” and said that “we believe that an economic, intellectual and artistic boycott is an effective way of speaking out against these crimes.” The letter added that “playing in Tel Aviv will be seen as giving support to the policies of the Israeli government, even if you make no comment on the political situation.”

The letter did not specifically mention the boycott, divestment and sanctions — or BDS — movement, but the views expressed within it are in line with that Palestinian-led campaign. Since 2005, the BDS movement has urged academic and governmental institutions, companies, musicians and others to avoid visiting Israel and buying its products with the goal of getting Israel to end its occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip and allow Palestinians to return to places they left when Israel was created in 1948.

At first Lorde responded to the letter by saying she would reconsider the concert date, and by Sunday, she said in a statement, “I've received an overwhelming number of messages and letters and have had a lot of discussions with people holding many views, and I think the right decision at this time is to cancel the show.” She added that she's “truly sorry to reverse my commitment to come play for you. I hope one day we can all dance.”

The production company that was to put on the concert said that tickets would be refunded within 14 days, and Israel's culture minister asked Lorde to reconsider.

In recent years, several artists have canceled tour dates in Israel, either for political reasons or because of ongoing violence. In 2010, the Pixies decided not to perform after the Israeli military raided a Turkish ship bringing aid for the Gaza Strip, an operation that killed nine people. (The band later played in Israel in 2014.) Elvis Costello also canceled two shows in Israel in 2010, saying “sometimes silence in music is better than adding to the static.” In 2014, when Israel was in a 50-day war with the Hamas-governed Gaza, several artists — including Lana Del Rey, Neil Young and the Backstreet Boys — postponed or canceled shows.

For as many artists who cancel shows in Israel, there are others who face criticism and still press on with their tour dates. In 2014, The Washington Post's Ruth Eglash noted that, since the BDS effort started, Rihanna, Alicia Keys, Madonna, Bob Dylan, Leonard Cohen, Jethro Tull and the Red Hot Chili Peppers all kept their concert dates in Israel despite public pressure to cancel them. Once on stage, these megastars sometimes use their microphones for more than their lyrics. For example, during a 2012 performance in Tel Aviv, Madonna, who isn't Jewish but follows the Jewish mystical practice of Kabbalah, wrapped herself in an Israeli flag and made a plea to rise above ego, religion and national allegiance to forge peace in the Middle East. “You can't be a fan of mine and not want peace in the world,” she said.

Some artists keep their shows to make a statement critical of Israel. In 2006, Pink Floyd's Roger Waters moved a performance from Tel Aviv to a village jointly formed by Arabs and Israelis. On that trip, Waters traveled throughout the West Bank and to the wall separating it from Israel, which he tagged with graffiti of his song lyrics: “We don't need no thought control.”

Waters has since urged other artists not to perform in Israel. In a 2016 interview with the Independent, he said that the music industry “has been particularly recalcitrant in even raising a voice” against Israel. “I'm hoping to encourage some of them to stop being frightened and to stand up and be counted, because we need them,” Waters said.


• Lisa Bonos is a writer and editor for Solo-ish at The Washington Post.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/arts-and-entertainment/wp/2017/12/25/lorde-canceled-her-show-in-israel-over-politics-heres-how-other-musicians-have-handled-it
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« Reply #20 on: December 27, 2017, 09:42:49 am »

Not reading your lazy spam. Next.
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« Reply #21 on: December 27, 2017, 10:14:01 am »


That's fine....if you wish instead to believe that Lorde hasn't cancelled her concert in Israel due to the fascist regime in that country, then go right ahead.

Meanwhile, people who indulge in reality will not be suprised when Lorde doesn't perform in Israel.

You will be scratching your head wondering why people are laughing at you.
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