America Now Says: "Old Ways of Military Intervention Don't Pay!!"

Its first President and liberator has said it. "No entangling alliances," It was George Washington's wise counsel to the U.S. More than 200 years later, another great American general, an Afro-American, also said it. Colin Powell as Secretary of State said: "Before we get militarily involved, we must have an exit strategy."

But then America lost its way. Duped by the war lords into attacking Iraq in 2003. Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz and Feith, coalesced around the idea of war on Iraq would be a bonanza for the U.S. Intelligence assessments were tampered with. Expert reports were commissioned to produce desired conclusions. First: that Saddam was in league with Al-Qaeda. Second: Saddam's lie about possessing weapons of mass destruction should be manipulated.

Results: Colin Powell appeared before the UN Security Council advocating the necessity of war on Iraq. Presenting false evidence, a pack of lies given to him by the CIA, on Saddam's possession of weapons of mass destruction. Lies within lies. America attacked. When those WMD could not be found, the war lords had a stupid answer: "We shall eventually find them." None could be found.

So from 2003 to 2011, when US troops had to leave Iraq (a raging Sunni rebellion, and Maliki's refusal to extend American military stay), Iraq was left earth-scorched. Rampant sectarianism; destroyed infra-structure; non-trained Iraqi army; and calls by Vice President Biden for splitting Iraq in 3 statelets.

The voids were quickly filled. In Erbil, Kurdistan, with oil emerging to challenge Baghdad. Musab Al-Zarqawi, a thuggish jihadi in Anbar split from Al-Qaeda. After his liquidation by an American predator air strike, his successor was a more brutal thug - Abu-Bakr Al-Baghdadi.

With Syria in flames, as of March 2011, against Bashar, ISIS, now split from Al-Qaeda, acquired a new "capital." Raqqa in northeastern Syria, became an ISIS hub. A hub with oil, money, propaganda, and welcoming Sunni allies in Anbari Iraq.

And with a huge arsenal of American war materiel left behind, the highly trained Saddam's war generals found a new employer: ISIS. Mosul, the second largest Iraqi city, a ripe low hanging fruit, fell to ISIS. Nearly without a shot being fired.

America did not create ISIS. But America's war on Iraq did. As ISIS gained foreign recruits, nearly 3000 from Europe and America, it finds its criminal jihadis ready to strike. Inside and outside of the Arab world. Paris and San Bernardino, California were wake-up calls for America. One jihadi-directed; the other jihadi-inspired. Same result.

And as America packages its commercial products, so does it engage in collective punishment. Branding Muslims as potential jihadis. Producing calls from seekers of the US presidency in 2016, such as Donald Trump, for sanctioning 1.6 billion Muslims. Demented claims that "Islam Is Jihadism."

A lunacy gone too far -as declared especially by Republicans. A dilemma between going too far, and protecting America from Jihadism. So now we have the pendulum swinging again towards a middle ground.

• Tightening visa requirements with regard to applicants from mostly Muslim countries;
• Acknowledging that American intervention abroad negates the wisdom of "no entangling alliances;"
• Abandoning the myth of "nation-building" abroad, as a formula proving "non-working" in both Iraq and Afghanistan;
• Tacit approval of the Obama doctrine on Middle East conflicts -basically no American ground troops fighting those wars. The locals should do it;
• Focusing on nation-building in America: the economy; jobs; banking regulation; health care; the middle class needs. And a focus on technology, including a smaller but highly tech armed forces.

Now we have in America a civilian side to the Obama doctrine. "No nation-Building" abroad is complementary to no military footprint in the Middle East. Leading from behind militarily. A laserbeam focus on internal American issues. Including gun control through executive action.

In essence, the "civilianization" of the Obama military doctrine. Of course it has its opponents among the Republican neo-conservatives, the Tea Party, the evangelicals, and the war lords of the Bush Jr. administration.

Which side will win? I am betting on the success of those who espouse "no-intervention." The exigencies of the economy and the cost of monitoring jihadism through intelligence-sharing, mainly with NATO allies are crucial factors.

What does this mean to the Arab and Muslim worlds?

• Dictatorships are not a problem for America. They are the problem of the locals;
• Human rights throughout the world should be respected. But they should not be defended by the force of American arms;
• In fact the consequences of the fall from power of Saddam and Qaddafi are now being re-interpreted in America. "America would have been safer from jihadism if Saddam and Qaddafi were still in power. They were America's first lines of defense. Terrible dictators for Iraqis and Libyans. But America's safety is American's concern."
• Music to the ears of Bashar, the Syrian killer. But to the present American thinking: "Better Bashar than the unknown."

A near perfect alignment with American attempts to work with Russia, Iran and Turkey. And if Riyadh is upset, so be it.

It is now common knowledge that outside intervention is costly to the intervener in both blood and treasure. This is while those losses are usually compounded by uncertainties: Would the intervener gain at home from the intervention abroad? Of course Russia's intervention in the Syrian war by conventional weapons guarantees Moscow no net benefits.

By contrast, America's caution in regard to that very complex war arena carries with it its own benefits. Obama's Republican detractors are left in the dust howling: "Obama is weak." 

How can he be weak when he has turned the negatives of American footprint intervention into a positive? Primarily through enhanced arms sales to Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Iraq. Let the natives fight their wars with American arms, under multibillion dollar sales, supplies, continuous modernization, and constant training.

On this issue, the annual report by the Congressional Research Services, a division of the Library of Congress, has astounding revelations. It reports that the U.S. now controls over half of the global arms trade.

This is great economic, strategic and political news. Their delivery to Congress seems to command symbolic, if not statutory, timing. With an imaginary ribbon on top, that annual report came to Congress at Christmas, 2015.

American weapons receipts rose to $36.2 billion in 2014 from $26.7 billion the year before. A jump of 35%. Even as the lucrative weapons market was adversely affected by the free fall in oil prices. Russia was a distant second (only $10.2 billion in arms sale); Sweden was third ($5.5 billion); France was fourth ($4.4 billion); and China was fifth ($2.2 billion).

Connecting the dots, you would find a logical relation between America's opting to stay out of direct intervention, while enhancing its lucrative arms sales.

In a lecture at the American University in Cairo (AUC), delivered on October 18, 2015, I presented "The Obama Doctrine on Middle East conflicts." Its heart was the avoidance of intervention. But its main background was the calamitous American war adventurism in Iraq from 2003 to 2011. Calamitous for the following reasons:

• Its faulty motivation was 9/11. But Saddam had nothing to do with Al-Qaeda, the perpetrator of that heinous crime;
• The Bush Jr. presidency was largely in the grip of four war mongers: Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, and Feith. This gang of four set aside sober CIA analysis. Replaced it by fabricated reports on Iraqi weapons of mass destruction;
• As said above, that fabricated intelligence was fed to the UN Security Council. In February 2003. Colin Powell, as Secretary of State, presented imaginary evidence on biological weapons. A total lie; the war mongers called those fabrications "alternative intelligence;"
• With massive US military force slamming into Iraq in March 2003, Baghdad fell in less than 3 weeks. Saddam and his two sons fled. Later to be found and killed;
• Within weeks after Saddam, Iraq was in total chaos. Symbolized by a young Iraqi student crying: "My destiny is lost;"
• Yet Rumsfeld gloated in his press conferences that "America brought freedom to Iraq. And freedom is untidy."
• Paul Bremmer was dispatched to Iraq in May 2003. A total idiot who presided over de-Baathification and over the firing of a mighty Iraqi army, largely officered by Sunnis; he knew no Arabic; he had no inkling about Arab/Iraqi tribal culture;
• The Sunni massive rebellion in the north against the occupation, was the incubator of ISIS that in 2014 controlled one-third of Iraq, including Mosul.
• Said Richard Clarke, a former US presidential advisor on anti-terrorism: "If there was no American invasion, no ISIS would have emerged;" and
• Aside from ISIS, the Iraq war resulted in the death of 150,000 Iraqis and 5,000 Americans; in the massive loss of trillions of dollars; in entrenching sectarianism which is now tearing Iraq apart; and in the flood of migrants heading toward the West.

Not one of the gang of four perpetrators of that calamitous war, named above, even apologized for their actions. Actions which may be considered war crimes.

America's war on Iraq was aptly described by Fareed Zakaria, on CNN on December 27, 2015: "The Long Road to Hell." The Bush Jr. administration was drunk with power.

Now sits in the Oval Office, "a sober president," Obama, who now has laid a firm foundation for non-intervention. The cherished calm, relatively speaking, after a war-infected hurricane period.

This new commitment is also expected to catapult into the Oval Office, the first woman president -Hillary Clinton. Even calamities, like the war on Iraq, could become historical game-changers.

As for the New Egypt, these consequences are largely of no direct consequence. Except for more American respect for "the Strong State." The victory in Egypt of the secularists over the Islamists of "Al-Noor," in the recent Egyptian parliamentary elections should augur well for a refurbished Cairo-Washington reconnection.

History seems to be on the side of this evolution. To America of today, fluidity of alliances with Middle Eastern States is the norm. The magnetism of Middle Eastern oil is now gone as a glue to such alliances. Selectivity and temporariness of these old alliances are now dictated by two factors operating in the New America: Need and cost.

The deal with Iran on the nuclear file is pervasively instructive: Delay the day of a nuclear Iran at the cost of making Saudi Arabia jittery. And punish an Iranian challenge of missile development which will not be stopping it (President Rouhani is pushing for more). Yet America is bound to release $55 billion to Iran, which is Iranian money deposited in non-American banks. And continue to support Riyadh's war on Yemen!!

These are highly nuanced American foreign policies which may be difficult for Riyadh to absorb. A situation which gives Riyadh palpitations, but offers Washington internally some relief from the onus of an association with a State which greets the New Year with the execution of 26 persons accused, without evidentiary support, of terrorism.

Reflecting this pervasive trend toward avoidance by America of intervention in Middle East conflicts is to be found also in the omnibus spending bill passed by Congress in December 2015.

The bill allocated for the Pentagon $58.7 billion to continue fighting ISIS. But mainly only from the air. With Congress thereby abdicating its exclusive constitutional responsibility to declare war, the White House is left to implement the Obama doctrine of war avoidance.

It is not that Obama is weak. He draws more strength from being in his last year as President. No more worries regarding re-election. His executive pen is at the ready. Even in regard to closing Guantanamo. It is Congress that is weakened by its partisan conflicts. And ideological paralysis.

Happy New Year To All Readers!!

A Crazy Call For America To Sanction The New Egypt

Hard to believe, but true. A Michael Wahid Hanna writes in the latest issue of Foreign Affairs that Egypt is "an unreliable partner" of the U.S.

His crazy call for sanctioning the New Egypt comes wrapped in Egyptophobia. As a "Senior Fellow at the Century Foundation" and "an adjunct at New York University School of Law," Hanna has plenty of room to hallucinate in that article titled "Time to Rethink Relations."

How? Primarily through "lowering the total of the annual amount (of U.S. military aid) from $1.3 billion to around $500 million." For what reason? "To alter Egypt's negative trajectory" through "expressing U.S. displeasure with the status quo."

But what "status quo" is that Michael Wahid Hanna referring to? The Peace Treaty between Egypt and Israel concluded in 1979 and is still observed by the two sides. That is in spite of the howling hurricane of the so-called Arab Spring.

How would tampering by America, who is the guarantor of that peace between Israel and one-third of the Arab world which calls itself Egypt, affect that historic peace? Hanna skirts that crucial issue of cause and effect. He offers no gems of wisdom on that matter. That is not his concern. His concern is to drum up Egyptophobia at whatever cost. Hanna's demons cannot be silenced.

Suppose Washington, D.C. acts on Michael Wahid Hanna's muddled day dreams of sanctioning the New Egypt. Where would those fictitious savings garnered from U.S. military aid go?

Ah!! Our Michael has a plan for where those illegal cuts go. He howls his solution. "The United States should consider diverting future military assistance to more reliable allies" in the area. Like whom, Michael? "Such as Jordan."

And supposed Jordan, a valiant Arab sister State of Egypt, but with a fraction of the size of the Egyptian military, cannot absorb those savings? Then to who else, Mr. Hanna?

"To partners that need help far more urgently than Egypt, such as Iraq." Did you say "Iraq," Mr. Hanna? Where is that? Hasn't Iraq, outside of Kurdistan, spurned a security arrangement with America, in order to accommodate Iran?

OK!! Details trouble Wahid Hanna. So he shifts directions in the same breath. Which directions: "Or to States in the region that are transitioning to democracy more successfully, such as Tunisia."

Oh, my God, Michael!! You make me a bit dizzy by your zigs and zags all over the Arab area. Of course Egypt wishes Tunisia, her sister Arab State, well. But I must admit to my slow thinking. Where is the Tunisian successful transitioning to democracy? Hasn't a prolonged state of emergency been declared in Tunisia by President El-Sibsi (not to be confused with the name of El-Sisi of Egypt)?

Now we reach the root cause of what ails the brain of Michael Wahid Hanna about Egypt of June 30, 2013. The ouster of the diabolic Muslim Brotherhood from power. Not by the army supported by popular demand, as our Hanna, with a defective bull horn, is screaming his head off. But by popular demand supported by the army. The Egyptians, 35 million of them, were the prime movers. The army simply protected them!!

Please Michael. Those, like you and your friend, David Kirkpatrick, another Egyptphobe writing in the New York Times, are not "aficionados" of history. So it behooves you not to try to revise it.

Mr. Hanna: You begin your 7 page article in Foreign Affairs of November/December 2015 by a provocative paragraph. In it, you make a bogus claim stating: "There are no longer any compelling reasons for Washington to sustain especially close ties with Cairo."

Then you compound that mystery by unabashedly saying without any proof: "What was once a powerfully symbolic alliance with clear advantages for both sides has become a nakedly transactional relationship." Sir: Are there any alliances which are not transactional? Name just one, if you can.

In America, we teach in law and political science that alliances are predicated upon mutuality of interest. That alliances are generally based on parity of sovereignty. That alliances need to be perceived, and are in fact of mutual benefit to the two sides. That is unless they are based on duress. In this case, they are colonial contracts between an imperial power and its protectorate.

So where do you draw your learning about alliances, Mr. Hanna? And how do you substantiate your naked claim that the Cairo/Washington, D.C. present relationship "benefits the Egyptians more than the Americans?" Nuts!!

If that is the case, and it is imaginary, or at best a hypothetical case, why does the U.S. Secretary of State, John Kerry, keep on having a stop in Egypt a near permanent feature of his shuttle diplomacy in the Middle East? Even to the point of attending recently in Sharm El-Sheikh, a mammoth Economic Conference organized by President El-Sisi!!

Let us now look for even a scintilla of logic to justify any of your claims, Michael, in that issue of Foreign Affairs.

You, seemingly inexpertly in the art of logical argumentation and presentation, lump disjointedly three different issues. A compounded and an inarticulate compendium of situations affecting the New Egypt with which you contemptuously deal. Here it comes:

"After a popular uprising followed by an authoritarian relapse in Cairo, and with the peace process moribund, and jihadism now a chronic condition, the U.S. - Egyptian relationship has become an anachronism that distorts American policy in the region."

Allow me to help out in disentangling the disparate elements of that overburdened paragraphic sentence.

• Your charge of authoritarianism is totally unfounded. El-Sisi became president through open and fair elections held in June 2014; his elevation came in accordance with a Constitution adopted in a popular referendum held that year; and the consensual Road Map has now been implemented by a free and open popular elections. 
• In those elections, the Islamist party of "Al-Noor" suffered defeat, and the secularists, as evidenced by "The Free Egyptians" party of the Coptic entrepreneur Naguib Sawiris, triumphed. So if you happen to be an Egyptian Copt, as your name leads me to suspect, you should be dancing in the aisle.
• Where do you find "the peace process moribund?" I hope that you know some Latin to realize that "moribund" comes from the Latin "moribundus," meaning "at the point of death." In fact Hamas and its terror-supported organizations such as "The Friends of Beit Al-Maqdis," has kept Egypt in their cross-hairs. Their declared reason: Cooperation with Israel through blocking the terrorists attempts to transfer the conflict with Israel from Gaza to Sinai. A well-known ISIS tactic.
• As for jihadism being "now a chronic condition," you are right, Mr. Hanna. But only on the surface. Making jihadism a chronic condition attaching only to Egypt is an insult to the innocent victims of jihadism in Paris, Brussels, California, Turkey, Mali, Russia, Syria and Iraq.
• And how is that situation causing "the U.S. - Egyptian relationship" become a factor that "distorts American policy in the region?" Your claim has an appropriate term in American contract law. It goes by the name of "nudum factum." Meaning bereft of facts justifying your claim. To elaborate: A bare contract or agreement that amounts to merely a naked promise. Sorry, Michael, your argument has no leg to stand upon.

Of course, Mr. Hanna, there is a distinct possibility that you, with your senior position at "The Century Foundation," are not keen on the facts of this Century. Otherwise  how are the following known facts "distorting American policy in the region?" The reverse is the only reality:

• Allowing American military aircraft to fly over Egyptian airspace;
• Egyptian provision to U.S. naval ships of fast track access to the Two Suez Canals;
• Provision by Cairo of diplomatic support for American regional policies, with regard to the Gulf region;
• Egyptian American resumed joint military exercises;
• Provision of eight F-16 U.S. aircraft to the Egyptian air force;
• Continued training of Egyptian elements of the armed forces in the U.S.;
• Military Egyptian involvement with Saudi Arabia, the Emirates, and the U.S. in the present conflict in Yemen;
• The U.S. opening to Egypt of the alliance with other Arab States in combating ISIS; 
• The recognition, in fact the praise, of Egypt's massive contribution to the fight against ISIS on two priority fronts, Sinai and the Libyan border;
• The expected stationing of the two Egyptian aircraft carriers recently purchased by Egyptian funds from France at the Libyan border and opposite the troubled Gaza coastline near the northern terminus to the Suez Canals.

The list can go on and on. Including the involvement by Egypt of U.S. energy companies in the exploration of the newly discovered natural gas reserves in the Western Desert and the Delta.

Mr. Hanna: Please get it in your head that what we have today is a new Middle East where America, through the Obama doctrine on Middle East conflicts, wants the Arabs to take care of their defense needs.

You must be comatose when you allege in your article that "Egypt has an interest in pursuing counter terrorism for its own reasons." Anti-jihadism has eliminated your outdated fiction of each State should combat jihadism only for "its own reasons." Jihadism knows no boundaries. So should anti-jihadism.

And if anti-jihadism requires "a religious counter-attack," where would you find the rich ideological resources for that lethal weapon in places which are better than Al-Azhar of more than a thousand years?

Could you also please help me understand this foolish assertion of yours: "In short, the regional landscape has been transformed, and Egypt has been left behind. Egypt is no longer an influential regional player. Instead, it is a problem to be managed." Is it because Egypt is turning from chaos to the strong State? A problem to be managed?! I haven't heard that term since the publication of my book in 1971 on "decolonization."

How laughable!! The only problem to hopefully be managed is your Egyptophobia. Compounded by your approbation of the reign of Islamic hegemony in Egypt for one year (2012-2013) by the Muslim Brotherhood.

You seem to regard Egyptian sovereignty as either for sale, or as a legitimate target for unilateral U.S. sanctions.  Whatever you believe, you, Michael Wahid Hanna, are on the wrong side of history.

And were you to find a magic cure for your myopia, you would see that a focus on internal affairs following upheavals, is not equivalent to becoming a marginal player either regionally or globally. Both America, following its five losing wars, and Egypt, following four years of upheavals preceded by 32 years of stagnation, are doing the same. Each of them are rebuilding their infrastructure, creating jobs, improving their educational systems. All acts of fusion of internal energy. Because national salvation begins from within.

So keep on whistling in the wind, Michael!! You wouldn't even get the benefit of an echo chamber!!

Reason: From your writings and your responses to Egyptophobes in The New York Times, you have stayed the course of the equivalent of "Uncle Tom" in regard to the New Egypt. Under the guise of freedom of expression, you seem to have made of your anti-Egyptian phobias a lucrative industry. Your neo-colonialism revival is sure to fail.

Michael Wahid Hanna: You have a bullhorn and an audience. Instruments which you are using in support of your merchantilist approach to the New Egypt. But please note an undisputed fact regarding your success in spreading mythology about Egypt -a rising strong State. You are operating in a Post-Fact America.

In North America, Two Outlooks on Muslims: Canada is Kinder , America is Weary!!

His appearance at the airport in Toronto in December carried an entire message. Young photogenic Prime Minister Justin Trudeau hugging the Syrian refugees. Putting warm jackets on their backs. Declaring to them and to the whole world: "Welcome to Canada. You are at home now!!" They, have reached a safe harbor.

Contrast this to the bluster of America's Trump. He, a fool, does not speak for America. But he is the poster idiot of a mean America. And no one in the Republican establishment dealt harshly with his profane calls for: A database for American citizens who happen to be Muslims; a non-return to America of those citizens; a total ban on the entry of other Muslims to America, even for study or family reunification.

Trump (or Chump) glories in anti-Islamism. And in anti-Latinos. And in anti-women. And in anti-peace. His mantra, which is a call for an American Sparta, is "Make America Great Again." 

A demented buffoon who is exposing America to the wrath of 1.6 Billion Muslims. Daring to fight the world from fictitious citadels called "The Trump Towers." Punching the air with his fists, saying: "I am rich" -a stupid qualification for ruling a super-power.

Now to Canada. That is where you find its Prime Minister on hand at the Toronto airport welcoming Syrian refugees. But that was one aspect of Canada's kinder outlook on Muslims and non-Muslims. Fleeing their countries westward in search for safety.

That phenomenon was best described by Obama. Standing on December 15 in Washington, D.C. delivering an address at a citizenship ceremony, he graphically summed up the migrants dilemma. He likened Syrians fleeing the civil war in their native country to the Jews who fled the Nazis.

But in America these words do not compare to actions and public campaigns in Canada. A gulf of differences between two outlooks.

For in Canada:

• Prime Minister Justin Trudeau keeps on repeating: "Extending the sins of the Islamic State group to all Muslims is irresponsible,"
• He also adds: "There shouldn't be a contradiction between what it takes to keep us safe and what it takes to keep us Canadian.;"
• At the provincial level, political leaders, like Andrea Horwath calls on the Ontario government to face up to racial issues. This is to be accomplished through action on legislation providing for setting up a secretariat to conduct public education and research on racism.
• The hallmark of schools in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) is extra help provided by teachers to immigrant children. These are traumatized kids of very diverse backgrounds;
• During the Christmas season, front page newspaper articles project the beginning of the healing process for new immigrant arrivals. Photos are splashed for toddlers lighting prayer candles at the St. Mary Armenian Apostolic Church;
• A chorus of hundreds of children of different faiths singing the greeting extended to the Prophet Muhammad by the residents of Medina upon his arrival, fleeing persecution in Mecca 1437 years ago;
• The Canadian Government, through its Minister of Immigration, keeps on increasing the figures of migrants from Islamic lands fleeing into the welcoming arms of non-Muslim western countries.
• By contrast, Saudi Arabia which prides itself on being the Custodian of the holiest of Islamic shrines in Mecca and Medina, had an obtuse response to this humanitarian calamity. Its foreign minister's response was: "Many Saudis are married to Syrian women." Four million Syrians have fled their war-ravaged country since its slide into civil war in 2011.
• During the Canadian elections of October 2015, the majority of Canadian voters showed their disgust for what the Toronto Star of December 15, 2015 described in graphic terms. It attributed the defeat of the conservative government of Stephen Harper to Canada's "own version of ugly Muslim-baiting by politicians desperate for votes."
• One of the top columnists of the same newspaper had his column in the same issue headlined: "Would Trump flourish here? Unlikely." The columnist Irvin Studin explained why. Here is what he opined:
• "The recent call by US presidential candidate Donald Trump for the wholesale exclusion of Muslims from entry into the United States can only give thinking Canadians some degree of comfort that our founders created Canada, in constitutional terms, as the negation of the American project."

Of course, in America, the Trump voice is rather negated by liberal editorial writings in The New York Times. In its issue of December 5, 2015, one such editorial was titled: "Fear Ignorance, Not Muslims." Following the San Bernardino massacre, the editorial commented as follows:

"Wherever the investigation leads, Americans must guard against overreacting, and subdue the panicked reflex of distrust and hatred towards the Americans among us who are Muslims. This has been a problem at least since 9/11 and will remain one as long as ignorance about Islam remains deep and widespread."

Wise words. But American public opinion continues to give the lunacy of Trump thumbs up. No less than 65% of Americans recently polled supported Trump's advocacy for a ban on Muslims. This is not only unconstitutional under several US constitutional provisions. It is also a clear violation of international law principles dealing with "freedom of movement" as a human right.

But here we must keep in mind the individual instances in Canada of a bias against some Muslims. Reference here is made to putting a woman teacher on leave for wearing the hijab.

That teacher undoubtedly believes that hijab is decreed by the Quran for Muslim females. She is wrong, as such an injunction cannot be textually proven by the Quran to be an obligation. The most charitable description of the hijab phenomenon is to say that only after the Khomeini Islamic revolution in 1979 was that fad elevated to a fareedha (obligation).

This issue is ironically further compounded by brutal enforcement in Wahhabi lands by a religious police called, for obfuscation: "The Volunteers" (Al-Mottaween). Storm troops with canes ready to strike without legal sanction.

These are lands which are divorced from the spirit of Islam as a faith continually evolving to accommodate changing circumstances. Particularly in regard to integration with legislated laws and customary practices in countries to which Muslims emigrate. This is the essence of what the Quran states 21 times as HEKMAH (the reasoning based on common sense).

We all recall how The Muslim Brotherhood, during its fascist one year rule in Egypt (2012-2013) terrorized the Copts. A lesson which the New Egypt, under El-Sisi, is not likely to forget anytime soon. It was a violation of the DNA of historic Egypt of 7000 years as a State.

Thus in regard to anti-Islamism, the issue is multi-faceted. Both Muslims as well as non-Muslims still have a way to go before mutual accommodation.

But the efforts at such accommodation seem to be more manageable, more promising, in Canada than in the U.S.A.

A Very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to All!

In the Voice of the Baby of the San Bernardino Killers

Mom and Dad

Wherever You Both Are Now 

Maybe In a Bad Place

After You Killed the Innocent

oooo

You Left Me With Grandma 

Who Awaited Your Joyous Return

To Pick Me Up, Change Me

And Feed Me

oooo

But You Never Did

Only Your Images

On the Somber TV

When You Moved Among the Living

oooo

Why Did You Do It?

All That San Bernardino Killing

Of Moms and Dads

Whose Families Are In Mourning

oooo

Your Names Are Deceptive

For Rizwan Means God's Blessing

And Malik Is One Name

For God Almighty

oooo

Neither Malik Nor Rizwan

Shall Be On Your Side

Especially That Farook

Means Separating Right From Wrong

oooo

These Are Muslim Names

Intended To Glorify

The Oneness of God

Whom You Have Grossly Deceived

oooo

I See All Those Faces

Whose Bodies are Lifeless

Cause You Acted As Life-Enders

While We Worship Life-Givers

oooo

Life-Givers Like Robert, Bennetta

Aurora, Sierra, and Shannon

And Daniel, Damian, and Tin

And Nicholas, Yvette and Michel

oooo

They Trusted You, Your Co-Workers

As Did America, the Giver,

Treated You As All Others

Your Faith Was No Problem

oooo

Where is Pakistan

And Where Is Saudi Arabia

I Only Know The USA

As My Birthplace, My Birthright

oooo

My Home Where When I Grow

I Can Be Equal To Men

I Can Learn and Endear

All Others Under Our Flag

oooo

Now With Your Victims Gone

To A Place Better Than Yours

I Am Here Left Behind

Baring The Shame of Being Yours

oooo

Of What Can I Be Proud

With Whom Shall I Play

Your Pictures Are Not Glorified

Your Faith is Tainted

oooo

Those Flowers, Those Candles

Those Moans Of The Injured

Those Vigils Are But Cursing You

And Blurring My Future

oooo

I Did Nothing Except Being Born

To Parents With a Pact

A Pact With Those Far Away

From The Sacred Bond of Mercy

oooo

Your ISIS, Your Bullets

Your Guns, Your Grenades

Have Taken Over My Space

Space of Toys, Love and Light

oooo

How Dark It Is To Peer

Into A Future I Don't Know

Filled Of Fog and Doubt

About Whatever Follows Thereafter

oooo

On Your Epitaph, 

What Shall I Place

Your Inscription On A Tomb

Would It Be Like A Curse

Of All Jihadis Like You

oooo

And What Should I Be Called

The Unloved Issue Of Killers 

Who Turned Their Blooded Backs

On Those Who Gave Them Life

In Paris, The Bells of Notre Dame Cathedral Have Tolled - Their Ring Has Ushered In a Just War

November 13 should signal the start of a revolution. A new type with a global perspective. Against global terrorism which, as it sputters, murders the innocent in its wake.

Liberty, equality, Fraternity!! All of these should be reborn. Out of the martyrdom of more than 120 human beings. They died in Paris. But shall be reborn in our world action that strikes without mercy, without a holiday.

To call this despicable tragedy "jihadism" is to elevate the humanly abnormal to the level of normalcy. If terrorism knows no boundary, so should be the global pre-emptive response. No boundary; no mercy; no shedding of crocodile tears by the so-called "human rights" organizations, reminding us of due process.

France has, in the immediate aftermath, closed its borders. Like in Sinai, there cannot be freedom of movement to allow the assassins the freedom of butchery. (How laughable to hear Hamas leaders calling the Rafah Crossing the Gaza lungs. Resuscitating the Gaza lungs is in the hands of Hamas, not in the hands of Egypt).

From France, the land of "The Social Contract" should emerge a new version of "Le contract social:"

• A new global World War Council to coordinate the global moves against all and every terror outfit;
• A new system of intelligence sharing to help that "World Defense Council" to strike pre-emptively. Not to await reactively;
• A global "Situation Room" that oversees the 24/7 pounding of the nests of evil. Regardless of what they call themselves;
• A massive world information system to inform the world citizenry of the progress of that "War Without Borders;"
• To the maximum extent possible, a protective shield against "collateral damage," whereby the innocent perishes as the wicked is attacked;
• A constant interpretation of the terrorist chatter across the globe to be fed to those who, in the War on Terror, are flying planes, staffing war ships, parachuting on the dens of evil, or rescuing hostages;
• Screening by modern technology the attendance at mass events whether sportive or artistic;
• Replacing the international and civil codes of civil and political rights, such as those of the 1960s of the moribund UN; and
• Assisting those who are fighting for securing a viable life of independence in geographic areas which they can call "a homeland," such as in the Middle East.

From the Russian plane crashing in Sinai, to the murdering of innocent civilians by hooded criminals in El-Arish (Egypt), to the bombing of Syrian civilians by a murderous Assad regime, to the attacks in Kenya, and Somalia against hotels, to the stoning of women for alleged adultery, to the kidnappings by Boko Haram, to the assistance extended to the Muslim Brotherhood, to the claims that the New Egypt is smothering dissent...!!

All of the above are various symptoms of the new Ebola of global terror. That world terror:

• Has no faith;
• Knows no mercy;
• Has no plans for an orderly society;
• Bears no resemblance to the ordinary human being;
• Respects no charter, no reconciliation, no orderly progression to integration within global society;
• Uses open borders and freedom of movement as means for reaching nameless and non-suspecting victims;
• Hides behind veils of secrecy and shields of trumped up interpretations of faith to satisfy its appetite for human chaos.

It needs war stratagems, globally coordinated, with each nation doing its part. Especially the Member States of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation.

For after November 13, 2015, our world has become one. A unity for survival. No more need for empty denunciations a la Ban Ky Moon. The U.N. Sermonizing General," instead of "The U.N. Secretary-General." Who from the 38th floor of his glass house on the East River in New York City, does not see his real world beyond Long Island across that River.

Time for action for whatever time it takes on all fronts, and by all means.

For those who gloated over their social media that "Paris is burning," should be made to count their days. That cry of satisfaction at mass slaughter should now be heard through a globalized war command and control.

Evil is the same. Even when it uses "God" as a part of its odious name!! ISIS (The Insane Satan In Iraq and Syria) pompously declares "responsibility" for killing in cold blood. Killing 129, and injuring multiples of that number in Paris. "Responsibility?"

This is a word denoting high morality. "Responsibility" refers to values which Al-Baghdadi, the thug from Anbar, has never known.

President Hollande of France got it right. "An Act of War," he described the dastardly attacks of November 13, in the City of Light - Paris. So did Hillary Clinton, who is expected to be the first female President of the U.S. as of January 2017. She said: "ISIS should not only be contained. It should be defeated."

The martyrs (Shaheeds) of Paris are not the eight stealth killers who perished to hell wrapped in their explosive belts. The martyrs (Shaheeds) are those who perished as they watched a soccer game, a concert, or sat peacefully for a pleasant dinner. This is what Islamic Law calls them!! Shaeeds.

Yes, Al-Baghdadi. It was a Friday. The Muslim day of prayers, reflection, and constructive interaction with all other human beings. Thus calling you a "Muslim" is like calling a poisonous snake a "bird of paradise." May you and your gangs perish in hell. Wrapped in your black turbans and your other garments whose blackness points directly to the true color of your heart.

Paris shall always be full of light. Al-Raqqa, in Syria, now under daily bombardment by the French air force, shall, in time, become the mass grave for the worst perpetrators of criminality against Islam.

The global menace of ISIS has an ideological sideon which it feeds. ISIS is enabled, though unwittingly, by Islamophobes. You can find them especially among those who speak or write about that faith without ever having studied it. Or even understood it.

A prime example of such ISIS-enablers can be found in a book recently published by Ayaan Hirsi Ali. A Somali young woman with terrible tribal experiences. Genital mutilation and a forced arranged marriage. Issues whose only link to Islam is that they were visited upon Hirsi Ali in a country which, though Islamic, yet socially dysfunctional. The capital country of the murderous Al-Shabab.

Ayaan's ignorance of Islam, a faith which she has renounced, became to her a substantial source of undeserved fame, and an ill-gotten fortune. In both Europe, particularly in the Netherlands where she was made a parliamentarian, and now in the U.S., a guest so-called scholar at Harvard and in Washington, D.C.

Ayaan, out of deep ignorance, has previously in an article, called for "the rewriting of the Quran." As if the Quran is another terrorism manifesto, not, as per Islamic dogma, the word of God revealed to the Prophet Muhammad. Her recent book is entitled: "Heretic: Why Islam Needs a Reformation Now." Published by Harper, she boldly declares in the introduction: "To make many people - not only Muslims but also Western apologists for Islam - uncomfortable."

Her conclusion is that "Islam is not a religion of peace." With such a conclusion, repeated also in her three previous books, ISIS draws the oxygen of its barbarity under the pretext that Islam was under attack. Under attack, not only by you, Ayaan. But by the West whose circles are providing you with encouragement. An encouragement to propagate hate and contempt for the faith of 1.5 billion Muslims. So when "Paris" happens, you and your entourage of hate-mongers find justification for the lies which gush constantly from the deep well of your ignorance.

In essence, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, you and ISIS feed on one another. You need ISIS criminality to sell your books of Islamophobia. And Al-Baghdadi, the thug from Anbar, needs you as an un-witting enabler/recruit to bolster his nihilistic ideology.

It was your tribe, Ayaan, that attacked you. Islam did not. When you opted out of Islam, that faith looked the other way. Under its humane principle of "In matters of faith, there is no compulsion." 

Perceiving yourself as a scholar, especially in matters of Islam, has been devastatingly rebutted by Max Rodenbeck, the Middle East Bureau Chief of the Economist. In his review of your book "Heretic"  in The New York Review of Books dated December 3, 2015, he posed a central question on the cover of this forthcoming issue: "Can Ayaan Hirsi Ali Change Islam?" 

His resounding response was a big "No!!" Here is a quote from his review, covering from page 35 to page 37:

"But there are several problems with her approach. These include such troubling aspects as her use of unsound terminology, a surprisingly shaky grasp of how Muslims actually practice their faith, and a questionable understanding of the history and political background not only of Islam, but of the world at large."

So Ayaan, go find a respectable way to make your living. Your barrage of rantings against Islam have the effects of a big horned ram repeatedly attacking a mountain. That mountain shall not move. But the ram shall soon lose its attacking horns!!

One of the tragic aspects of the Paris massacres is that similar outrageous calamities in southern Beirut do not get the same world attention. Call it "citizen's fatigue," or "differentiated treatment." It is both. When we have a quarter million Syrians killed over 4 years of civil war, overall numbness takes over. Paris, by comparison, is expected to be safe. Safe enough for one million migrants aspiring to head toward it.

In this regard, the ISIS Satan has proved capable, at least for now, to force us to think differently about the same human tragedies. A global focus on Paris, as it should be. Less attention to southern Beirut, as it should not be. Beirut is thus entitled to feel, by comparison, forgotten.

Summing up the moral depravity of the eight suicide bombers who attacked Paris, I would say to their ISIS masters:

• Your ideology is nihilistic - the burning wish to die;
• Your desire to kill and your desire to die are the clearest indication of your futile search for clarity;
• Your search for violence as an end in itself is foredoomed as dead-end;
• Your program, if one may charitably call it that, is based on a faulty premise: divide our world between Muslims and non-Muslims; between Muslim Sunnis and Muslim Shiis, and between Muslim Sunnis who submit to your enslavement and Muslim Sunnis who are yearning to leave your hell hole;
• Your riding the migration wave which you have caused is sure to close that escape hatch. But will surely serve the ranks of those who want you dead;
• Your genocidal ideology shall boomerang and justifiably turn it into a sword for your eventual annihilation.

Your targeting the Bataclan arena, where a soccer match between France and Germany, and which was attended by President Hollande, had a response of defiance: a piano with its player, moving his fingers deftly and sounding music about peace.

That song is by John Lennon of the Beatles. It begins by "Imagine All the People!!" An apt response of resilience in the face of barbarity. Within an unshakable refrain: Vive La France!!

The Arab and Muslim star is composed of eight angles. Angles of light, referring to all kinds of learning. The savage executioners in Paris were eight. Each angle pointing to all kinds of evil for which they, and their so-called Emirs, stand clothed in infamy.

Now here is another clear indicator of the gulf in values between the wicked (the Paris terrorists), and the good (the innocent Parisians). The mastermind of the Paris attacks of Nov. 13, Abaaoud, gloated about how easy it was for him to get from Syria to Paris to plan that massacre. That was before he perished a few days later north of Paris at the hands of the French police.

Scum like Abaaoud shall never know that their ease at inflicting harm on humanity is rooted in a higher value. The openness of borders, the freedom of movement, and the trust in the decency of other humans not to use these universal values for subversion and criminality.

A real gulf in values which can only now be bridged by a globalized effort, led perhaps by boots on the ground, through the creation of an Arab/Muslim NATO to erase the so-called Islamic Caliphate from the face of the earth.

They do not belong with other humans as sharers of this planet. Because they have come from Hell, to which they are surely returning. Their presumed express passports, through imagined martyrdom, to paradise have, especially since 9/11, been stamped "CANCELLED."

  

Idiotic Claims on the Giza Pyramids By the Most Ignorant of Today's Stupids!!

The claimants cover the three Ibrahamic faiths: Jews, Christians, and Muslims. The democratization of insane ignorance.

Some Jews claim that they built those pyramids. A Christian running for the U.S. presidency, Ben Carson, claims that the pyramids were used by biblical Joseph to store grains. And the Muslim Brotherhood saw in the Giza pyramids idolic symbols that should be destroyed.

All idiotic claims by the most ignorant of today's stupids; the crazy revisionists of world history. Under the guise of giving themselves a leg up on the ladder of legitimacy. And the evidence is clear through the following facts. Facts that are stubborn enough to make those claimants the world's laughing stock!!

As students in Egypt, our curriculum included "Ancient Egypt." At both the primary and secondary levels. And all history majors at the university level are required to pass that course before graduation. I was one of them. This is the DNA of Egyptian education. It has a basic pedagogical reason: The modern Egyptian is thought of as an amalgam of ancient Egyptians and Arabs.

That genealogical link is the back bone of never-ceasing Egyptian nationalism. It has served Egypt well. No foreign occupation of Egypt went unpunished. From the days of the Hyksos to the days of the Zionists.

Now to the historical facts about the Giza pyramids. And down with the myth information maintained by some of the Jews; by an Afro-American Christian brain surgeon who should get his own brain operated on; and the un-Islamic Muslim Brotherhood whose leader one day said: "To Hell With Egypt." (Toz Fi Massr)!!

• The age of the pyramid builders began with "The Old Kingdom." It lasted for 500 years. A united regime with a firm throne, occupied by a great pharaoh worshiped as God or God's representation by a pious population.
• The entire history of "The Old Kingdom" was characterized by self reliance and self sufficiency. Through those Egyptian masses which believed in the sanctity of the Pharaonic system. Underpinned, not by the small group of Israelites, Moses adherents. But by an indigenous faith. Hard work by these masses was a subsidiary religion.
• The age of the pyramid builders separated between those residents who were outside the faith of Ancient Egypt, and those who were immersed in it. The ruler was a God; the public was his congregation; and his plans to build the pyramids was to concretize the stability of the State. In this grand endeavor, the public, as pyramid builders, during 3 months annually (the Nile flood period), was engaged in a second mission. No outsider was to lift a stone in that nationwide Egyptian declaration of greatness. The sacred had no place for those who looked for  God outside the official faith of the State.
• That huge sacred endeavors stretched west of the Nile from near Luxor in the south, to Memphis, the great capital near which the 3 great pyramids arose.
• The overseers were engineers; the advisors were the priests of "The Old Kingdom;" the peasants, now in the employ of the Pharoah, moved tons of stones; the boats moved the granite over flowing Nile waters from south to north; and the peasants, turned laborers, sang as they slid the stones in place. No mortar. But air suction to keep the stones tightly in place.
• The stepped pyramid of Saqqarah was considered an old model. Now the pyramids have to rise up with one solid face to remind the whole world that the stability, faith, economic prosperity, and mighty armed forces, are the four corners of Ancient Egypt.
• The gravitas of Egypt, its capital, moved from the south to the north, at where the great Nile split in two branches. Pouring its waters rich with silt, into the Mediterranean. From the first Nubian cataract south of Aswan to where Alexandria stands today.
• The great engineering genius of the Giza Pyramids was Imhotep, Pharao's priest, his prime minister, and his great architect. Imhotep was a northerner; was later regarded by the Greeks as "the genius of stone engineering." A graduate of the ancient Egyptian schools of science, religion, and politics. Faith was in the Sun (Raa). Not beyond. Heliopolis became, at that dawn of history, the Mecca of ancient Egypt.
• That was five thousand years ago. Faith and governance were one. The Giza pyramids were to be the burial places of the pharaohs. Their greatness lies in their being the first stone structures in the world: durable; perfect angels; standing aloft at the edge of the desert; peering over the temples and the burial places of personalities lesser than the mighty Pharaohs.
• Khyops, Khafraa and Mankaraa, were the respective occupants of the Big Pyramid, the Middle Pyramid, and the Small Pyramid.

Case closed. History speaks louder than the Jewish myth of taking part in pyramid building. In that regard, those false claimants are akin to saying that non-Muslims could participate in the washing of the Kaabah.

So is Ben Carson who believes in the apocalypse and the end of time. If he had been to the pyramids only once, he would have seen that the pyramids are no silos for grain storage.

So is the crazy Brotherhood that regards the pyramids as idols which should be destroyed. Why? Diversion from the Muslim faith of the oneness of God, and the exclusion of statues and images as distraction from Muslim worship. Real idiocy!!

Sorry, fellows!! You can go home now. See whether you had something to dream about the leaning Tower of Pisa (Italy). Or the Arch of Triumph of Paris (France). Or the Statue of Liberty in New York. Do yourselves a favor and leave the Giza Pyramids alone. Your claims are as bogus as those who try to sell the Brooklyn Bridge to the fool.

And if you have free time, see the comic Egyptian film starring Muhammad Al-Heneidy, who stars in "Hamam In Amsterdam." See the depth of his spontaneous revulsion at something "an Israeli" starring in the film told him. "The pyramids are ours!!" Prompting Hamam not to shake hands with that offending usurper. Usurper of basic historical facts. Repeating to himself in amazement, "Can you imagine him saying: 'The Pyramids are ours'?!!"

The basic context of the pyramids project of Ancient Egypt is this: It was the first equivalent in human history of the State taking care of the needs of its citizens. Especially at times of agricultural paralysis due to the Nile floods. Citizens were defined by faith. Worshippers of the sun (Raa) were the only recognized faithful. Everyone else, including the Israelites, were mere residents.

At that dawn of history, the State launched the equivalent of the first Social Security scheme in world's history. If you are a citizen, not a mere resident, you were entitled to be covered by that scheme. That is when you could not farm.

So you get on "the food stamp scheme" of that time. Build the pyramids, and get your ration of wheat, maize, and oil to feed your family. On top of that you get the heavenly stamp of indulgence after death. That stamp, in essence, might have read "A Participant In Pyramid Building." No one else got it. If you were a mere resident unacknowledging the pledge of allegiance to Pharaoh.

You see, knowledge is light. And information is power. No amount of hallucination about "the Giza Pyramids" is of any use. Because you are merely whistling in the wind. The wind of the Western Desert which hugs the Pyramids from every angle. With the Sphinx keeping close watch as a royal guardsman. A heritage for all mankind!!

I love Sadat. Yet I have been critical of his allowing Menachem Begin to get away with saying at the Pyramids: "We built these. But we are not going to claim them." Instead of a well-deserved retort, Sadat laughed. For diplomatic reasons.

But one should always keep in mind that diplomacy cannot trump history. History must always trump diplomacy.

ISIS Kicking Sand In the Eyes of the Truth - Losers!!

Even in catastrophic tragedies, ISIS hurries to reap the wind of evil. The Russian airbus plummets from 31,000 feet down to the Sinai mountainous floor. More than 200 hundred Russian and Ukrainian tourists and crew head to a fiery death. Instead of heading home with lungs refreshed from the iconic resort of Sharm El-Sheik. The alternative capital of Egypt during Mubarak days.

So the world grieves for the human loss. Egyptian groups gather before the Russian Embassy in Cairo with flowers, candles and songs of condolences. Putin declares a national day of mourning. Egyptian-led teams of investigators descend upon the floor of tragedy seeking the inner secrets of the black box to reveal the actual cause of the tragedy. A hundred Egyptian ambulances carry the body bags to awaiting Russian planes to fly the victims home.

Everyone on the face of the earth bow their heads in a prayerful gesture of accepting the fate of that airbus and its occupants.

Except for ISIS!! Evil celebrates evil. In a transparent attempt to grab the headlines for publicity of a false victory. Even before the investigations by Egyptian, Russian, French and American reveal the real cause of that enormous human tragedy. ISIS celebrates: "We did it. Victory for our Sinai campaign." Yet no such celebration and "high five" are in order. The fact belies the ISIS premature claims of victory of evil over good. For at 31,000 feet high up over the Sinai sky, no ground to air missile is known to climb more than 20,000 feet. An airbus in flight at that altitude is not akin to a low flying helicopter, easily reached by a powerful and well aimed Kalashnikov.

These are facts. Not a barrage of lies spread by ISIS and its affiliates in the Sinai/Hamas regions. That is where the combined strength of the mighty Egyptian Second and Third Armies, concentrated by El-Sisi in the hands of one brilliant and battle-tested commander, is pummeling that evil. Gradually out of viable existence whatever time it takes.

Thus to ISIS and its so-called Caliphate at Raqqa, Syria, the Holy Quran, in Chapter VIII, seems to address itself to the anti-Islamic "Islamic State." Verse 37 is on point: "So that God may distinguish the corrupt from the Good, and pile the corrupt one upon another. And so heap them up together, and throw them into Hell. Those are the losers."

The losers keep on kicking sand in the eyes of the truth. The truth is that ISIS moves where there is no opposing movement on the ground. Moves into empty spaces; into where loyalties are split by the fiction of a Sunni Islam and a Shii Islam; into the void of authority; into the void of jobs taken away from half a million mighty Iraqi army, officered mainly by Sunnis during the reign of Saddam terror. That was a void created by an American lunatic called Bremmer at the outset of the great American war debacle of the Bush/Cheney war on Iraq.

We are still in an age of several voids exploited by the phantom Caliphate of an Anbar thug called Al-Baghdadi. Let us have a recitation of these voids on the US side, enabling ISIS to temporarily prosper on the oxygen of these voids which have to be likened to the underground tunnels. Previously dug by Hamsawis in an attempted underground invasion by the renegade Gaza enclave of mighty Egypt.

• No US coherent policy in regard to US war effort against ISIS;
• The US Secretary of Defense, Ashton Carter, is wedded to three R's:

Raqqa/Ramadi/Raids. But from the air. An air campaign cannot secure timely victory for on the ground campaign.

• Only 50 US special forces for Syria, and 3500 for Iraq. To do what?: "Advise and Assist!!" What does this mean in regard to ISIS in Syria? It means that the US has no reliable partner on the ground in Syria. But in Iraq, there is the Pesh Merga of Kurdistan, seeking through their collaboration to secure from within Iraq, the State of Kurdistan.
• But would Sunni Arabs of Syria acquiesce to a Kurdish occupation of Raqqa, following the expected defeat of ISIS? Of course no.
• So here we go again: A complicated battlefield. Lines keep on shifting; loyalties are measured only by the day. Your friend of today is your enemy of tomorrow. Thus the concept of "command and control" goes to hell.
• Add to this, the general policy, in fact doctrine of Obama of "no more US involvement in Middle East wars." This is the prevailing doctrine at the very time when ISIS needs a strong response.
• On top of that, add the absence of a legal framework for any robust US involvement. There is no declaration of war by Congress. Because? Against whom? Against the foes of selected bands. But how do you know that that selection endures? Especially when the US has no informants on the ground!!
• Have I just said "the absence of a legal framework for any robust US involvement?" Yes. But attorneys like myself have to be both credible and circumspect. So, OK!! There is one legal framework. It is a Congressional authorization that dates back to the tragedy of 9/11!! Thus it is no good for the age of ISIS. Obsolete. And in law, whatever is obsolete cannot be cited as credible.
• Also bear in mind that "an authorization" cannot be legally equated with "a declaration." You usually authorize another branch of Government, after its action has begun. And you "declare," no ipso facto. You legislate. And your legislation is upon request of either the legislature (Congress) or the Executive (the President in the Oval Office). And you fund what you legislate.
• And your legislation, when unfounded, becomes a dead letter. Unless stopped by a Presidential veto or an executive order. Provided that executive action can survive a Congressional over-ride of a super majority. Complicated? Yes. The story of the American system, especially when it comes to war. This is what we do as legal counsel in US constitutional issues: The process of unscrambling, which drives our students sometimes to mental exhaustion!!
• The pile-up of uncertainties is not yet complete when it comes to the US vs. ISIS. Because?
• There is a lack of attainable goals. The best result is to prevent the occurrence of the worst scenario.
• There are no clear limits of authority between Congress (where the Republicans have a majority in both houses), and the President who is passionately hated by the Republicans -the war party.
• Why not "a no fly zone?!" You must be kidding. No fly zone (NFZ) could protect those on the ground whose loyalties you don't know. NFZ needs to be defended. NFZ infringes sovereignty. Sovereignty which is still claimed by present-day super-killer Bashar. Who is supported by Russian military might, Iranian Al-Quds Revolutionary Guards, and Hezbollah, the only discernible ruler of Lebanon. So instead of Syria occupying Lebanon, we now have Lebanon occupying Syria!!

I still have more bad news, about the efficacy of America's war in Syria: the terms that have wavering meaning, or no consensual meaning whatever. Here are some: "The broader war;" "Boots on the Ground;" "War improvisation;" "Guiding Local Fighters;" "Covert Training and Equipping by the CIA;" "Ideological Spectrum;" and "Downward Slope."

I hope that the reader has not concluded from the above that ISIS shall eventually prevail!! They don't have the long breath, the enduring bond between themselves and their subjects, the mammoth weight of Islam as a faith, and their reliance on incidents of panic-creation not on the Rule of Law -any law. They are the proverbial losers!!

Back to the Quran: "Say, 'The pure and impure are not equal, though the abundance of the impure may allure you much.' So be God fearing, O people who possess minds, that you may be successful."

Thus with the US and Russia or without, ISIS and Al-Nusra and their nominal franchises wherever they may be, shall be proven to be the proverbial losers. For they are like bats, flying at night -the night of present-day Islam. 

Soon there shall be dawn!! Yes, ISIS for now can kick sand in the eyes of the truth. But truth is more durable than sand. Sand that falls apart with a good dose of cleansing water.