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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: maceng2 who wrote (15997)	1/10/2002 4:37:28 AM
From: frankw1900	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 281500

I think all of the Arab, Persian, Israeli (plus USA Russia etc) need to sign an agreement that says...We all agree that both Israel and Palestine have a right to exist. Draw some borders etc, problem solved. In fact I wonder why it has not been fixed already...I am suspicious of all sides. Including the USA Read my previous post to you and the one after it. It hasn't been fixed because certain palestinians, israelis, and outsiders don't want it fixed the sensible way you suggest. Some for the reason I mentioned: getting it fixed the way you suggest is seen by them as a defeat. Others don't want it fixed because it would interfere with their agendas. The US policy in the area has been hypnotized by the oil, vitiated by Washington's (especially Foggy Bottom's) gnat like attention span, poor scholarship, careerism, WASP recruiting policies, Monica, narrow legalism, naivte masquerading as realpolitik, wishful thinking, insularity, confusion about unilateralism and multilateralism, some sort of breakdown in the CIA, and a bunch of other stuff I can't think of right now. And it's as bad, if not worse, in Europe. [Edit] US policy has improved a bit the last few months but it could improve a lot more.

To: maceng2 who wrote (15997)	1/26/2002 5:39:15 PM
From: maceng2	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Been speaking on the phone with an Iranian friend of the family. Goes back to pre Ayatollah and the revolution times. He is a five star guy imho, it takes guts going from being rich to being poor and then being able to turn the table. He is doing OK, living in the USA on a J1 visa, now approaching to becoming a senior member of the academic world. Had to come back to the UK to renew his visa, normally takes 5 days, been waiting a month so far. No problem, anticipated some problems after 911. I asked him if he hit any special problems with security with air travel. Yes he says, gets quizzed all the time, usually passes all the tests though. I expect some (including me) are thankful that the vetting procedures are in evidence. All the same it takes some smarts to separate the contributors to humankind from the terrorists. We need lots of smarts in the security department. It is not a minimum wage job any longer. The guy I was talking to obtained a PHD no problem, you need a good number of those guys working in security imho.

To: maceng2 who wrote (15997)	1/26/2002 7:14:00 PM
From: Hawkmoon	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 281500

I expect some Iranians think...How come the USA can ship arms to Israel? How come only our shipments are "illegal"? Well, I don't believe the shipments are "illegal" from the perspective of the Iranians, and I haven't yet seen the US gripe too much to Tehran. They obviously have a right to ship arms just as we do. However, the Oslo accords forbade the PA possessing such military arms, thus making the shipment illegal from the perspective of those agreements. And that makes Iran complicit in violating that agreement (which they obviously don't endorse). Nope.. the Iranians have the right to ship weapons to whomever they please. But they also have the right to absorb the repercussions of those actions in the form of political and economic sanctions. Hawk