Two slogans and some math...

Well, the Muddled East continues to entertain...
1) "The Palestinians never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity" - someone far wiser than I.
2) "A Theocracy Is NOT A Democracy Is NOT A Theocracy Is NOT A Democracy..."ad infinitum - A major facet of the problem of Israel.

At the same time these two seemingly-neverending characteristics of the current situation play themselves out in a delightful new variant, Junior and his strange bedfellow, Condi, demonstrate how completely clueless they both are. Condoleezza literally spoke for 10 minutes without constructing a declarative sentence that had semantic content. Listen to her. Students of semantics are impressed, but none others.

And now, the math. Solve this series of simultaneous equations:

Is > P + S + L + J + In + Iq + SA
P > Is
S > Is
L > Is
J > Is
In > Is
Iq > Is
SA > Is

This is the military balance-of-power problem of the Middle East, defining the perceived military needs of each player, where Is = Israel, P = Palestine, S = Syria, L = Lebanon, J = Jordan, In = Iran, Iq = Iraq, SA = Saudi Arabia...

The situation is one of perception, leaving sheer religious and racial hatreds out of it (yea! right!)

Israel sees a pan-Arab enemy, and so must have more arms than all Arab countries combined. Meanwhile each internationally-recognized shiekdom (Jordan, Syria, Saudi Arabia) as well as each of the other nations, who all see themselves as sovereign, free-standing nations, contending with the others as well as with Israel, must have more arms than Israel.

The joke is that the non-governmental Islamic organizations, Hamas in Palestine (Sunni), Hezbollah in south Lebanon(Shi'ite), and the Muslim Brotherhood, in Egypt and Pakistan, ARE creating a pan-Arabic movement. Using the hatred of Israel, and its biggest supporter, US, to organize and motivate followers to overthrown their national governments, the rise of a pan-Islamic federation is happening before our eyes, and without a whimper from the Junior Administration. Hamas was elected in Palestine, Shi'ite mullahs run Iran, and we have not a civil war but a religious war happening in Iraq. Now Hezbollah has dragged the nation of Lebanon into supporting its fight against Israel.