Josh Trevino has the latest on the newest front on the war against Islamism, in Somalia, and on the media’s nonreporting and misreporting of it.

(I expect Anonymous “Chickenhawk” Moron in comments will now demand that I, and Josh, go to Mogadishu, since we’re not allowed to inform our readership or express an opinion without being on the scene.)

You shouldn’t need a think tank to figure this out, even though many foolish diplomats, at Foggy Bottom and in Europe, don’t get it.

“There is no longer a possibility for effective sanctions to stop Iran,” retired Brig.-Gen. Zvi Shtauber, of Tel Aviv University’s Institute for National Security Studies, told The Jerusalem Post.

“Our conclusion is that without military action you won’t be able to stop Iran,” Shtauber said.

We have a very grim choice before us, and the administration doesn’t seem to be doing anything to prepare the American people for it. We will have a war with Iran, or we will have a nuclear-armed Iran (with a nuclear arms race in the rest of the Middle East). That’s it.

You shouldn’t need a think tank to figure this out, even though many foolish diplomats, at Foggy Bottom and in Europe, don’t get it.

“There is no longer a possibility for effective sanctions to stop Iran,” retired Brig.-Gen. Zvi Shtauber, of Tel Aviv University’s Institute for National Security Studies, told The Jerusalem Post.

“Our conclusion is that without military action you won’t be able to stop Iran,” Shtauber said.

We have a very grim choice before us, and the administration doesn’t seem to be doing anything to prepare the American people for it. We will have a war with Iran, or we will have a nuclear-armed Iran (with a nuclear arms race in the rest of the Middle East). That’s it.

You shouldn’t need a think tank to figure this out, even though many foolish diplomats, at Foggy Bottom and in Europe, don’t get it.

“There is no longer a possibility for effective sanctions to stop Iran,” retired Brig.-Gen. Zvi Shtauber, of Tel Aviv University’s Institute for National Security Studies, told The Jerusalem Post.

“Our conclusion is that without military action you won’t be able to stop Iran,” Shtauber said.

We have a very grim choice before us, and the administration doesn’t seem to be doing anything to prepare the American people for it. We will have a war with Iran, or we will have a nuclear-armed Iran (with a nuclear arms race in the rest of the Middle East). That’s it.

Is it the beginning of the end for Wahhabism? This is a necessary if not sufficient condition to reform radical Islam.

Is it the beginning of the end for Wahhabism? This is a necessary if not sufficient condition to reform radical Islam.

Is it the beginning of the end for Wahhabism? This is a necessary if not sufficient condition to reform radical Islam.

I’d sure like to think that this is true:

North Korean Leader Kim Jong-Il and his generals inspect a Korean People’s Army Unit in this photo released by the Korean Central News Agency on December 6. According to the report, intelligence activities against the Kim regime also are being considered. The Chinese military intelligence service, known as 2 PLA, “is toying with the idea of a palace revolution that would kick out the ‘Kim dynasty’ and replace it with ‘pro-Chinese generals,'” the report said.

Long overdue, if so. That wouldn’t be great for the North Koreans, but it has to beat the current situation. I suspect that the Chinese are getting pretty upset now, because they don’t want Japan to start to build up a nuclear arsenal.

The leftist/Arabist myth that Israel and the plight of the “Palestinians” is the cause of all ills in the Middle East is a lie and a nonsense, and stories and editorials pointing it out aren’t new. What is new is that even Time magazine seems to have figured it out:

Yes, it was a great disturbance in the Arab world in the 1940s when a Jewish state was born through a U.N. vote and a war that made refugees of many Palestinians. Then the 1967 war left Israel in control of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, and thus the Palestinians who lived there. But the pan-Arabism that once made the Palestinian cause the region’s cause is long dead, and the Arab countries have their own worries aplenty. In a decade of reporting in the region, I found it rarely took more than the arching of an eyebrow to get the most candid of Arab thinkers to acknowledge that the tears shed for the Palestinians today outside the West Bank and Gaza are of the crocodile variety. Palestinians know this best of all.

To promote the canard that the troubles of the Arab world are rooted in the Palestinians’ misfortune does great harm. It encourages the Arabs to continue to avoid addressing their colossal societal and political ills by hiding behind their Great Excuse: it’s all Israel’s fault. Certainly, Israel has at times been an obnoxious neighbor, but God help the Arab leaders, propagandists and apologists if a day ever comes when the Arab-Israeli mess is unraveled. One wonders how they would then explain why in Egypt 4 of every 10 people are illiterate; Saudi Arabian Shi’ites (not to mention women) are second-class citizens; 11% of Syrians live below subsistence level; and Jordan’s King can unilaterally dissolve Parliament, as he did in 2001. Or why no Middle Eastern government but Israel’s and to some extent Lebanon’s tolerates freedom of assembly or speech, or democratic institutions like a robust press or civic organizations with independence and clout–let alone unfettered competitive elections.