[ralfy]

Also, high oil and food prices contributing to global social unrest.

[radon]

Rebels fighting the government of President Bashar al-Assad in Syria will be paid salaries, the opposition Syrian National Council has announced.

Money will also be given to soldiers who defect from the government's army, the SNC added, after a "Friends of the Syrian people" summit in Turkey.

Conference delegates said wealthy Gulf Arab states would supply millions of dollars a month for the SNC fund.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-17578248

[threadbare]

The article explains the Arab Spring in lofty terms, a consequence of "moral shock" that "embodies a different utopian politics." It "seeks a new beginning." High sounding language that obfuscates. Hides the truth.

No mention of high food or fuel costs, and no suggestion that unemployment, lack of opportunity, over-crowding, and finally over-population as a root cause. We shouldn't be surprised that peak oil takes its first toll in these ancient worn out ecologies. Too many people and not enough fresh water, arable land, cheap energy. The truth of Malthusian overshoot and die off is just too nasty to contemplate and thus the real problems will never be addressed or real solutions considered.

No coincidence the discontent started around the time there were world wide food shocks, many arising out of land being used to produce ethanol rather than food and feed corn. That rippled throughout agro commodities and drove the price of rice up as well. The politics of the region has stunk big time for years. All of a sudden the major powers are getting all sentimental about freedom in the Arab lands? I smell a rat too.

[ralfy]

"Why Global Fuel Prices Will Spark the Next Revolutions"

http://world.time.com/2012/11/28/why-gl ... volutions/

[JV153]

Middle East had a significant groundwater loss recently. http://www.livescience.com/27057-middle ... erves.html

yes, Egypt is a net oil importer, and SA, Iran and Iraq import a lot of food. SA is virtually a desert.

[M_B_S]

http://www.arte.tv/guide/de/048385-000/ ... aet-syrien

1001 reasons to kill the tyrann Assad


The IS in Syria is a product of the Assad Regime and its Terror.

Yeah somtimes you must kill fire with fire.

When the US bombs IS in Syria dont forgett to bomb Assad to free the people from terror.

M_B_S

[Tanada]

Because that strategy worked out so well in Iraq and Libya I am thinking, no thank you.

[M_B_S]

ASSAD the Rebels are coming to have a close look on you...


http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeas ... 79953.html

Syrian opposition fighters have stormed a strategically important hill, just south of Damascus, after hours of fighting with government forces, seizing large quantity of arms and ammunition.

Al Harra is situated between the Syrian provinces of Quneitra and Deraa and fighters say their next goal is to fully control the route leading to the capital.

Al Jazeera's Victoria Gatenby reports.
*****************************************************

Assad look @ Gahaddafi he dies like a rat .......

[SeaGypsy]

Just picked up on some senior US strategist suggesting no decisions about Syria will be made until Iraq is back.under central.control, in other words, its not really.a.war on IS but a new Iraq war.

[M_B_S]

http://www.scientificamerican.com/artic ... yrian-war/

Climate Change Hastened Syria's Civil War
Human-induced drying in many societies can push tensions over a threshold that provokes violent conflict

March 2, 2015 |By Mark Fischetti


Climate change can make storms stronger, cold spells longer and water supplies drier. But can it cause war? A new study published today in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences says drought in Syria, exacerbated to record levels by global warming, pushed social unrest in that nation across a line into an open uprising in 2011. The conflict has since become a major civil war with international involvement.......

Drying and drought in Syria from 2006 to 2011—the worst on record there—destroyed agriculture, causing many farm families to migrate to cities. The influx added to social stresses already created by refugees pouring in from the war in Iraq, explains Richard Seager, a climate scientist at Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory who co-authored the study. The drought also pushed up food prices, aggravating poverty. “We’re not saying the drought caused the war,” Seager said. “We’re saying that added to all the other stressors, it helped kick things over the threshold into open conflict. And a drought of that severity was made much more likely by the ongoing human-driven drying of that region.”
*************************************
There are indeed other factors but NO food and overpopulation are strong reasons to go to war.

What did the roman empire do when food was in short supply ? YES go to war and get it.

Guys we are still apes ...
http://news.sciencemag.org/plants-anima ... each-other
As for understanding the roots of human warfare, Wilson says that chimpanzee data alone can’t settle the debate about why we fight: Is it an intrinsic part of our nature or driven more by cultural and political factors? Still, he says, “if chimpanzees kill for adaptive reasons, then perhaps other species do, too, including humans.”

M_B_S

[M_B_S]

Nobel Peace Prize for Tunisian National Dialogue Quartet

Tunisia's National Dialogue Quartet
The surprise winner of this year's Nobel Peace Prize has played a key role in mediating between the different parties in the country's post-Arab Spring government.
The Quartet is credited with creating a national dialogue between the country's Islamist and secular coalition parties amid deepening political and economic crisis in 2013.
Tunisia's revolution - also known as the Jasmine Revolution - began in late 2010 and led to the ousting of President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali in January 2011, followed by the country's first free democratic elections last year.
***********************

[davep]

Nobel Peace Prize for Tunisian National Dialogue Quartet

Tunisia's National Dialogue Quartet
The surprise winner of this year's Nobel Peace Prize has played a key role in mediating between the different parties in the country's post-Arab Spring government.
The Quartet is credited with creating a national dialogue between the country's Islamist and secular coalition parties amid deepening political and economic crisis in 2013.
Tunisia's revolution - also known as the Jasmine Revolution - began in late 2010 and led to the ousting of President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali in January 2011, followed by the country's first free democratic elections last year.
***********************

Fully deserved IMO. And to be honest, Tunisia was the only genuine Spring movement. The rest was co-opted by various interests.