Category Archives: Extremism

Brothers at Each Other’s Throats

2025 Cruise up the Danube River, Croatia, Democracy, Extremism, Fear, Hate, Modern History, Pluralism, Polarization, Populism

 

The problem in the north of Yugoslavia was not so much resurfacing of ancient hatreds, or religious or linguistic differences, as it was economic nationalism. The northerners were producing most of the wealth of the country and felt that much of this wealth was being siphoned off by their poorer southern cousins. They were starting to believe in the north that they would all be better off as independent countries. Sounds a lot like Alberta doesn’t it? Resentment is often fuel of strife.

 

The Communist leader, Tito, had managed to suppress such serious criticisms during his life time, but as soon as he was gone such critiques flourished.

The economy of Yugoslavia had seriously unraveled during the 1980s.  The country moved into hyperinflation.  By 1989 the inflation rate was 1,240 % and rising.  These were conditions in which tensions were incubated into vigorously nasty animosities. As Tony Judt another brilliant historian said, in his book about Europe after the Second World War, “the growing distaste for feckless southerners was ethnically indiscriminate and based not on nationality but on economics.”

 

The ruling centres of former communist enclaves in Belgrade, Serbia, were also spectacularly corrupt. When these led to financial ruin, the people were ready to revolt.  These feelings were intensified by fears that a small group of former Communist apparatchiks coalescing around the brute Slobodan Milošević were planning to make a bid for power in the political vacuum that followed Tito’s death.  That is exactly what happened. He gained power by arousing and manipulating Serb national emotions.  Like Trump decades later, he was a master of that. Many Communist leaders had tried similar tactics in other countries.  As Judt said, “In the era of Gorbachev, with the ideological legitimacy of Communism and its ruling party waning fast, patriotism offered an alternative way of securing a hold on power.” Or as Samuel Johnson said, “patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel.”

 

In Yugoslavia however, Milošević and his cronies encouraged nationalist meetings at which the insignia of wartime Chetniks were on public display and this aroused deep disquiet among those groups that had been abused by the Chetniks during the war. The Chetniks were the Serbs who had fought on the side of Hitler during the war, using that opportunity to commit mayhem and destruction. Riding a wave of Serbian nationalism, Milošević was confirmed in power as the President of the Serbian republic in 1989.

Milošević wanted to forge a more unitary Serbian state. No more wimpy federalism. Like so many autocrats before and after him, he used nationalism as an instrument to cement his power. After all, he told his fellow Serbs, we are just taking what is rightly ours.  He could have said, I just want to make Serbia great again.

Naturally the other 4 republics were not so keen on Serbian domination. In Slovenia and Croatia, they saw only one way out from such domination, secession. Unlike other Communist countries where the former powerful Communists had no internal ethnic divisions on which to prey when their political power waned, in Serbia those divisions were exploited for the personal gain of the former Communist power brokers. As Judt said, “The country offered fertile opportunities for demagogues like Milošević, or Franjo Tudjman, his Croat counterpart.”  The problem as Judt saw it was that, “in Yugoslavia, the break-up of the federation into its constituent republics would in every case except Slovenia leave a significant minority or group of minorities stranded in someone else’s country.”  Then when one republic declared itself independent its neighbours quickly fell like dominoes.

 

Milošević was the first Yugoslav politician to break Tito’s ban on the mobilization of ethnic consciousness.’  He liked to portray himself as the defender of Yugoslavia against the secessionist longings of Croatia and Slovenia, and, ominously, as the avenger of old wrongs done to Serbs. He wanted to build a greater Serbia on the ruins of old Yugoslavia, but with Serb domination. Milošević was quite capable of inciting Serb minorities in Croatia, Slovenia, Bosnia-Hercegovina, and Kosovo to rise up and demand Serb protection.  In fact, that was his favoured technique.  The Serbs in these other republics to a large extent merely served as Milošević’s pretext for his expansionary designs.

 

Although most Serbs at the time displayed little nationalistic paranoia, and even less interest in distant Serbs, Milošević transformed their vague memories into rabid fears and paranoia that Serbs spread around the old Yugoslavia were about to be annihilated by the majority in their republics. Milošević, in other words, used these fears to further his demagogic purposes. He used the oldest trick in the playbook of wanna be autocrats–manufactured fear. Trump does it all the time.

 

Milošević did not invent the fears.  They grew up naturally when Yugoslavia disintegrated, as every national group feared they were endangered as a minority in some republic. So, for example, the Serbs, as the largest minority group in Croatia, they felt particularly vulnerable. He did not make up the fears, but he sure knew how to exploit them.

 

In the Slovene election in April of 1990 a government was elected that was still pro-Yugoslavia, but also highly critical of the Serbian government in Belgrade. In the following month of May a new nationalist party under its leader Tudjman came to power in Croatia. In December of that year Milošević seized, without authorization, 50% of the entire drawing rights of the Yugoslav federation in order to pay back pay and bonuses for federal employees. Again economics, as always, was a crucial factor in developments that often wore an ethnic or religious disguise. In January of 1991 the Slovenia government declared independence.   Within a month the Croats did the same thing. Soon the Parliament of Macedonia did the same thing.

 

The hasty recognition of the independent states by Europe, especially, Germany, perhaps were not helpful. When an independent Croatia was formed, political leaders in the Serbian capital of Belgrade began to play on the fears of Serbians with outrageous propaganda on radio and television.  This helped to invoke in the Serbs memories of massacres in World War II and prompted those Serbs to rise up in revolt against their ‘Ustache’ neighbours. The Ustache had been seen as traitors in the Second World War who supported the Nazis and did their best to exterminate the Serbs, so now the Serb minorities feared, a repeat, not entirely without  justification.

The Serb minorities in these states were deeply worried.  Clashes with authorities followed. They called upon Belgrade to help them against their ‘Ustache’ oppressors.

When Serbs were dismissed from their positions in the police force, judiciary, and military, many thought the Croats might be setting the table for another massacre. They believed they might be seeing the return of a an ethnic state with a genocidal past. Croats denied that this was the case, but there were some reasons for this angst. When Serb police were fired, Serbs armed themselves as militia. When the Croats were unable to maintain order, the Yugoslav national army, under the direction of Serbs from Belgrade stepped in at first to restore order, and later to obliterate Croatian independence. As Michael Ignatieff said, , “War was the result of an interacting spiral of Serbian expansionism, Croat independence, and Serbian ethnic paranoia in Croatia.”

 

Even though the Americans claimed to support a democratic and unified Yugoslavia, as Judt said, by then “a ‘democratic and unified Yugoslavia was an oxymoron.’” There really was no room for democracy.  Slovenia and Croatia took active measures to implement their independence by actually unilaterally seceding from the federation.  They enjoyed the tacit support of a number of European leaders.  The Serbs responded by moving the national Yugoslav army to the borders.

Although the Serbs and their army, the Yugoslav National Army bear the primary responsibility for what happened, since they hurled 150,000 shells into Croatia from the surrounding hills, but Croats were not without blame. They dynamited parts of the great city as they left so there would be nothing left for their Serb brothers. These are the type of things you can expect when all sides seem to be represented by their loudest and most extreme voices.

Unfortunately, all around us today this seems to be happening.  We had best be alert.

 

Blood and Belonging

2025 Cruise up the Danube River, Croatia, Extremism, Hate, Modern History, Pluralism

 

This is now a quiet business street. Not long ago, it was hell on earth. It has been completely rebuilt.

The Balkans is one of the most interesting areas on the globe.  Michael Ignatieff wrote a series of excellent books that focuses a lot of attention the region, and were supplemented by some documentary films. Michael Ignatieff was a much better writer and thinker than he was a political leader. As he said in one of the series of books I mentioned, Blood and Belonging,

 

“…huge sections of the world’s population have won the ‘right-of-self-determination’ on the cruelest possible terms:  they have been simply left to fend for themselves.  Not surprisingly their nation states are collapsing… In critical zones of the world, once heavily policed by empire—notably the Balkans—populations find themselves without an imperial arbiter to appeal to.  Small wonder then, that, unrestrained by stronger hands, they have set upon each other for that final settling of scores so long deferred by the presence of empire.”

 

It is not good enough to blame the melee on the assertion that this area of the world was filled with sub-rational intractable fanatics.  Though it was more than its fair share of those. We have to think more deeply than that.  We have to ask why people who had lived together for decades were transformed from neighbours into enemies?  That was the crucial question that has to be answered.

 

It was that great British philosopher Thomas Hobbes who wrote about the war of all against all that occurs in the state of nature (when there is no state) and requires the creation of a state to protect all and to provide a platform for morality when all give up the means of violence in favor of the sovereign. As Ignatieff said,

 

“Thomas Hobbes would have understood Yugoslavia.  What Hobbes would say, having lived through religious civil war himself, is that when people are sufficiently afraid, they will do anything. There is one type of fear more devastating in its impact than any other: the systemic fear that arises when a state begins to collapse.  Ethnic hatred is the result of terror that arises when legitimate authority disintegrates.“

 

This was the basis of the film Civil War shown a couple of years ago, speculating what might happen in the United States if their state broke down. Not at all an impossibility. It was brutal.

 

Tito, the communist leader of Yugoslavia, with his brand of Coca Cola Communism,  had realized that the unification of each of the 6 major Slav peoples required a strong federal state to keep it together.  Like Canada.  Who knows what would happen in Canada if the state collapsed as it did in Yugoslavia? If later any group wanted to secede it would have to deal with the minorities within in its own territory. After all, people don’t live in neatly separated enclaves.  In the case of Yugoslavia, in too many cases, this led to the forcible expulsion of whole populations.  They called it ethnic cleansing, an expression now known around the world, thanks to Yugoslavia. Remember that as much as 25% of both Croat and Serb populations have always lived outside the borders of their own republics.

 

The big mistake that Tito and the Communists had made was to fail to provide for divorce or succession. They failed to provide for the eventual emergence of civic, rather than ethnic based multi-party competition.   His doctrine of socialist rhetoric had lauded, not without some moral attraction, the “brotherhood and unity of all Yugoslavs.” This was a lofty goal, but it provided no mechanism for that to be accomplished when the state disintegrated.  That idea swiftly melted in the face of the profound hatreds that were released between the combatants. As Ignatieff said,

 

By failing to allow a plural political culture to mature, Tito ensured that the fall of his regime turned into the collapse of the entire state structure. In the ruins, his heirs and successor turned to the most atavistic principles of political mobilization in order to survive.

 

If Yugoslavia no longer protected you, perhaps your fellow Croats, Serbs, or Slovenes might.  Fear, more than conviction, made unwilling nationalists of ordinary people. …

 

Ethnic difference per se was not responsible for the nationalistic politics that emerged in the Yugoslavia of the 1980s.  Consciousness of ethnic difference turned into nationalistic hatred only when the surviving Communist elites, beginning with Serbia, began manipulating nationalist emotions in order to cling to power.

 

That is precisely the issue; people have to learn to live in plural cultures.  If difference leads to hate, as it often does, bloodshed soon follows when the dogs of hell are let loosed. No one should insist on my way or the highway, but many do. Who doesn’t like variety? Who thinks they have a monopoly on the truth? Many conservatives in the US now want a country without those nasty liberals. Of course, many liberals would like to get rid of the conservatives too. How could that happen peacefully?

 

Well, the extremists think they have a lock on the truth. Sometimes they even come to believe their own lies. This can even happen in modern countries such as the United States. Or Canada.

 

We all need to learn to live in pluralistic societies. If we can’t look out for those hounds. That is why Yugoslavia is so important. Even in Canada.

From Coca Cola Communism to Anarchy

2025 Cruise up the Danube River, Croatia, Extremism, History, Modern History, Pluralism

 

A Proud Croatian in Vukovar

At the end of World War II, communism was ushered in to Yugoslavia by the Russians. This was no favor.  Josip Broz Tito, commonly called Tito led the country as a communist prime minister from 1944 to 1963, and as president from1953 until his death in 1980. Of all the countries under the Soviet umbrella his regime was by far the least intrusive and most gentle. Some called his type of communism Coca Cola Communism.

 

To the amazement of many, Tito boldly declared Yugoslavia independent from the Soviet Union.  The people of Yugoslavia loved it. People around the world loved it, Celebrities from around the world, like Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton came to visit him. Russia was not so keen, but to the surprise of many, it tolerated Tito.

Yugoslavia under the communist regime had been a federal regime, like Canada. It was designed to allow different groups from different regions to live together in relative harmony.  While he was alive it worked quite well. After Tito died things fell apart and as the poet W.B. Yeats said, “Things fall apart, the centre cannot hold.” That is exactly what happened.

After the fall of the Berlin wall in 1989 and the collapse of the Soviet Empire the leaders of Slovenia, Croatia, (under its first President Franjo Tudjman) and Macedonia were persuaded that they should annul their federal ties and instead each declared independence after a referendum that clearly indicated the people favored separation. The same thing of course, could happen in Canada or the United States, and in fact, there have been some recent rumblings of discontent with the federal system in both countries.  That is why for Canada and the US Yugoslavia is so important.  We should learn from it, but so far there are few signs that we will do that, or even try to do that.

Croatia declared its independence from Yugoslavia on June 25, 1991. The Croatian Parliament officially announced the separation, following a referendum held in May 1991 where over 90% of voters favored independence. That should have been simple right? Wrong! It was actually very complicated by the awkward fact that Croatia had large ethnic minorities of Serbians who feared that they would be forever after dominated by the Croats. And the neighboring Serbian state who was dominating Yugoslavia after Tito died, saw themselves as the saviors of their fellow Serbs in Croatia.

 

The Serbs did not take kindly to this rejection of the state they dominated, citing traditional ties and the need to protect Serb minorities in these states. As a result, not just war, but wars, broke out.

 

One might have thought that in modern times with the advent of civilization, things would be more civilized and less bloody.  If one thought that one would be wrong.

 

Tito was a powerful and charismatic leader who amazingly managed to weld together the various ethnic groups of the country that otherwise found it all too easy to attack each other. However, as soon as he died in 1980, the ties that bound these ethnic groups began to fray. As Adam Michnik once said, “the worst thing about Communism is what comes after.”  There is at least a sad grain of truth in this remark.

 

With the collapse of the communist state of Yugoslavia, a number of states that had been held together by the iron fist and charisma of its long standing-leader, Tito, broke off like pieces of glass from a broken window.  With that breakdown the rule of law, such as it was under Tito, evaporated.  Anarchy soon prevailed. When states collapse, they rarely do that in an orderly fashion.

 

This is even more remarkable because Yugoslavia was generally considered the most liberal of all of the Communist regimes. Why did it collapse into such bloody anarchy while Czechoslovakia did not in 1989?

 

No treaty, no law governed what would happen when Yugoslavia broke apart.  It was thus even more fractious than the splintering of Mennonite churches, if that is possible. The basic problem was that the Imperial power, Soviet Russia disappeared, leaving a terrible vacuum behind.

As usually happens, the void was filled by the worst.

Conflict Entrepreneurs”

Extremism, Left-wing Extremism, Political Violence, Right-wing Extremism, The Sleep of Reason

 

A lot of people in America, and elsewhere, are going crazy over the shooting of Charlie Kirk. The killing of Charlie Kirk because the killer disagreed with him was completely despicable. At the same time, from what little I have learned about Kirk, in my he is not saint.  But he has generated a lot of controversy, and because he is now dead, a lot of hero worship.

 

The Utah governor, in talking about Kirk referred to “conflict entrepreneurs” that drown out the voice of the moderates, whose voices represent the majority. Most people don’t want to go to the far left or far right, as they see it. They want the temperatures to go down on debate, but they are stymied by these entrepreneurs. The social media algo rhythms amplify the voices of the extremists. There is no economic benefit to the social media corporations to look at the moderate’s views when people are so attracted to the views of the extremists. Social media rewards the views of the extremes because that is what engages the attention of people, so the social media gives people what they want, not what they need.

 

As CNN’s David Irvine said, “there is a market for crazy in America.” That is a bitter understatement  I think he is bang on right. There is no market for reasonable. There is no market for sane. At least, not in social media.

 

A lot of people are ignorant about political violence against the right.  A lot people are ignorant about political violence on the left. In both cases because their sources of news are very limited. A result there is plenty of ignorance to go around. As Alyssa Griffin, a conservative CNN commentator, said, “They are getting information from these rage entrepreneurs and are not getting the cold hard facts.” That applies to many people.

 

And that is unfortunate for all of us. We all suffer the consequences of ignorance.

The Soul of America

Extremism, Left-wing Extremism, Political Violence, Right-wing Extremism

 

I enjoyed listening to American historian Jon Meacham, the author of The Soul of America: The Battle for our Better Angels, on CBS Sunday Morning. Robert Costa interviewed Meachum, asked him right off the bat, “What is the state of the American Soul?”  Meachum’s answer was appropriately blunt: “We are in a dangerous place. There was no ‘once upon a time’ in America. There is not going to be a happily ever after.” No those are for fairy tales.

 

Meachum did say that these are times where history is very important. History is always important, in my opinion. Hiding the truth as Donald Trump urges is not the answer.  Ugly truths must be confronted; not swept under the carpet. Meachum acknowledged to Costa: “there are times when you and I can agree what can be replicated. This is not one of those times”.

 

The television show included an outrageous claim by Charlie Kirk when he was alive: “Donald Trump is the guardian of western civilization.”  Even though Kirk has now been lionized by the right, that is a statement from a man who did not appreciate history. He also said, “the entire Democratic project [referring I will give him the benefit of the doubt that he was referring to the Party, not the system] is how quickly can we turn America into a hell hole.”  I know people in America who would drink up such stuff. Stuff like that is very popular on the right, though it is patent nonsense.

 

Costa asked Meachum why America reacted with such violence so often. To this Meachum said,

 

“Political violence erupts in America when there is an existential question—who is an American? Who deserves to be included in ‘We the people,’ or ‘All men being created equal’? When that is in tension, when we don’t have common agreement about that, then, if you look at it historically, violence erupts.”

 

Meachum said, instead, much more wisely, “We don’t want to end up in the situation where because you do not agree with someone you pick up a gun.” If America reaches such a stage—and it certainly looks like it might—the American project is bankrupt.”

 

Meachum asked a very good question of Costa: “Are we going to be able to see each other neighbors?”

 

Or will they only be able to see each other as enemies? If the latter, that country is dead.

 

Meachum put it this way:

 

“When we lose the capacity to engage in argument and dissent and debate peaceably, we are breaking faith with the American covenant. And the American covenant is that we live in contention with each other, but we’re not at each other’s throats.”

 

I wonder though if Meachum is right. It seems to me he is being a bit of a Pollyanna.  Meachum said, “this is why history is important.  There is not much in the current moment that we want. The country is about dissent, and respecting each other; it is not about hunting each other down.”

 

More and more, I see Americans as hunting each other down. More and more I see anything else as fairy tales.

 

 

Recurring American political Violence

Extremism, Left-wing Extremism, Political Violence, Right-wing Extremism

 

As we all know, America has been inundated with violence, including, of course, political violence. It is everywhere and it keeps coming back.  The left blames the right; the right blames the left. But they are both responsible.

 

Here are a few incidents that stand out, but there are many. Usually more than one every day.

 

An assassin with a rifle tried to kill the candidate for the American presidential election, narrowly missing his head and nicking instead his ear. Some think God changed the direction of the bullet so that the bystander behind him was shot instead.  The American left is lucky Trump was not killed.  Had Trump been killed he would have been revered as a political hero for a century.  When Martin Luther King Jr. was shot and killed in 1968, he was not liked by 83% of the population. He has been a hero ever since.

 

Some acts of political violence have been incredibly violent. For example, the man who walked into Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s house and assaulted him with hammer. His wife had an armed detail, but that night she was in Washington, so he had no protection.   Unsurprisingly, Donald Trump made jokes about it. Another man walked up at the home of Representative Gerry Connolly in Virginian with a baseball bat looking for him and his staff members. Someone lit the door of Bernie Sanders’ house on fire. An obviously unwell man came to the house of Supreme Justice Kavanagh looking to harm him but was talked out of it. The list goes on and on. It will go on and on. Because Americans don’t want to do anything about it.  Except pour more guns into the fray to protect their leaders.

 

Americans are largely content with this. That is the only thing that surprises me.

 

Wisdom from Comedy News

Extremism, Left-wing Extremism, Political Violence, Right-wing Extremism

 

I know I have commented a lot on right-wing extremism.  But that is not to deny that left-wing violence is real as well. Recently, America experienced some and it was ugly. It was the shooting of young right-wing commentator Charlie Kirk by distant rifleman.

 

On the day after the shooting The Daily Show hosted by Michael Kosta had some interesting things to say. Some of it was even wise. Imagine that, wisdom from Comedy News.

 

First, they pointed out that presidents from both parties made good comments about what had happened. I particularly liked what president George W. Bush had to say:

 

“Today, a young man was murdered in cold blood while expressing his political views. It happened on a college campus, where the open exchange of opposing views should be sacrosanct. Violence and vitriol must be purged from the public square.  Members of other political parties are not our enemies; they are our fellow citizens.”

 

But what did the current president have to say:

 

“For years those on the radical left have compared wonderful Americans like Charlie to Nazis and the world’s worst mass murderers and criminals. This kind of rhetoric is directly responsible for the terrorism that we are seeing in our country today.”

 

Not as impressive as Bush. He was quick to blame the other side.

Kosta suggested that this was like saying, “My fellow Americans we must come together to destroy each other.” He carefully added, “I am not singling this guy out. This is how our society behaves now. A tragedy occurs instead of digesting and trying to understand everyone sets their feet and starts throwing punches immediately.”  Both sides immediately blame the other side except for the wiser ones like George W. Bush.

 

Kosta was reluctant to blame rhetoric, as bad as it is. It might be something complex that actually requires thinking.   He said, “Political is not going to go away if the people on the other side say exactly the right words from now on.” Of course, there was a lot of unhelpful rhetoric from both sides. Some on the left suggested Kirk was asking for it by his rhetoric. Some on the right said “they” were asking for it. Who do they mean by “they?”

 

Fox News host Jesse Watters,

 

“It’s happening. You got trans shooters. You got riots and L.A. They are at war with us. Whether we want to accept it or not, they are at war with us.  Whether we want to accept it or not, they are at war with us. Trump gets hit in the ear. Charlie gets shot dead. They came after Kavanaugh with a rifle to his neighborhood. They went after Musk’s cars.”

 

I am always surprised that people on right often completely forget about violence  on their own side. Same, of course, goes for people on the left. After all there has also been plenty of violence on the right and even, many like me, suggest, much more violence comes from the political right.

 

To this Kosta had a pretty good response: “I’m sure people in the media would like to talk about how they are responsible for what they’ve done and how they had better watch out, or else they’ll get what’s coming to them. But I think it would be better if we as a country understood that we have a problem with political violence. And we need to start thinking less about what they should do and more in terms of what we have to do.”

 

I wish I were better, but I know I have been as guilty as anyone in blaming others. Them in other words, rather than us. I must do better. We must do better. Turning such tragedies into a game of us against them is not very helpful. We have to get together and work together without turning them into the enemy. If we can’t do that we are done.

It would be nice though if our political leaders, like George W. bush got on side, rather than pouring fuel on the flame.

 

 

Israeli Barbarism

Extremism, War Between Israel and Hamas

 

Israel attacked Hamas today inside Qatar, which is not only the staunch ally of the United States, but the mediator in the war between Hamas and Israel. Israel attacked Hamas just as its leaders were staying in Dohar to consider the settlement proposed by Israel and the United States.

 

But the Israeli strike in Qatar targeted the very Hamas political leaders who could have helped end the war diplomatically. They were considering a new U.S.-Israeli backed cease-fire plan for Gaza that President Trump had called, ominously,  a “warning”. If members of Hamas can’t go to Qatar to consider a peace proposal where can they go? Then peace is impossible. And this is exactly the point. Israel did not want Hamas to consider the proposal.

 

Hardliners in Israel cheered when they heard the result.  They don’t want a peace either. Those same hardliners have been pushing Netanyahu to abandon peace talks and achieve total victory over Hamas. By that they mean the death and destruction of every single member of Hamas. This shows how extreme the forces that support Netanyahu so vigorously are. They want total victory and see this as an opportunity to get exactly that.

 

This is war without limits.

 

This is barbarism.

 

 

It shows Netanyahu is actually opposed to peace. It wants war so it can destroy every last member of Hamas. This is a hopeless goal. Mona Yacoubian, Mona Yacoubian, director and senior adviser of the Middle East Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think tank on PBS News Hour, said, “For every leader killed another 6 appear on the scene.”

 

Qatar is the one and only country in the region that is respected as a mediator by both sides. It is a tiny little country between the large countries of Iran and Saudi Arabia. It had not choice but to become a mediator to survive.

 

As Yacoubian, said,

 

“Let’s note this is now the second time in just a few months that Israel has undertaken military strikes in the midst of negotiations, whether it was the U.S. and Iran or now the Qataris seeking to negotiate between Hamas and Israel.”

 

And is this an accident?  Here is what Yacoubian added, “I think the negotiations have been set extremely far back. Any hope for a cease-fire now is just a distant prospect, at best.”  There is little doubt that this has killed all hope for the hostages either.

 

Is there any doubt that Netanyahu has no interest in a peace settlement? And why would that be?  He wants instead to obliterate Hamas. He, together with his extremist partners want to kill every last one of Hamas members no matter what. And that is the problem with this strategy? It is born out of extremism.

 

As Canadian expert Janet Stein said today on CBC’s The National: “This kills the peace process.”  I would say that is what Netanyahu wanted. He and his extremist partners heard too many say they wanted to see negotiation and a two-state solution.  No, Israel wants it all. I think I am just connecting the dots.