Almost another week has gone by and the Middle East looks the same except with more destructions in Lebanon and Israel. Don't forget Gaza and of course Iraq. The only good news for Bush is the conflict in Lebanon has pushed Iraq to the back page. Does anyone notice the disaster that is happening in Iraq? Each week it has been worse than the one before and more troops will be going there with more U.S. soldiers going out on the streets to try to stop the sectarian violence. Nobody seems to notice this as everyone is focused on Lebanon.

So what is the Bush administration doing about Lebanon? Rice made her rounds but says nothing except to decline to have a cease fire until some permanent solution can be found. In other words we'll let Israel beat up Hezbollah to her satifaction before we call a cease fire. In other words our diplomatic effort will depend on Israel's military effort. As I said before, Israel may win the war but will give birth to more terrorists each day she is destroying Lebanon. Also Israel painted herself into a corner by vowing to destroy Hezbollah. This looks like will take longer than expected. Hezbollah, on the other hand, can claim victory by simply surviving. So if Israel destroys 80% of Hezbollah and then call for a cease fire, we are no better off than if we had called for a cease fire right now. So it is not in the interests of the U.S. to let Israel keep on fighting. We should act in our best intersts just as Iran and Syria would rein in Hezbollah if it is in their best interests to do so.

This brings to what we should do in the future. With countries like Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Egypt all condeming Hezbollah and fearing the power of Iran, this gives the U.S. an opportunity to break up the radicals. Iran and Syria are the supporters of Hamas as well as Hezbollah. If we can break these two apart and leave the other one isolated we may have a chance for an Arab-Israel peace. As I have said, this peace is absolutely necessary if we are to defeat terrorism. This is what Bush should have concentrated on, not going into Iraq. He has a second chance now.

It won't be easy but I think it is possible to get Syria away from Iran. The Iranians are Persians and they tend to look down on Arabs. They are also Shiites and the Syrians are predominantly Sunnis as are the Jordanians who are U.S. allies. Israel and the U.S. also have a negotiating chip, the Golan Heights. The return of the Sinai to Egypt was the key for peace there. Israel eventually will give back the Golan Heights anyways and this is as good as any time to negotiate. The leader of Syria, Assad, is not a religious fanatic like the president of Iran. (can't spell his name) Assad is a British trained physician and I think he would like his country develop economically as King Abdullah is trying to do in Jordan. The only problem is that he is not the strong man his father was so he cannot make peace with Israel without risking his life. Also Israel cannot come out and say she will give up the Golan Heights, so the U.S. will have to use our diplomatic channels to convey the desire.

Of course some will say that Syria was the one to tell Hezbollah to attack so Syria can get back into Lebanon and Assad will not negotiate seriously with Israel. Also some will point out that after the Israelis left Gaza, Hamas attacked Israel. Sure all this maybe true but not trying to break the bad guys up will be an opportunity lost. Even if Israel had not left Gaza, Hamas would cause trouble anyways. And it would be obvious that if there is a possiblity of peace, the bad guys will try to stop the process. You just have to keep doing the right thing and maybe someday the goal will be achieved. If Syria decides to make peace, it will be automatic that Iran will cause big trouble. But if you don't try to make peace with Syria, you know that Iran will cause trouble anyways but will also be helped by Syria. Right now most of the Arab countries are condemning Hezbollah and they are afraid of Iran getting stronger. Now is the time to try to get the Syrians to join their Arab brothers.

As the war between Israel and Hezbollah keeps escalating, there seems to be no significant effort from the U.S. to stop the fighting. It seems that the only strategy Bush has is to curse the Syrians. I don't have any problem of the president cursing but I think he has not demonstrated any leadership or understanding in the Middle East. Maybe he didn't study history at Yale. So I am going to write what I understand about the history of this region. I am not a history buff and my understanding of this area may not be accurate but I think that in order to make good policies, a leader must have a good understanding of the past.

The region of Palestine was controlled by the Ottoman Empire prior to WWI. Unlike the assertion of pro-Palestinian groups, the Jews did not take away their country. They had no country to begin with as they were controlled by the Turks. Some Jews were in this area even in the early 1900's even though they were greatly outnumbered by the Arabs. During WWI, the Ottomans were on the sides of the Germans. Britain wanted the help of the Arabs to defeat the Ottomans so they promised that various Arab groups will get independent countries following the defeat of the Ottoman if the Arabs help Britain. At the same time through the Balfour Declaration, Britain expressed support for a Jewish homeland in the hope of getting support from Jews in Britain and the U.S. Needless to say these promises raised the expectations of the Arabs and Jews alike.

After WWI, with the Ottomans defeated, Britain had the mandate to create a Jewish state. Many Zionists started to immigrate to Palestine. But fearing Arab hostility, Britain sought to control Jewish immigration. During the Nazi attempt to exterminate Jews, the cry for a Jewish state increased. Britain continued to ignore the demand of the Jews and there were uprisings against the British by Jews in Palestine. Future Israeli leaders like Begin were considered terrorists by the British at that time. After WWII, the UN decided to divide Palestine into a Jewish state and an Arab state. Jerusalem was to be under international control. The Jews accepted this plan but the Arabs did not. Fighting broke out immediately after the state of Israel came into existence. Israel won easily and gained a lot of land that was meant to be the new Arab state.

After this you have various wars starting in 1956 when Israel, England and France attacked Egypt for closing off the Suez Canal. In 1967 Israel defeated Egypt, Jordan and Syria in the 6 Day War. Egypt lost the Sinai peninsula and Syria lost the Golan Heights to Israel. After this war the PLO came into prominence. Since regular Arab armies couldn't defeat Israel, Arab support went to the PLO and their guerrilla tactics. The armies of Egypt and Syria tried again in 1973 in the Yom Kippur war. Again they failed miserably. But Israel did suffer losses during this war and she became more dependednt on the U.S. for arms and aids.

Jimmy Carter didn't accomplish much as president but one thing he did accomplish was bring together Sadat and Begin to Camp David. This eventually led to the peace agreement between Israel and Egypt. Incredibly, this peace has held up. This did cost more credibility of the U.S. in the Arab world. In the 1980's and maybe even now, I am not so sure, the aids that the U.S. give to Egypt and Israel make up 50% of our total foreign aid. Everybody knows that Egypt did not get the aid because the U.S. likes Egypt. Even neutral countries would agree that the U.S. is not even handed in this conflict and that the aid to Egypt was for making peace with Israel.

How did Lebanon get into this mess? Location, location, location. When Lebanon was formed she was an example how Muslims and Christians can get along. Lebanon was about 60% Muslim and 40% Christians and they were doing all right. Then the Palestinians poured in and the PLO established itself among the refugees. The Lebanese Muslims came to support the PLO and the Christians opposed it. This led to internal conflicts and brought Syria into the picture. It also brought in western troops including the U.S. forces. Unfortunately that led to a suicide bombing killing over 200 U.S. troops in the 1980's. This was the beginning of Hezbollah. Foreigners were taken hostages so often that a comedian said that if you go to Beirut, instead of stamping your passport, they stamp "hostage" on your forehead. Ariel Sharon took the Israel army into Lebanon to destroy the PLO. Some say Sharon was responsible for the massacre of Muslim civilians by Christians. Israel ended up occupying southern Lebanon for many years with heavy losses and finally pulled out few years ago. The pull out of the Israelis was seen in the Arab world as a victory for Hezbollah. With this momentum and their organized social services, Hezbollah was able to get some posts in the mainstream Lebanese government. Their hatred for Israel, however, is still the main reason for its existence.

The PLO under Arafat actually had became more moderate over the years and had signed a peace agreement with Rabin. Unfortunately Rabin was killed by an Israeli extremist. Arafat had opportunity to make a lasting peace during the Clinton administration with Barak. He ultimately chicken out believing he would be assassinated just as Rabin was. His so-called government was also very corrupt and did not serve the Palestinian people well, wasting international aid. This led to the rise of Hamas, a much more radical group bend on destroying Israel. Hamas became popular among the people with its organized social services. Arafat would not have gotten any international sympathy, except the Israelis were dumb enough to listen to extremists on their side and built settlements that were considered illegal in the eyes of the international community. The harsh treatment of the Palestinians led to intifadas and ultimately more and more suicide bombings.

So why do I go through this exercise of writing about what I feel as some of the important parts of Arab-Israel history? I figure I will be writing about this topics in the next few weeks and I will be referring to some of this history as I go. For example, I see pundits are calling for Israel to go into Lebanon and destroy Hezbollah once for all. As you can see from history, winning wars has not been a problem for Israel. They have won all the wars decisively and yet no security has been achieved. Israel maybe able to kill the leaders of Hezbollah and most of its foot soldiers in the coming weeks. But will that help her security? History says no. The bombing in Lebanon is making more future suicide bombers and terrorists everyday. Diplomatic solutions are hard because the bad guys are going to try their best to destroy any peace gesture. But diplomatic solutions are the only ones that can possibly bring lasting peace in this region. So has Bush make any diplomatic effort? Condi Rice hasn't even gone to the region yet and we are almost two weeks into the conflict. Apparantly Bush did not learn anything from history.

Newt Gringich was on t.v. today saying the Middle East conflict may lead to World War III. What irresponsible hyperbole! Even if we are to attack Iran and Syria the conflict will only be Middle East in nature. Is North Korea going to join in? Will Russia and China help Iran? Don't politicians have any understanding of the world?

Of course this does not mean the situation in the Middle East isn't dangerous. The Israel -Arab conflict should have been the first thing we addressed after invading Afghanistan. Our effort in this area is much more important than Iraq, Iran and North Korea. The so-called Axis of Evil have nothing to do with 9/11 but the Israel-Arab conflict has great impact. As our best ally in the area, Israel deserves our support. But not unconditional support. It is our unconditional support that makes it easy for the bad guys to recruit terrorists. There will always be evil people. But the most evil people who want to disrupt the world for their own gain do not want to sacrifice themselves. The Israel-Arab conflict, with the U.S. painted as anti-Arab, provides a perfect opportunity for the evil-doers to recruit for them.

Israel had made a meaningful step in moving out of Gaza. It is understandable for the Israelis to be frustrated by Hamas' attacks on Israel after the withdrawl. Most of us would want strong retaliation in response to the attacks. It is also no surprise, however, that Hamas and Hezbollah would attack. They don't want any peace plan to succeed. If the aftermath of withdrawl by Israel is peaceful then moderate Arab may proceed to peace agreement with Israel. So Hamas and Hezbollah have to act and then wait for Israel to react. The overwhelming reaction by Israel will sure upset more Arabs, particularly the young, and hope for peace will be destroyed. Terrorism against the west will increase.

So what do we do? Certainly by saying things like "all countries have the right to defend itself" is of no use. It actually give countries like North Korea an excuse to pursue missles and nuclear weapons to "defend itself". Israel must show restrain. Anger is understandable and in reality an eye for an eye is understandable also. But gouging the eyes of innocent civilians will not bring security to Israel. Instead of standing on the sideline, the U.S. must use diplomacy to bring about a cease fire. What good is it for Israel to keep bombing the infrastructures of Lebanon? And forget about sending troops into Lebanon, Israel just left there not long ago after a disastrous occupation. Stop the fighting now, send in UN peackeepers with humanitarian aid. Over the long haul if Israel and the U.S. can provide more social service to the Palestinians and Lebanese than Hamas and Hezbollah, then eventually the influence of these evil groups will diminish and peace will have a chance.

As you can see I offer no quick solutions. Nobody has quick solutions. Certainly military might will not do it otherwise Israel and we would have won a long time ago. Ariel Sharon's plan of withdrawl from the settlements is still the right decision. It is easy to predict that evildoers will try to derail the plan. It takes men of courage to continue a peace process despite obstacles and sometimes threats on their lives. Sadat and Rabin paid for peace with their lives. It will take courageous men in Palestine to challenge Hamas and courageous men in Israel to continue the plan started by Sharon. The U.S. must go between the two sides and encourage moderates from both sides to emerge. That should have been priority #1 after invading Afghanistan. It maybe an impossible task but if we were ever successful then Iran, Syria, al Qaeda and others will diminish drastically. But we continue stand on the sidelines on the Israel-Arab conflict then we will never defeat terrorism. If won't be World War III but we would not feel secure.

Soccer was my favorite sport when I was growing up. Of course for most of the world it is the only sport so people love it no matter what. Having just finished watching the World Cup, I feel that despite the popularity of the game world over, it needs some changes. The defense is so good that players with enormous dribbling and shooting skills can rarely get a shot off. Not only is the scoring too low but the acrobatic skills of the goalies are rarely on display. And a penalty shootout is not a way to determine the world champion. So I make the following suggestions. It is unlikely that significant changes will be made but I can hope. Several years ago I said to myself that they should get rid of passing back to the goalie to decrease offensive pressure, and lo and behold, they actually put that rule in. So maybe there is hope for other changes.

1. Change the no offside rule from mid-field to about the 35 yard area. This will lead to more fast breaks and help the fast players.
2. Shrink the penalty area by one-third. This will leave less area that the goalie can handle the ball. It will decrease the number of penalty kicks but that's o.k. because the penalty kick is deciding way too many games which means that the referee is deciding way too many games. If a foul is really close to the goal the pk is a reasonable penalty. But a foul 17 yards away generally do not deserve a pk. A free kick by someone like Beckham with a wall blocking him is much more interesting than a pk.
3. For the world championship no shootouts with sudden death goal wins. Have unlimited substitution in OT if you are worried about player exhaution. You have 23 players on the roster why are you using a maximum of 14? The team with the better depth should have a better chance to win.
4. Anyone who has received a yellow card, cannot stand in the defensive penalty area during a free kick or a corner kick.
5. Two referees, each monitoring half of the field. The game is too fast and often the referee, trailing the play cannot see fouls correctly and also cannot see what's happening behind him.

If you have other suggestions, write in. I have ideas for rule changes in other sports also if anyone is interested.

Horray for Bob and Mike Bryan of Camarillo for winning Wimbledon doubles championship and thus achieving a career grand slam!

I was watching CNN last night and one of the so called experts says that the launching of missiles by the North Koreans means there is more danger than when we were in the Cold War. This is ridiculous. The North Koreans were not even successful with the launch of their long range missile and even if they were successful, they are no threat to us. It will be years before they can fire these missles with any accuracy and put a nuclear warhead on them. And we can always blow up the missles before they are launched if we want to. Kim Jong Il also knows that if he ever use nuclear weapons he will be destroyed. Like any dictator, his first priority is staying in power and he cannot do that if his country is destroyed.

So why does Kim shoots his missiles? He does it to get attention. By creating a crisis, he hopes to improve his image at home and get concessions from the U.S. He was tired of Iran getting the attention when she does not even have nuclear weapons yet. Kim has gotten concessions before by causing a crisis and even if he does not get anything this time, he enjoys being in the limelight.

So how do we respond? We are paying way too much attention to Kim. As I said, this is no threat to us. We should just ignore him. Our government should not even mention this event and certainly should not say that this has grave consequences for North Korea. We are not going to attack him and diplomatically there is very little we can do. Just like treating a child, negative reinforcement seldom works. So we should ignore bad behavior and reward good behavior, if any ever occurs. Say nothing except perhaps give a computer generated scenario of what would happen to another country if we ever counterstrike against a nuclear attack. Just to give Kim a reminder!

The so-called Axis of Evil are all paper tigers. We should have never invaded Iraq. Having seen Iraq destroyed despite not having WMDs just make Iran and North Korea more anxious to have nuclear weapons as a deterrent. Iran and North Korea are still not great threats yet. Nuclear bombs will not fly across the sky at us. If any nuclear weapon is to hit here, it would be most likely be carried across the ocean on cargo ships or delivered as a dirty bomb. None of these countries we are worried about has the technology or the willingness to help terrorist groups secure nuclear weapons. They don't want their own country obliterated for helping terrorists. The most likely source of help for the terrorists, in my opinion, will be former Soviet states. They have the weapons and the skilled scientists who are not paid well. These scientists can be bought off and help secure nuclear material. If say a scientist in Lithuania helps Al Qaeda, we can't bomb the whole country of Lithuania for revenge. So this is a much bigger potential threat. Instead of worrying about North Korea and Iran, we should spend more money and effort to safeguard the nuclear materials and scientists in the former Soviet Union.

So ignore North Korea's antics. South Korea is much more threatened than us by North Korea. If the South doesn't want sanctions against the North, we shouldn't demand international sanctions. Sanctions would not be effecitve anyways and China and Russia may veto it. China is not helpful to us because she likes to see North Korea being a headache to us. China enjoys getting the attention from us as the only with possible influence on Kim. China does not want to see North Korea collapses and milllions of refugees charge into China. The only situation where China will be putting pressure on Kim is if Japan starts building up her military in response to North Korea threats. This may happen soon and China will not be happy. Obviously we don't want big military build-ups in Asia but the threat of a build up in Japan would be the only strong reason for China to put great pressure on North Korea. So let South Korea and Japan take the intiative in dealing with North Korea, they have a lot more at stake than us.