It was not a game, it was a shame

The defeat of the US team in Germany's 2006 World Cup in Soccer was the culmination of an illusion we had in America that Soccer has become a popular game. It is not. Almost the majority of the people here did not know that the most famous and popular sport in the whole world was taking place in Germany. We will talk about the whys later but now will focus on the defeat. All commentators up to and until the start of the first shocking game against the Czech republic predicted and said that this team is the strongest team the US has assembled ever! and even some predicted that the US might win the cup. I was shocked to hear these predictions specially that we really still do not have the strong foundation like other sports that can produce a strong well trained cohesive team. Sure we have good players that play out side the US but that is all we have, good players and not a good team. We must start by looking inward and strengthen the MLS and popularize it by all the means necessary. Second we must have a strong foreign coaching team preferably Brazilian, or German that will put focus and not politics into the team. Then we must choose from the stars of the MLS and who plays abroad a team that will train regularly even if takes to travel from their respective playing countries to the US.It's normal to be defeated in sports,but it's not normal to be so ilusioned about our capabilities.

Rotate The Power in Lebanon

In a previous article, Lebanon 2005, I talked about the problems Lebanon faces in the aftermath of the assassination of its former Prime Minister Rafik Elharrir. I then voiced concerns about the nature of the Lebanese people and if they will ever have the national integrity to create a country, a real country. In this article, I’m more of a pragmatist. I see hope in Lebanon’s problems by starting to reform the political system. This system was created primarily to navigate the various religious groups that make up the Lebanese social life and in some opinions was created to protect the Christians. It does not make sense anymore and it needs to be changed to create the new Lebanon that can survive and be a normal country. We still can not ignore the hard feelings each religious sect feels about its own group; in Lebanon the tribe or the religion loyalty is more important that the country itself even if the Lebanese pretends otherwise. The ideal solution for Lebanon as I have mentioned before is the Switzerland example but until the Lebanese people reaches such maturity, we need an interim system that preserves the rights of the different sects. The solution is to rotate the power at the helm, meaning the presidency, which is the most important symbol especially for the Christians as they have been giving the position since independence. The solution is for the parliament to elect a representative of each sect, Muslim, Maronite Christian, Shiite, etc for one six years term. Right now the parliament does this function but elects only a Maronite Christian. The rest of the positions in the government should be left to the elections and to the winning party personnel as in all democratic systems. The system now allocates the presidency to a Maronite Christian, the premiership to a Muslim Sunni, and the speaker of the parliament to a Muslim Shiite. This current system is unfair and unrealistic. The fact is that the majority of the population is Muslims contributes to the need to change the system. Having said that, Lebanon is kind of a unique system in the Middle East, almost, now Iraq looks like Lebanon when it comes to sects fighting over power, and Lebanon needs to relax the fears of the Christians from losing their privileges. Another issue is the presence of almost 300,000 Palestinians who live in Lebanon and where the idea of giving them citizenship status creates a nightmare for the Lebanese in general and the Christian Lebanese in particular. However I think that those Palestinians that most of them were born there need to have the Lebanese citizenship and needs to move on with their lives. Those people will not go back to their original land in Israel and Palestine and any way it does not make sense to keep talking about the right of return. Palestinians in the Arab world need to be nationalized with the citizenship of the country they live in.

The Begining of The End Of The Ba'ath In Syria

The Security Council resolution 1636 calling on the Syrian regime to cooperate with the UN special investigator regarding the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Al Harriri is not the beginning of the end of the Ba’ath Regime in Syria. The beginning of the end of that regime started with the fall of the other Ba’ath system in Iraq led by Saddam Hussein. Both branches of this ideologue party came to power in both Iraq and Syria almost in the same period. In Iraq in 1968 and in Syria in 1970. Both embody the same theory on how a group of people, well organized, not necessarily related to the majority of the country they are in can rule that country effectively. It's what I call the dictatorship of the few. In Iraq, a group of the minority Sunni that did not even belong to the elite sunnie ruled a country of a Shiite majority for almost 40 years; the same in Syria, where a group of a sect called Alawite, kind of a Shiite on the fringe, ruled the country of a sunnie majority. I do not think this would have been a problem had these parties ruled their countries in a democratic fashion or if they had reached power through democratic means. The similarities between the two Ba’ath regimes in Syria and Iraq are great. Both were chapters to this so called pan Arab party that was created by a Christian Syrian by the name of Michel Aflak. After the fall of Saddam, Things have changed for The Baath; it became a strange body in an area that is changing rapidly into open political systems though not yet fully democratic. The assassination of Rafik Al Harriri came to expose Syria and its military regime and helped to escalate the departure of its forces under domestic and international pressure especially from the United States. Recently the former Syrian vice president Khaddam who happened to be a Sunni Muslim defected to France and aligned himself with the banned Syrian Muslim Brotherhood which is a Sunni organization though they would never admit it, and created a front to topple the regime of President Bashar Al Assad. The exact way of the end of the Ba’ath regime in Syria is difficult to predict but the continuation of this regime as it is now is almost impossible. We just need to look at Iraq, though the end might not be similar.

The Business Peace of The Middle East

Let us try to put politics aside for a moment, if we can, in the Middle East and talk about resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and to a larger extent the Arab Israeli conflict from a pure economic and pragmatic approach.

The whole premise of the prosperity of the United States did not come from its ability to resolve conflicts and differences between its people with their various ethnic and cultures but from its ability to create a net of mutual benefits, interests and well being among its citizens.

We, in the US, live together, work together, make money and prosper not necessarily because we have harmony between us but because it is in our best interest to do so. The whole rationale of the interstate commerce clause was not to create cohesiveness but to allow the free flow of goods and people across state lines to benefit businesses and consumers.

This helped to tear down the political and ethnic barriers that divided the country and was going to create two unequal nations within the USA. In the US example, economic benefits helped to create a better political process and smooth the transition into a more just society.

If it was not for the economic pragmatism, racial divide might have ended but through more violent means. Let us emulate the US model in the Middle East politics and focus on the tremendous economic benefits that would spread all over the place if peace exists.

The Middle East powers can put aside their conflict-minded approach to the Israeli Arab question and focus on how we can get prosperity to everybody and all countries including Israel and Palestine.

The economic logic demands that in order to have a flow of goods and people through the borders, we must ensure that all countries, entities including the independent states of Israel and Palestine have open but recognized borders, and that requires the immediate psychological drop of the words that Israel does not belong in the Middle East from the Arabic social political dictionary.

Israel in return, from an economic approach, should start recognizing the aspirations of the Palestinian people and start helping with the creation of a viable Palestinian state. Some said that good borders create good neighbors. It's true, we can have borders but we do not need to have walls and barriers.

The Middle East should now start moving from conflicts to cooperation, from struggle to prosperity. The three religions started in the Middle East. Now, it’s time for them to live in peace.

BMW and the loss of imagination

What happened to the well designed and sporty looking cars of BMW? Look at the 7 series and the 6 series and you can see what I’m talking about. I wrote before about the problems GM is having with their tasteless cars and now it seems that BMW is going through the same spill. Just have another look at the 7 series design that really shows, in the opinion of most experts and cars enthusiasts and not only me, the lack of coordination and taste. The back of the 7 series is so unimaginative that one wonders if the person who designed it is an engineer, an artist or just someone BMW brought from the streets of Munich and gave him or her a brush and paper and asked them to design their flagship car. Even after couple of years from realizing the mistake, and making changes to the posterior of the 7 series, the car still looks bad even worse. Now it looks like the Toyota Avalon. Before it was unique and ugly, now it's just very ordinary but less ugly. Take another look at the re born 6 series and its posterior reminds you of Chrysler cirrus 2000? The front of the 6 series is no better, it looks like the Z4! The only thing that BMW did not really experiment with was the 3 series, their bread and butter. The 5 series passed, in my opinion, and did not have the same craziness that the 7 and 6 had.

We are a regular country

Well, looking back now, starting from the beginning of the nineties, we have come to realize that we are a regular country, vulnerable to world events and a target to terrorists and later on to natural disasters, New Orleans 2005 and that we are not or were not ready to confront these issues because in most part we were not confronted with them in the past. In the early nineties we were struck by the first terrorist attack against one of our most important financial symbols and success, The Twin Towers, in New York. Most of us thought that this was an isolated attack due to our increased role and involvement in The Mid East policies or as a result that we have become the only super power after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Most of us did not realize that this attack was just a rehearsal to the worst that yet to come. Then, we did not focus on the home land security, we did not coordinate quick and effective response among the federal, state and local authorities, we were just islands within the big Unites States. We thought that because of the geography and history we were immune from attacks. We were and still are the strongest on earth, but mostly out side our boundaries. We did not look much inward. Then, came 9/11 with all it's disasters and we woke up to a new reality which is that we are a regular country, we can get attacked by terrorists, we can be vulnerable and we realized that we have joined the rest of world in this field. We still did not look much inward and we went, rightly so by the way, to both Afghanistan and Iraq and took care of the deranged political systems in both countries. We created a Home Land Security department and we realigned all the security organizations to make sure that we are ready in case another attack happens. But still, in my humble opinion, still did not really have a close look at our vulnerabilities inward until the New Orleans Natural Attack. We woke up and asked our selves what if what happened was not a natural cause but a terrorist attack... We looked and found out that we still live in islands when it comes to security, and evacuation. We just acted a little late and we were not prepared. We also found out that a large segment of our population lives like many areas in what we like to call Third World Countries, that they do not have hope or voice and that they are the forgotten people. We need to look more inward, empower FEMA, restore the cabinet level position to its director and align federal, state and local authorities to be ready to prepare, and secure us against all disasters. We knew in the nineties, at certain intelligence level, and not the most of us, that we are vulnerable but we did not act. We knew in New Orleans even more, we knew for sure 100% that a natural disaster was in its way and we did not act. We must act, and we must protect the home front inward as we try to protect the home front outward.

New Orleans 2005 and the Fall of the Mask

The devastation that happened and still happening in New Orleans, as we write now, shows the fall of the mask from all of us. The mask of racial tranquility and harmony. The facts on the ground are ugly and conscience's awakening. There are still hundreds of thousands of American who still live in a third world country circumstances that live within the greatest and the richest country on earth. People who for whatever reason, mainly the color of their skin, live on the far end of society, they are the forgotten people that we only hear of when disasters strike. We heard of them during the California and other states riots, and now we know that they exist because nature exposed them. We knew that devastation is in its way and we did not do much, at least something that we can talk about. We know the Gulf of Mexico, we know the Mississippi and we still could not build enough dams or enough gates, barriers, levees, I will leave the technical terms to engineers, to protect our people against natural disasters. We knew that there are tens of thousands of people who can not evacuate themselves, we knew everything but we just did not move. We did not have a strong proactive leadership, on all levels that would predict, plan and execute a methodical emergency plan. The pictures talk volumes of the rust that penetrates our body. Obviously most of those that could not move were in the minority and obviously those who counted them out or did not count them at all were our officials, local and federal. I was glancing at the international papers, Arabic and else and the whole world was at shock not at the disaster but at our “impotence” as the greatest country on earth to deal with it, prepare for it, minimize the damage and manage the destruction. But, still, amidst all this, America has a unique trend that it tries to be better, it tries to improve and correct. America with all it's institutions including it's free press does at least shed the light on the deficiencies of our society. It's always a great first step.

What is Jordan.. but Amman by Jamil Shawwa

The other day I was having lunch at a Middle Eastern restaurant in the DC area, in Virginia. While ordering the food, I came across a server who ‘happened’ to be from the Middle East and particularly from Jordan. Before knowing where he was from exactly, I asked him to tell me and he said Jordan, I then asked, from Amman? And he responded spontaneously by saying, of course, what is Jordan but Amman. The obvious explanation to his answer is that Amman is the capital, the biggest, the richest city so clearly he must be from there, where else. Beneath this simple direct answer lies a volcano of how the people in the Middle East feel about their countries and how the rulers have ruled in the past fifty years. Since the early fifties, all resources in the Arab world, the Middle East have shifted to the capitals of the Arab countries, the government, the financial power, the capital, etc. People from all over the respective countries started to migrate towards the capitals searching for better life. There cities, towns and villages did not have the resources to maintain them. Investments have shifted to the capitals and the very surrounding areas. The capitals became congested, crowded, randomly designed to accommodate the thousands and millions newly immigrants, case in point is Cairo-Egypt.
Cairo became a monster in random buildings and designs, by the way, the Arab world shares this problem with other countries elsewhere like Mexico, etc. The feeling became since the late fifties that if you want to succeed you must go to Misr, meaning Cairo, this is Egypt’s name in Arabic and also Egyptians refer to their capital as Misr. Nasser, Egypt’s leader then almost ignored all other parts of the country and focused on Cairo. The problem became bigger and bigger by time and now as the Egyptians try to expand outside the city, the solutions are very hard to implement. The concentration of power was one of the reasons that those leaders focused on the capitals. They wanted the capital to have the power to control the rest of the country. Another reason was the socialist model that many Arab countries have copied from the defunct Soviet Union. Again, the solution resorts in few words, democracy is one of them, the private initiative and the powers of the market. These solutions that are easy to talk about but difficult to implement, however the gate has opened and it has to be done in the near future. These solutions will overcome the void the Arab youth feel and will steer the focus into building rather than destroying.

Air France 309, and the making of the news

CNN was first, in The USA, to report the unfortunate accident of Air France 309 while landing in Toronto Airport coming from Paris. MSNBC was second, and then FOX, then the rest. What caught my attention in that coverage is that all, everyone, including so called aviation experts assumed that no one could survive such an accident, that the pictures are so clear and the precedents are there, a similar Delta crash twenty years ago, to back up those experts claim that there is no way that anyone survived. I, a no expert in aviation, felt that the plane looked as if it did not went to flames immediately, and that there was no immediate explosion. I kept watching to see how the news media either love to jump into conclusion, take short cuts, or just hungry for a juicy piece of news, unfortunately the possibility of no survivors, or all the above would cover the news. It's amazing how CNN brought an anchor by the name of Miles O'Brien who has some, or a lot, of aviation experience who swore on his ancestors grave that there is no way that there could be any survivors. He even brought a friend of his who was a Captain of US Airways to talk the same talk. Wolf Blitzer who was running the show then tried to make sense out of all this and tried to keep brining the Delta crash to show that he also knew what he was talking about. At the end, or just an hour after the coverage the truth came and that all passengers and crew survived this accident. Oh, poor news media, what a disappointment. No one dared to predict the possibility of survivors, at least not any of the ones I watched. Again, mediocrity in the coverage, not much gut to swim against the norm or the obvious, taking the safest and what I call just scratching the surface approach to news or things.

NASA, why?

What is happening to the Nasa Space Shuttle Discovery is the least to say weird. When NASA started the space program over 50 years ago, it seemed that it knew what it needed to do. The leaders of this great organization had vision, know how, means and most important they had leadership that set a business model, goals and structure to get the job done. What went wrong? Maybe the lack of competition made the people there go easy on the quality of the program, Russia is no more a viable competitor, Asia and Europe lag behind and most important no one has a similar shuttle program. To send a shuttle full of human beings, qualified scientists to space knowing that it is not perfect is a scandal. When it comes to such missions, everything must be examined, reexamined and perfect. On earth maybe we can tolerate imperfection, but out there, in the outer space, everything must be perfect. Instead of focusing on the mission, we are now focusing on how to repair the shuttle and prevent it from exploding in the space or when it comes down and enter the earth. This is a shame. It's a shame that we were better when we first sent Columbia to space and after over 20 years we are worse. Why? Maybe because of the reasons I stated above, probably the lack of leadership. We have political appointees that worry about cutting cost and taking risks rather than a methodological approach to our mission. Fix the problems at NASA by having experienced visionary leaders who have the knowledge or can acquire it. Leaders who can set the tone and the stage for a great space program. Kick out the short cuts and mediocrity from the program. Please review the Busboys article in my site for related information.

The BusBoys Culture

We live now and have been for quite some time in a culture I like to call the busboys culture. It is a culture where the principles in all fields step back and let the second, third or tenth tier employees run the show without the necessary experience or talent. Take the food, or the hospitality business as an example; a new restaurant is open, and the food is marvelous, the chef is either a chef-owner or a renowned talented cook, the place is clean, or maybe the owners seat you and take your order. Give this establishment a few months, if we are lucky, and go back to the same place, place is half clean, food is half cooked or tasteless, the renowned chef is no longer there or no longer cooks the food himself or at least supervise it, the owner, of course, lift for other projects. So who cooks? probably the bus boys, I’m using the term loosely and do not mean to hurt the feelings of the bus boys, but the meaning here is that half talented people run the show, again, I mean people who are not talented to do certain work or are not trained to do it. Though I believe in the field of cooking, you must, first and foremost, be talented to make the great tasty dishes and not necessary very educated. Like any artistic field, talents come first. I mentioned the food, maybe because I love a good meal, a tasty one. But again, look at every field, we hire the experts, consultants, contractors that set and do a job for us and then leave the same job to be done, mediocrity, by people who are not trained to do it. I worked for a company that the owner ran the show and did marketing campaigns that he did not share with any of his sales people that were suppose to get him the business. We are no longer, I’m talking now mainly small business, want to spend the time training or garnish the right talents. We have the bus boy mentality that anyone can carry on the job; it's just a matter of math not quality.

My Son...... From Daddy

My baby...

Look at him,

Keep looking,

He is alert,

..Curious,

Wondering

Observing,

Talking through the eyes,

Exploring,

Comforting

Supporting

He is my son.

Vienna, VA, 07/30/05

My Daughter....From Daddy.

My baby,


Look at her...

She is a person….

A character

A poem

A song

A potential


…..her name is my daughter


McLean, VA, 05/08/2004

The Royal Republics

The president of Yemen, Ali Abdullah Saleh, announced couple of days ago in a party gathering in Yemen that he is not going to run as a candidate for the presidency in next year elections. Amidst the shock of party activist, president Saleh continued to say that it's time for a newer generation, a youthful one, to run and rule the country. He also said that the rulers, he meant the Arabs; have to leave office before they are forced to do so. For many observers this gesture sounded like a real change in Arab politics. Well, it is, but a smart and clever maneuver on the part of President Saleh that probably will be followed by other Arab presidents. When president Saleh mentioned transferring the rein of powers to a new generation of Yemenis he was eying his Son who also happens to be the head of the republican guards and the Special Forces that basically protects the regime. President Saleh, probably, will have his party elect his son as its running candidate for the presidency, and probably if this happens, the son will win. President Saleh by this maneuver would prove to be a clever politician who while out of office will be in the office through his son. Also the president will protect his son while he, the president, is alive and lastly would ensure that his son will be elected again while he is alive. I talked briefly about this point in previous articles but thought to bring a fresh example of what I already have predicted that the Arab presidents are emulating the system of the monarchs and trying to create the royal republics where you have a republican for of government without a form a royal title or a formal inheritance system. Watch next for Mubarak of Egypt and Gaddafi of Libya.

kifaya and the Arab Grass Roots Movements

"Kifaya or Enough" is a small yet gaining momentum grass roots secular movement calling for change in Egypt. It is unique that it is the first time since a long time that a secular movement for a peaceful change is gaining momentum not only in Egypt but in many other Arab countries. Since the sixties and early seventies the calls for change have been owned to groups that called for a religious change the way they see it. The vast majority of the masses were and still are silent but Kifaya is gaining momentum. Kifaya depends on small and short yet much publicized strokes against the aging regime of President Mubarak of Egypt. They organize almost daily demonstrations with small number of people and they use poetic slogans to express their feelings, frustrations, demands and hopes. The Egyptians have been famous of expressing themselves politically by using jokes or poetic slogans. They found this method over the years safer than using direct statements calling for change. During one of Kifaya demonstrations that took place in the same time of a visit by US Secretary of State Condi Rice, demonstrators were shouting " give him a visa, give him a visa, and take him with you Condoleezza" they meant of course to take with her president Mubarak. Another poetic slogan says “wake up! You who are sleeping in Abdin-one of the presidential palaces- your rule is in the mud and dirt!" again they meant the president. The "virus" of Kifaya is spreading in the Arab world under other names, sometimes similar with the same simple idea to create grass roots movements that -they hope- eventually will change the status qua. The field in the Middle East is no longer lift to extremists, other groups and people across all sects and religions are going to the streets asking for change. They are not only asking for political change but also for economic change. Lady luck, I think, is on their side for one important reason, the times that we live in, the spread of democracy and most important thing the media, the satellite media that covers every where and sends it all over the world. The satellite news media has changed the Arab world forever. People know that even the smallest movement will be covered by somebody. The rulers, most of them so far, want to be appeared as tolerant to freedom of speech and demonstrators. They want to appear democratic.

Quality Control And World Politics

In business, we use the word QC or quality control as often as we use vending machines. Quality control and Root Cause Analysis are synonymous to modern and current business practices. The reason is to ensure that we are doing what we are supposed to do in order for us, businesses, to get the job done, and done right. I think we need to create such a mechanism in world politics and international relations. Quality control will help politicians to do a better job in understanding other cultures’ sociopolitical dimensions. In accordance to what I wrote in "Mission" many mishaps in world politics happen when we, people, politicians, etc, misunderstand a cultural dimension to a reaction or a decision from another party or country. The UN is a perfect world body that we can use as a pilot for this program. The whole world is at the UN and having a department that would filter and interpret information upon request would be a great first step. Of course I do not have all the answers as to how this QC would really help but I'm sure that if the political class in every country creates a mechanism for more intercontinental understanding to each other that this mechanism will help to reduce world conflicts. Each country should consider the rest of the world as it own customers , potential customers or prospects and accordingly should be more thorough and civilized to news and issues other wise the customer or customers would go somewhere else. In business, there is a famous statement, if we do not treat them well, someone else will" We also should apply root cause analysis to world conflicts and break down each conflict to it's smallest components to get to the root of the issue in place. This approach will not only help to prevent on going conflicts but will also help to reduce and diffuse future ones. Quality control can be applied to war zones and active conflicts. The approach would make us better conflict managers and reduce human and financial losses.

The New Role of the Armed Forces

Armed conflicts, as we know it, between countries are fazing out. The new armed conflicts now and in the foreseen future will be mostly between countries and armed groups or terrorists that want to change the status quo through armed struggle. We see it now between, almost, the whole world and Al-Qaeda militant group that ironically and loosely speaking has offices in many countries, or mountains. Before the Second World War we saw in Nazi Germany an armed militant organization seizing power, though through elections in the beginning, and turning the country into a state terrorist. I do not expect, at all, that Al Qaeda will seize power in a country and turns it to state terror organization although they were doing it in Afghanistan before the US intervention and under the Taliban regime. After World War Two, we witnessed terror groups such as the Japanese Red Army, Bader-Meinhof in Germany, and The Red Falangists in Italy who were defeated only when states saw their danger to the civilized world and the modern state system. These organizations claim a philosophy but believe in destruction as a way for change. Though in the above countries, those groups could easily have become political parties, with no terrorism of course, and pursued political agendas. However their purpose was not to be in the system but to destroy it. The examples above are for groups who did not want and do not want, in case of Al-Qaeda, to be a part of a civilized process for change, but as a hammer to destroy. Such organizations can not be handled through dialogue but through war. It happens now in Iraq and it happened in Afghanistan. We have to differentiate the above groups from other groups such as the PLO in Palestine and Argon in Israel, who used the armed struggle to free their countries. Once liberated, they turned to regular political process. Both used war to achieve independence and used what we describe now as terror in modern day language. But once independence is achieved or become achievable, they succeeded to make the transition. Other example is in South Africa, where Nelson Mandela was the head of what used to be called a terror organization. He went to jail and came out as the new president of the new South Africa and his party became the ruling party in South Africa.

Iran 2005, By Jamil Shawwa

Iran is a strange country in The Middle East. When I say strange, that is strange to the Arabs and from the Arabs. For thousands of years the relationship between the Persians and the Arabs has never been good. They invaded each other, mostly from the part of the Persians before Islam. After Islam arrived and spread all over the current Middle East and parts of Asia and Africa, Iran or Persia became part of the Islamic Empire. Persia contributed to the religion and then created its own sect, Shiite, with people in neighboring Iraq. The Shiites are those who believe that Ali, the cousin of Prophet Muhammad, should have succeeded the prophet as Islam khalifa and not the Prophets’ successor Abu-Bakr Al Sediq. A milestone in the political relations between the Arabs and the Persians came some thousand and so years ago when a famous Persian family known as Al Baramekah became political consultants to Amir Al Momeneen, the ruler, Haroon Al Rashid in Iraq. Al Rashid was the head of the Islamic empire and he employed Al Barameka to be his political advisers. Their influence spread all over and one of them, Jaafer Al Barmaki became Al Rashid Prime Minster. To make the story short, Al Rrashid felt their influence and got information that they were trying to take over the regime, then Al Rshid acted and executed them and by that he expelled the Persian influence from the Arabic political system. I think, since then, the doubts between these two, the Muslim sunnis Arabs, and the Muslim shiites persians became strenuous. In the modern, current, time, the relationship is the same, doubtful and suspicious. Iran during the Shah took over Islands that the United Arab Emirates proclaim as their own and never returned them back to the UAE. Iran under the Islamic Shiite regime continues on this policy. Iraq under Saddam invaded Iran to proclaim the area of Shat al Arab as its area and after 10 years of unexplainable, or explainable war, the situation returned between the two as it was before the war! Iran and the Shiite Arabs created a militant organization in Lebanon by the name of Hezbollah which took on itself to have a quasi army side by side of the Lebanese army. Hezbollah claims that its military wing is there to fight Israel and expels it from all the Lebanese territories. Iran wants, among other things some say, to be to Shiites as Israel was and is to the Jewish people. A Mecca where Shiite can get support and influence. The Arabs Shiite, to a great extent, are proud enough not to accept Iran's influence. However Iran has it's supporters among Shiites in Lebanon and Iraq, a little in Bahrain and maybe among the Shiite in Saudi Arabia. The Arab regimes did not help to cordon the Iranian influence among the Shiite Arabs.They, the regimes, have treated the Shiites as second class citizens and not as true Muslims or at least first class citizens like the rest. Going back few years, or a century, when Khomeini lead the Iranian revolution that ended the regime of Muhammad Reza Pahlavi, the Iranians sent signals that they want to export their revolution, of course, the Iranians are experts in scaring the Arabs, used these tactics to elevate their prestige in the area and to position themselves as the guardian of the Arab Shiite and maybe Islam as they see it. The main influence Iran has at this moment is through two streams, in Lebanon, the Hezbollah organization and in Iraq through Al Sistani, the spiritual leader of the Iraqi Shiite, or at least a big fraction of them. How the relations between these two Muslim powers, the Sunni Muslim and the Shiite Muslim, will evolve is something difficult to predict. But if history gives us any lesson it would be that these powers will not trust each other unless both of them become democratized, and I mean really democratic, and start to cooperate as regular neighboring states and not as two entities trying to have a win-lose situation. As for The relation between the USA and Iran which has also been strange, to say the least, it also could improve if Iran changes it's government format from combative to democratic. The Turkish example could apply to Iran where an Islamic government rules a secular system. The government in Turkey was elected and the people Can in an election oust it and put another party.

Jerusalem 2005

Jerusalem, the holy land , the land of peace, the heart of The Middle East, the heart of the Muslim world, the Jewish world and the Christian world. The capital of the State of Israel and the future capital of the State of Palestine, side by side of the state of Israel. What a city! Basically the whole world, almost, is there. Most people in the world have some sort of a stake in this great city. It is however meant to be under two dominant powers, the Muslims and the Jews. Before 1967, Jerusalem was under the Jordanian power, and then became under the Israeli power who later on annexed it as its capital. There is an Arab population in Jerusalem, Muslims and Christians besides the Jewish people. This city should continue to be open to everyone who wants to visit. I remember when I used to go and eat the knafa at Ja'afer in the old city or when I used to have a delicious piece or two of Riches Pizza and then getting an excellent cup of coffee and Strawberry torte at Max Cafe across the street from the Hamashbir. Having said that, peace will not survive in that area unless the Palestinians are given their share of the city. The Arabs there have the right to have Jerusalem as their capital as Israel does. Both people can administer their respective areas and all people can visit the holy places there. It was in the news that a group of religious Jews tried to go to Al Aqsa mosque area and were confronted by emotional Muslims who felt violated by that visit. The reaction was normal because the Arabs do not have any say in their city and because that part is occupied. If the situation was normal and both the Arabs and the Jews have their share and both rule their areas that situation would not and should not have happened. All religions should be welcomed to visit but not occupy or intimidate the other. If we do not respect the rights of the Jewish, Christians and Muslims people in the holy city, peace will not take place. It's time for all of us to act with civility and not hatred.

The Arab Republics

We talked about the Arab monarchies, now we will address the Arab republics. The Arab Republics are tasting the sweet flavor the monarchs have had for a long time, which is to pass the leadership in their countries to their sons. We saw it happening in Syria and we see signs of it in Libya and Egypt. In a perfectly normal democratic system, it's not abnormal to have the son of a president becoming a president. It happened here in The USA and it's ok to happen anywhere else. The only issue is to have a democratic free system that allows such a transition to happen by the free and transparent choice of the people. The late Syrian president Assad continued to deny until the end that he was giving the presidency to his son while everyone knew that the process was in action and just ready for the declaration. This system is deceiving and of course not democratic. It resembles a thief with the stolen goods trying to deny that he stole anything. The presidents know, maybe, that a free election, probably, will not bring their kids to power, they also might feel jealous from their counterparts the monarchs who can have their kids inherit the power without any fanfare, sort of. The solution is simple: Democracy. Create countries with institutions and elected bodies. Have the three branches of government applying the system of checks and balances. I foresee the French style governing as an example for the Arab republics where you have an elected president and an elected parliament. The head of the wining party in the parliament forms the government. The president governs with the support of his prime minister who is also elected. Neither can do the job in the French example without the support of the other. Personally, I prefer the US system but for some reason I see the French example closer to the Arabic mentality of governing.