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Letter from Mazin Qumsiyeh

The attack on Syria by the United States while illegal per internationallaw (not sanctioned by the UN Security Council and opposed by Russia andChina) comes to remind as all of four basic facts of geopolitics:1-US Presidents no matter how “unconventional” must always obey the rulesset for them. Trump came to office opposing intervention in Syria and isnow directly siding with the “rebels” and has accepted the 1990s neoconstrategy of regime changes across Western Asia that are supposed to benefit"Israel".2-As Henry Kissinger said: “all foreign policy is domestic policy”. With astrong Zionist lobby in the US and absence of any counter lobby thatwatches over US (let alone world) interests, we have a push for warssupposed to help apartheid Israel whether in Lebanon, Iraq, Yemen, or Syria.3-Modern warfare kills far more civilians than military (the ratio now is>10 to 1). War is immoral, illogical, and criminal and has no “good side”or “bad side”. The only positive thing now is that countries that use warsas their main tools (Israel, US being the key ones) will lose because warshave now become also illogical in terms of achievement of policy. Just takeas examples in the past 20 years: the US attack on Iraq and Israel’s attackon Gaza and Lebanon. It is now almost a given like the Newtonian laws ofphysics.4-People still have the power to change things. Governments regularly lieto their own people (all governments). But their biggest tools are to a)create fear, b) create apathy (powerlessness). Getting people to be goodconsumers (of propaganda and products) is key to government “success”(short term as it may be and to enrich politicians and their backers). Keyto human rights advocate success is getting people to be good involved andinformed citizens. The conflict between the two (governments and people) isthe real consequential conflict we face. It is between short term greed andlong term planetary interests. It is an existential conflict for humanity.5-It is far easier to criticize existing systems than work to create moreequitable and sustainable systems. This issue while clear is not easy toaddress. Our humble beginning towards an intentional community “PalestineInstitute of Biodiversity and Sustainability” is finally seeing a milestonereached noted above with our opening to the public next week. Follow us onthe web at http://palestinenature.org and on facebook (updates daily) atPalestine Museum of Natural History.Stay HumanMazin QumsiyehA bedouin in cyberspace, a villager at homeProfessor and (volunteer) DirectorPalestine Museum of Natural HistoryPalestine Institute of Biodiversity and SustainabilityBethlehem UniversityOccupied Palestinehttp://qumsiyeh.orghttp://palestinenature.orgJoin me on facebook https://www.facebook.com/mazin.qumsiyeh.9