NORTH KOREA, ISIS AND IRAN
The Lord foils the plans of the nations;
he thwarts the purposes of the peoples.
But the plans of the Lord stand firm forever,
the purposes of his heart through all generations.
Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord,
the people he chose for his inheritance.
Psalm 33: 10-12
With the eyes and ears of the world fixed on the heated rhetoric being exchanged between North Korea and the USA, North Korea's provocative missile tests, and the growing list of terror attacks in Europe orchestrated by ISIS, the situation in the Middle East seems to have somewhat fallen off the radar. This is dangerous. Events in the Middle East are equally alarming and should not be ignored.
In a surprise visit to Baghdad last week, US Defense Secretary, Jim Mattis, said that now that ISIS has been expelled from its northern stronghold, it is caught between converging forces approaching from both the northern and southern ends the middle stretches of the Euphrates Valley. Mattis referred to this region as being ISIS's 'last stand' (1). I wish that were true. He is forgetting that ISIS is not primarily an army or a state, it is an ideology. States and armies can be defeated but it is not so easy to destroy an ideology. ISIS was able to attract many followers because it was perceived as being victorious, giving legitimacy to its claim to being the true Islamic State carrying out true Jihad, at least in the eyes of extremist Muslims. It has suffered a blow to this image but it is yet far from being defeated. It is merely shifting its arena of warfare and is now digging in in other areas, such as in the Sinai Peninsula, Egypt, Gaza and the Palestinian areas, Syria and Lebanon, where it continues to gain power. It is also activating its supporters all over the world to carry out terror attacks. Every time ISIS carries out a successful terror attack in Europe or elsewhere, it gains power and additional followers. It is not enough to defeat ISIS in the battlefield we must show its ideology to be flawed and its power to be weak. There is a long way yet to go to achieve this, and I wonder if the Western world has the will to even engage this fight. We, after all, do not have the religious fervour or any united ideology with which to counter that of the Muslim extremists.
What is more, as ISIS is being driven relentlessly from Syria and Iraq, the power vacuum is not being filled by the local states but by Iran, backed by Russia and supported by North Korea. Yes, North Korea has a finger in the pie in the Middle East too. The news agency, Reuters, reported that "Two North Korean shipments to a Syrian government agency responsible for the country’s chemical weapons program were intercepted in the past six months, according to a confidential United Nations report on North Korea sanctions violations", and furthermore, "The U.N. experts said activities between Syria and North Korea they were investigating included cooperation on Syrian Scud missile programs and maintenance and repair of Syrian surface-to-air missiles air defense systems" (2).
Yesterday Yahya Sinwar, the recently elected Prime Minister of the Gaza Strip, told reporters that Iran is helping Hamas to prepare for war with Israel, saying "Every day we build missiles and continue military training" (3). On Monday, when Israeli PM Netanyahu was meeting with the UN Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres, Sinwar announced that " his group has restored relations with Iran and is using its newfound financial and military aid from the country to gear up for a new round of battle with Israel". He added that Iran is now the largest backer of Hamas' military wing both financially and militarily (4).
Iran also backs the terror organization, Hezbollah, based in Lebanon. Hezbollah has fought with Syrian government forces in the Syrian war and is now also being supported by Russia. Hezbollah, which boasts that it already has an arsenal of some 100,000 missiles with which it can attack Israel. Now, however, it wants to acquire from Iran long-range missiles which can target specific sensitive sites in Israel. Over the past few years several convoys of missiles passing through Syria have been attacked and destroyed by Israel. This has led Hezbollah to bring missile construction closer to home. Ynetnews reports that "Russia has reportedly stationed its advanced S-400 anti-missile defense system near an Iranian arms factory in Syria, which allegedly manufactures long-range guided missiles for Hezbollah to use against Israel" (5). This factory is located near the coastal city of Tartus just north of Lebanon.
This week the world's attention has been captured by the terrible results of Hurricane Harvey in the United States. There is no doubt that this Hurricane has created devastation of epic proportions and my heart goes out to all the people who have lost loved ones, homes and businesses.
I do not want to belittle their suffering in any way, but one thing struck me as I followed the news this past week, and that was the unbalanced picture of the world we receive via the western media. Here on our TVs CNN and Fox News gave us continual live coverage of the situation in Texas for several days. However at the same time on the other side of the world, in the Indian subcontinent, a similar and even greater disaster was unfolding. This horrific event received scarcely a mention. Even today as I watched CNN news they devoted 15 minutes to recovery efforts in Texas and less than one minute to the horrific tragedy in India. Bangladesh and Nepal were not even mentioned. The death toll in Texas has reached 46 so far and some 100,000 homes flooded or destroyed, and many are displaced and facing an uncertain future. However in Bangladesh, India and Nepal torrential monsoon rains have killed around 1200 people and sent at least 41 million people fleeing from their flooded homes (6). The USA is a rich country with well-organized relief services and the resources to rescue trapped people, and eventually rebuild homes and businesses. The nations of the Indian subcontinent are much poorer and do not have anything like comparable resources to help people. The situation there is dire and many more people are likely to die from the flooding, landslides, collapsing buildings, starvation, and disease. Now the heavy rains are moving into Pakistan as well causing loss of life and flooding. To the western media and the world as a whole, I would like to ask the question - is an Indian, Nepalese or Bangladeshi life worth less than that of an American?
In a similar vein, there has been much reported recently in the media about terror attacks in France, Spain, England and other western nations. However, in 2016 some 34, 676 people were killed in terror attacks worldwide. Of these only 0.7%, 238, were killed in Western Europe. The majority of fatalities, 55%, occurred in North Africa and the Middle East (7).
In view of all these tragedies, I have been reminded to be grateful for everything I have, a roof over my head, a dry place to sleep, clothes, clean water to drink and plenty of food. How many people around the world do not have any of these things? If you have these you are in the 5% most privileged people of the world. When I see the suffering around the world, through natural disasters, wars and disease it puts my relatively minor problems into perspective. Elie Wiesel, a Holocaust survivor, human rights activist and author said this:
When a person doesn't have gratitude, something is missing in his or her humanity. A person can almost be defined by his or her attitude toward gratitude.
I have also been challenged with respect to my care of my fellow man. Sometimes the scale of need can become overwhelming and cause a kind of paralysis, but there is always something I can do, whether it is practical help, financial aid or prayer. We should not underestimate the value of prayer. Even to help one person is important. Elie Wiesel also said this:
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-5001245,00.html
Yesterday Yahya Sinwar, the recently elected Prime Minister of the Gaza Strip, told reporters that Iran is helping Hamas to prepare for war with Israel, saying "Every day we build missiles and continue military training" (3). On Monday, when Israeli PM Netanyahu was meeting with the UN Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres, Sinwar announced that " his group has restored relations with Iran and is using its newfound financial and military aid from the country to gear up for a new round of battle with Israel". He added that Iran is now the largest backer of Hamas' military wing both financially and militarily (4).
Iran also backs the terror organization, Hezbollah, based in Lebanon. Hezbollah has fought with Syrian government forces in the Syrian war and is now also being supported by Russia. Hezbollah, which boasts that it already has an arsenal of some 100,000 missiles with which it can attack Israel. Now, however, it wants to acquire from Iran long-range missiles which can target specific sensitive sites in Israel. Over the past few years several convoys of missiles passing through Syria have been attacked and destroyed by Israel. This has led Hezbollah to bring missile construction closer to home. Ynetnews reports that "Russia has reportedly stationed its advanced S-400 anti-missile defense system near an Iranian arms factory in Syria, which allegedly manufactures long-range guided missiles for Hezbollah to use against Israel" (5). This factory is located near the coastal city of Tartus just north of Lebanon.
This week the world's attention has been captured by the terrible results of Hurricane Harvey in the United States. There is no doubt that this Hurricane has created devastation of epic proportions and my heart goes out to all the people who have lost loved ones, homes and businesses.
I do not want to belittle their suffering in any way, but one thing struck me as I followed the news this past week, and that was the unbalanced picture of the world we receive via the western media. Here on our TVs CNN and Fox News gave us continual live coverage of the situation in Texas for several days. However at the same time on the other side of the world, in the Indian subcontinent, a similar and even greater disaster was unfolding. This horrific event received scarcely a mention. Even today as I watched CNN news they devoted 15 minutes to recovery efforts in Texas and less than one minute to the horrific tragedy in India. Bangladesh and Nepal were not even mentioned. The death toll in Texas has reached 46 so far and some 100,000 homes flooded or destroyed, and many are displaced and facing an uncertain future. However in Bangladesh, India and Nepal torrential monsoon rains have killed around 1200 people and sent at least 41 million people fleeing from their flooded homes (6). The USA is a rich country with well-organized relief services and the resources to rescue trapped people, and eventually rebuild homes and businesses. The nations of the Indian subcontinent are much poorer and do not have anything like comparable resources to help people. The situation there is dire and many more people are likely to die from the flooding, landslides, collapsing buildings, starvation, and disease. Now the heavy rains are moving into Pakistan as well causing loss of life and flooding. To the western media and the world as a whole, I would like to ask the question - is an Indian, Nepalese or Bangladeshi life worth less than that of an American?
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| Floods in Pakistan today http://www.indialivetoday.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/43-people-died-and-61-others-wounded-after-heavy-rain-and-floods-that-took-place-in-Pakistan-indialivetoday.jpg |
In a similar vein, there has been much reported recently in the media about terror attacks in France, Spain, England and other western nations. However, in 2016 some 34, 676 people were killed in terror attacks worldwide. Of these only 0.7%, 238, were killed in Western Europe. The majority of fatalities, 55%, occurred in North Africa and the Middle East (7).
In view of all these tragedies, I have been reminded to be grateful for everything I have, a roof over my head, a dry place to sleep, clothes, clean water to drink and plenty of food. How many people around the world do not have any of these things? If you have these you are in the 5% most privileged people of the world. When I see the suffering around the world, through natural disasters, wars and disease it puts my relatively minor problems into perspective. Elie Wiesel, a Holocaust survivor, human rights activist and author said this:
When a person doesn't have gratitude, something is missing in his or her humanity. A person can almost be defined by his or her attitude toward gratitude.
I have also been challenged with respect to my care of my fellow man. Sometimes the scale of need can become overwhelming and cause a kind of paralysis, but there is always something I can do, whether it is practical help, financial aid or prayer. We should not underestimate the value of prayer. Even to help one person is important. Elie Wiesel also said this:
“We must not see any person as an abstraction. Instead, we must see in every person a universe with its own secrets, with its own treasures, with its own sources of anguish, and with some measure of triumph.”
Finally I would like to recommend an article that appeared in Ynetnews, one of Israel's main newspapers, last week. It is a ray of hope in a very troubled world. It points to the only solution for the world, the love of Yeshua (Jesus). Only He can heal us from hatred and anger and restore us to forgiveness and love.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-5001245,00.html
References:
1. http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-5006214,00.html
2. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-northkorea-syria-un-idUSKCN1B12G2
3. http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/hamas-leader-iran-helping-hamas-prepare-for-war-with-israel/article/2632784
4. http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-5008902,00.html
5. https://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-5010187,00.html?utm_source=Taboola_internal&utm_medium=organic
6. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/india-floods-bangladesh-nepal-millions-affected-says-un-a7920721.html
7. https://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-5007804,00.html
