The Booming Demographics of Kazakhstan (youtube.com)
Religeon plays a role (but not extremist or fundamentalist much). Endogamous clan family type culture. Cousin marriages widely practiced. Family-oriented culture, politics encourage childbearing, families help with children. Some kind of balance that works.
youtube.com
‘last piece of colonization in Africa’
Britain could sense it was losing the room, it was losing support, at the UN and other places. Negotiations have been happening (to give the islands back to Mauritius) for years.
They were to be kept until the US didn't need the islands any more for military reasons.
They are far from anything else, except Diego Garcia Island (lots of secretive US and British military, bombers, subs, refuelling, rearming), and DG will remain as it is now. They're uninhabited, sometimes yachts visit them.
There were people who had been evicted from living there. It would be difficult to turn the islands into habitable places.
This shows how the current international system functions, and how it's not like the previous Cold War order.
Britain has to protect its credibility in particular, for its institutions.
Britain isn't part of the EU anymore, so doesn't have that automatic support. They have to rely more on international, more on Africa and other countries than before.
With more time, Iran can move centrifuges etc. Iran now has more incentive to develop nuclear.
If the strategy to make Iran so scared to develop nukes because of fear of action, that they don't do so, is now undermined by Biden's statements against Israel considering nuclear sites as targets, said Albright.
Iran might be ‘running scared’ after ‘ring of fire’ which they'd depended on, with Hezbollah etc, ‘failed’.
‘They’ve had a policy based on ‘Let’s avoid a crisis' but you can't do that in the Middle East, you encourage our adversaries.' Albright. If you encourage them, they feel they can make these incremental progresses.
‘Both hands are being forced’ Irans and Israels. CNBC
youtube.com
‘You can’t wage a war or conflict when you can't appeal to your own population at home, internally.' Goinar Motevalli. Iran has had this role for the past 50 years almost, of being this quite formidable bulwark against US Western NATO-aligned, Israeli-interests. It’s now manifesting in these violent terms. We have very slowly walked into this situation. The 2015 nuclear deal, how it was negotiated, who was included, who was excluded. The way rhetoric on the Western and European side, and sanctions on the nuclear plan going back to 2007. The 2002 George Bush Axis of Evil speech, at exact time Iran was starting a backchannel effort to work with US against Taliban in Afghanistan. It all kind of leads to this war scenario. That missile strike, Iran felt it had no choice, because of this perception of this loss of credibility, weakness, given the amount of domestic unpopularity it's facing. It couldn't just sit back.
There was an unidentified explosion near the Israeli embassy in Copenhagen. There's a suggestion they might take some of the retaliation offshore, hitting diplomatic Israeli assets, something they've done in the past.
They're in a competitoin that involves assasinations and bombing strikes.
Iran and Russia are planning to enter a defense pack in a few weeks.
;There's no appeasing US or Israel.' Mearsheimer. What this means is you have to play hardball, so Iran and Russia are coming closer together.
‘The decapitation of Nasrallah is not going to produce any positive effects on the outcome from Israel’s perspective.' Israeli has been doing this to Hezbollah's leaders for a long time, and it doesn't have any meaning, it doesn't do anything of consequence.
Hezbollah's not going away. Hamas is not going away.
'This is a poor set of policies that Netanyahu is pursuing, and we're going along with them.'
Could Iran be another proxy battleground?
Some people think US is controlling Netanyahu, not the other way around. Such as Chompsky.
Israel seeks to humiliate Iran and undermine its feeling of safety, analyst says • FRANCE 24 (youtube.com)
Israeli Soldiers Aren't Hiding Their War Crimes - They're BOASTING About Them w/. Richard Sanders (youtube.com)
Israel’s Netanyahu warns Lebanon could face destruction ‘like Gaza’ (aljazeera.com)
First phone call between Biden and Netanyahu in 2 months, it was reported.
‘Is it US lying to Netanyahu or is it Netanyahu lying to the US?’ she asked.
Netanyahu is known to be a lyer, everyone has agreed on this, and he doesn't hide it, the expert said. Does it matter to anyone? It seems telling the truth has almost no importance.
Only when the US feels their interests are really being compromised, the really put the pressure on Israel as a client. Why should US do leverage with Netanyahu, he asked, when there is not really even anyone in the Middle East who is asking for it. The Muslim countries don't really seem to be vocal on this.
It's been rumored and reported in news that behind closed doors Biden or the US has labelled Netanyahu as a ‘bad guy,’ while doing staunch support for Israel in public.
Israel is on a high, and has an emboldened posture, and US also. Israel currently willing to take more risks, and US willing to let Israel take more risks.