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In this mailing:
* Nils A. Haug: Here We Go Again – The West's Palestinian State Fantasy
* Amir Taheri: Russia: Europe's Prodigal Son


** Here We Go Again – The West's Palestinian State Fantasy ([link removed])
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by Nils A. Haug • August 17, 2025 at 5:00 am
* Only leaders completely sold out to extremist ideologies would persist in pushing a proposal so far detached from reality and so harmful to many people -- starting with the atrociously governed Palestinians -- that it is almost beyond comprehension.
* "If you notice, the talks with Hamas fell apart on the day Macron made the unilateral decision that he's going to recognize a Palestinian state. And then you have other people come forward, other countries say, well, if there is not a ceasefire by September, we're going to recognize a Palestinian state. Well, if I'm Hamas, I basically conclude, 'let's not do a ceasefire because we can be rewarded, we can claim it as a victory.'" — US Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
* The situation in Gaza could quite easily have been resolved many months ago if Hamas had laid down its weapons and released the hostages it had no business kidnapping in the first place. This did not happen. Nevertheless, Israel is blamed for trying to get its tortured and starved hostages released. What would France, Britain, Canada or Australia have done? The party responsible for Gaza's collateral damage is Hamas.
* Israel... is doing its best in horrendously dangerous circumstances to feed the hungry people of Gaza, while Hamas deliberately starves the hostages, and has lately photographed them digging their own graves.
* A Palestinian state would, in addition, continue trying to conquer more of Israel's historic homeland, and try to drive Jews out of it, as they openly vow to do...
* That, it seems, is Macron's view of a "just and lasting peace".
* "If France is really so determined to see a Palestinian state, I've got a suggestion for them: Carve out a piece of the French Riviera, and create a Palestinian state. They're welcome to do that, but they're not welcome to impose that kind of pressure on a sovereign nation. " —US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee, June 1, 2025.
* A further reason that Western efforts to impose a Palestinian state are inadvisable is that they ignore a warning from the Trump administration that "any country that takes 'anti-Israel actions' will be viewed as acting in opposition to US interests and will face diplomatic consequences."
* "There was a Palestinian state. It was called Gaza. Look what we received. The biggest massacre since the Holocaust. To establish a Palestinian state after October 7 is a huge prize not only for Hamas [but] for Iran." — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, February 6, 2025.
* The question remains how any rational national leader can simply discount Israel's attitude towards an independent Palestinian (terrorist, Jihadist) state within or alongside its borders? Would those leaders countenance an uppity ISIS or Al Qaeda on their borders? Yet, Starmer and Macron (together with leaders of Spain, Norway and Ireland) are doing exactly that. Is it possible that they are endeavouring to accommodate the millions of Muslim voters they have helped infiltrate into their own broken countries?
* This irony is that many in the West who are advocating "social justice for all people" think nothing of vilifying the Jews.
* At this point in history, Israel's legitimate actions consist in defending its people -- and the stunningly ungrateful West -- from a horror disguised within a veneer of fake "moral clarity," along with false charges of a supposed genocide in Gaza. As Huckabee remarked, "If Israel is trying to commit genocide, they are really, really bad at it." In fact, Israel is defending the West -- the very people undermining them -- from a genocide. Publicly expressed slogans targeting Jews simply support the murderous intent of the enemies of Israel and those apparently trying to help them finish the job.

A majority of Western leaders clearly refuse to exercise integrity when it concerns the Palestinian issue. Only leaders completely sold out to extremist ideologies would persist in pushing a proposal so far detached from reality and so harmful to many people -- starting with the atrociously governed Palestinians -- that it is almost beyond comprehension. "Are these people wicked or just very, very stupid?", asks columnist Melanie Phillips. A valid question indeed. Pictured: UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer meets with French President Emmanuel Macron on July 10, 2025 in London. (Photo by Leon Neal/Getty Images)

A majority of Western leaders clearly refuse to exercise integrity when it concerns the Palestinian issue. Only leaders completely sold out to extremist ideologies would persist in pushing a proposal so far detached from reality and so harmful to many people -- starting with the atrociously governed Palestinians -- that it is almost beyond comprehension. Perhaps this phenomena is best described as a "cognitive bias" that can "lead to a person interpreting all new information as supporting their preconception."

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** Russia: Europe's Prodigal Son ([link removed])
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by Amir Taheri • August 17, 2025 at 4:00 am
* Trump.... must have realized that Russia remains economically resilient and politically determined enough not to throw in the towel. He also realized he couldn't expect Putin to simply walk out of Ukraine without carrying something with him. This is why Trump talks of "territorial concessions by both sides", knowing that the "both sides" part of the phrase fools no one.
* Thus, we are faced with another "land-for-peace" conundrum that has never worked as a permanent solution to conflicts between adversaries that regard each other as existential threats.

By accepting US President Donald Trump's summons to Alaska, Russian President Vladimir Putin acknowledged the United States' status as the indispensable power in world politics. In other words, he admits that the days when US and Soviet summits were held in neutral venues to underline their equality in status are gone. Putin knows that the war isn't going well for him. Pictured: Trump greets Putin on the tarmac at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson in Anchorage, Alaska, on August 15, 2025. (Photo by Andrew Caballero-Reynolds//AFP via Getty Images)

Even before Friday's meeting between US President Donald Trump and Russian leader Vladimir Putin in Alaska had happened, conflicting views were aired about its purpose and possible outcome.

Trump-bashers, that is to say usual suspects such as the New York Times and CNN, dismissed it as another photo-op to add a brushstroke to his portrait as peacemaker deserving Nobelization.

The Blame America First crowd, in this case represented by Harvard Professor Jeffery Sachs, claimed that Trump will try to get a chunk of Russia's oil and gas for American big business.

The European nay-sayers' chorus, led by French President Emmanuel Macron, sang their song of "Trump kowtowing to Putin" by excluding the European Union from the rendezvous in icy Alaska.

But even if all those assertions were true, there is no doubt that the summit marks an important event.

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