War, Then & Now | National Catholic Reporter

War, Then & Now | National Catholic Reporter by MSW.  MGB: World War One was started by an anarchist from Serbia, so it became a war of nationalism.  Unlike the Americn civil war, it spread and unlike that war - and the wars and revolts that also happened in the 1860s, solidiers dug into trenches rather than bravely forming a line and shooting at each other.  That war gave us our first Marxian revolution (sort of - Marx would not have picked feudal Russia as the place most likely to achieve spontaneous industrial revolt of the Proletariat - and indeed, that revolution was not that.  It also saw U.S. troops in Russia fighting the Reds and losing when Russia opted out of the conflict because of its revolution.



Most importantly, it saw the destruction of the Ottoman empirie, leading to the Balfour Declaration and the possibility of zionism and the French expulsion of the Hashemites from Syria - a direct cause of the current middle eastern conflicts. ISIS is better understood as a revolutionary group, although their success seems limited to current territorial gains - although their goal of a global Caliphate is still delusional and will be until they recognize the hier to the Prophet as the legitimate Caliph - King Abdullah of Jordon who should rightly rule from the Lebanon to Iraq, as well as any Palestinian territory carved from the West Bank and Norhern Israel.  Such a Caliphate would end ISIS and Hezbollah or incorporate them into regular army rather than as milita forces currently filling the gaps in civil society (making them kind of a Muslim Tea Party).



As for Gaza, its a hot mess and has been for seven years, when the settler gang (stealing land from other people is a criminal activity) used public action to seal off Gaza after they were expelled.  Gazans should be treated as Israeli citizens and arrests should be made if necessary - however blowing up the houses of those arrested is not Kosher and is a violation of Torah.  So is the bombing of Palestinian civilians when the rockets that Hamas sends don't really kill anyone, except by accident.  You don't murder children when someone essentially sends fireworks in your direction.