Israel mounting Troops near Gaza ....

Israeli land forces are massed along the border with northern Gaza. Earlier today, eight Palestinian cabinet ministers and 56 other officials of Hamas were rounded up by Israeli soldiers who crossed into the Gaza in the southern sector.

At this point-in-time, I would refer all of you to my post from May 10th entitled "Iran and the United States - 1979 Redux ?"

Tensions in the Middle-East are at an all-time high, and while I hold the United States responsible for mismanagement of the power politics in the region since the 1950's, the fact remains that Canada has no moral choice other than that of supporting NATO allies and Israel at this time. I am on record as far back as 1989-90 in foretelling that the future held nothing of greater peril to International Order & Security than the expansion of what we then called "Islamic" extremism, and what is now more properly referred to as Islamist extremism.

I also find it interesting that Russia is now aggressively in the mix - something that I foresaw back on May 10th. For more see the following:

http://today.reuters.com/News/CrisesArticle.aspx?storyId=N29185600

and now this:

http://english.people.com.cn/200606/30/eng20060630_278698.html

It is going to get much worse before it gets much better, I'm afraid ...