General Chat

I was in Hama, Syria 1982.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1982_Hama_Islamic_uprising

The sort of terror that goes in the middle east and other areas where ISIL is attempting to put down roots is on a different scale altogether to pinprick bombings etc in Bali, Turkey, Northern Ireland, France, Spain, England and so on. Flee if you can is the only real option.

Peace can mean something very different to some people to what you or I understand. The jihadists believe that "peace" can only be achieved through submission to god's will as expressed in a series of wildly harsh edicts. Most muslims of whatever stripe don't believe in this diabolical nonsense either and have few options. "Standing up" to the De'esh is a non-starter or even giving them a dirty look.

As things stand De'esh will establish a de facto regime of terror from Aleppo to Mosul while the Russians protect their client in Damascus and Tartus. The west would be stuck with as many as 10 million refugees.

A realistic if unpalatable option would be to throw our hand in with the Russians and Assad working with them to destroy the terrorists. That could at least result in a state that refugees could return to though probably even less democratic than before as well as badly damaged. Of course such a policy would hardly be workable without a resolution in the Ukraine.

As it stands nothing the west is proposing is workable either on removing Assad, De'esh or allowing refugees to live a normal life. And then there is the vexed question of selling war refugees and taxes to EU populations.

Giant problems pygmy leaders apart from Frau Merkel who is the only leader so far to have shown capability and honour.

fwiw my cousin owns and runs a hotel in Turkey. She is fully booked.
:-)

Ann, my friend and her daughter have just come back from a holiday in Turkey and they were ok. They stayed close to the hotel at night instead of going out so much. (My friend is in her 40s and her daughter early 20s)

Lizx

My son lived in Turkey for a year he was fine :-D :-D

Most Turks are very nice :-D

Most of my British friends are very nice too. ;-)

Whilst I'm very much against these people being sent to the UK, I'm also against the way they're being treated in Hungary

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-34216883

If there's a shortage of supplies then surely ration books would be better than this

Ration books would be better. The problem about that is that they/the majority don't want to be registered in Hungary.

I'm not entirely sure how we'd cope in a similar situation. Imagine 8000 people arriving uninvited at one of our ports. It would probably take us at least a week to sort out enough shelter and food.

I think I saw on the news that some were being thrown food parcels, if that isn't enough to degrade those poor people even more and causes riots and injury, I don't know what is. No wonder they want to move in as soon as they can.

Lizx

On Sky news the reporter went on a refugee boat from Turkey to Lesbos. She interviewed a heart surgeon from Damascus fleeing with his wife and 3 children. How bad must it be for him to take that risk?

As Benedict Cumberbatch said yesterday, "No one puts children in a boat unless the boat is safer than the land."