Reuters, via the Jerusalem Post, tells us:
The Middle East - as we never tire of saying - is in flames.Saudi Arabia used an attack on its embassy in Tehran as a pretext to fuel tensions, Iran's foreign ministry said on Monday after Riyadh severed diplomatic relations...
Iranian protesters stormed the Saudi embassy in the early hours of Sunday after Saudi Arabia executed Shi'ite cleric Nimr al-Nimr, prompting Riyadh to withdraw its diplomatic staff and order Iranian diplomats to leave the kingdom.
Saudi Arabia used an attack on its embassy in Tehran as a pretext to fuel tensions, Iran's foreign ministry said on Monday after Riyadh severed diplomatic relations...Despite those flames there is still considerable stability in the region. Tehran is more powerful and stable now than ever before thanks to President Barack Obama's visionary friendship with Islamist regimes. Amman, remains calm and Cairo, G-d love it, chose brutal-style, torture-prone, secular dictatorship over brutal-style, torture-prone, al-Sharia theocracy.
But, one important geo-political development that we are seeing now - and that is flying under the radar of most people in the West - is the proxy-war between Shia Iran and Sunni Saudi Arabia for control of the Middle East (outside of Israel) and domination of the Islamic religious narrative.
As is occasionally noted in the American press, Iran - an enemy of both the United States and Israel - is seeking regional hegemony and funding proxies such as Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon.
George W. Bush destabilized a chaotic region with Iraq War II in 2003. Barack Obama left a power vacuum when he withdrew American troops from that country and ISIS was quick to fill that vacuum. Iran is willing to challenge ISIS because while the United States fought and defeated Saddam Hussein's Iraq, Iran won that war and is now solidifying its position as the dominant player in that part of the world with the blessing of the current American government.
So, whatever the mess and chaos belching from the Arab-Muslim Middle East, and whatever gradations and distinctions we can draw between the various armed factions, hovering above everything else is the never-ending Sunni-Shia conflict.
And, it is heating up.
It is Tehran versus Riyadh and almost nobody is acknowledging it.
What we are seeing is an intra-Muslim proxy-war between Arabs and Persians fought within Yemen.
Yesterday, January 5, Reuters tells us via Newsweek that:
ADEN (Reuters) - Air strikes led by Saudi Arabia targeting Iran-allied Houthi forces intensified in Yemen on Tuesday, residents said, ending weeks of a relative lull in the war after a major diplomatic row erupted between the kingdom and arch foe Tehran.
Large air strikes targeted military positions linked to Yemen's ascendant Houthis in the capital Sanaa, the port city of Hodaida and the disputed southwestern city of Taiz.
Residents reported that the air raids hit a care center for the blind and Yemen's chamber of commerce headquarters, in which there were no casualties.The Middle East is crumbling around Israeli ears as Europe flings open its gates to the most violently racist people on the planet.
