It doesn't come any clearer than that.
I cannot help noticing that 13th November was the anniversary of the Allied occupation of Constantinople in 1918, which eventually brought to an end the Ottoman Caliphate, the last claimant to the title until very recent years.
To many in the Middle East and beyond, sometimes quite far beyond, Europeans, Westerners, whites, Christians, and so on, are still "the Franks".
Add to that France's particularly heavy level of involvement in recent and ongoing wars in the region, and the results are as we have seen them in the last 24 hours.
Iraq was quite a long time ago now, and even then the French were quite properly protecting their commercial interests by staying out, which effectively put them on a side.
People will criticise me for pointing out these things. But they did so over Charlie Hebdo. Right up until everyone who mattered, including the Founding Editor of Private Eye, expressed exactly the same view.
Iraq was quite a long time ago now, and even then the French were quite properly protecting their commercial interests by staying out, which effectively put them on a side.
People will criticise me for pointing out these things. But they did so over Charlie Hebdo. Right up until everyone who mattered, including the Founding Editor of Private Eye, expressed exactly the same view.
No comments:
Post a Comment