Is Pompeo Good For Israel and the USA?

Nadene Goldfoot                          

Mike Pompeo, born December 30, 1963
Head of CIA January 23, 2017
Harvard PhD, editor of Harvard Law Review with JD in 1994
Conservative Republican

"Having a secretary of state who does not conform to the State Department worldview “is very good for us,” Deputy Minister Michael Oren said."                                          

Michael Bornstein Oren (Hebrew: מיכאל אורן; born Michael Scott Bornstein; May 20, 1955) is an American-born Israeli historian, author, politician, former ambassador to the United States (2009–2013), and current member of the Knesset for the Kulanu party and Deputy Minister in the Prime Minister's Office

This must be in reference to the former Secretary of State of the USA, John Kerry, who made the horrible deal with Iran, stating it was a good deal.  As we look at his "good deal," it allows Israel to live without being bombed by an atomic bomb for about  the next 10 years at the best.  Iran is now in Syria which is right across the road from Israel and calling the shots for Assad.  Pompeo blames Obama for Iran's position to be closer to Israel now.  

An assignment  of North Korea with Kim Jong-un going very well

President Trump has chosen Michael Richard Pompeo as his new Secretary of State after not being really happy with Rex Tillerson.  He feels that Pompeo and he are thinking on the same lines, and Tillerson just didn't on important matters.  Mike was educated at West Point, 1st in his class and majored in mechanical engineering in 1986 and then served for 5 years in the US army as cavalry officer in East Germany, rising to Captain.

Trump has stated that Israel is very important to him.  This would mean that he also finds the Iran deal a mess.  Pompeo shares his thinking.  He had been against Kerry's Iran deal that Obama's administration backed.  Pompeo calls it a disastrous deal and that Iran is the world's largest state sponsor of terrorism.  He is not adverse to taking strong steps to stop Iran's goals of having nuclear capacity to harm others but with coalition allies if necessary.  

Pompeo and wife Susan with Mickey Rosenfeld, Israel's Police National Director 

Pompeo visited Israel in November 2015.  He stated that "Prime Minister Netanyahu is a true partner of the American people" and that "Netanyahu's efforts to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons are incredibly admirable and deeply appreciated." He also stated that "In the fight against terrorism, cooperation between Israel and the United States has never been more important" and that "we must stand with our ally Israel and put a stop to terrorism. Ongoing attacks by the Palestinians serve only to distance the prospect of peace".  The surpise to me is that Pompeo was against moving the USA embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, a decision in 2017 which was a promise Trump had made.  

Pompeo has been a Senator from Kansas for 3 terms.  He was on the House Select Committee on Benghazi in 2012 and was sharply critical of Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's handling of this deadly attack.  He said that it was worse in some ways than Watergate's scandal.  As a former military-educated man, he saw the failure of leadership.  

Democrats are afraid of Pompeo, as they also fear Trump as they fear conservatism.  They weren't afraid of him becoming CIA Director, however, voting him in 66 for 33 against.  Under his direction, he in his short time pushed to expand espionage and covert operations that had lapsed.  Will his recent positive report on Kim Jong-un help him win over votes?  We'll soon see.  

Update: : Pompeo passed, thanks to Senator Rand Paul who changed his mind at the last minute and voted for him.  Pompeo is now officially the Secretary of State.  
Update:  
July 2018-I watched TV as senators quizzed Pompeo about Trump and the Russians, etc. and I was so proud of him.  He was fantastic and made senators who were being nasty look like fools compared to his replies and presence and bearing.  We have the very best in this man.  

Resource:  https://www.biography.com/people/mike-pompeo-121317
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_Pompeo
http://www.jpost.com/American-Politics/Pompeo-very-positively-disposed-to-Israel-strong-critic-of-Iran-deal-545010
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Oren

Why We Cannot Allow Chemical Warfare, Even On ISIS

Nadene Goldfoot                                             

Child said suffering from chemical attack in Douma, Syria.
Most victims were women and children.

Russians, who have control
of Syria and Assad, plead that all pictures were staged.  Russia has been in Syria since 2012, maybe earlier.  They know the problems involved working with Assad and what he's capable of.  Copping a plea about this is hard to swallow.  Some people are just compulsive liars.  As to staging
pictures of the suffering seen on TV, that's pretty hard to do.  The picture above proves nothing.  

Homs, Syria is shown with the red dot at the top that was hit in an
attack by France, England and USA  Friday the 13th of April 2018.
After being warned last year not to use chemical weapons, they were warned a 2nd time with
3 times the strength as the first time since he hadn't believed the first message.  Just
west of Homs was the factory making the gas, Sarin that was destroyed. 

In World War I, chemical warfare was used by the Germans on the Allies.  "One of Germany's earliest uses of chemical weapons occurred on October 27, 1914, when shells containing the irritant dianisidine chlorosulfonate were fired at British troops near Neuve-Chapelle, France."
                                                                         

This Canadian soldier in WWI suffered from mustard gas burns 1917-1918.

 "Germany used another irritant, xylyl bromide, in artillery shells that were fired in January 1915 at the Russians near Bolimów, in present-day Poland.^[17] The first full-scale deployment of deadly chemical warfare agents during World War I was at the Second Battle of Ypres, on April 22, 1915, when the Germans attacked French, Canadian and Algerian troops with chlorine gas.

A total 50,965 tons of pulmonary, lachrymatory, and vesicant agents were deployed by both sides of the conflict, including chlorine, phosgene, and mustard gas. Official figures declare about 1.3 million casualties directly caused by chemical warfare agents during the course of the war. Of these, an estimated 100,000-260,000 casualties were civilians. Nearby civilian towns were at risk from winds blowing the poison gases through. Civilians rarely had a warning system put into place to alert their neighbors of the danger. In addition to poor warning systems, civilians often did not have access to effective gas masks.

Football team of British soldiers with gas masks, Western Front, 1916

World War I-era chemical ammunition is still found, unexploded, at former battle, storage, or test sites and poses an ongoing threat to inhabitants of Belgium, France and other countries. Camp American University where American chemical weapons were developed and later buried, has undergone 20 years of remediation efforts."

Chemical warfare technology timeline

	Agents	Dissemination	Protection	Detection
1914	Chlorine Chloropicrin Phosgene Mustard gas	Wind dispersal	Gas masks, urinated-on gauze	Smell

At the end of WWI, more had been created.  Gas was placed in shells that could be dropped.

1918

Lewisite

Chemical shells

Gas mask Rosin oil clothing

smell of geraniums

Conventional weapons are allowed in warfare,  but not the following; called the NBC  which are the  Nuclear, Biological and Chemical that have been known about.  These can take over and kill millions at one swipe.  They can kill one's enemy and one's friends alike all at once.  They could wipe out the earth of its population.  This was decided by 65 states in 1997, that late.  Israel has signed but not ratified it since the Palestine authority has not signed.   Only Egypt, North Korea, Palestine (which became eligible to accede to UN deposited treaties upon becoming a UN observer state in 2012) and South Sudan have neither signed nor acceded to the Convention. Aside from Palestine, the other four states which are not 
parties are suspected of possessing chemical weapons.

                 Signed        Deposited     Entered into force

Switzerland	14 January 1993	10 March 1995	29 April 1997
Syria	—	14 September 2013	14 October 2013

                                                                   

Devastation of Homs, Syria "It has been widely reported in the Western media that women and children trapped in Homs are to be rescued - allowed to get out of the city. At the time of writing civilians are leaving but it is of little comfort, the old city is beyond rescue. The losses that this city has endured surpass piecemeal attempts at intervention."
In fact it is a double siege; 73 Christian civilians with their priest are being held as hostages by troops, who are in turn being besieged with their families.  Only the chemicalfactory was the pinpointed target.  These people were not injured. I hope they were able
to escape.  

"In July 2012, Syria publicly acknowledged that it possesses chemical weapons. For a number of years preceding this announcement, the United States intelligence community assessed that Syria has a stockpile of chemical weapons, including mustard gas, blister agents, and nerve agents such as sarin and VX. Syria has the capability to deliver these agents using aerial bombs, ballistic missiles, and artillery rockets.

"A secret State Department cable from the U.S. consul general in Istanbul said there was compelling evidence that the Syrian military had used a chemical weapon known as Agent 15 in Homs on December 23, 2012."

The use of Sarin gas is about as bad as you can get. "It is a highly toxic chemical weapon that can kill in minutes and is estimated to be 26 times deadlier than cyanide." The nerve agent sarin is believed to have been used in the Assad government’s alleged chemical weapons attack on Douma Syria; his own people who may have turned against him. 

                                            

Assad is a bad guy, we know that.  As bad guys, go, his replacement could be worse.  Who is he fighting against? Who are

the rebels?  Syrians who want him replaced.  Who are they all fighting against?  ISIS.  Russia is not earning any halos in this debacle.  Iran is the really bad of the baddies.  Who earns the halo?  France, England and the USA who are upholding the international law of not using the c in the NBC list of abhorrent ways to kill people in a war.  Others in this world seems to keep on testing the waters constantly to see if the light has changed.  It's still on red as far as this disgusting method of killing goes.  It was President Trump who was not afraid to take this moral stand along with President Emmanuel Macron of France and Prime Minister Theresa May of Great Britain.  

                                               

                  The German soldier fought prepared as Germany

                   used gas and chemicals against the Allies. 

More than 16 million soldiers died in WWI, many from the use of chemical weaponry.  Over the course of the war — which lasted from July 28, 1914, to Nov. 11, 1918 — about 3,000 chemicals were investigated for military use, and 50 toxic agents were deployed on battlefields across Europe, killing an estimated 90,000 to 100,000 people and leaving 1.3 million people injured.

Reference:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chemical_Weapons_Convention
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_parties_to_the_Chemical_Weapons_Convention
 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chemical_warfare
http://thehill.com/policy/international/383170-haley-pictures-of-dead-children-in-syria-chemical-attack-not-fake-news
https://www.architectural-review.com/rethink/view-from-homs-syria/8658696.article
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/3258573/what-is-sarin-gas-nerve-agent-syria-douma-trump-assad/
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-43697084
https://www.historyonthenet.com/how-many-people-died-in-ww1/
https://www.livescience.com/58569-chemical-weapons-world-war-one.html

Looking Back At My Aliyah To Israel and Now

The culture of Lebanon  reflects their warlike behavior.
This is a sculpture in Bint Jbeil, Lebanon of missiles aimed at Israel.
Syria has the real missiles aimed at Israel.  I remember
Major Hadad of the Christian Lebanon Militia  who helped guard Israel's border from terrorists.
Look at what has happened to it today.  Hezbollah terrorists have taken over Lebanon. Palestinian Gazans are acting out dangerously in every manner.  

Nadene Goldfoot                                                   

Syrian scud missiles aimed at Israel 

Syria had missiles lined up facing Israel since the 80's, probably bought from
Russia.
Israel and Russia have had several chats about this of  late.  

                                                                         

The Golan Heights are so close to Safed, where I had lived.
Missiles from Syria are only 3 miles away from Golan Heights.
It's only 31.3 miles from Safed to Golan Heights. 
North Korea's ICBM missile range is anywhere from 4,000 to 8,100 miles.

It was 38 years ago in 1980 that I made aliyah to Israel.  That same year, my friend, Jack, was born in Damascus, Syria.  The distance between us was only 222.7 miles via highway M5.  Coming from Portland, Oregon, that's like comparing Portland's  driving distance  to  Mt. Vernon, Washington, which is 234.51 miles or 203.78 in nautical miles.

I tried very hard to get him into Israel when he became a refugee from the Syrian Civil War in 2012 which caused him to seek sanctuary in Egypt. That's when I met him on facebook, of all places.

 His desire to live in Israel was  because he was led to believe that his birth mother was a Jewish woman who was a friend of his Muslim father.  She had lived in the segregated Jewish Quarter on "Jew Street.'  Since he had been little, he had insisted on attending
his local Christian school, which he did until time to transfer to high school. He wanted to live a Jewish life, and not the life Damascus had to offer.

  When that seemed impossible to get him into Israel, I tried very hard to get him into the USA as a refugee, which he was.  This turned out to be impossible.  It was at a time that Obama was in office.  I did everything I could think of, contacting immigration lawyers, going to the local immigration center, speaking with those that decided who was eligible, contacting my local senator, and contacting the Jewish community.  Nothing helped.  He was a single young man.

The map above shows the distance from Portland, Oregon to Mt. Vernon, Washington which is 234.51 miles. 
Right now Turkey, Iran and Russia are situated in Syria  taking it over.
Their plan of course is to be able to attack Israel next.  It was bad enough with just
Assad in power with thousands of missiles pointed towards Israel.  Russia has been there for many years because Jack learned a little Russian from them being there.

Syrian refugees living in Egypt have been exiled and had  to seek other places to live.  Egypt's 

population was overly crowded for their own resources anyway.  There was no future

for refugees in Egypt.  Even Jack  as an educated man had problems.  Syrians going to Egypt had no problems with the language as the United States is confronted with.  They all spoke Arabic, just had different accents.  

                                                                           

Listening to Madeline Albright on CNN this morning, I hear even her not understanding

how taking in refugees at this time in history is quite different from taking in refugees at 

other periods, which, by the way, was always almost impossible for Jews because of the 

inhumane anti-Semitism that has existed since Roman days.  I don't remember anyone ever raising the riot-act because Jews were being mistreated when they couldn't enter any country when refugees from the Holocaust.  She herself lost many of her family members in the Holocaust and can't see the differences between them and today's refugees who could have been the axis  powers, terrorists themselves instead of those whose lives were being taken.  There wasn't that problem in the 2nd World War.  

                                                                     

        

This time, most single male refugees in particular could be members of terrorist groups or 

drug pushers;anoather of our problems where  people have entered who would bring harm to Americans.  Never before in history have 

refugees needed to be screened for their honesty in just wanting to have a chance to live.  

There's no way that my friend Jack can prove his honesty since all his records have been 

destroyed in the destruction happening in Syria.  He needs his college transcripts, diploma,

job qualifications, birth certificate, things we all would need.  How can he prove his innocence

in not being involved with terrorism?  How can the USA vet such people from this country?  I only hope that one day he'll get the chance to try.  

We've had bad experiences with refugees of late, and they come from either Mexico or have 

been extremist Muslims.  We're wary of more than one type of refugee.  What we've had a lot of are English speakers.  It seems that everyone voicing an opinion on TV has an accent showing they weren't born in this country.  Immigration has not come to a standstill.   

                                                                           

It was in 70 CE that the Romans, who had taken Jerusalem, burned down the Temple and the city

and took many Jews prisoner, marching them to Rome as slaves along with all the Temple booty. 

Jews were no longer allowed in Judah, which had been the southern end of Israel,  but many managed to hide out there, anyway.  This happened 1948 years ago.  It was in  May 1948 CE that Israel was reborn again, amazingly.

 Celebrating this remarkable date is what's causing the Palestinian rioters in Gaza to demonstrate with their madness.  They don't just demonstrate like teachers in the states wanting raises, they are violent!      The picture below tells of their reason to demonstrate. They still, after 70 years, have not accepted the fact that Israel exists and is there to stay.  Of course they're being fed a different history from the true facts, like the fact that there was never a country of Palestine; or that it's only the name of land named by the Romans and held by the Ottoman Empire who lost it, or that it was the land that Israel and Judah sat on for 3,000 years since Joshua.                     

                                                                     

The Jews with Moses numbered 650,000 at his last census on the Exodus from Egypt to Canaan.

The Jewish population  in May 1948 CE at the time of Israel's creation was 600,000.  For 2,000 years, Jews have had to wait to regain their homeland. For 2,000 years, they have been the scapegoats of every country they've lived in; some more, others less.  Whatever the foreign religion has been or whatever style political power it has been, they've all used the Jews as scapegoats to their problems.

All the while, through all their disasters, they've maintained their own religious beliefs of Judaism.

                                                                   

       

That was the joy I found in living in Israel.  Here is a picture of the Safed's Old City Inn.  Safed is one of the oldest cities in Israel, on top of a mountain at about the same height as Jerusalem.   It was unique to have my neighbors practicing the same religion as our family, or the stores really prepared for Passover.  Restaurants were kosher.  For an American from the West, it was unbelievable.  This city is so picturesque, and even has an artist's quarter with tons of galleries.  

I lived in a government  building where Jews and Muslims lived.  Once I had a horrible problem of a broken pipe in the building causing a river of water to enter my basement apartment and immediately an Israeli woman who spoke only Hebrew and Arabic and an Arab woman came to my aid.  All three of us were fighting the onslaught of water.  They could speak to each other but I couldn't say much at all.  What an experience that was!  We all faced the danger of being surrounded by crazed enemies  and wild situations together. 

                                                                           

In 2012, I met my Syrian friend, Jack on Facebook,  and from that and skyping and chatting a lot and taking notes, I became very interested in the plight he had found himself in.  My book that I finally wrote is full of Syrian facts from those days  that I had dug out from newspapers, books and articles including what they were doing with chemicals found that were used to kill people. It may be amateurishly written, but is loaded with some very interesting details through the eyes of his family reacting to what I had discovered.  

I had left Israel after watching  Israeli TV for 5 years where I saw TV streaming in from Syria and Lebanon.  I saw Syrian soldiers doing a horrible thing where they were biting animals!  I guess they were trying to scare anyone watching as to how ferocious they were, and indeed, they were behaving in such a primitive manner that I about  threw up.   From that experience to meeting Jack, who couldn't kill a fly, who was exemplary of the most humane person I've met, was quite a stretch.  I guess every country contains all kinds, but it's really hard to find people we do admire, like who I had met.  

.      

References: https://www.timesofisrael.com/iran-backed-forces-could-be-3-miles-from-israel-under-syria-deal-report/

https://www.wired.com/story/north-koreas-missile-test-puts-entire-us-in-range/

 "Israel Destroyed Russian Shipment of Anti-Ship Missiles to Syria (Eschatology Watch)"

Messages From A Syrian Jew Trapped In Egypt by Nadene Goldfoot 

How Moses Wrote the Torah and Why It Hasn't Been Changed

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