Richie, you seem always to be looking for an argument. I re-read my post and I'm baffled where you reached the conclusion that I "pointed" at Israel as the trigger for Middle East unrest. I didn't and even after re-reading the article, neither did the author. Did you read the article?

But so long as you raise the point, yes to a large degree I do assign a lot of the blame for unrest in the Middle East to the way Israel has conducted itself in the region. They take full advantage of the military capabilities that the U.S. provides them (and for which we will be blamed) to not only refuse to negotiate with the Palestinians, but to put a stick in their eye by continuing to build settlements on their land. The only land with water in their area, by the way.

If by attacking Iran they start a war in the region will it be their fault? That's hard to say. Clearly Iran won't negotiate with anyone either, exhibiting the immunity they have as the result of their close relationships with China and Russia. So they're at least half to blame. If Israel bombs their nuclear facilities, power grid and other key utilities, they certainly can be assigned the other half of the blame.

But the point of my post is that whether we believe it or not, the Islamic world will blame the United States for an Israeli attack on Iran and any regional war that results. I hope the Israeli military is ready to defend their small country without the U.S. If you put the Iranian and Syrian armies together, as well as the Palestinians and maybe the Egyptians, along with any other rag tag troops that want to see Israel eradicated (like the Palestinians), Israel may find that they've bitten off m ore than they can chew.

Then the question becomes, what does the U.S. do? Will we be the last man in the fight? You can be sure that China and Russia will be backing Iran and any other country over there that has oil to sell, surreptitiously of course. Does the U.S. have the will to jump into another war to back Israel? Can we afford it?