Though I do read/listen to a lot of MSM my opinions on the ME and what happens there come directly from my experience as a moderator on a blog site that was mainly a middle eastern blog. I started out there posting a lot of MSM stuff, the guy who ran the blog challenged me to look at alternative media. I spent months combing through articles from sites he recommended and look at a variety of issues and groups involved. Spent months googling stuff on the various conflicts and deciphering who all the groups were. It wouldn't matter one iota if we were there or not they'd still kill each unabated over issues that most go back hundreds of years...that's how deep the hatred is among themselves to each other. The only time they deflect away from hating each other is when we intervene then we become their main focus, the bad guys. When we leave, which we have managed to do from time to time, they just go back to killing one another. Yes that is their right to do so but underneath it all when assessing it it leaves no doubt in one's mind what so ever that if the worse of worse of themselves wins, gains control of the resources which enable them to buy arms their is no doubt in my mind that once they were no longer focused on themselves they'd be focused on other countries of the world and getting rid of those so called enemies also.

In the end of the reality of it all considering the way they conduct themselves among themselves over these minute historical differences and would genocide each other over them it is them who has to present to the world that they can live humanely and respect their differences between each other before trusting them of being capable of doing such to the rest of the world.

That whole experience led me down a path of severe depression for quite some time as I had to come to grips with the fact that the potential for peace in the middle east would likely never come to fruition as there doesn't appear to be a route to go down that would solve such a complex mix of issues.