Refugees

One "side effect" of the war in Lebanon is that a lot of Lebanese with dual citizenship are moving elsewhere. And leaving their maids behind.
And a lot of the maids are Filippinas, who are hiding in the church of the Miraculous Medal until the government her gets them out, either home or to another area.

The dirty little secret is that there are few jobs here, and many prefer the danger to being "safe" with out food or school fees so their kids have a chance at life.

The dirty little question no one is asking GMA is: Why do you brag that you visited Spain and they agreed to give 500 000 Pinoys jobs, or Libya who will hire a couple thousand Pinoy nurses, instead of bringing business here?

The question no body is asking: Why are there 30 000 Philippinos and 30 000 Indians and 20 000 Indonesians there working, when in Gaza and in the West Bank and in Southern Lebanon the unemployment rate is 40%?

The third thing no one questions is how terror groups embed with locals until hatred becomes the new normal.

One sees parallels of this with FARC and other narcoterror groups in Colombia, and with Communists in Viet Nam or Mugabe in Zimbabwe or the NPA here or in Nepal. Or the Taliban in Afghanistan and Somalia. Or the NPA and MILF in some areas of the Philippines. Essentially they "rule" via terror, but they combine intimidation and even murder of their enemies with help: Medical care, schools, helping those in need...

People just want to be left alone. So if given a choice between safety with tyranny or anarchy/war, they chose safety.

They think: They provide us schools and clinics. They don't think: They shot the teachers, they threw out the doctor,so the only school we has teaches their ideology instead of algebra, and the clinic has a nurse's aid not a doctor... and if they weren't here we'd be better off..because people who don't have experience don't know better.

But as long as their power is merely local, they can't be too radical or the locals will ask the government to intervene and help them rid themselves.
What is bad is if they actually take over the government (which under the UN means no one is allowed to interfere) they can literally get away with murder.

The Cambodian massacres are one example. The Taliban another. And Mugabe's decimation of his enemies by destroying their urban dwellings so they have to return to rural areas, where he controls the food supply, is another.

Alas, the only way to get them to "reform" is to make people so tired of the horrors of war that they decide peace is actually preferable. This is how the MILF and NPA has been largely reintegrated into Filippino society.

So the news is full of Israel's attack on Lebanon. But of course they are not "attacking" Lebanon but trying to remove Hizbollah's missles, and Hizbollah has had twenty years to entrench themselves into the local population...and they are hiding behind locals who stay by choice or by force...so the result is Israeli strikes kill civilians, and the Arab press (mainly run by dictatorship) and CNN promptly show the casualties: Voila. Instant propaganda.

So the tirade that Israel is bad, Israel is terrible continues...because if the chorus got weak, perhaps people would question what does Israel have to do with their own lack of jobs or lack of eduacation...and why is their unemployment rate 40% when a Pinoy from Santa Cruz is able to work at a Lebanese factory and make good money...

Israel is their scapegoat. and as the song goes:

You've got to be taught to hate and fear
You've got to be taught from year to year
It's got to be drummed in your dear little ear
You've got to be carefully taught

You've got to be taught to be afraid
Of people whose eyes are oddly made
And people whose skin is a different shade
You've got to be carefully taught

You've got to be taught before it's too late
Before you are six or seven or eight
To hate all the people your relatives hate
You've got to be carefully taught
You've got to be carefully taught

So, where have been all these pacifists for the last twenty years, when Hizbollah was preaching hatred?

The real pacifists and Christians and other groups who I respect have actually been right there in the midst. (been there, done that).

But too many are merely posseurs whose real religion is "me me me" and they prefer to preach hatred of America and peace for our time because it makes them feel self righteous...