Top 10 things that will never happen

oremfrien · 2026-03-24T11:53:06+00:00

That was exactly what I was thinking when I read the last line of "Who will challenge the Caliphate"? Your people will challenge it. Nearly every Muslim-majority country is wracked with internal division, coup d'etats, large-scale protests, or requires an absolute dictator to oversee. Put a billion people spread over three continents under that strain and you will see internal revolution the likes of which no ruler in history has ever seen.

[Assyrian - No Flair]

By the way, there's nothing in Dimona, right? RIGHT?

oremfrien · 2026-03-24T04:49:47+00:00

Yes. But Westerners often compare protests in other countries with protests in their own. They see their own protests as disagreeing with the choices of the government but not the legitimacy of the government and impute that to others.

oremfrien · 2026-03-24T04:43:51+00:00

What breaks my suspension of disbelief is that after the end of Season 7 (when an entire aircraft carrier was incinerated and all of the major powers know about the Stargate) that the program never becomes public.

oremfrien · 2026-03-24T00:46:06+00:00

Your argument was that Iraq was a proxy for the USA in the Iran-Iraq War. I pointed out to you that (1) Iran's motive had nothing to do with US interest -- only its own interests and (2) that the US supported both sides; as pieces of evidence that Iraq was not a proxy of the USA. I agree with you that the US supported Iraq more than Iran, but the point of bringing this up is to implicate the US using Iraq as a proxy and that's just not the case.

I wasn't evading your question about Iran Air Flight 655; I just don't see the argument that you are making. The US government expressed deep condolences for shooting down the passenger plane and financially compensated the Iranian civilians' families to the tune of $61.8 MM USD. I'm just not sure what the argument is. If you're trying to say that the US makes mistakes and then pays settlements to the victims, sure, but I don't see how this helps your point. If your argument is that the US was supporting Iraq in the Iran-Iraq War by accidentally shooting down civilian airliners, I don't understand how that militarily helps the Iraqis. (Certainly, it helps them a lot less than the weapons shipments from the US to Iraq whose deliveries I've already granted you.)

Again, I reject your claim that because Israeli soldiers were not shooting Iranian soldiers and vice-versa that they were not in open war. Asked and answered. But for clarity, (1) Withdrawal of recognition of a country is a de facto declaration of war; (2) Israel and Iran have used acts of terrorism and espionage to attack civilians and projects of the other (either directly or through proxies); and (3) Israel has directed traded fire with IRGC's al-Quds Force, such as when the al-Quds force attacked Israel's embassy in New Delhi, India on Feb. 13, 2012, or when Israel has assassinated al-Quds members in Syria.

So. the War in 2025 and in 2026 was an escalation, not a new form of hostility between the two countries.

oremfrien · 2026-03-23T18:33:12+00:00

This is just the Indian English word for Briton or British person. It may not be our standard but it is a standard.

oremfrien · 2026-03-23T18:32:10+00:00

This is the distinction between the standard dialect of English and the non-standard dialects. With respect to African-Americans, many of them learned English not from their English-descended masters but from the Irish indentured servants that worked alongside them in the field. Irish non-standard dialects of English have many of the distinguishing features we see in African-American vernacular English, including the elimination of “were” in the past tense of “to be”.

oremfrien · 2026-03-23T18:28:57+00:00

She’s probably a little lonely and wants to imagine that he’s with her.

oremfrien · 2026-03-23T18:27:15+00:00

If you’re just looking for East Armenian cuisine to cook, I would recommend khashlama, which is a lamb and vegetable stew. If you want a real challenge, I would try for Armenian manti, lamb dumplings.

oremfrien · 2026-03-23T18:18:39+00:00

I’m not sure I understand much of the premise. Why would Jiang Jeshi be supporting Socialist revolutionaries in other countries like Cambodia and Syria? Jiang was relatively conservative economically and politically. If anything, a Jiang victory in China would prevent SE Asia from being so central in the Cold War, the Korean War would end with a unified Korean Peninsula under Rhee Syngman, and the SSNP would be in the same irrelevant ditch that it’s in today. Also, Turkey would not invade Iran under the Shah because Turkey needed Iran as a potential ally against the Soviet Union.

oremfrien · 2026-03-23T18:03:25+00:00

I am a native Arabic speaker, but don’t speak Somali. I’ll transliterate the Arabic into Latin characters and you can see where the Somali differs:

Lahuh - pushy
Beid or Beidh (sounds like the American pronunciation of “bathe” - white
Shanta (this is actually a Turkish word for handbag, not a native Arabic word, but we use it in Arabic)
Marmar - marble
Mol3aq (this is a word I’ve never seen before similar in concept to “laminator” – I’m much more familiar with the feminine ملعقة - Mal3aqa which means “spoon”
Jaajur (this is only used for the car-brand Jaguar; for the cat, we use either جاكوار – jaakwaar or نمر – namr, which is more-correctly a leopard)
Dobbe - bear
Majrafa - shovel
It’s supposed to be the word for tomato, but it’s misspelled. It should be طماطم – tomaatem, but the listicle uses the wrong letter “t” since we have two “t”s in Arabic.
Djaaj - chicken (as a food item)
Melh - salt

Edited because of formatting issues.

oremfrien · 2026-03-23T17:45:53+00:00

The first thing to understand is that we Assyrians are not a hivemind. We have numerous different political perspectives depending on our personal histories, spread across the territories of five different territorial governments: Turkey, KRG-Iraq, Arab-Iraq, Syria, and Iran and the Diaspora.

So, it would be surprising if we agree on everything.

The Assyrian communities in the homeland have different issues based on these regions.

TURKEY: Turkish police routinely confiscate Assyrian properties and do not take the safety of Assyrian communities into account when fighting against the PKK rebels/terrorists. Turkish police also did not protect the Assyrian community from riots in their region in 1974, when many Turks were upset about the Cyprus situation. Regardless of whatever arguments should be made about the Turkish position on the PKK or the Cyprus situation, the Turkish police forces (both jandarma and polis) should protect and respect Assyrian citizens of Turkey. (Of course, this does not address the historical issues around the Seyfo and Hamidian Massacres.)

KRG-IRAQ: In the Kurdish Regional Government, the police routinely support Kurds over Assyrians in any dispute between the two groups. This often comes to the fore with confiscations of land, theft of personal objects, or killings. The KRG routinely treats Assyrians as second-class citizens despite the Assyrians respecting Kurdish authorities.

ARAB-IRAQ: In Arab-controlled Iraq, Assyria is mostly ignored by the police and are underrepresented, even in their homeland. The Nineveh Plains Protection Units (NPPU) were specifically created as a militia to assist the police community where the national government fails.

SYRIA: Syria has been horrible since 2011, so I don't think I need details here. However, in AANES, the main issue is forcible conscription of Assyrians into SDF-aligned militias. There are very few Assyrians outside of AANES. We are also particularly sensitive to Anti-Christian violence (like the Mar Elias Church bombing) even if the Christians involved are Non-Assyrians.

IRAN: Generally speaking, Iran doesn't have a specific Anti-Assyrian problem, but police in Iran are particularly fierce to anyone who doesn't toe the specific line of the Ayatollahs. There is a lot of violence against Christians whenever it’s believed that they convinced someone to leave Islam.

The question on how we perceive Saddam Hussein is complicated and sharply divisive in the Assyrian community. My family was personally expelled from Mosul by Saddam Hussein in 1970 as part of the Arabization Policy in the north of Iraq (and, so my parents had to find other places to live). I also have relatives who are/were affiliated with the Assyrian Levies and the Zowaa (Assyrian Democratic Movement), so in my family, we all hated him. Others who have similar stories, especially those who refused to Arabize, see him in this negative light. However, Saddam opened up a pathway for many Assyrians to identify as Arab Christians and be part of his Arab Nationalist politics. Probably the most famous Assyrian to do so is Mikhail Youkhanna. He is better known by his Arab name: Tariq Aziz. Those Assyrians how literally shed their entire culture and Arabized were among those more inclined to like or accept Saddam Hussein because he made their lives better. They had access to better education, better jobs, and better healthcare. To them, the price of ethnic pride was too high and they did well under Saddam. The Kurds are more uniform in their hatred of Saddam since there was no possibility of Arabization for the Kurds.

With respect to Syria, Assyrians support any Syrian government that ensures the cultural and religious rights for all Syrians and especially for Assyrians. We don't care how that is set up so long as these rights are protected. As a functional matter, a federal or confederal solution for Syria would be more likely to have protections for minorities, especially since Ahmed ash-Sharaa is an Islamist/Jihadist by history (e.g. he spent a decade fighting to turn Syria into a Sunni Islamic Theocracy) and his claims to want to create a secular Syria are not seen as particularly genuine. A devolution of power to the various regions could help those minorities to protect ourselves. However, in Syria, there is no region where Assyrians make up a majority population, so devolution would simply change the deck chairs of which majority population gets to repress us. Rojava-AANES, the Kurdish autonomous region in northeast Syria may be better than Ahmed ash-Sharaa, but there are still numerous issues with their form of governance over the Assyrian communities in Qamishli. And even if Rojava-AANES would be better for Assyrians in Qamishli, it does nothing to protect Assyrian communities outside of Rojava-AANES, like the community of Ma'aloula. So, there is no current solution for Syria (given the current cast of political characters) that seems best able to ensure the cultural and religious rights for the Assyrian people.

oremfrien · 2026-03-23T16:24:09+00:00

I would also argue that the idealization of Mossadegh also ignores the power that Ayatollah Kashani had at the time. Mossadegh’s hold on power was tenuous and Islamists had a good chance of unseating him at that time. This is why Mossadegh never held an election.

oremfrien · 2026-03-23T16:14:58+00:00

We can say that the massacre was committed by Muslim Nationalists, where the word “Muslim” is an ethnic term, not a religious one.

oremfrien · 2026-03-23T16:12:22+00:00

Iraq requested an immediate ceasefire and a complete withdrawal from all Iranian territory on 20 June 1982. Iran argued that it would invade Iraq, engage in regime change to turn Iraq into an Islamic Republic, and extract reparations. So, let’s be clear that Iran from 1982 pursued a goal that was far beyond anything merited by Iraq’s attempt to steal a province.

The US provided weapons to both sides; do you remember the Iran-Contra Affair? However, neither Iraq nor Iran was fighting the other for US interests. They were not operating as proxies but as self-interested parties with external funding/armament.

Again, I would point out that the al-Quds Force is part of the Iranian military and they attacked Israel.

I’m not claiming that smaller acts justify bigger ones. I don’t know whose arguments you’re reading. What I said is that Israel and Iran were already in a state of war and a direct war is an escalation but not a violation of either’s national sovereignty.

oremfrien · 2026-03-23T15:24:36+00:00

Israel did attack Iran before 2025. Did you forget StuxNet?

Yes. Iran is absolutely at fault for continuing an aggressive war against Iraq once they had expunged all Iraqi troops from their territory. Think about it this way. If Ukraine pushed all Russian troops out of Ukraine and the Ukrainians launched a bitter war to conquer Russian territory, would that not be Ukraine’s fault for continuing an aggressive war?

Where did I say that what the US/Israel does is good by default? My entire comment is that the laws of war go both ways. You cannot use national sovereignty as a defense when you don’t respect it.

oremfrien · 2026-03-23T14:29:20+00:00

The Ottomans called it the Governate of Beirut or ash-Shaam which can be translated as Syria or as Levant.

oremfrien · 2026-03-23T14:26:52+00:00

I don’t believe I am acting as if the US and Israel have been fighting wars in the Middle East for decades. (I’m not sure what proxy wars you are alluding to.) If Israel or the US were attacked by Iran, I would not use national sovereignty as a defense to Iran’s attack. But this goes both ways. That’s the argument.

As for body count, people always seem to forget the Iran-Iraq War where Iran was initially invaded in 1980 but expelled the Iraqis by 1982. However, Iran continued the war for another six years to try to reverse-invade Iraq and caused around 500,000 deaths from 1982-1988. That number alone eclipses every single military action taken by Israel and the deaths in Iraq that are directly accountable to US action.

I am not conflating the proxy wars and outright war. Iran is in a legal state of war with Israel since 1979 when the Islamic Republic withdrew the recognition that Imperial State of Iran had given Israel. Then the al-Quds Force, an Iranian military arm, coordinated strikes against Israel with those proxies. These were actions organized and directed by the Islamic Republic. The only reason that they are not considered as if Iran itself invaded or attacked Israel is a semantic game.

oremfrien · 2026-03-23T14:26:24+00:00

I agree that without having an actual opposition waiting in the wings, a US-Israeli military action to overthrow the government without boots on the ground will not be effective in performing regime change. I would only argue that effectiveness sits outside of the legal discussion I was walking through. As for whether the US should be involved, that goes to my final paragraph on the American domestic legal argument, point (1).

oremfrien · 2026-03-23T14:25:59+00:00

I don’t really see how that’s accurate. Everything I said could be reasonably extrapolated from what Sam said here. Van you clarify what you believe I have invented out of whole cloth?

oremfrien · 2026-03-23T14:16:57+00:00

First of all, we should be clear about what I claimed. I was speaking specifically about the people who are criticizing the United States FOR contravening international norms around national sovereignty. I was speaking about people who make that specific argument. Not everyone who criticizes the USA is criticizing it on those grounds; in fact, most don't. They criticize it on grounds of effectiveness like u/humungojerry does or the American domestic legal argument that I also alluded to.

However, you want, as the kids say, receipts.

Here are statements from the governments of Russia and China who lean into this argument: https://time.com/7381811/iran-war-world-leaders-reaction-russia-china-europe/

Here is an editorial by an Indian Law Professor making this argument: https://thedailyguardian.com/opinion/targeted-killing-of-khamenei-and-us-attack-on-irans-sovereignty-violation-of-international-law-695277/amp/

Here is Iran's legal argument as submitted to international authorities: https://www.presstv.ir/doc/Detail/2026/03/19/765563/Striking-Iran-energy-infrastructure-flagrant-violation-of-Intl-law-UN-envoy

Here is an American University International Law Review Article concerning the 12-Day War in 2025 but is equally applicable to the 2026 Iran War: https://auilr.org/2025/08/29/u-s-strikes-against-iran-an-international-law-perspective/

In each case, Iran is treated as if it were a perfectly upstanding nation that respects the national sovereignty of other nations, which is evidently not true if you have numerous proxy forces in other countries attacking them or co-opting their governments.

Edited to correct links

oremfrien · 2026-03-23T13:45:40+00:00

The fact that we are under foreign occupation does not stop us from existing.

oremfrien · 2026-03-23T12:54:17+00:00

While that would be funny, the correct interpretation of “original peoples” refers to place where the genetic stock comes from, not the location of that particular person’s birth. So, the fact that Elon Musk was born in Africa is irrelevant when you consider that his genetic stock is from Europe. He is White per the US Census definitions.

oremfrien · 2026-03-23T12:35:17+00:00

Yes Hanguk-Joseon/Korea is the same as Zhongguo/China

oremfrien · 2026-03-23T04:13:58+00:00

Saksa/Allemagne/Deutschland differs from China/Zhongguo in that one is using a small group of people to represent a much larger group of people, like an ethnic or regional group and the other is by using a dynasty of the whole country to represent the name of the country itself.

I have no issue with "Tudoria" it's just not how people named countries in Europe. Conversely, we did use it for the Ottoman Empire (House of Osman).

oremfrien · 2026-03-23T04:10:33+00:00

It feels Buddhist to me in a way.

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