Middle East turmoil will continue without new leaders

We have had several generations of diverse world leaders since World War II: presidents, diplomats, dictators and organizations trying to solve political, social and economic problems derived from wars and historic mismanagement and misjudgments of critical events.

The past and current Middle East conflict has been a failure, a tragedy and a waste of human and financial capital as our focus has been on military solutions for a political problem. We have spent billions of dollars supporting Israel’s military machine to the glee of an extreme right-wing ultranationalist government. We are nowhere near a peaceful solution in this human catastrophe, yet we continue to feed the beast.

Our current global leaders and their political and military solutions have failed miserably in their efforts because they have not addressed the key issues in this latest Middle East conflict. In fact, they have added to the problem because they are obsolete in their diplomatic delivery of solutions.

We are seeing the birth of a new generation of potential leaders born out of the global protest that have taken place on the issue of occupation. They understand that feeding a military machine perpetuates generations of violence and has caused a backlash against a cruel and crude form of colonialism. This is our only hope if we have learned any lessons from history. Our leaders of today are using old failed methods linked to the past. We are losing our Democratic creed, but Israel has lost it entirely.

Kamel Aossey

Minnetonka, Minn.