Commentaries, Analysis, And Editorials -- October 5, 2014

VP Biden Apologizes for Telling Truth About Turkey, Saudi and ISIS -- Christopher Dickey, Daily Beast

The vice president’s remarks last week provoked a diplomatic firestorm among key Sunni allies in the region. But he was just telling it like it is.



Vice President Joe Biden is apologizing again for speaking the truth. After talking for an hour and a half at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy Forum last Thursday, he took a question from a student who asked a wise question: “In retrospect do you believe the United States should have acted earlier in Syria, and if not, why is now the right moment?"



Biden, predictably, said “the answer is ‘no’ for two reasons.” The first being the unreliability, incompetence and radicalism of the forces the United States would have been supporting on the ground. No real surprise there. But then he said what everyone in the region knows and The Daily Beast has reported extensively:



“My constant cry was that our biggest problem is our allies — our allies in the region were our largest problem in Syria,” Biden told his listeners in remarks subsequently posted on the White House YouTube channel (go to 1:32:00 if you want to skip the earlier speech).



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Commentaries, Analysis, And Editorials -- October 5, 2014

Has Turkey Joined the Anti-ISIS Coalition to Counter the Kurds? -- Benny Avni, Benny Avni



Yemen's Capital Fell To A Rebel Group And The World Hardly Noticed -- Eline Gordts, Huffington Post



Yemen Violence: Why The Houthi Rebels In Yemen Threaten Gulf States And Could Help Al Qaeda -- Alessandria Masi, IBTimes



Netanyahu: In Middle East, you need at least three to tango -- CNN



Cost to rebuild Gaza? $4 billion, political will -- Karin Laub, AP



Supreme Leader's health raises questions about Iranian succession -- Babak Dehghanpisheh, Reuters



Israeli Prime Minister: ISIS and Nuclear Iran Are ‘Twin Challenges’ -- Nolan Feeney, Time



Refugee numbers rising: four questions about those from Syria and beyond -- Howard LaFranchi, CSM



Will Hong Kong Become the Next Tiananmen? -- Ron Gluckman, Vocativ



6 Questions You Might Have About Hong Kong’s Umbrella Revolution -- Rishi Iyengar, Time



China: A Crack in the Great Firewall -- Zach Toombs, The Diplomat



Russia Has No Way Back From Sanctions War -- Fyodor Lukyanov, Moscow Times



Mass grave found in Mexico raising fears it could hold bodies of missing students -- Whitney Eulich, CSM



Photos: As Colombia Pursues Peace, Millions Remain Displaced -- Karla Zabludovsky, Newsweek



How the world’s health organizations failed to stop the Ebola disaster -- Washington Post



Ebola threat in U.S., and we're not prepared to contain it, experts warn -- Luis Fábregas, Adam Smeltz and Megha Satyanarayana, Stars and Stripes/The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review (MCT)



Battle of the Upstarts: Houston vs. San Francisco Bay -- Joel Kotkin, Daily Beast