Ever since St. Raygun, RW politicians have had their sights on the Middle East. [View all]

It's like a modern throw back to the Crusades. Even the stated motives for ME fighting and the unstated ones are the same -- opportunities for glory and personal gain sold to the public as a righteous cause.

Not that the other side was totally innocent. Middle East nations were determined to conquer the world beyond their region and encroached on Europe from both the east (Balkans) and west (Spain and France).

Will these tensions never end?

One way to knock the wind out of the sails of both sides today would be to rely more and more on solar and renewable energy, making oil based wealth less valuable. There still would be products and machinery that rely on petroleum, but the demand for and wealth from oil would decrease. So would the finances of oligarchs who are so invested in oil.