Aid for Israel by AnthonyT

Quote:
Originally posted by Wulfenstar:
Of COURSE I make a distinction. The Jew down the street who isnt doing anything to anybody doesnt bother me.

Its the Zionists.

Also, I may have made a flippant remark about the diamond trade. But it is true. Look it up.

What about all the free air that Jews use up with their big noses? Does that bother you some Hans?...and did ya hear the one about the difference between a pizza and a Jew?

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Monday, January 14, 2008 10:40 AM

http://youtu.be/VUnGTXRxGHg

As I said in my previous post. The Jew down the street, not bothering anyone...does not bother me.

HOWEVER...The ones pushing Zionistic policies, and decrying anyone who opposes them as an "anti-semite", DO bother me.

(Also, those who take this discussion to a racist level..."

I DO NOT CARE ABOUT ISRAEL. In fact, if it was gone tomorrow, I think the world would be a better place.

Harsh words, perhaps rash, I know. But think about it for a minute. Without Israel, there would be peace in the Middle East.

The fundamentalist Christians would bemaon the loss of it...but really, wouldn't they be better off too? Maybe then they could wake up from the "dogma of the Left Behind" a little. If their Rapture couldn't come, maybe they could rejoin society...just a little bit.

Hell, the Islamic folks might even call off their jihad...(long shot, I know) so we could back off from Iraq.

We would have all the money that we dump into Israel, and could use it for our own problems. (Instead of propping up a failed, evil, country that shouldnt exist in the first place.)

But while Im wishing, Id like to win the lottery...lol

......and a pony....one which doesn't bite.

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Monday, January 14, 2008 11:55 AM

KIRKULES

Quote:
Originally posted by Wulfenstar:

I DO NOT CARE ABOUT ISRAEL. In fact, if it was gone tomorrow, I think the world would be a better place.

Without Israel, there would be peace in the Middle East.

I'm not a middle eastern historian, but I believe that there has been a conflict in the region every few years for the last 1000 years or so. Did Israel somehow cause Saddam Hussein to invade Kuwait or did he want their oil and a platform to attack Saudi Arabia.

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Monday, January 14, 2008 12:04 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Wulfenstar:
I DO NOT CARE ABOUT ISRAEL. In fact, if it was gone tomorrow, I think the world would be a better place.

Harsh words, perhaps rash, I know. But think about it for a minute. Without Israel, there would be peace in the Middle East.

So you are saying that without Israel there will no longer be any sectarian violence? Let's just wipe Israel and her people off the map and Sunni will embrace Shia and all will be good again. Just curious, what was the Iran / Iraq war about again? Oh, that's right, it was Israel's fault.

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Monday, January 14, 2008 5:53 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Wulfenstar:
As I said in my previous post. The Jew down the street, not bothering anyone...does not bother me.

HOWEVER...The ones pushing Zionistic policies, and decrying anyone who opposes them as an "anti-semite", DO bother me.

One of my colleagues at work remarked once that “Every racist knows a good nigger.” It doesn’t make any difference what words you use to sugar coat it. It’s not the word that is the problem. That’s what I tried to explain to Signym, but it just went in one ear and out the other. The problem is the negative one-sided way you describe the Palestinian-Israeli conflict to load the whole thing onto Jews. You describe this conflict as a bunch of Nazi-Jews who go to Palestine and start randomly killing Palestinians for no reason. That’s not what happened. It doesn’t make any difference whether you call them Jews, Zionists, Israelis or Fluffy Purple People Eaters. It’s your whole conception of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict that is completely screwed up. I don’t know if this is what you intended to say, but it is how you‘re coming across to me. If you would like to re-evaluate your position and get back to me, then I’ll reconsider it. If it is your intent to come across with an anti-Semitic argument, then that’s your prerogative too, but I’m not going to entertain discussion at that level.

Nihil est incertius vulgo, nihil obscurius voluntate hominum, nihil fallacius ratione tota comitiorum.

Nothing is more unpredictable than the mob, nothing more obscure than public opinion, nothing more deceptive than the whole political system.

-- Cicero

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 2:58 AM

TRAGICSTORY

1. Yes, but Palestine is "African Nation" corrupt. They are on par with Sudanese War Lords and military dictatorships. The more money you give, the more they take. The Palestinians live under the Mob for lack of a better term. Thugs with guns who take their money and don't even bother to call it taxes.

2. No one is going to give up power to go back to herding goats. You have to remember, most of the terrorists/millitants are uneducated, unskilled and beyond their terrorist/military training have no skills. Now, their boss might say "Yes" to peace, but they will not. No one will give up the power to go back to being a nobody.

3. In Palestine, off the top of my head, you have Hezbollah, Hamas, Fatah, PLO, Islamic Jihad, Al-Aqsah Mytars Brigade and each of them have splinter groups... Fatah said "peace" and Hamas took over the Gaza Strip. Now Fatah says its living up promise and Hamas keeps sending missiles into Israel. And Palestine has no problems getting weapons, they import them from the Middle East. The weapons caches Israel has found are amazing.

And as for religious, most Israeli Jews do not practice any form of religion. There are numerous religious laws but that is because of how their parliament is set up. The UltraOrthadoxNutballs have a small but needed block in the parliment that is needed for the "winner" of the elections to start building their coalition government.

-----------
"Societies are supported by human activity, therefore they are constantly threatened by the human facts of self-intrest and stupidity." --Peter Berger

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 2:59 AM

TRAGICSTORY

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 3:05 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
The problem is the negative one-sided way you describe the Palestinian-Israeli conflict to load the whole thing onto Jews. You describe this conflict as a bunch of Nazi-Jews who go to Palestine and start randomly killing Palestinians for no reason. That’s not what happened. It doesn’t make any difference whether you call them Jews, Zionists, Israelis or Fluffy Purple People Eaters. It’s your whole conception of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict that is completely screwed up.

Bravo! You stated it perfectly. Jew haters only see the parts of the news and history they want to...the part where Israel looks bad. They fail to realize and understand that Israel has consistently over the last 4 decades attempted to make peace with these people. It has always been some element of "The Palestinians" which commit a murderous atrocity to end the peace...then Israel answers back...but usaully the media don't cover the entire story...just that some kid got shot by Israeli troops. The Palestinian have become the greatest group of useful idiots for Jew haters worldwide since Nazi geneticists announced their racial theories back in the 1930's. Heinrich Himmler, head of the SS and self-appointed expert on racial purity would be grinning ear to ear these days.

Also, there are no Zionists. That faction of Israel disappreared in the late 1940's. That's just a term that Jew haters like to use so as to appear not so trogladytic. By all rights there shouldn't even be an Egypt, or Syria, or Lebanopn today. Israel was sneak-atacked by coalition forces of the UAR
and defeated those countries in a humiliatingly swift manner. If Israel was "zionistic" in any way their country would be about 100 times larger than it is today, and they wouldn't have any hostile neighbors.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 5:17 AM

http://youtu.be/VUnGTXRxGHg

Quote:
Originally posted by Jongsstraw:
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
The problem is the negative one-sided way you describe the Palestinian-Israeli conflict to load the whole thing onto Jews. You describe this conflict as a bunch of Nazi-Jews who go to Palestine and start randomly killing Palestinians for no reason. That’s not what happened. It doesn’t make any difference whether you call them Jews, Zionists, Israelis or Fluffy Purple People Eaters. It’s your whole conception of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict that is completely screwed up.

Bravo! You stated it perfectly. Jew haters only see the parts of the news and history they want to...the part where Israel looks bad. They fail to realize and understand that Israel has consistently over the last 4 decades attempted to make peace with these people. It has always been some element of "The Palestinians" which commit a murderous atrocity to end the peace...then Israel answers back...but usaully the media don't cover the entire story...just that some kid got shot by Israeli troops. The Palestinian have become the greatest group of useful idiots for Jew haters worldwide since Nazi geneticists announced their racial theories back in the 1930's. Heinrich Himmler, head of the SS and self-appointed expert on racial purity would be grinning ear to ear these days.

Also, there are no Zionists. That faction of Israel disappreared in the late 1940's. That's just a term that Jew haters like to use so as to appear not so trogladytic. By all rights there shouldn't even be an Egypt, or Syria, or Lebanopn today. Israel was sneak-atacked by coalition forces of the UAR
and defeated those countries in a humiliatingly swift manner. If Israel was "zionistic" in any way their country would be about 100 times larger than it is today, and they wouldn't have any hostile neighbors.

So you are denying that the UN set up Israel? That they (the US included) took the land from the Palestinians and just gave it to someone else? Ok....

So...by your reasoning, if the Native Americans had the means to fight back, and used any and all means neccessary...they would have been in the wrong for doing so? It would be one-sided to say that the Europeans who came to this country, robbed and pillaged, were wrong?

Wow....

Ok, I can understand why you are so vehement about Israel. After the shit and horror the Nazis visited on them, the Jews took the land and decided to hold on.. NO-MATTER-WHAT.

Fine. There are a lot of cases in the world where nations were formed by people who did the same thing. Great. My issue is, WHY THE FRAK ARE WE GIVING THEM OUR MONEY?

Why do we allow the news stories to propagandize the "heroic" Jews fighting the good fight and killing Palestinian "terrorists" ( i.e. some terrorists, some women and children).

Where is the balanced coverage?

Its not one-sided, you are correct. But the Jews of Israel, and even of America, have as much blood on their hands as any Palestinian. The Israelis are not innocent defenders of their country. They routinly engage in covert operations to assinate Palestinian leaders, lauch rockets into Palestine (killing women and children), build walls to make Palestine areas a ghetto, deny or reroute water supplies, and genrally act like terroists themselves.

Its the same ugly thing.

Now answer the questions Ive proposed:

1. Why are we giving money to Israel.
2. Why is there no balanced coverage by the media of what is really happening.
3. Why should Americans even care what is going on over there? Other than our duty as the worlds policeman I mean.
4. Why must you call anyone who disagrees with what the Jews are doing in Israel "Jew-haters", "anti-semites" ect? Is that your only answer? Using propaganda words, and political correctness to try and force me into your way of thinking? If so, then you are simply proving my point from above about how the Jews learned well from the Nazis.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 5:29 AM

I read your spin, and I sense your desperation. There is ZERO moral equivalency between Israel & Palestinians. For decades Arafat STOLE ALL the Palestininans money & blamed Jews. He hid it away in banks in Switzerland, and his wife lives even today like a queen in France. Every time Israel conceded a point to make peace, Arafat or some other splinter group would launch strikes inside Israel to dis-engage the process...Arafat liked getting his "aid" money a lot! Israel doesn't send women & children strapped with suicide bombs to blow up innocents in a pizzaria. They do go into Palestinian areas and demolish houses of suicide bombers, and they do target bomb makers and leaders who instruct, and forcibly coerce people to commit atrocities for them.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 5:44 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Wulfenstar:
Now answer the questions Ive proposed:

1. Why are we giving money to Israel.

Because as you stated earlier, the U.S., as part of the U.N., established the State of Israel. I'm sure Israel gets money from other U.N. countries as well.

Quote:
Originally posted by Wulfenstar:
2. Why is there no balanced coverage by the media of what is really happening.

So Palestine is not lobbing missles into Israel and Israel is not firing back?
For that matter, why is there no balanced coverage of the Iraq war?

Quote:
Originally posted by Wulfenstar:
3. Why should Americans even care what is going on over there? Other than our duty as the worlds policeman I mean.

Please see my first response.

Quote:
Originally posted by Wulfenstar:
4. Why must you call anyone who disagrees with what the Jews are doing in Israel "Jew-haters", "anti-semites" ect? Is that your only answer? Using propaganda words, and political correctness to try and force me into your way of thinking? If so, then you are simply proving my point from above about how the Jews learned well from the Nazis.

Same reason you don't blame all Americans if you do not like certain policies of the U.S. Government. It is short-sighted and wrong IMHO.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 5:50 AM

http://youtu.be/VUnGTXRxGHg

Quote:
Originally posted by Jongsstraw:
I read your spin, and I sense your desperation. There is ZERO moral equivalency between Israel & Palestinians. For decades Arafat STOLE ALL the Palestininans money & blamed Jews. He hid it away in banks in Switzerland, and his wife lives even today like a queen in France. Every time Israel conceded a point to make peace, Arafat or some other splinter group would launch strikes inside Israel to dis-engage the process...Arafat liked getting his "aid" money a lot! Israel doesn't send women & children strapped with suicide bombs to blow up innocents in a pizzaria. They do go into Palestinian areas and demolish houses of suicide bombers, and they do target bomb makers and leaders who instruct, and forcibly coerce people to commit atrocities for them.

You still have not answered my questions. If you can't thats ok.

If you won't...well thats a different story. It means the truth will destroy your argument.

As to the moral argument. If the UN or some other agency decided to give parts of America to some other hostile nation....for whatever reason....and we didnt have the milatary might we now enjoy.....and the only means of fighting back was through suicide bombers....well I would hope that it wouldn't come to that, but if it did, I would also hope that there would be true patriots who would fight back with any and all means neccessry.

Don't get me wrong, the Palestinians are fighting stupidly (perhaps evily). But its from a position of weakness and desperation.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 5:58 AM

FREMDFIRMA

Your first mistake, Wulf, is trying to reason with a zealot.

The second would be buying any of what they're selling you.

You know, the very worst irony of this, is that if you go back along the path of history, like, way back... Muslims and Jews used to be quite good friends, overall.

The Jews would seek refuge with them from endless Christian persecution (and by the way they backstab em at every turn and corner, I doubt they've forgotten it) and even in many cases lived in shared communities...

The shining jewel of which was Medina, a city that was mutually shared by Christians, Muslims and Jews all living with each other peacefully under a treaty known as the Medina Compact, written by Mohammed himself in an attempt to bring peace between all the children of Ibrihim/Abraham - which, of course, in the end, did not work out too well, but it did, for a time.

Now, post WWII, as had been their policy for long and many years, the middle eastern nations were willing to offer them comfort and shelter, but land in the middle east... especially USEABLE land, is of a value you just cannot understand, you have to understand the history behind it, and why they are territorial to such a psychotic degree, is the rarity of useable land, and thus, the ONLY way you take turf in the middle east is by killing every living thing on it, period.

And with the massive influx of refugees, the jewish leaders of the time were very desperate, and felt a need to secure enough land to ensure their survival as a people, and remember what I said about the only way you can take it, right ?

Now imagine the reaction of folk who had ignored both Christian and Nazi propaganda about how treacherous and horrible these people were, folk who place a MUCH higher respect (often with violent consequences) on the principles of hospitality in general.
(See Also: Pashtunwali, for example)

And imagine their reaction to having their land taken, people slaughtered, by those Jews they so often aided and sheltered, and the UN, and those damned Christians (who sure as hell did not want these guys in THEIR country, being that historically they've been an uneasy neighbor..) helping it right along, ramming a dagger into the spine of the one people who more than any other treated them with respect.

That kind of a thing, especially given the actions of a nation that essentially began AS a rogue nation (See Also: Irgun) and has continued to be in every way shape and form (See Also: UN Sanctions) with a demonstrable habit of collective slaughter for little to no reason...

You know, like the incident that finally set ME against them, using helicopter gunships and armaments more or less given to them by the US, to rocket a street where a suspected "terrorist" might have been as a local school let out, slaughtering a great many children, and for nothing, cause they certainly didn't bag the guy, even if he existed - that was a turning point for me - they ARE a rogue state, as a people, meh, they're people, but that so-called-country has made it's own bed over there.

And the saddest damned part of it all is that the Palestinians are doing exactly the same thing, for exactly the same reasons - they feel their existance as a people is threatened, which let's be blunt, it IS, and that they are being pushed into the sea and ethnic cleansed in slow motion, with a damned lot of evidence to back the claim.

When you remove the incentive, even the MEANS, for a person to return to their life, if they have nothing to return to, nothing to rebuild and little chance of doing so without their oppressor just kicking their sand castle over again - THAT is what makes folks strap bombs to their chest and set them off in crowded cafes.

But in the end, for me, it comes back to those helicopter gunships, made in the good ole USA, with american ordinance beneath, and the bloody screams of torn apart schoolchildren as our gift to their oppressors murdered them.

To have my money taken by threat of force, which is what Taxation really is, and then handed over to THAT government, for it's endless atrocities like THAT, disgusts me beyond all measure, to see them hide behind the weapons that WE GAVE THEM, for free, paid for by money they looted from me and you.. from the parents and relatives of those children...

Call me what you will, but we invaded the wrong country if we really gave a shit about stopping terrorism.

-Frem

It cannot be said enough, those who do not learn from history, are doomed to endlessly repeat it

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 6:05 AM

http://youtu.be/VUnGTXRxGHg

Amen Frem. I cannot agree with you more.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 6:41 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Wulfenstar:
Quote:
Originally posted by Jongsstraw:
I read your spin, and I sense your desperation. There is ZERO moral equivalency between Israel & Palestinians. For decades Arafat STOLE ALL the Palestininans money & blamed Jews. He hid it away in banks in Switzerland, and his wife lives even today like a queen in France. Every time Israel conceded a point to make peace, Arafat or some other splinter group would launch strikes inside Israel to dis-engage the process...Arafat liked getting his "aid" money a lot! Israel doesn't send women & children strapped with suicide bombs to blow up innocents in a pizzaria. They do go into Palestinian areas and demolish houses of suicide bombers, and they do target bomb makers and leaders who instruct, and forcibly coerce people to commit atrocities for them.

You still have not answered my questions. If you can't thats ok.

If you won't...well thats a different story. It means the truth will destroy your argument.

As to the moral argument. If the UN or some other agency decided to give parts of America to some other hostile nation....for whatever reason....and we didnt have the milatary might we now enjoy.....and the only means of fighting back was through suicide bombers....well I would hope that it wouldn't come to that, but if it did, I would also hope that there would be true patriots who would fight back with any and all means neccessry.

Don't get me wrong, the Palestinians are fighting stupidly (perhaps evily). But its from a position of weakness and desperation.

Why should I answer your questions? Were they even directed at me? You fail to read my posts, and your continued selective obtuseness here strongly indicates that you are just another lemming in a long history of good ole'fashioned Jew haters. You and your Israel-hating friends here may not be as blatantly biased and hateful as your kindred spirits in Iran and at KKK Hdqtrs, but I see right through your rhetoric for what it really is.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 6:47 AM

http://youtu.be/VUnGTXRxGHg

Jongsstraw.

Wow. Nevermind. I have no intention of matching wits with someone who is working with only half of theirs.

You are a zealot, and as such, I will not bother with you anymore.

Now...can anyone answer the questions I've proposed, intelligently and logically?

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 7:09 AM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important

Hello,

When words like 'Jew Hater' get thrown into this discussion, it stops being a discussion and begins to become polarized warfare.

That is too bad, because this might have been more constructive.

For my own part, you could label the participants Klingons, Romulans, Cardassians, Bajorans, or Gorn, and it wouldn't change the dynamics of the situation.

Maybe I am a Bajoran hater, but if you say that, it becomes plainly silly, whereas if you say "Jew Hater" it carries a strong moral bludgeon.

Unfortunately, by wielding the bludgeon, you demonstrate the inadequacy of your ability to discuss the topic. If you can't win an argument without villainizing your foe, then your argument is inherently flawed.

--Anthony

"Liberty must not be purchased at the cost of Humanity." --Captain Robert Henner

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 7:20 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Wulfenstar:
Jongsstraw.

Wow. Nevermind. I have no intention of matching wits with someone who is working with only half of theirs.

You are a zealot, and as such, I will not bother with you anymore.

Now...can anyone answer the questions I've proposed, intelligently and logically?

This little piece of the thread started when YOU RESPONDED TO ME when I agreed & applauded Finn. You chose to engage me....so just piss off! And give us a Zeig Heil for the road.
Finally, congratulations on learning a new word today...zealot ( of course you had to hear it from The Minister), but hey, it still counts.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 7:24 AM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important

Quote:
Originally posted by Wulfenstar:
Quote:
Originally posted by Jongsstraw:
I read your spin, and I sense your desperation. There is ZERO moral equivalency between Israel & Palestinians. For decades Arafat STOLE ALL the Palestininans money & blamed Jews. He hid it away in banks in Switzerland, and his wife lives even today like a queen in France. Every time Israel conceded a point to make peace, Arafat or some other splinter group would launch strikes inside Israel to dis-engage the process...Arafat liked getting his "aid" money a lot! Israel doesn't send women & children strapped with suicide bombs to blow up innocents in a pizzaria. They do go into Palestinian areas and demolish houses of suicide bombers, and they do target bomb makers and leaders who instruct, and forcibly coerce people to commit atrocities for them.

You still have not answered my questions. If you can't thats ok.

If you won't...well thats a different story. It means the truth will destroy your argument.

As to the moral argument. If the UN or some other agency decided to give parts of America to some other hostile nation....for whatever reason....and we didnt have the milatary might we now enjoy.....and the only means of fighting back was through suicide bombers....well I would hope that it wouldn't come to that, but if it did, I would also hope that there would be true patriots who would fight back with any and all means neccessry.

Don't get me wrong, the Palestinians are fighting stupidly (perhaps evily). But its from a position of weakness and desperation.

Hello,

If all else failed, absolutely we would have suicide warriors. I always think it is interesting that we, as a western nation, embrace the 'suicide mission' to achieve a vital objective...

but we turn around and villainize the 'suicide bomber' who drives a truck into a military base and destroys himself, or the kamikaze fighter that crashes himself into a ship, or the speedboat driver who explodes a warship in harbor.

The question What Would We Do? isn't asked enough. The truth is, we are a lot like our enemies, in more ways than we care to admit.

I do not suggest that we should not war with people who have violently opposed interests, but we should understand them, and understand the real reasons we are fighting them. It is not necessary to envision your opponent as an orc or a goblin in order to fight him. If you have to do that... if you have to label someone and invent a monster in order to fight them... perhaps you shouldn't be fighting them at all.

The arab nations are fond of creating the Evil Jew Monster, which is as bad as us creating the Evil Arab Monster. (Or Muslim Monster.)

It's important for people to understand that the middle east wars are about perceived injustice and resources. If Sweden wiped out all the Jews and occupied Israel, the same war would be fought with new players. It would now be the Evil Swede Monster vs. the Evil Arab Monster or Palestinian Monster and on etc. The Arabs would want to push the Swedes into the Sea instead of the Jews. It would all be happening with new labels and new propaganda.

--Anthony

"Liberty must not be purchased at the cost of Humanity." --Captain Robert Henner

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 7:29 AM

http://youtu.be/VUnGTXRxGHg

Anthony,

You are correct. This may have been more constructive. However, unfortunatly, this is an issue which has too much emotion embroiled in it.

Straight logic dictates that we end foreign aid to Israel, and use it for ourselves. But, for the reasons mentioned above, and our own sense of "guilt"... we don't.

Foreign Aid to Israel and Affirmative Action are 2 sides of the same coin. Both are tossed in the air to compensate for a lack of intelligence and/or logic.

Still waiting for an INTELLIGENT response to my questions.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 8:15 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

So, Finn- Care to address the issues so eloquently brought up by Frem and Wulf?

---------------------------------
Always look upstream.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 8:16 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Wulfenstar:
Still waiting for an INTELLIGENT response to my questions.

Ouch.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 12:12 PM

KIRKULES

Quote:
Originally posted by AnthonyT:
If all else failed, absolutely we would have suicide warriors. I always think it is interesting that we, as a western nation, embrace the 'suicide mission' to achieve a vital objective...

but we turn around and villainize the 'suicide bomber' who drives a truck into a military base and destroys himself, or the kamikaze fighter that crashes himself into a ship, or the speedboat driver who explodes a warship in harbor.

I don't believe we villainize "suicide bombers" that strike military targets any more than any other enemy combatant. You are confusing the villainization of those that target innocent civilians with those that strike "legitimate" military targets. Are you saying there's no difference between the US military sending a person on an important mission with a high probability of failure, and a Palestinian suicide bomber blowing up innocent Israels in a shopping mall. I can't remember the last time our military strapped a bomb on a soldier and blew up innocent civilians for no strategic reason. Sure we kill innocents all the time but we don't target them.

I fail to see the moral equivalency between a high risk "suicide mission", and placing so little value on the lives of your soldiers that you strap a bomb on them to kill civilians.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 1:55 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
So, Finn- Care to address the issues so eloquently brought up by Frem and Wulf?

Not really. As I explained to Wulf, I’m completely uninterested in dicussing this topic at that level. Discussing the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict is one thing, but if it’s hating Jews...count me out.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 2:06 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Well then, care to discuss the founding of Israel?

---------------------------------
Always look upstream.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 2:18 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Well then, care to discuss the founding of Israel?

I'm game. Where would you have established the State of Israel?

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 2:52 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

If it were up to me, nowhere.

---------------------------------
Always look upstream.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 3:03 PM

Well,... it's an answer.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 3:19 PM

FLETCH2

If you were part of a people without a homeland, a people that had barely survived a genocide that killed millions wouldn't you want somewhere --- a defendable space and your own military to protect you?

That's the problem with this whole deal. I can't think of any group of people that wouldn't want somewhere safe, somewhere where they were not dependent on someone else for defence after an event like the holocaust.

Doesn't mean that taking arab land was right, but you can at least understand the motivation behind it.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 3:29 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Well, the Brits screwed the Palestinians over from the very beginning (British mandate of Palestine)

Quote:
The Palestinian Arabs felt ignored by the terms of the Mandate. Though at the beginning of the Mandate they constituted a 90 percent majority of the population, the text only referred to them as "non-Jewish communities" that, though having civil and religious rights, were not given any national or political rights. ... In contrast the text included six articles (2, 4, 6, 7, 11 and 22) with obligations for the mandatory power to foster and support a "national home" for the Jewish people. Moreover a representative body of the Jewish people, the Jewish Agency, was recognised.

The Palestinian Arab leadership repeatedly pressed the British to grant them national and political rights like representative government, reminding the British of president Wilson's Fourteen Points, the Covenant of the League of Nations, British promises during World War I, and their natural rights as a people. The British however made acceptance of the terms of the Mandate a precondition for any change in the constitional position of the Palestinian Arabs. For the Palestinian Arabs this was unacceptable, as they felt that this would be "self murder". During the whole interwar period the British, appealing to the terms of the Mandate, which they had designed themselves, rejected the principle of majority rule or any other measure that would give a Palestinian Arab majority control over the government of Palestine.

... Not having a recognised body of representatives was a severe handicap for the Palestinain Arabs compared to the Zionists. The Jewish Agency was entitled to diplomatic representation e.g. in Geneva before the League of Nations Permanent Mandates Commission, while the Palestinian Arabs had to be represented by the British.

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Always look upstream.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 3:31 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Quote:
If you were part of a people without a homeland, a people that had barely survived a genocide that killed millions wouldn't you want somewhere

This goes back to 1918, it didn't start in 1948 or even 1935.

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Always look upstream.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 4:14 PM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important

Hello,

I wanted to address a couple of comments.

Q1) If I were an oppressed people, recently the subject of attempted genocide, wouldn't I want somewhere safe to call my home?

A) Absolutely. If I were an oppressed person in the world, there would be two options at the top of my list. 1 - Carve out a safe place of my own, or 2 - migrate to someone else's safe place where I am welcome.

As far as I know, no nation wanted to absorb tens or hundreds of thousands of immigrants. So, that leaves carving out my own home. It so happens the Jewish people have an ancestral homeland that was lost in ancient times, and it must have seemed like a natural choice. In practice, they chose a region which may possibly be the most hostile environment for Jewish people anywhere in the world. They are completely surrounded by enemies, with their backs to the sea. I often wonder if there weren't more practical choices. However, the Israelis have matured in power, and seem fully capable of defending the little strip of land they call home, however impractical a choice it may have been in the beginning.

Q2) Aren't we morally superior to suicide bombers because a) we value our soldiers highly enough to not 'waste' them by strapping bombs to them, and b) we don't intentionally target civillians?

A) I'm not entirely sure. We generally aren't desperate enough to 'waste' our soldiers in suicide missions or attacks, but if we were in desperate circumstances, I'm sure we would do so rather than embrace defeat. As for not targetting civilians, I will grant you that we haven't done it lately. However, it is within the living memory of this nation that we firebombed civilian population centers in Germany and Japan. This carpet firebombing of cities did not target military bases or installations, but rather sought to break the enemy's will to fight and obliterate their infrastructure. One might convincingly argue that in the midst of the 'morally purest' war of the 20th century, the United States engaged in the wholesale slaughter of civilians as part of a terrorist campaign against our enemies. We were fortunate enough to be able to do this without blowing up our own troops.

The idea of civilians being safe in the midst of war is a fairly new and exotic concept in the history of warfare, and it is a concept that I believe would dissolve swiftly if we ever again faced a war where we did not completely outclass our enemies in every measurable way.

None of this makes the targeting of civilians palatable to me, nor am I suggesting that we give three cheers for terrorist bombers. But if we bother to take five minutes to imagine ourselves in our enemy's shoes, we might come to understand why they feel compelled to use these tactics. They are far less evil than we imagine, and far more desperate than we've considered.

May we never be in their place.

--Anthony

"Liberty must not be purchased at the cost of Humanity." --Captain Robert Henner

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 6:43 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Quote:
If you were part of a people without a homeland, a people that had barely survived a genocide that killed millions wouldn't you want somewhere
This goes back to 1918, it didn't start in 1948 or even 1935.

I think you’re thinking of the Balfour Declaration of 1917, which was ratified in 1922 by the League of Nations, but it goes back further than that. The Holocaust, as awful as it was, was just the proverbial straw. Jews had been subject to discrimination an a scale largely unheard of in the last 1000 years. Zionism began in the 19th century in Russia as a response to centuries of abuse and widespread Pogroms that killed thousands of Jews and terrorized thousands more. The Holocaust pretty much proved what many Jews and Non-Jews alike had known for decades. Absent a Jewish nation, Jews will always be an underclass subject to discrimination and slander by anyone who needs a scapegoat to blame or something to hate.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 7:12 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

So the answer to Jewish persecution is to grab someone else's land and persecute them.

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Always look upstream.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 7:18 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
So the answer to Jewish persecution is to grab someone else's land and persecute them.

No, the answer was opening immigration, in particular, out of Russia and Poland and later Germany and France, to a non-Christian part of the British Empire. The eastern fifth of the Palestinian Mandate seemed like a logical place to start considering it had ancestral significance in the Jewish religion.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 8:24 PM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Quote:
No, the answer was opening immigration, in particular, out of Russia and Poland and later Germany and France, to a non-Christian part of the British Empire. The eastern fifth of the Palestinian Mandate seemed like a logical place to start considering it had ancestral significance in the Jewish religion.

So OOC, since the Brits were so generous with other people's land, why didn't they open up their own borders? They didn't they want to give up their own precious land, jobs, and cultural/ religious homogeneity perhaps, so they decided to shuffle the problem off on someone else? Someone who wasn't "worth" as much as the Brits or the Jews? With their relative generosity towards the Jews and disregard for Arab Palestinians it sure comes across that way.

So, the Palestine Mandate was a big cock-up which resulted in the lot of dispossessed and pissed-off natives. And all because the so-called Xtian nations didn't want to put up with Jews in their own borders, and it still goes on that way. (But come to think of it, persecuting natives is something American colonialists did to ensure their own "freedom from persecution", so I guess its a comforting and familiar story to us.)

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Always look upstream.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008 10:26 PM

FREMDFIRMA

You'll note the key word here - desperation.

Post WWII, the Jewish people were awful damned desperate, and sure, let's not blind ourselves, committed some awful deeds they felt necessary to secure the continued existance of their people.

It is that they CONTINUE to do so, that rooks me.

And as stated above, historically the middle eastern nations were as a rule LESS hostile to them than anyone else - but when a people whom you have historically sheltered, offered aid, comfort and hospitality starts slaughtering your people and taking your precious land, over there, that's an offense of a level I cannot effectively describe to most westerners, on top of which, both sides are rather legendary in their ability to hold a grudge.

And when the now equally desperate Palestinians resort to the same measures, for the same reasons, it's somehow less justified than the actions of the Irgun were ?

No, I do not think so.

Desperation drives folk, any folk, to do some downright awful things, and maybe if anyone involved had an ounce of sense, they'd try to avoid backin people into corners where they feel those measures are necessary.

Awful hard to grow food for your family if you ain't got no useable LAND to do it on, mere population pressure, combined with an ever-expanding border crushing them into the sea, is a substantive root cause of the problem.

It's like two starving men fighting over a loaf of bread and mostly tearing it to shreds, but that discounts the fact that we're there stuffing MREs into the back pocket of the one, and they're STILL wrestling for that damn loaf of bread on top of it.

How they behave, in the end, is up to them, MY problem is with us financing it, and everyone who knows that hating us as a direct result.

-Frem

It cannot be said enough, those who do not learn from history, are doomed to endlessly repeat it

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Wednesday, January 16, 2008 5:21 AM