Palestine

[Odelay]

For what it's worth, I believe the debate we're having on Palestine/Israel in this thread is actually more civilised than what occurs in other forums. I've seen some pretty awful comments on this topic in other places.

[yosi]

And the point I was making here - in this thread about Israel and Palestine - is that the media and the great public have been worked up about the situation in Gaza to to a degree that the quite deliberately murderous onslaught by Isis - of Christians, of other Muslims who do not measure up to their view of true believers, of the Yazidi and others is being ignored. Hence my comments here.

for the same reasons 170,000 ( one hundred and seventy thousands ) dead poeple in Syria , many of them killed by chemical weapons - are ignored.

[Prospero]

I agree Odeley. But Stavros's unfounded attack on me is unnaceptable.

[fred41]

Look beyond the Israel-Gaza dispute. Consider what is happening in Iraq. Consider the real ethnic cleansing being carried out by ISIS (or the Islamic State as they now style themselves). I applaud the overnight decision by the US President to intervene with airstrikes on humanitarian grounds. But we need to do more to eradicate this evil. We have a moral responsibility to sort this out after the illegal US-UK invasion of Iraq under Bush and Blair.

I also agree with what the President is doing so far.

I agree Odeley. But Stavros's unfounded attack on me is unnacceptable.

Prospero, as I do with most people - sometimes I agree with you, sometimes I don't...either way, I've learned things from your comments in the political thread...as well as from others (Stavros, Trish (love her), etc...)...but regardless, I must say - I don't recall you ever advocating violence...ever...(I frequently do...but that's by nature....I'm learning though...lol...or getting old).

I'm gonna assume Stavros was kidding (?)...or..I dunno.

My view is that sometimes violence - especially extreme violence - can only be met with, at least some sort of violence...even if only in a very limited sense.

[Ben]

Netanyahu Urges US Lawmakers to Defend Israel Against ICC "War Crimes" Prosecution:

http://www.commondreams.org/news/201...es-prosecution

[broncofan]

I'm enjoying everyone's posts except for Ben's. For the love of jehovah write some prose. An editorial every now and again can be useful, and hard news is almost always useful. But the wholesale appropriation of other people's ideas via link could easily turn a discussion into a debate by proxy. Who can find the authors who express something useful to their very generalized stance? Who can post the most videos of Noam Chomsky doing naughty stuff on webcam (that is what he's doing right?). It's not didactic Ben. You know what I've learned. You agree with Noam Chomsky and Glenn Greenwald.

With all due respect, if Noam Chomsky and Glenn Greenwald got into an argument whose side would you take.

P.S I know this sounds very harsh. You're a heck of a nice guy, but you do realize all you're doing is posting links don't you?

[Stavros]

Stavros. I do not have "an addiction to violence" and I do not see what grounds you are claiming that to be the case. Show me the basis for that claim or apologise please.

The problem is that you posted a link to an interview with Amos Oz with which you said you are in agreement, though I don't know if this includes the section in which he says Unlike European pacifists I never believed the ultimate evil in the world is war. In my view the ultimate evil in the world is aggression, and the only way to repel aggression is unfortunately by force; and in the last post applauded what you call US 'airstrikes on humanitarian grounds'.

Oz is clearly confused, and I don't know how an airstrike can be 'humanitarian' at all. Look at this way: IS kills people; airstrikes kill people, and tell me how you can make a moral, rather a political distinction between the two?

I apologise for the use of the word, it was a challenge too far, but I do suspect that like Oz you believe there are situations in which violence is the only solution, and in that I cannot agree.

[Stavros]

Stavros my friend

put your self in the shoes of those who for the last 13 years , have to run for shelters because of some rocket(s) being shot to KILL them on an almost daily basis , think about their life , THEIR children .

I'm not saying all Israelis are saints , far from it , but many of them think from their guts instead of their brains , after 13 years of living under the threat of dayly missiles shot to kill you , I think you will also think from your guts.......

over 70,000 children were killed in Syria , why do you think nobody cares about it? is there anything done to stop it?

because of Hamas shooting missiles from populated areas , do you know how any palestinian children were killed because of missiles exploded instead of being launched? why does no one bother to give you these facts?

Many years ago I was walking through the market in the Citadel in Jerusalem when a young man stopped my mother and begged her to try his plums; we assumed it was just another good natured hustle that took place in the market in those days, but she tried one, and bought a kilo on the spot, and we went home and ate most of them, because they were divine and I have never tasted plums like it since. Where, I wonder, is that orchard now-buried under the Berlin Wall that Israel built on land stolen from the Palestinians? Or maybe it is now a car park in a settlement, or one of those melancholy patches of land that was farmed for centuries until Israel ripped up every tree and bush, and bulldozed the earth into dust, because 'terrorists' were taking cover behind the Olive tree, the Plum tree? Palestinians live with violence on a daily basis, do you want to count heads, to what purpose?

Yosi, take sides, and justify your own, if you must, with head counts, rocket counts, iron walls, and plum trees, but remember what the Rabbi said:
And now it has come to this; that we are supposed to be proud when Israel scores higher than Hamas in a moral evaluation test

[yosi]

Stavros my friend

lets leave the Gaza vs. Israel conflict for a short while , we will get back to this conflict later.

please give me your educated and inteligent answer to this question : why the slaughter of 170,000 poeple , many of them innocent children in Syria , many of them by chemical weapons , or the slaughtering of thousands in Iraq by the ISIS are totally ignored by the media?

[Odelay]

I agree Odeley. But Stavros's unfounded attack on me is unnaceptable.

Stavros tempered his attack and apologized above, but I have to say you sort of set yourself up for the attack by unequivocally agreeing with pretty much everything Oz was saying. And he said some pretty ridiculous things in that interview.

This is just one example, but a foreign policy of keeping a people besieged for many, many years while hoping the masses one day rise up against those viciously in power, ala Ceausescu in Romania, is not a foreign policy at all but pure fantasy role playing. This is the same policy the US has had toward Iran for 35 years to no good effect. Why sit on your hands for decades fantasizing about an extremely remote possibility when other options exist to ameliorate the situation?

When I read Oz' piece, before you posted the link, by the way, I didn't see someone who "sums up my feelings." Instead it seemed to me a rambling piece by a 75 year old man who is well past his intellectual prime. Just my opinion.