the irony.
Israeli - Palestinian Conflict
- Thread starter Raoul
- Start date
I am not arguing if it pragmatic for him to fight on this issue or not. But the notion he should just represent the majority opinion on any issue is not totally correct.
Yep, disgusting
I've said this in the past...the Palestinians are paying the price for the criminal behavior of western europe during WWII.
Jews at large identify themselves with the Holocaust and everything that entails. Not being a Jew I can't pretend to completely understand the mindset, but I can sort of understand, why for them - everything points back to that.
It's not fair that Europe was so indifferent for such a long time while Hitler tried to wipe the Jewish population off the face of the earth, and that, now that gets thrown out anytime anyone asks Israel to show restraint or criticizes it.
But can you blame them? Too many of that generation are still alive, they lived through the horrors - I bet if you'd asked anyone back then, was a mass genocide like the Holocaust possible, and they would have told you to feck off.
The reality is, it happened, and despite the US being such a strong ally today, Israel if need be, will go it alone to do what it thinks is best.
Arabs need to take away the fear that Israel feels - be it real or imagined.
No, Israel need to stop murdering innocent children and labeling it 'collateral damage''
Yesterday, a tear gas canister was thrown by the IDF at a red crescent medic van, a medic fell out and was critically injured
Jake, where do you get your information from? Genuine question.
sorry ... but WTF???
Slight exaggeration, this. First, Israel was a complete non-factor in the election, as was, near as I could tell, foreign policy pretty much across the board, (bin Laden's death the possible exception.)
Second, Obama ran saying "I'm pro Israel" and Romney ran saying "I'm pro-er Israel!" While the only people who actually think Obama is anti-Israel are the same nutters who think he's anti-Capitalist (or the anti-Christ), it is fair to say he was slightly less forcefully pro-Israel than Romney was.
It's ok for Israel to do that - nobody else though!
Really that hard to understand? How many of the arab countries have a diplomatic relationship with Israel? How many of them recognize it?
Don't tell me it's because they care about the Palestinians...I made a post in the last page how there are infinitely more productive ways of showing their 'care'.
Maybe if the Israelis saw that the vast majority of their neighbors were actually nice guys, guys who wanted a piece of Bar Refaeli and not to blow her up to pieces, they'd be more willing to make concessions!
Over the past week, more muslims were killed by muslims than Israel - yet why is Israel the one that has everyone so angry? It's ok for us to kill each other, but not the Jews?
I've seen Israelis and Jews hold demonstrations calling for their govt to stop the bombing, what are the chances we see muslims doing the same to Hamas? I'll tell you...nil and feck all.
Because of my background(a background you share to some extent) I have a natural inclination to side with independence movements - the Pakistanis called my grandparents and uncles terrorists too, but I am not going to blindly follow down the path of the muslim ummah.
Gotta call a spade a spade.
Really find it hard how people are justifying Israels actions. If someone justified Hitlers or the talibans or any other terrorists actions anywhere in the world then there would be huge consequences. fecking disgusting, really is.
I think if you told him that IDF soldiers were spearing new born Palestinians on their bayonets, he'd believe that too.
I'm not really talking about religion. It was set up as a refuge for Jews, as in people of Jewish ancestry. I've never met an Israeli who gave a feck about religion. Well one, but she lived over here, and was mental.
Er, well yes, as well as the fact that they'd massacre the Jewish minority if they got a chance.
Theocratic?? The religious have some power over stuff like marriage registrations, and the have increasing political leverage, but for the moment it's still a secular state.
Things are moving...
Thank goodness for that.
Don't tell Jake though, he thinks they are dropping mustard gas & he'll be terribly disappointed if it turns out not to be true.
if they can get to talks...without any pre-conditions, it will be a huge step.
What did you expect to happen? What would happen if a state next to Britain, or America... kinell, can you imagine America?... started launching rockets at its major cities? They'd get flattened. What happened to Chechnya when its terrorists started targeting Moscow? it got flattened, with perhaps a quarter of a million casualties.
Hamas knows what will happen. What happened last time, and the time before that? Every kid that gets caught in the crossfire, Hamas has factored into its calculations as expendable when it decides to start firing.
Olmert was nothing like Netanyahu, who, as far as I'm aware (correct me if I'm wrong), has stepped up settlement building, is more belligerent and far more aggressive. Olmert has also now I believe admitted the block that are the settlements, does Netanhayhu recognise this?
Yes you do, we've had this discussion before. 'Give up' in the sense that it becomes a Palestinian capital after an adequate settlement between the 2 sides.
To be honest I don't understand this at all. First of all, what do the Palestinians have to do with the holocaust?! It's like invading Iraq because of 9/11. I find it disgusting that some nations are using some terrible disasters to justify actions that are not related to those incidents at all.
So the Israelis don't feel safe because they are afraid of another holocaust?? And who did the first holocaust? The Palestinians who were sitting peacefully in their homes?? Why do we ALWAYS have to think about the emotional scar among the Israelis caused by the holocaust (which the Palestinians had nothing to do with) while neglect the emotional scar among the Palestinians that was caused by the Israelis themselves who invaded their homes?!
Ignore Israel
The arab nations spend billions on toys aka war machinery. Saudis to this day bring in Pakistanis to help them train their pilotsThey are useless, why not use some of that money to help out the Palestinians. Build them roads, power plants, schools, factories...
People speak of Israel being an occupying force, and they had boots on the ground for ages, but atm don't. Why not put together an Arab peacekeeping force - 40000-50000 strong. Get them in the conflict zone.
Lets say we go along with what Israel says...Hamas are the aggressors, these boots on the ground could ensure there were no more rockets outgoing from Gaza, if Israel still bombed Gaza, you'd have the moral high ground.
Why can't they impress on the Palestinians, with each passing day, the Israeli position grows stronger - the staus quo becomes too hard to turn back. The longer this conflict rages, the stronger Israel grows, and the worse off the Palestinians are.
Think about it....there is now a clear divide within the Palestinian independence movement. Could you say the same 5 years ago? 10 years ago?
Conquer and Divide...this is all so obvious, but apparently the current way of doing things is better
Qatar a couple of days ago promised $10mil...$10mil are you kidding me? That's not even pocket change.
The Arab dictators are absolute morons. They couldn't give the slightest feck about the Palestinians, other than to direct popular anger of their population at their deprivation from them to the Israelis.
While I like that idea, how would it work in practice? Rightly or wrongly, can you see Israel ever agreeing to 50,000 Arab troops being stationed just kilometres from its borders? There would be absolute mayhem.
But that is a good point. Again, rightly or wrongly, this conflict perhaps needs to stop being about what is fair and the Palestinians should look to what is practical. The Palestinians have had a horrid 70/80 years, at the hands of the Haganah, the IDF, their 'Arab brothers' and the world in general. They live in despair. They live under occupation or under siege and constant fear of F16s. And it is only getting worse. My feeling is that, in the West, Israel is losing the PR battle about the rights and wrongs of the situation but that doesn't do anything to change the facts on the ground.
They need to do something to alleviate their suffering.
Well, Israel used White Phosphorus during the Gaza war in 2008/9 so I wouldn't be surprised if the same was happening again.
It was a non-factor but that was because Obama snuffed out any potential weak spots about his Israel policy during the campaign to where Romney and the GOP were left with nothing to exploit. Rest assured if he were to come out with some pro-Palestinian talking points he would get hammered by elements on the left and right, and it would certainly derail his post election momentum. He'd be wise to stay out of it beyond the usual platitudes about stopping the rockets and calling for restraint from both sides.
I've got to agree with Raoul here. I'd love Obama to be far more forceful with the Israelis but the reality is that he cannot use precious political capital on this issue when he has more pressing domestic issues at home.
Let's look at the facts.
10 people were murdered today in a bombing, one hamas official, 9 civilians. Some where young children.
More and more bombs are going off every few minutes all over Gaza.
3 Israelis have died in this latest round of attacks.
3 Palestinian children have died today.
I'd like to know where you are getting your facts Collin, probably the BBC.
10 people were murdered today in a bombing, one hamas official, 9 civilians. Some where young children.
More and more bombs are going off every few minutes all over Gaza.
3 Israelis have died in this latest round of attacks.
3 Palestinian children have died today.
I'd like to know where you are getting your facts Collin, probably the BBC.
Obama is helpless here - think of the hate he faced simply because he wouldn't declare war on Iran straight away.
He apparently is 'weak' for wanting to exhaust every possible peaceful means at a resolution before committing the US to another war.
He apparently is 'weak' for wanting to exhaust every possible peaceful means at a resolution before committing the US to another war.
The point Neutral's making is that you don't get anywhere without understanding the other side's psyche. A lot of Israelis are holocaust survivors or the children of holocaust survivors, and the country's been in existential wars most of its existence (not that I'm saying it wasn't to blame for any of them).
And while you might have Israeli empathy fatigue, it's interesting that the PLO guys who negotiated the Camp David accords were very, very surprised to discover Israelis were afraid for their existence. They'd never met an Israeli before the negotiations in Norway, they'd just seen soldiers and tanks, and they were amazed that fear of extermination played any part in the Israeli mindset.
Personally I think the fear's misplaced. Currently the only country in the region that would stand a chance against them in a conventional war is Turkey, and any nuclear attack from a state actor would be suicidal. But rightly or wrongly it plays a huge part in the Israeli-Palestinian dynamic. Hamas doesn't help by denying the holocaust happened and propagating pre-WWII racist mythologies.
Again, what do you expect to happen? I'm not saying it's right, but put yourself in the position of being an elected leader accountable to your people. The people next door, who are run by religious fundamentalists militants, are sending rockets into your major cities. What do you do? How do you stop it in a way that doesn't kill people, and that is politically remotely practical?
A lot of Israelis are against the attack on Gaza
Unlike the Israelis?
What you don't do is destroy cities.
Hamas are not innocent, but Israel shouldn't be there in the first place.
Plecha, Israel wasn't established to protect the Jews from being exterminated. Israel was established to solidify the west's control over the middle east. It's ridiculous that you create a new country for every group of people who think they might be exterminated, especially in a location like that. If you want to protect those people, let them live in your country and protect them.
The history of Israel (right from the start) doesn't suggest either that they "just wanted to live in peace".
The history of Israel (right from the start) doesn't suggest either that they "just wanted to live in peace".
Be where shouldn't Israel be?
Should Israel not be anywhere or not in Gaza...which they're not?
What do you do?
Well that's a can of worms, but it's pretty irrelevant at this point. Should the yanks be in America? Should the Australians be in Australia? Should anyone be anywhere? The country's there now, and it's not going anywhere for the moment. Palestinians have had a shit deal, but bombing their cities at this point is not going to help make their lives less shit, it's going to do the opposite. They know this, and they do it anyway.
Well wasn't it a nice coincidence that the Holocaust just happened to take place, just when the West needed a brand new outpost.
It is not irrelevant yet thought pragmatically it should be. It is irrelevant in Oz and US because the native populations there have already been made near extinct or marginalized severely. I think Israel would have done the same by now if the whole conflict had occurred 100 years ago. Unfortunately under the current glare of 24/7 media and internet, conducting massacres is not so simple.
What do you do?
Well that's a can of worms, but it's pretty irrelevant at this point. Should the yanks be in America? Should the Australians be in Australia? Should anyone be anywhere? The country's there now, and it's not going anywhere for the moment. Palestinians have had a shit deal, but bombing their cities at this point is not going to help make their lives less shit, it's going to do the opposite. They know this, and they do it anyway.
Yeah the thing is the Jews didn't just 'think they might be exterminated', they were exterminated, losing half their population in Europe. The ones that emigrated to Israel probably wouldn't have put that much faith in their host countries 'protecting them'.
The Zionist immigrations started in the late nineteenth century and were generally peaceful. By the time WWII ended about a third of the population of mandated Palestine were Jews. The period after that was characterised by violence (ethnic cleansing on both sides, the invasion of the new state by all its Arab neighbours), but it's incorrect to say that 'right from the start' they didn't want to live in peace.
Stalin agreed to the foundation of the State of Israel. I hardly think he would have done if it was designed to let 'The West' control the ME.
That does not make any sense. Israel do not listen to anyone in the west, bar US on select occasions. I do agree that it was not very pragmatic to make a Jewish state where they did if the primary goal was a haven against possible future holocausts. But then religious reasons governed that particular 'logic'.
The West were always looking for a new outpost there.
We have people who are traumatized and want to live in peace. "Ok, let's send them occupy another country! That sound a pretty peaceful solution that will not expose them to more wars!", compared to just letting them live peacefully in their countries. How does that make any sense?
Again, I agree with this. The Palestinians have had a truly shit deal. I think most people are deluding themselves if they tell themselves they wouldn't have done something similar to what Palestinians would have done in the past 60 years if they had been in their position. They have lost land, lives and dignity.
I also think that a perhaps more apt comparison when people ask what the Americans would do if someone was bombing their cities is what Americans would do if someone were to tell them that 78% of their country was to be given to the Native Americans, whether now or 200 years ago.
However, this is unfortunately all irrelevant as it really gets everyone nowhere. The Palestinians have lost out, perhaps in the distant distant future once we're all dead and everyone is peaceful, everyone can return to their ancestral homes and live side by side. Until that happens, they need to do what they can to lessen their suffering.
Nor does France listen to what the US say, bar on select occasions, but they have common policies and priorities, and share the same friends and enemies.