Wow. Idiot is just one of a few choice words to describe him after that post.
Israeli - Palestinian Conflict
- Thread starter Raoul
- Start date
Maybe if their leaders didn't fire rockets, or if you believe Israel is at fault - invested money in any sort of defending rather than attacking measures, hey?
Oh, I know things can be far, far worse. And they are for civilians here as well when Iron Dome fails to intercept the rockets... And that has happened in the last 24 hours with several people being injured, a couple severely.
Some of the photos from Gaza are fake, some I'm sure are true. Do I like to see them getting hurt? No. But when their leaders fire rockets at civilians, and also use them as shields for the terrorists and their weapons, they have their blood on their own hands. You can't expect any country not to retaliate - I'd love to see what happens if one rocket is lauched from Mexico towards the US - but Israel has been fired at for 13 years now, with the rockets getting better, with more explosive and longer range. Incredibly, during that time we just about accepted that parts of Israel are going to live like that on a near daily basis. It's insane.
Yeah, because this is how life should be like...
I've given my reasons in other posts. Funnily enough that animation about a "bully" is a school playground sums it up. You can't fire rockets (at civilians), hide behide your own, and then expect that nothing happens. Israel isn't targetting civilians, but unfortuntely in a situation like that they will get hurt. Can it be prevented? Of course. Someone tell that to the terror organization that uses them. But their deaths do Hamas great service, so why should they care.
Once again you're making excuses for a clear violation of human rights. You are not the government of Israel so why do you act as if you have to defend them? I don't want to argue with you about this issue but please don't "accept" things just because your own government does it.
I still have hope that the population of Israel are not savages like their leaders so it would be better if you help improve that image rather than support killing of women and children.
Unfortunately it's not as simple is that. I'd love if you we could just decide not to kill women and children and still weaken Hamas by only taking out the actual terrorists. But when those people hide behind the population, it means we can either do nothing or try to hit the terrorists while accepting that yes, people who don't deserve to can and will get hurt.
I have plenty of issues with my government, some relating to the palestenians. It's a terrible government, with some pretty extreme right wing hold. But I've no issues with it for taking action trying to stop the rockets. No country would accept that and any country would be doing what Israeli is doing, even if they can comfortably tell themselves they wouldn't.
Not many in Israel are savages. But even those who aren't are struggling to condemn this operation.
Wrong! We are talking about an agreement here, part of which is an independent Palestinian state. Thus we will not treat them at all. They will be citizens of their nation state they allegedly crave for.
They spent their money on building their rocket capabilities, and concrete on tunnel construction across the Egyptian and Israeli borders, and in Gaza to protect their leaders when shit hits the fan. For all the sympathy I have for ordinary Gazans I don't feel the slightest need to apologize that Israel has done brilliantly in defending its citizens. In fact, I am as proud as I have ever been in my country and its capabilities.
Iron Dome is not a miracle, but a result of unique combination of innovation and persistence. It is a life-saving system not only on this side but on the Gazan side too. Just imagine what Israel's response would have been if all those 100's of rockets resulted in the deaths of dozens of civilians here. Mind you, it could still get worse.
For all the outcry of the Palestinians and their sympathizing body counters, I'd just remind the recent popular joke in the WB and Gaza which followed the kidnapping and murder of the three Israeli teenagers. It read "Palestine- Israel- 3:0".
You start young, don't you?
The thing is that Israelis feel there aren't any more concessions to be made, finally realizing that the Arabs can not live with a Jewish Israel within any borders. I'm sure you were able to get that from your Israeli friends.
Similarly, you would have probably find equally distasteful posters to how you see Fearless if you tried to see things from our perspective...and that's in the last 3 pages only. Looks like very few can be actual neutrals on this one.
We don't fight our wars overseas, mate. We rush to bomb shelters every now and then. Completely different scenario to all those where posters on here criticized their countries for their ME/Asian/African adventures in the last decade or so.
The Israeli citizens support every action taken so far by their government. Recent polls suggest a divide on whether the IDF should go in, but I guess when it does it will be with massive public support.
Please stop spreading propaganda. Even if Hamas (who are morons in their own rights) protect their bombs using civilians, you it justifies bombing the civilians to destroy the missiles that have yet to cause a single Israeli causality?
It's sickening if you can justify killing of civilians under this situation which is not completely true anyway. Like I mentioned before, I really don't want to go into the details of this argument. With the mind set that you have it is completely useless to even convince you about anything else. If only you could spend a day in a real war zone and know what happens when a bomb actually explodes a few meters away from you (rather than hearing sirens and running into your safe homes) you'd understand the brutality of it. I have and I don't want to wish it upon anyone.
Enjoy supporting action that has killed over hundred civilian women children and infants.
HR, this is genuinely incredibly appalling propaganda; Again, I've met a couple of people from Gaza, neither of them Hamas members or sympathisers at all. The 'policy' of sometimes standing on the roofs of buildings is not a Hamas policy but an organic policy as a response to the sometimes random bombings of peoples' homes (some of them with Hamas members living there, some of them not).
They get the phone call and some of them go up to the roof as a final desperate attempt to stop their house being demolished, knowing full well that the pilot of the aircraft/ the controller of the drone can see them very clearly. Sometimes it works, sometimes it does not.
I don't agree with the policy but then again, while I lived through horrific war in my home country, I've never had the situation where I'm told in advance that my house is being destroyed in about 2 minutes, nor have I lived like the Gazans do. How can I therefore judge their actions when I do not know how I would react in the same situation?
As I've said before, a huge part of this conflict, in my view, stems from the 2 sides refusal to accept the underlying reasons behind the others' behaviour.
The Israelis seem to struggle to understand that to the Palestinians, it is the Israelis that are the aggressors. It was them that forced out Palestinian Villagers in 48 to create a state when just 20 years earlier, they made up just 10% of the population. They feel like they were forced into a partition because of events elsewhere. It is them that has been controlling every facet of their lives since 67, that has deposited half a million settlers in the occupied territories. That is why to some of them, the idea of a demilitarised state seems strange. They demilitarise when they see it as them being the victims of aggression.
Very rarely are a whole population aggressive or contain large violent elements simply because they are somehow inherently more aggressive. There is often a reason why the population has become like this. Some Israelis seem to have comforted themselves with the notion that they're animals who will always act like this and so there is nothing to be done other than to treat them like animals.
Similarly, the Palestinians seem to struggle to understand why the Jews are so frightened and why they respond in the way that they do. It doesn't mean that it is right but there needs to be an understanding of their history and position.
Oh I'm not saying Fearless is unique, there are many like him/her on both sides unfortunately, I've had the displeasure of meeting many of them all over.
Perhaps I've missed it but is there somebody calling the Jews beasts and advocating for their ethnic cleansing to other countries in the past few pages? How well would that go down on this board generally?
But then again the Palestinian Arabs had the chance in 1947 to have their own independent state, right? Something that they never had before. I mean you just have to look at the portion of the land allocated, even with the Mediterranean coastal line almost equally divided. And considering the unimaginable, only recent catastrophe of the holocaust and the need for a Jewish homeland, and for the sake of peace and for the prospect of a full independence, are you actually saying that all this simply made it impossible for the Arabs to accept it? A plan so badly devised that not only it had to be rejected but a plan that has literally forced the Arabs into starting a war with the new Israeli state?
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I imagine they were rather miffed that the land which they called theirs and had done so for centuries was now being split up into 2 because of very recent mass immigration.
I also imagine that whatever their views on the holocaust, they struggled to understand why they were the ones being punished for hundreds of years of horrible European anti-semitism culminating in the horrors of the Nazis by the loss of land to a minority that in the early 1900s was almost negligible in that area? Which other peoples would accept partition and subjugation because of events elsewhere they were not responsible for?
I also imagine the Arabs felt betrayed by the French and British double cross.
How do you think Serbians would have reacted in the situation? If Serbia was split when it was ruled by the Ottomans into a land for Serbians and a land for another ethnic group, which had lived there well over a thousand years previously but which was now a small minority, even after atrocities against them in a completely separate part of the world, how would they have reacted?
The land allocation was supposed to be highly disproportional to the population share. To some extend this is understandable as increased Jewish immigration was expected. Still, it is not hard to understand that the huge majority that lived there for generations was not exactly happy to concede the majority of the land to people most of whom had only recently immigrated or had not even immigrated yet. And the plan basically meant that hundreds of thousands of Arabs would have to live under Jewish rule and not in their own independent state, or would have to leave their homes. Again, it is not surprising that people were not happy with this.
It's not "full independence" when the majority of the land that you perceive as yours is still under the control of people that you perceive as foreign occupants. And hundreds of thousands would not have been living under "full independence" as they would have been subjects to Jewish rule unless they left their homes. On the other hand, I find it interesting that you suggest the Arabs should have made such large concessions "for the sake of peace and for the prospect of a full independence". What kind of concession would you ask from Israel for the sake of peace and the prospect of recognition of Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state?
The Jewish state was just another form of foreign occupation in the eyes of the Arabs. So they fought against it like they fought against the British occupation. The Jewish did the same thing. The declaration of the Jewish state had to be perceived as a hostile act by the Arabs. How would you perceive the declaration of rule of people who most had only recently immigrated to your area, barely formed a majority and were intending to separate you from your fellow people?
I understand that other reasons (e.g. Islamic anti-Semitism, pan-arabism) played a role. I have no sympathy for that. But I can relate to the view of the Arabs that foreign powers were making a deal under the impression of the holocaust and handed the Arabs the raw end of the deal.
I also understand why the Jewish people find a Jewish State imperative after the collective trauma of the holocaust and other horrible experiences as minorities in other countries. I have sympathy for that. The Jewish state did not come into existence in a vacuum, however. There were already people there. And to my knowledge the Zionist movement did not really consider the impact of their aims on the existing non-Jewish population and to this date a lot of Israeli fail to realize the impact of the subsequent events on the Arab/Palestinian population. It's their collective trauma.
The real first step to peace is to acknowledge the other side's trauma. But of course, most Israeli prefer easier explanation for Arab hostility, while many Arabs do not even acknowledge that the holocaust actually happened.
Well put.
Academically, this is classic security dilemma imo. Both sides feel an existential threat from the other, which is causing them to entrench further and cooperate less.
Shame on you for spreading propaganda more shame if you actually believe this.
What part about it do you believe is untrue ?
First of all, a person's house in Gaza is more or less his entire life's work's worth, while it goes without saying that it's not worth more than their own lives, it's still something you would try to salvage in case they were actually warned, which in many cases this is untrue.
How does this actually work then? Hamas convinces regular civilians to take a straight hit from a missile? A father would agree to end his sons and daughters lives?
Also, as long as they remain in this open-air prison, the people of Gaza have a right to resist the oppression of the colonial state that I live in.
How does this actually work then? Hamas convinces regular civilians to take a straight hit from a missile? A father would agree to end his sons and daughters lives?
Also, as long as they remain in this open-air prison, the people of Gaza have a right to resist the oppression of the colonial state that I live in.
The part that I outlined above
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/07/is-this-hamas-last-war-108832.html#.U8Ev7vldVUU
Is this Hamas' last war?
Is this Hamas' last war?
Personally, I'm not sure the Israeli public have the appetite for a ground war, replete with significant Israeli casualties.
Agreed. Especially as I don't think, regardless of how isolated it now is in the Middle East, Hamas can be taken out with a short war. If the Israelis go in, take out as many Hamas members/ installations as they can and then leave, the vacuum is either going to be filled with Hamas again or perhaps someone even worse.
Which obviously isn't going to be seen as an acceptable outcome for however many lives the IDF may lose if they were to undertake a ground war.
What was in holyland's post that got such reactions? Did he edit it out himself, but not delete, or was it a modmin? I don't get it.
Israel may be going in, but it won't be deep, it won't be for long and it won't be in order to take Hamas down.
Unfortunately, it might be the only way to get rid of those rockets.
Unfortunately, it might be the only way to get rid of those rockets.
Israel will never agree to an independent Palestinian state, you'll control its borders, its air space, sea ports, and retain the right to invade at will, into this you will expel your citizens.
Which post are you talking about ?
of course we know HR is completely unbiased.
Still it is a no win for Hamas if they push for this war....
Still it is a no win for Hamas if they push for this war....
Great post.
Mijailovic, Serbia was once a great nation (the only in Europe that fought and won against Nazism), it is a shame that is producing people that are defending Israel because we can draw parallels in both situations.
122 deaths and counting.
I'm just being pragmatic. I have friends from Krajina who have lost everything that they owned in the ethnic cleansing by the Croats in 1995. My uncle lost everything he had in Croatia, land, property, machinery. Fast forward 20 years later and everyone is trying to get their land back via whatever legal systems available. However, my uncle would not dream to strap dynamite around his waist and blow himself up in a Croatian cafe. Nor would he ever encourage my cousins to grab a kalašnjikov, go down the road and murder as many Croats as they can get. He would also not vote for a government that is firing rockets on mainland Croatia because of some revenge feelings and in order to, hopefully, kill as many Croatians as possible.
The loss of land and life is a horrific experience (and I went through the same crap in Bosnia) but I'd still never ever consider risking the lives of my children by allowing them to be used as human shields, nor would I ever want to take part in any killing of innocent people.
All my family that had lost their land adapted to the new reality, kept on fighting for their rights legally whilst building a new life at a different location. I have lots of cousins and nephews and nieces who all fled between 1991-1995, and who are now not some refugees but citizens and full members of the society in which they live.
What I'm arguing for is that the main responsibility for endangering the lives of innocent people in Gaza lies with the Hamas. Every single jihadist that's firing a rocket from Gaza is willingly risking the lives of his own people. And please don't tell me I do not understand how terrible the Gazans feel etc, I'm from Bosnia and I know full well what horror is. I am, however, able to make a conscious decision not to attempt to murder innocent people on the other side of the fence but to protect the lives of my children by not provoking retaliation from a much stronger opponent.
PS. How come there were no 100+ deaths in the West Bank and no air strikes against targets in the West Bank this week?
Israel is like the man in an abusive relationship. It's Palestine's fault she keeps getting smacked, she needs to stop shooting her mouth off.
RT is a disgusting "channel" that's nothing more than State run Russian propaganda. Here, a presenter rails against US TV bias on Israel/Palestine, while RT just spent the past 6 months spearheading a nasty smear campaign to legitimize Russia's invasion and annexation of Crimea. In short, they will broadcast anything to advance their boss Putin's agenda - here, using the channel as a device to highlight flaws in western coverage while they themselves are far worse than Fox News in their attempts to brainwash audiences. They could give a rats ass about Israelis or Palestinians, as long as it advances Russian policy against the West.
Well this is what happens when five Arab armies fail to live up to their bold promise of pushing the Jews - who have every legal and historical right to be there - into the sea.
No Hamas, no rockets.
No woman, no cry.