Our brave boys in the IDF wounded this heavily armed, highly dangerous woman lying by the curb on the left (Suhaib Salem/Reuters)So now it’s come to this. Not to be outdone by its bang-up job in entirely dismantling the nation of Lebanon during the recent war, the IDF has taken things to a new low. Now it prides itself on killing unarmed civilian women and children:
Israeli troops fired at a large crowd of unarmed Palestinian women in the Gaza Strip today as the women approached a mosque to help Palestinian militants holed up inside. Two women were killed and about 10 were injured, according to hospital workers.
One of the Palestinian woman [sic] who ringed a mosque in the northern Gaza town of Beit Hanoun fell to the ground after being wounded.
The shooting provoked widespread outrage among Palestinians.
To be fair, we should hear the Israeli version:
The Israeli military said its fire was directed at Palestinian gunmen who were hiding among the women as they marched toward the Um al-Nasir mosque in Beit Hanun, the town in the northeastern Gaza Strip where Israeli troops and militants have been battling for the past three days. The Israelis said eight militants were shot, and that they were not aware that women were hit, but were investigating.
So let’s get this straight. If an armed Palestinian hides in a group of unarmed civilian women then it’s OK to shoot the women in order to try to kill the gunmen? That’s a new and interesting development in the history of modern war. And don’t you love the military response that they weren’t “aware that women were hit” even though they shot into a massed crowd of perhaps 2,000 (according the BBC World News report I heard last night). Mark Regev, Israeli foreign ministry flack also claimed that the gunmen were actually shooting at the soldiers from within the crowd. While it is certainly possible, the idea that a Palestinian gunman would shoot within a crowd of civilians seems a stretch considering how easy it would be for him to accidentally shoot them.
I’m certainly not countenancing the this if it did happen. But an elementary rule of war is that you do not kill unarmed civilians, especially not in cold blood. I hear the Hague calling: Peretz and Halutz, do you hear them too?
Haaretz reports three deaths among the Palestinian women demonstrators, not two as the NY Times reports:
Earlier Friday, a 40-year-old woman was killed by IDF fire as women flocked to a Beit Hanun mosque to act as human shields for some 60 gunmen holed up inside. Two other civilians – youths aged 15 and 19 – were also said to have been killed.
Haaretz also reported a total of 20 Palestinian dead in Gaza in the past 24 hours:
At least 20 Palestinians, including five civilians, were killed Friday in Israel Defense Forces operations in the Gaza Strip and West Bank. Nine of the fatalities occurred in the northern Gaza town of Beit Hanun, where the IDF has been operating since Wednesday morning.
Yet this will stir barely a flicker in the consciences of Israelis and their right-wing supporters in the Diaspora. They will not hear the keening of Palestinian women in their Gaza courtyards and hovels as they mourn and bury their dead. Business as usual I’m afraid. While I have never and will never support suicide bombings, this lack of conscience is what first motivated Palestinians to send suicide bombers into Israel. That’s one of the reasons there is so little hope and so much hate on the Palestinian side.
Israel’s conscience seems utterly obtuse and impermeable. It’s as if Israelis manage to seal off their vulnerable side so that it does not have to deal with such inconvenient realities as Palestinian suffering. And to think that this is the same people that produced the great moral consciences of the world’s religions: Isaiah, Jeremiah, Amos. These prophets who understood deeply and in their heart of hearts the suffering of the oppressed and the domination of the weak by the strong. Who castigated their countrymen for having hearts of stone in the face of such injustice. We should be ashamed. We’re not worthy of them.
I stumbled onto your site while I was researching the song Tzena, Tzena, Tzena. Thank you for an accurate history and transliteration of the song. Unfortunately, that’s the last nice thing I can say about your site. WOW, how does one man get so many things wrong. Lets just look at the last posting. You accuse Israel of cold blooded killing of civilians. Now lets look at the facts. Israel withdrew 100% from Gaza but rocket attacks have continued. This operation is an attempt to stop these attacks. The women, intentionally placed themselves into the conflict, trying to shield the Palestinians fighters. THEY CEASED TO BE CIVILIANS AT THE MOMENT THEY INTENTIONALLY ENTERED THE BATTLE FIELD WITH THE INTENTION TO IMPACT THE CONFLICT. That was their choice. They could have stayed on the side lines and maintained their status as civilians. They choose not to and they suffered the consequences. Israel correctly fired on them, as to do otherwise would encourage this tactic and untimately cost many more lives. Do you get any part of this?
I have read many blogs today all talking about this dark day in our history. One blog used a visual – the painting the Scream from Edvard Munch. I wrote this:
“The painting the Scream is exactly how I feel tonight after seeing what has gone on today in Gaza. I feel I am going mad and I only watch from the comfort of my home in Amsterdam. I can only feebly begin to imagine how those feel there on the ground. Do all of our blogs and all of our writings do anything? How can this madness be made to stop? How can I continue to share the same faith and same (dual) nationality with those committing these crimes? Have I crossed some mental Rubicon if I can understand the utter desperation, the utter hopelessness, the total frustration that spawns such hatred for us (perhaps better said – such longing for freedom from our occupation) that young men and women use the only weapons available to them to fight us – their own bodies. How did we, supposing to be ‘a light unto the nations’ become a nation of such darkness? How do we kill and kill and kill, crying to the world like we are the tortued victims? How do we justify all this because of a handful of Qassam dead and wounded over six years? Where is this leading? Where is this all going to end? With every bullet we fire we kill another last remaining bit of our own humanity. This madness must stop. Tonight is not a good night for me. And for those is Gaza, tonight is a hell a thousand times over.”
Now I am going to bed, with childlike dreams that when I wake up, this insanity will have passed. But I know it wont.
Shabbat Shalom, peace, salam, shalom
Your comment is typical of the bankrupt thinking of many Israelis, I’m sorry to say. Israel “withdrew” from Gaza. How did it withdraw? Did it allow Gaza to maintain commerce, an independent economy, transportation, free government? Of course not. After withdrawal, Gaza was no more “free” of Israel or Israelis than before withdrawal.
Of course rocket attacks continue. As long as Israel does not negotiate a final settlement with the Palestinians in which it agrees to return to 67 boundaries, resistance to Occupation will continue.
NO, you don’t get to define what is & is not a civilian. International law does that. An unarmed, non combatant (someone not taking up arms) is a civilian. You can try to do a presto chango & manipulate the status of the women turning them into combatants, but you’d be making a mockery of international law. This is, of course, something the IDF does virtually every day so it doesn’t surprise me that you’d find it so easy to pervert international standards as well. But the rest of the world doesn’t buy yr distortion. You can fool yourself into believing you have no moral responsibilities to Palestinian civilians but no one else accepts those terms. And such moral blindness only testifies to the abject bankruptcy of your & Israel’s approach both to the Gaza massacre and the general Israeli Palestinian conflict.
You are simply morally depraved. I only wish your mother, sister or daughter had been among them. As a a father of a 2 yr old daughter I don’t say this lightly. Then we’d see how cavalierly you’d shed such innocent blood. And if you cleverly attempt to argue that your female relatives wouldn’t do such a thing, you lie. Any woman in similar circumstances might do the same to protect their loved ones.
I am proud to say that I will NEVER, EVER “get” that a soldier should deliberately fire on and murder in cold blood a defenseless woman. We may share a religion, but we will never share a moral outlook. Your moral outlook confines itself to your own kind and defines Palestinian life as worthless. This is not a Jewish outlook. This is a pagan ultra-nationalist outlook. Isaiah, Jeremiah and Amos would inveigh against you in disgust if they could.
I am with Richard on this one regarding the women. Anyone who was not morally depraved would have said, damn, we lost this battle. Or, well we will just have to maintain this cordon and not let any of the militants leave and we’ll see what happens. But to raise your rifle, look thru the sights or line your eye up over the barrel at an unarmed women a hundred or two hundred meters away and then pull that trigger… sorry… that is moral depravity, criminal behaviour, hate or some other dark and lost emotion. And in the end, the militants escaped in the ensuing confusion. Which is interesting, because it is just like Isael’s overall Gaza policy. Say what you will, the fact remains that the policy is inneffective. Galid si not yet home, the Qassam rockets haven’t stopped and we are not one step closer to peace or helping cultivate an atmosphere conducive to peace. So tell me, what is Isael accomplishing?
Thinking about this event – and so many in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict – I’m reminded of a book I read when I was a college student, I got my Bachelor’s in American and European History and was particularly interested in WW2.
Nazi Seizure of Power: The Experience of a Single German Town 1922-1945 is a scholarly work that describes – in chilling detail – the events of a small German town in the pre- and Nazi period.
The biggest lesson I drew from that book – the main reason the Socialists lost to the Nazi’s – particularly in the eyes of the “average citizen” – was that every time the Nazi’s lowered the bar of despicable acts – (and of course went lower and lower) – the Socialists who opposed them – met the Nazi behavior tit-for-tat. Of course they were never as good as it as the Nazi’s – and they eventually lost any sort of moral high-ground and people soon saw there was no reason to support them….
Reading Richard’s post, and yosef’s comments – and Richard’s ressponse – I think of the words of the organizations – and actions of the young men and women in extremist groups who strap belts of explosives on to themselves and walk onto buses or cafes in Jerusealem, Tel-Aviv (etc etc) and commit suicide bombings.
They always make the same arguement that yosef as made. That the Israeli’s killed by their bombs aren’t civilians – they are all complicit in Israel’s “Crimes”… That they are acceptable targets of a quasi-military operation.
Now don’t get me wrong – I’m not equating either the Israeli’s OR the Palestinians (as a whole) to the Nazi’s. I do, however, equate the actions of the most extreme – who justify suicide bombing in cafes, school buses and so on (or crashing a 747 into an office building for that matter)- to be among the most despicable (and perhaps senseless) acts of violence in modern times.
We can never allow ourselves to justify behavior that we consider unacceptable by our opponents by the behavior of our opponents.
This is a lesson that American Jews like myself must not consdier acceptable by Israel, also as an American citizen myself must not consider acceptable, so many acts my own government is commiting in my name. (And I pray the events of next Tuesday may begin to change).
Arguing against the IDF commiting these (yes I can’t use any better word) crimes – we are not doing so out of a feeling of moral superiority, or hatred – or any other negative emtion.
But for fear of the consequences – and the desire for Israel to be stronger, safer, and God-willing, more peaceful…
Yosef,
Don’t bother trying to convince Richard of anything, he has become more and more unhinged as of late. You are, of course, correct, that under international law, once the Hamas burqa brigade decided to swarm into the street to abet the escape of their rocket firing, arms tunnel digging, suicide bombing brethren, they assumed the role of combatants, even if unarmed.
The IDF was remarkably restrained in its response. They could have simply mowed down the frontline of women, sacked the mosque, and detained or killed the Hamas killers. Instead, to avoid a high death toll, they actually allowed the Hamasniks to escape.
One other thing. Richard will attack you personally, call you names, and slander you. But if you say anything that he deems offensive, he will summarily ban you (or attempt to). It’s particularly funny because Richard is one of those people who gets hysterical about their not being “open debate” on the Israel topic (which of course their is, it’s just that Richard’s views are so morally and intellectually bankrupt that they don’t have credence in America).
This is an outright lie. If it is not, please inform us of a source that verifies this stupid claim. You won’t find him providing one because there is simply no provision under international law that allows an armed force to fire into a crowd of unarmed civilians period, no matter who is hiding in their midst.
More mindless lies (or perhaps he’s deluded enought to think that what he writes is true–but more likely he read this at some fourth-hand hack pro-Israel blog like LGF & has received it as Moses’ law from Sinai). The gunmen escaped not because the IDF let them, but because the IDF simply could not catch them among 2,000 swarming women. There were holes created in the mosque wall allowing ingress to & egress from the building. I’m certain that this is the way that some or most of the gunmen escaped. Others simply melted into the crowd as any self-respecting guerrilla would be able to do.
NO. You called me a “useful idiot.” My comment rules state clear as day: “insulting comments directed at the author may…result in being banned from…participation. In case you don’t understand the language you claim to speak–“idiot” is an insulting comment. You earned it. But you neglect to mention that I offered to reinstate you if you wrote to me directly & promised you would merely argue in yr posts but not post insults. You certainly didn’t contact me. Instead you use the subterfuge of multiple IP addresses to avoid my spam filter. You’re like the guest who comes to dinner & leaves a deposit on the dining rm. table. When the host shows him the door, he leaves & then climbs back in the house through the open bathroom window where he proceeds to do a number again on the floor.
You can lie and delude yourself and have diarrhea of the mouth here all you like. That won’t earn you banning. But calling me an idiot (as you did in an earlier thread) or “deranged” (as you did in this thread) most certainly will.
And please do spent lots of time writing comments here & trying to post them. If they’re not moderated as spam, I’ll delete them as soon as I see them. It’d give me great pleasure though to obliterate words that took you time to write. Though they aren’t worth a brass farthing, yr words & “ideas” (such as they are) are perfectly deserving of oblivion.
UPDATE: I’ve rethought this a bit. If this commenter publishes future comments again, I will not delete the comment outright unless it is insulting and personally offensive in ways outlined in my Comment rules. But if it is, I will snuff those comments out as quickly as I see them. And again, I offer him the option of doing the decent, respectful thing & writing to me to say that he understands and will abide by these rules. That would earn him immediate unbanning.
It is interesting that in order to feel outraged about the IDF actions in this case you pretend that the terrorists somehow hid themselves among an innocent group of civilians who just happened to be walking by. In those circumstances I might have joined you in your outrage.
However the situation was the reverse – these women willingly put themselves in harms way for the explicit purpose of aiding the terrorists in their getaway. Hardly sounds like innocent bystanders to me. This reminds me of a movie where a bankrobber, when confronted by police, takes one of his own men and threatens to shoot him if the police come any closer. Of course in the film the police simply shoot both of them as the “hostage” is no more an innocent bystander than these women.
That they were not wearing army fatigues and purposely engaging in a combat situation means, under International LAW, that they are non-uniformed enemy combatants and can be summarily shot on the spot, just so you know, while you are carelessly flinging around claims of abuse of that very same set of laws.
By your Jew-hating standards a teenager or woman with bombs strapped to themselves also should not be fired upon since they are not wearing uniforms and are just innocent civilians, or do you even bother to draw the line there?
How far will you go to ensure the destruction of Isreal?
By the way, I also spent two years at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem but two years earlier than you. I met a number of so-called Jews who were just like you. Not many, but a few. The same kind of Jews who would not say anything politically incorrect for fear that “THEY” would hate us more if we sounded off or complained or defended ourselves, whoever “THEY” might be.
Yes it would be so nice if only we met bombing attacks with flowers and kisses. Eventually “THEY” would be too embarrassed to continue destroying us as we continued to be shmoos. After all, “THEY” eventually stopped killing the sappy Dodo birds who did nothing, neither fighting nor flying away, didn’t “THEY”?
I am sorry if I missed your solution to the conflict. Was is not fighting or not flying away?
I “pretend” nothing of the sort. I even said in the post I believe that Hamas radio urged Gazan women to come to the mosque to protect the gunmen. But it makes no difference why the women were there. They were unarmed civilians. That is their status under international law. The law makes no distinction involving their motive for being there.
I”m glad you used your inapt bank robber analogy. Let me make the analogy more apt to the Gaza situation: do you mean to tell me if the gunmen had been bank robbers that the police would be justified in shooting civilians surrounding them if the civilians were there to protect the robbers, while the police would not be justified if the civilians were there by accident? Of course not. The police have no right to shoot civilians no matter what the intention of the civilians.
You are the 2nd person in the last week to make up from whole cloth what international law says on this subject. Under international law a civilian is a civilian is a civilian. I challenge you as I challenged the last bozo who tried to substitute his own prejudiced errant notions for what the law actually said: prove it. Of course you can’t. But I’d like to see you try. And while you’re at it why don’t you give us some of yr bona fides that prove yr expertise on the subject of international law?
I reserve you a special place in hell for calling me that. I am a Jew. Proud of my heritage. You, I’m afraid are the one who hates. And you hate a fellow-Jew. That makes YOU the Jew-hater.
If you had a whit of intelligence you’d present stronger arguments than this. Of course a suicide bomber is not a civilian. They have a bomb strapped around their waste which they intend to blow up & kill people. What weapon were the Gazan women using when they surrounded the mosque other than pure, non violent resistance?
Not very far at all. I don’t support Israel’s destruction, nor will Israel be destroyed if it makes peace with the Arabs. It’s the hate & venom of bozos like you which will ultimately lead to Israel’s destruction. You can afford to hate Arabs to the last one. Unfortunately, Israel cannot afford yr armchair homicidal rage. Israelis are flesh & blood & die when they are shot or blown up. While you sit comfortably at home & egg them on to fight to the last.
And btw, don’t you think if you love Israel so much you could learn to spell its name properly?
More steaming horse piss. I’m not afraid of “sounding off” against Palestinian behavior which I deplore. I’ve criticized Hezbollah & Palestinian terror here. Have you done the same regarding Israeli terror? Of course you haven’t. You’re one of those self-centered bastards who thinks that the world should revolve around Israel & its every need. Israel right or wrong, eh? Or I should say “Israel never wrong.”
How dare you reduce my views to some stupid caricature. There has been far too much hatred & violence from both sides & especially people like you to talk in terms of “flowers and kisses.” Peace will be made by hard-headed realists on both sides like Rabin who realize that the killing cannot go on forever. Peace is not a fuzzy, utopian vision. Peace is a hard, pragmatic necessity.
Maybe if you actually bothered to read what I say instead of trying to score propaganda pts. you wouldn’t ‘miss’ it next time. But why bother trying to argue with you. You make up the “facts” and never bother to seriously grapple with anyone holding an opinion diff. fr. yr own. You’re a piece of work.
Richard:
After reading much of your blog, I have two questions for you:
1) If Israel should “negotiate a withdrawl to the ’67 borders,” and then the terrorism, rocket attacks, and genocidal hatred continue, what should we do? Is it ever OK to fight back?
2) Would you, as a Jew, feel safe on the streets of Gaza City? Should the palestinians develop a state in the Judea, Samaria, and Gaza, do you think that they would ever let you, as a Jew, visit the Jewish holy sites there?
Michael: Of course it’s OK to defend oneself. But the question we must ask now is–is Israel defending itself? Is killing 1,200 Lebanese civilians and 50 Gazans (half of whom were civilian) in 4 days truly defending the nation? And from what is the IDF defending Israel? Mostly harmless rocket attacks. I’m not defending the rocket attacks as I oppose them. But the problem is that Israel has lost all sense of proportion in this vain, desperate effort to stifle Palestinian resistance. And finally–the IDF is “defending” Israel in these operations, is it working? The answer is most demonstrably, NO. It is not working. What would work? Negotiation. In fact, that’s all that would work.
I have a very simple answer for you regarding potential Palestinian recidivism once there is a peace agreement. There should be a provision in such a document for the border to be patrolled by an independent international force to prevent precisely such incidents. The UNIFIL force is working tolerably well right now in southern Lebanon. I see no reason why a similar effort couldn’t succeed between Palestine & Israel. Eventually, once peace has a solid foundation such forces could be withdrawn, but only with the approval of both sides.
The problem with the perspective of anti-Palestinian/pro-Israel rightists is that they believe that Israel will be left out there hanging once peace is declared. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Once there is peace it will be in the world’s interest to ensure that it continues. If it doesn’t the UN, EU, the U.S. and every Quartet member will have a tremendous black eye should Israel agree to peace and be attacked.
I will feel safe on the streets of Gaza City once there is peace. I have Jewish friends who have recently visited Palestinian towns and villages. They felt safe while they were there. Of course, they were on a medical mission to treat sick Palestinians. If I wore a kippa and tzitzit would I feel safe walking on the streets of Gaza? Of course not. Will there ever come a time when you could walk down a Gaza street wearing a kippa? Yes, I know that day will come. It might take a year or two or three after peace. But what you don’t realize is that things do not stay the same in life. They change. The person you wanted to kill one day is someone you might do a business deal with under future different circumstances. And this will be how things change in a peaceful Mideast.
WHEN (not ‘should’) the Palestinians create a state in Palestine they most definitely WILL let me visit the Jewish holy sites should I wish to do so. If they did not, then they would be in violation of the peace agreement.
You can have israel, or you can have peace, but not both. The choice is yours
“Mostly harmless rocket attacks.”
Well, I live in the north of Israel. These rocket attacks are not harmless. I know people in my town, and my wife has coworkers, whose houses were destroyed by the rockets. Tell them that the rockets are harmless.
“I have a very simple answer for you regarding potential Palestinian recidivism once there is a peace agreement. There should be a provision in such a document for the border to be patrolled by an independent international force to prevent precisely such incidents. The UNIFIL force is working tolerably well right now in southern Lebanon.”
The UNIFIL force has already said that it will not stop the smuggling of weapons into Lebanon, will not prevent Hezbollah from disarming, will not enter palestinian refugee camps in southern Lebanon to disarm terrorists, and will not prevent Hezbollah forces from returning to the border area. These are all facts taken directly from news articles in the last month or so. Right not in southern Lebanon, UNIFIL is avoiding work.
International forces have a history of failure on the Israeli border. Remember in ’67, how the UN force was ordered out of Sinai? They left without any debate, or even any protest. The original UNIFIL was so useless that they couldn’t even see the terrorists.
“the UN, EU, the U.S. and every Quartet member will have a tremendous black eye should Israel agree to peace and be attacked.”
This has already happened, many times. Just look at the last 15 years since the Oslo agreements. Palestinian terrorism never stopped. In 2000, the Israeli gov’t agreed to give the palestinians almost everything they have been asking for, with agreements to talk about the rest, and the response was a campaign of terrorist violence which still has not ended.
“WHEN (not ’should’) the Palestinians create a state in Palestine they most definitely WILL let me visit the Jewish holy sites should I wish to do so. If they did not, then they would be in violation of the peace agreement.”
A nice hypothetical. Which Jewish holy sites would you visit? Joseph’s Tomb? No, wait, it was destroyed by a palestinian mob, while PA police watched, 3 years ago. How about the Cave of the Patriarchs? Nope, the synagogue there was also destroyed. Maybe you’d like to visit some Christian sites? I hear that the Church of the Nativity is a good one… um, nope, about 4 years ago, palestinian terrorists invaded and desecrated it.
A peace agreement is just words on paper. The palestinians have a proven track record of breaking them.
Here are a few things for you to mull over. The following statements were all taken from palestinian sources, during this past October:
At an October 20, 2006 Hamas convention in Khan Yunis, Palestinian Foreign Minister Mahmoud Al-Zahar stated that “Israel is a vile entity that has been planted in our soil, and has no historical, religious or cultural legitimacy. We cannot normalize our relations with this entity. The history of this region has proven [time and again] that occupation is temporary. Thousands of years ago, the Romans occupied this land and [eventually] left. The Persians, Crusaders, and English [also] came and went. The Zionists have come, and they too will leave. [We say] no to recognizing Israel, regardless of the price we may have to pay [for our refusal].”
And:
Mahmoud Al-Zahar [co-founder of Hamas] said: “We [aim to liberate] all our lands… If we have the option, we will establish a state on every inch of land within the 1967 [borders], but this does not by any means imply that we will relinquish our right to all the Palestinian lands. We want all of Palestine from [Ras] Naqura to Rafah, and from the [Mediterranean] sea to the [Jordan] river.”
And:
Hamas Political Bureau Head Musa Abu Marzouq said: “Hamas has serious reservations about the [Arab] initiative since it involves acceptance of two states, Palestine and Israel. Hamas rejects this because it means recognition of Israel.”
And, here is Hezbollah’s position, given by their spokesman, Hassan Ezzedin, in an interview with the New Yorker Magazine, published 14 Oct 2002:
“Our goal is to liberate the 1948 borders of Palestine,” he added, referring to the year of Israel’s founding. The Jews who survive this war of liberation, Ezzeddin said, “can go back to Germany, or wherever they came from.”
Richard, these folks are not interested in peace with Israel. They are interested in killing Jews. They’d kill you, too, in a heartbeat.
If you examined the context of my post it does not deal at all with northern Israel, Hezbollah or its rocket attacks against Israel. This is an entirely different story. If you want to talk about this subject yr comment belongs among my many posts about Lebanon. I have never denied the damage of danger from Hezbollah rockets which are more powerful, more destructive, & more accurate.
I was talking in this post solely about QASSAM rocket attacks against southern Israel. These are indeed “mostly harmless” as I wrote in this post.
If you disapprove of UNIFIL & expect it to fail then you’re contradicting the stated policy of your own government. The Olmert government asked for UNIFIL to patrol southern Lebanon. The same government has pronounced itself satisfied (though admittedly not overjoyed) with the results thus far. If you disagree you really should be taking it up with your own duly elected government and not arguing here with me.
And your argument that because previous international forces failed to prevent hostilities, this means that the current iteration of UNIFIL will fail does not hold water. The missions you criticize were not peacekeeping missions with full military capability. They were not designed to enforce peace. They were only designed to monitor and had standing orders that if war broke out they were NOT to stand in the way because they simply did not have manpower or firepower to do so. Not so with UNIFIL 2 which has a robust military capacity. So why don’t you talk apples to apples instead of apples to oranges?
Yours is an entirely tendentious perspective on recent Israeli-Palestinian relations. Israel did not agree to give the Palestinians “almost everything they were asking for.” They offered the Palestinians 90% of what they were asking for. And we’re not talking about a 10% that was scrub sand. That 10% was some of the most hotly contested territory between them. And was Israel willing to agree to two capitals in Jerusalem? Most definitely not. Think of the U.S. negotiating a peace agreement with an enemy in which the enemy promises to return 90% of the territory it has conquered MINUS Washington D.C. What American would accept such a ludicrous proposal?
Not so fast. Israel has just as accomplished a track record of breaking agreements. It never fully implemented the Oslo accords which helped (note I said “helped” rather than “caused” outright, since Israel was not solely to blame for this) cause the first Intifada. Israel certainly has not implemented the Road Map under which it would already have dismantled all illegal settlements and refrained from expanding existing legal ones.
Regarding all yr anti-Hamas propaganda–do I trust these guys? Not entirely. But will they be the ones to sign a peace agreement with Israel? No. If the national unity government comes to power Hamas won’t be anywhere near controlling peace negotiations with Israel (if Olmert would ever agree to conduct them). So spew horrid Hamas pronouncements all you want. They’re likely to be irrelevant to political developments over the coming months if not years.
Besides, you’ve conveniently left out any and all statements by Hamas officials and leaders which state much diff. sentiments than those you feature here. I’ve written posts about just about every one here so do an internal search on my site before you spout one-sided propaganda. I don’t make a claim that Hamas is God’s gift to peacemaking. I wouldn’t fully trust them even if I were negotiating peace them. My motto would be: “Don’t fully trust, but verify.” There would be a whole lot of verifying going on were I negotiating on behalf of Israel. And no one says Israel has to sign a peace agreement with Hamas if, after going through the negotiation process, it still mistrusts it or disputes the terms. But what Israel MUST do is negotiate seriously with the Palestinians. You’ve provided nothing but poor excuses for not doing so. And those excuses will unfortunately cause even more of your fellow-citizens to be killed fighting an unnecessary war to the death against a people that, like yours, is prepared for peace.
And this is precisely what many Palestinians and much of the world’s Arab population believes about Israel. So what good is propaganda like this whether it comes fr. your side or the other? It’s quite useless except to stoke fear and hatred on both sides.
Well, Richard, if you want to talk about kassam rockets in southern Israel, we can. Here are some reports I gleaned from the news, over the last week:
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3325101,00.html 7 Nov, kassam rockets hit Ashkelon
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3325424,00.html 8 Nov, a woman was injured in Sderot
(forgot the link, sorry) 12 Nov, kassam rockets hit near Nativ Ha’asara
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1162378401822 15 Nov, 1killed, several critically injured by kassam rockets in Sderot
This article gives a graphic description of the type of damage these rockets inflict on houses:
blogcentral.jpost.com/newsItems/viewFullItem$1372
And, just to round it out, HonestReporting.com gives some longer term statistics of kassam fire.
To sum it up, in the first 9 months of 2006, there were 202 casualties from kassam rockets, more than double the number for all of 2005. In other words, after Israel left Gaza, the terrorist activity there increased. Dramatically. While there was no “occupation” of Gaza, and the palestinian people were free to make their own choices for their own lives.
These rockets are not harmless, Richard. They have put an entire city under artillery fire, every day, for over a year. Thank God, the casualties have been low, but there has been tremendous damage done, pychologically and materially, none the less. Have you, personally, ever been on the receiving end of a rocket attack?
When I said that the palestinians have a history of making and breaking treaties, it was simply a fact. You can read more about this long-time policy of the palestinian leadership at worldnetdaily.com
When I said that UNIFIL would fail, that, too was a fact. They have failed. Hezbollah claims to have 30,000 rockets in Lebanon, ready for another round of fighting. You can read the news story here: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2089-2449728,00.html
UNIFIL’s mandate was to prevent arms smuggling into Lebanon, and prevent the re-arming of Hezbollah. If Hezbollah is better armed now than before the Lebanon War, it is logical to assume that UNIFIL failed.
Why do you say that I was using anti-Hamas propaganda? I was reporting to you what the Hamas leadership says publicly. That’s not propaganda; that’s the public record. Hamas says that they want Israel destroyed. That is their vision of peace. Here are some more quotes, from Hamas, in the last week:
International Herald Tribune, Nov 8, 2006:
“[Ghazi] Hamad told The Associated Press. “It’s a state that believes in killing, and therefore this state should cease to exist.”
Hamad is considered a moderate in the ranks of Hamas, whose charter calls for Israel’s destruction.”
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2006/11/08/africa/ME_GEN_Israel_Hamas.php
Jerusalem Post, Nov 12, 2006
“[PA Foreign Minister Mahmoud] Zahar insisted. “We do not and will not recognize a state called Israel. Israel has no right to any inch of Palestinian land… This is a holy land. It is not the property of the Palestinians or the Arabs. This land is the property of all Muslims in all parts of the world.””
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1162378380219
The inescapable conclusion I reach from these statements is that the palestinian leadership doesn’t want peace with Israel, Richard. They want peace without Israel.
I wish you a very good day, Richard, and I hope that you see the truth before you get hurt.
‘I was talking in this post solely about QASSAM rocket attacks against southern Israel. These are indeed “mostly harmless” as I wrote in this post.’
You are so incredibly arrogant sitting where you are in peace and comfort and lecturing people who have to live with rockets randomly being shot at them. God save us from people like you.
By the way, I am going to refrain from saying that I hope that one of those escaped terrorists winds up killing you or one of your loved ones. Instead I will pray that you come to your senses one day.
“Casualties?” Let’s rather talk DEAD. The facts are that one person has been killed by Qassam rocket attacks in all of Israel going back several YEARS. The NY Times says 300 Gazans have been KILLED going back only a few months (Gideon Levy of Haaretz says 350). That’s a 300 (or 350) to 1 ratio, something you and the IDF should be proud of. And well over half have been CIVILIANS. I won’t even mention how many Palestinian “casualties” there have been because it would bring you into the low thousands. Again, many times more Palestinians are killed & wounded by IDF attacks than the reverse.
This is the same old bullshit you &/or others have tried to peddle here forever. No occupation of Gaza? What do you call strangulation? “Free to make their own choices?” Free to cross their borders? Free to engage in commerce? Free to move people or products? Free to earn a living? Free to ship medicines to hospitals? Free to travel so receive critical medical treatment? So OK if we don’t call it “occupation” we’ll call it national asphyxiation. Would that make you happy?
Don’t get cute with me. Of course, I know these rockets are not harmless. I never said or implied that was the case. Qassams are a menace to peace and security. While I sympathize with the plight of Sderot, a more thoughtful observer than you would recognize that while Palestinians may have lobbed hundreds of shells into Sderot, the IDF has lobbed tens of thousands with constant, unremitting shelling.
I’ve called here for Palestinian militants to stop their firing. But I cannot in all good conscience say they have no reason or justification for their actions. Thankfully, I do not have to suffer under Occupation or constant bombardment as they do. But if I did & I saw 18 sleeping civilians murdered in their beds or unarmed women killed in cold blood, I would find it quite difficult to be as unequivocal in my condemnation as you are.
First of all, have you? But even if you have, I’d challenge you to spend an evening in a Beit Hanun home just beyond Israeli lines. Tell me what that’s like and then we’ll see if you’re still whistling the same tune.
I’ve asked you numerous times here NOT to repeat yourself. I’ve already answered this claim and proven it is deliberately deceptive. If you try to publish another comment here that simply regurgitates the same old crap I simply won’t publish it.
Returning to yr distortion, it is also “simply a fact” that Israel has broken every single agreement that the Palestinians have broken. If they’d followed Oslo and the Road Map there would be an independent Palestinian state and an end to settlements by now. Has that happened? I know that Palestinians have broken agreements. But you can’t only blame one side and be honest. For that reason you are a lying rightist ideologue.
Again, this is a claim you’ve already made here. You have logorrhea. And once again my answer to yr distortion, not according to your own government. No member of the governing coalition has made this claim. I trust their perspective far more than yours.
You also make a completely delusional claim of UNIFIL. UNIFIL is not only there to protect Israel. It is there to keep the peace on both sides. Has Israel stopped overflights as the UN ceasefire directs it to do? An Israeli jet came within 2 seconds of being shot down by French troops when it staged a mock attack on a French position. Is that adhering to the ceasefire.
Furthermore, using UNIFIL is not the best way to disarm Hezbollah. The only way to stop that is to engage in talks with its sponsor, Syria. Return the Golan and Shebaa Farms to Syria and then they will stop sponsoring Hezbollah. In addition, both Syria and Lebanon would recognize Israel and conduct normal relations. But you don’t want normal relations. You want continued dominance and continued war.
If your PM continues to refuse to talk to Assad then Hezbollah will continue to rearm. You have a clear path to ending hostilities with Hezbollah and Syria & yet you & yr PM refuse to follow it. You have only yourselves to blame.
And most Israeli parties and the nation’s top leadership say they want Hamas destroyed. And for every quote you can bring to bear fr. a Hamas leader denying Israel’s legitimacy I can bring 2 from Israeli leaders saying the same thing in reverse. You don’t think hearing Olmert & Sharon before him not to mention Netanyahu, Lieberman and those even farther to their right, call for the liquidation of Hamas gives its leaders the idea that they should try to get Israel before Israel gets them? But even more importantly, you quote selectively. For every quote fr. a Hamas leader saying they want to liquidate Israel I can find you one fr. an equally important Hamas leader saying they do not wish to destroy Israel.
Generally, the Syrian based Hamas exiles or those allied w. them (like Zahar) make the statements you note. And generally (though not exclusively) the Hamas leaders in the Territories speak differently. Hamas is by no means uniform on this issue. Most importantly, the Prisoner’s Document, on which the new unity government will be based does not call for Israel’s destruction. While it does not recognize Israel either, it will serve as the basis for a unity government that WILL lead the way to the PA recognizing Israel.
I have noted previously that I have written a number of posts quoting Hamas leaders making diametrically opposite statements about Israel. I have invited you to visit these posts. But you clearly have not done so because they would disturb that nice insular hateful bubble world you’ve created for yourself.
This is quite simply a lie. You are the boxer Paul Simon sang about: “A man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest.”
This has been yr last word on this post as you’ve begun repeating yrself ad nauseum.
Aren’t you the pot calling the kettle…Your nyc.gov domain indicates that you too are here in the Diaspora “sitting in peace & comfort and lecturing” me about the conflict. In fact, from the luxury of your Brooklyn Metrotech work space in comfortable NYC you tell those Israelis to fight & kill the Palestinians to the very last one. Isn’t that the height of chutzpa? Will you shed your own blood in the battle?
The problem with hateful ideologues like you is that you wear blinders so that you see the suffering of yr own people right in front of you, but cannot see to yr right or left where the vastly greater suffering of the Palestinian people unfolds. Both sides suffer. Both sides need an end to attacks upon them. Both sides need peace. The IDF is not the answer. Neither are Qassam shells on Sderot.
In yr own snarky way, that’s what you just did.
I don’t wish for you, your loved ones or any Israeli to be killed by terrorists just as I wish no Palestinian to be killed by the IDF. Which one of us has the broader sense of menschlichkeit? Or are Palestinians not entitled to humanity?
‘You are simply morally depraved. I only wish your mother, sister or daughter had been among them. As a a father of a 2 yr old daughter I don’t say this lightly.’
This is a direct quote from you, so please don’t lecture me about mentchlichkeit. Maybe you should change the name of your blog to tikun myself. You have a ways to go in improving your own charachter before you go saving the world.
First of all, your distortions and lies are amazing. First of all you claim that one person was killed in Sedorot in all the bombings there. That is factually incorrect, I’ve counted at least 9. So get your facts straight, pal. It sounds like you just regurgitate everything you read from the Palestinain ‘News’ agency without any factchecking whatsover.
Secondly, to equate the victims in Sedorot who are trying to mind their own business with the ‘innocent’ victims in Gaza is moral bankruptcy. The vast majority of the Gazans were terrorists, and most of the so called ‘civilians’ who were killed were in fact hiding and shielding the terrorrists. Once they do that, they are not ‘civilians’ anymore, and I don’t know under which warped set of morals they would be. Where Israel has killed civilians accidently, they have apologized, unlike the Palestinans. I
srael left Gaza entirely and what do the Palestinians do as soon as they go? Do they try to make a business out of the greenhouses that was handed to them on a silver platter? No, right away they start firing rockets into Israel. And what do people like you do? They start making pathetic apologies for them, like implying that Israel was the one who started shelling Gaza when anyone with eyes and a working brain can see where all the violence is coming from. Even liberals like Thomas Friedman from the New York Times has given up on them.
Let’s hear from you. How would you negotiate with people who don’t want a 2 state solution like Hamas who keeps saying to anyone who will listen that they will never negotiate with Israel, not even to the pre-1967 borders? What don’t people like you understand about them when they keep repeating that over and over? I know, if just Israel would give more concessions, they would finally come around. Everything is Israel’s fault somehow.
Thirdly, I don’t work in Brookyn Metrotech, so wrong again. And, yes, I am proud to say that even thought I live in America, I feel deep empathy towards the people in Sedorot AND to the people in Beit Hanoun who were killed accidently. But I blame the Gazans for that because they chose to be in a constant state of war by electing Hamas. (I know, that’s Israel’s fault also.) War is hell and innocent people get killed, especially if the terrorists embed themselves among civilians, hoping that these civilains get killed, so they can get good press coverage form the anti-Isreal media.
Last but not least, maybe you should examine your views as to why they coincide with the most vile Anti-Semites out there.
I certainly will lecture you about menschlichkeit. The commenter to whom I made the statement you quoted approved the deliberate, cold-blooded murder of unarmed Palestinian women. That is the ultimate violation of terms of menschlichkeit. I thought such heartless cruelty deserved an appropriate analogy that might catch this wicked person’s attention. If you can approve of the murder of innocents, then the least you could do would imagine how you might feel if your own flesh and blood was murdered in cold blood. Then you might not muster the same level of heartlessness.
You have provided absolutely no proof that this number is accurate. I’ve tried to do some research on the subject & found a heavily pro-Israel online source which notes 4 Qassam rocket deaths from 2003 to February, 2005. There was one this week. That would make 5. And even if there were 9 deaths, as horrible and unacceptable as such deaths should be, have you no sympathy or mercy on the 300 Gazans killed since July?? Or does yr version of Judaism not allow for sympathy for Arabs?? And btw, that still makes a death ratio of 300 to 5 (or 9 depending on how you count). How much, if anything, is a Palestinian life compared to an Israeli? Not much in yr universe I guess.
If we quote death figures for the war in Lebanon the death rate was closer to 10 to 1.
I do not use any Palestinian news sources for my posts except in very rare instances. I use only Israeli media and American sources like the NY Times.
This is a lie controverted by numerous Haaretz articles saying otherwise. BBC quotes Physicians for Human Rights figures which declare that 155 out of 258 (their count is slightly lower than the NY Times count which I linked to in my earlier comment) or 60% were civilians. Over 1/3 of the civilians were children.
Those civilians who were killed were doing things like sleeping in their beds (were they shielding terrorists when they were blown to bits in their beds?), walking on the street, playing in a field. Many of the civilians killed were women and small children. I suppose all were terrorists or working for them. Pls. provide me a single credible source which confirms your bogus claim that the “vast majority” were terrorists and that the civilians were aiding terrorists. You can’t provide such a source because there simply isn’t one.
Oh really? Pls. show me the 155 apologies issued to those Palestinian civilians killed since July. There was one faint apology issued for the Beit Hanun massacre because the entire world shuddered at the awful brutality of their deaths. Pls. show me all the others you claim were made. And besides, do you think an apology for the death of 18 innocents means anything when the Palestinians know the IDF will take up right where they left off once attention wanders from the Gaza mayhem.
While I don’t defend firing rockets at Israeli civilians, you twist and distort the truth. Israel did not LEAVE Gaza except in a mere physical sense. Israel maintained then & continues to maintain an iron grip on Gaza. No commerce, no travel, no livelihood, no freedom. The entire place seems to be an IDF free fire zone 24/7. All Gazans are free to do is stew in their own impotence to have decent normal lives. Also, the IDF reentered Gaza at will & occupied various portions of it almost fr. the moment it “evacuated.” In reality, Israel never really left Gaza at all. It’s presence is felt in every facet of Gaza life.
Diff. Hamas representatives have said diff. things regarding recognition of Israel. You’ve chosen to focus on those who’ve made the most extreme statements as a true propgandist would. But it will not matter what Hamas’s position is on this question because it appears that the new national unity government will appoint Mahmoud Abbas to negotiate on its behalf a deal with Israel. Or is it your position that Abbas & Fatah do not support a 2 state solution?
Your IP address is registered there. You either work for the municipal government or else you’re abusing a municipal e mail & IP address. And even if you do work for the city you may be abusing your telecommunications policy and privileges.
Not so fast. You feel deep empathy for the Beit Hanun victims yet you blame them for their own deaths. How is that “empathy?” I’d say it’s blaming the victims, a phenomenon we Jews don’t take to kindly to when it comes to our own Holocaust dead.
Do pls. tell me how the terrorists were embedded among those Beit Hanun civilians sleeping in their beds.
More lies. Maybe you should examine yr views as to why they coincide with the most vile rightist ultra-Israel lies, canards and distortions out there.
“This is the same old bullshit you &/or others have tried to peddle here forever”
Are the insults really necessary?
“Don’t get cute with me. Of course, I know these rockets are not harmless. I never said or implied that was the case.”
Not true; further up, you said, in reference to kassam rockets: “Mostly harmless rocket attacks.”
“a more thoughtful observer than you”
more insults…
“would recognize that while Palestinians may have lobbed hundreds of shells into Sderot, the IDF has lobbed tens of thousands with constant, unremitting shelling.”
Not a very efficient army, is the IDF, to only kill 300 to 350 people with tens of thousands of shells? Is that because they’re trying not to target the innocents? With that much artillery flying around, you’d expects thousands dead….
“Thankfully, I do not have to suffer under Occupation or constant bombardment as they do.”
“Have you, personally, ever been on the receiving end of a rocket attack?
First of all, have you? ”
Well, unlike you, yes, actually, I have. During the recent war. For a month. And I can’t take your challenge to spend a night in Beit Hanoun, because, as you admitted earlier, Jews aren’t safe there; the palestinians would probably hurt us.
“lying rightist ideologue”
more name calling…
“You also make a completely delusional claim of UNIFIL. UNIFIL is not only there to protect Israel.”
I know, but I was referring to the parts of its mandate to stop the smuggling, keep Hexbollah disarmed, and keep Hezbollah away from the border. None of which it has managed to do.
Furthermore, using UNIFIL is not the best way to disarm Hezbollah.”
You actually said just that, in your answer to my original questions: “The UNIFIL force is working tolerably well right now in southern Lebanon.” You also said that having an international force on the border is the way to enforce peace agreements.
“I have noted previously that I have written a number of posts quoting Hamas leaders making diametrically opposite statements about Israel. ”
So you admit that Hamas really does talk out of both sides of its mouth? If they say “Peace” and “War” simultaneously, and shoot at the same time, I think that means that they really want war….
Bye bye, Richard.
Normally no. But when you hear 2-3 people a wk or so, each & every wk. of the yr. repeat the same old tired, distorted arguments & you’ve repeated yr demolition of said argument ea. & every time, you just get plain tired of it. In fact, I’m thinking of creating an Israeli-Palestinian FAQ which, instead of repeating my arguments ad infinitum, I’d merely link to my rebuttal of whatever false argument was raised.
I don’t know you. You may be an absolutely sterling individual and a credit to yr community & nation. But I can only go by what you write. And in this case it was JUST PLAIN WRONG.
My statement is factually true. 99.8% of Qassams don’t hit anything or anyone. There have been deaths on the Israeli side. I do not diminish the evil of the act that killed them in any way or the suffering it creates. But I insist on keeping a measure of proportionality in discussing the suffering on both sides. And the suffering is FAR, FAR greater on the Gaza side. If you don’t believe me then read a distinguished Israeli journalist who has just spent a considerable amt of time in Beit Hanun covering the massacre story. He says precisely this:
I’m not making this up fr. what you call my armchair of luxury here in the Diaspora.
“Thousands dead.” You’d quite like that wouldn’t you? What, is this yr attempt to be snide, sarcastic & cute all rolled into one? If so, give it a break. It’s not working for me. As many as 350 Gazans have been killed in 4 months & all you can do is try to crack a flippant joke about it?
That’s not quite what I asked you. Yes, I’m aware that you & many Israelis were forced to sit in shelters for a month. But what I’m asking is have you had a comparable experience to residents of Gaza who sit in their homes (not shelters) & wait ea. day or night for the shells to fall hoping they won’t kill any loved ones? How close have you been to an actual shell landing? Have you heard it whistle over yr. head? Have you heard one land a block from your house? Next door? Have you personally known close friends, relatives, etc. blown to bits by them? I don’t want this to be merely a political/intellectual argument. I want this to be personal. Very personal.
This is not so. In fact, Gideon Levy, in the Haaretz article I link to above invites you and other Israelis to join him in Beit Hanun. He has been covering stories like this for ages and not a hair on his head has ever been mussed. So you no longer can use the “I wouldn’t be safe there” argument. I have Levy’s e mail address & know him. I’ll personally intercede & ask him to help you arrange the trip. Hell, if there are expenses involved I’ll even chip in to help out. Not because I want to prove a point. But rather because I firmly believe that if Palestinians had to live in those shelters w. you last summer; and if you had to live with the Atamnas in their bombed out home where 20 family members died–then the war would simply end because then both sides would know the suffering of the other.
But as long as you & those like you here, who write as unfeelingly of Palestinian suffering as you do, continue to harbor yr callous feelings–that’s how much longer the conflict will continue.
Yes, I said the force is working tolerably well. I do not currently think it is possible for UNIFIL to disarm Hezbollah. Nor can the Lebanese army do this. Not even Israel could do it despite the massed might of its entire military force. Israel knows this is true & still isn’t loudly protesting the failure of UNIFIL (yet). I would not put the burden on UNIFIL of doing the impossible. So, I continue to maintain it is doing its work tolerably well.
Do you expect that UNIFIL is Israel’s military agent in Lebanon? That UNIFIL will do what Israel itself could not accomplish–disarm Hezbollah. This is delusional thinking. There is only one way to disarm Hezbollah. That is, to disarm the political/military situation which created it. As I’ve written here at least 20-30 times, Israel must return the Golan & Shebaa in return for Syria ending sponsorship of Hezbollah and recognition of Israel by both Syria & Lebanon. That is the quickest, surest & safest way to disarm Hezbollah. And it can be done–it will be done.
You are insufferable aren’t you? NO, Hamas is no different than the Labor Party, Kadima or Likud. There are hawks & there are doves. There is a battle for political supremacy within every party and movement. One side makes its statements, the other side makes its diametrically opposed statements. The only problem is that if you were a Palestinian you’d take the worst, most extreme statements by Israeli pols & say: “See, they all believe in exterminating us.” But you would be dead wrong in yr understanding of Israeli politics just as you are dead wrong in yr understanding of Palestinian, & specifically Hamas politics.
‘While I don’t defend firing rockets at Israeli civilians, you twist and distort the truth. Israel did not LEAVE Gaza except in a mere physical sense. Israel maintained then & continues to maintain an iron grip on Gaza. No commerce, no travel, no livelihood, no freedom. The entire place seems to be an IDF free fire zone 24/7. All Gazans are free to do is stew in their own impotence to have decent normal lives. Also, the IDF reentered Gaza at will & occupied various portions of it almost fr. the moment it “evacuated.” In reality, Israel never really left Gaza at all. It’s presence is felt in every facet of Gaza life.’
This is just the typical propaganda apologetics for terrorist sympathisers like you. How about if they make a good faith effort to actually engage in some business and commerce, and not this mad fighting ,then we could actually judge the Israeli actions. The next thing you’re going to tell me is that Thomas Friedman is also some right wing zealot, right? The fact is that at the first chance to actually have self-rule, they started attacking Israel. You are no different than Joseph Goebbels with your vicious lies. Anybody with eyes can see that Israel is responding to attacks and not the other way around.
‘Diff. Hamas representatives have said diff. things regarding recognition of Israel. You’ve chosen to focus on those who’ve made the most extreme statements as a true propgandist would.’
Again, more lies. Only the most ‘extreme’? Really now. This is part and parcel of their agenda. Anybody from Hamas who says differently is considered on the fringe of that group.
‘Not so fast. You feel deep empathy for the Beit Hanun victims yet you blame them for their own deaths. How is that “empathy?” I’d say it’s blaming the victims, a phenomenon we Jews don’t take to kindly to when it comes to our own Holocaust dead.’
No, I didn’t blame them specifically. I blamed the Gazan people as a whole for perpetuating a war. If there are deaths of civilians that result of that war it is the fault of the people who started that war. Of course your response to that will be that Israel did something as usual so it’s not the Palestinians fault. Ever.
Calling me a “terrorist sympathiser” has earned you banning from this site. Read the comment rules above the comment box. It is a blatant calumny to use such a term to describe me. And if you do you don’t deserve the right to communicate with me or my readers. Much better for you to spew hate & lies elsewhere.
And what will they use for product when borders are never open which in turn prevents almost all goods from being either exported or imported? There is no economy to speak of due to Israel’s strangulation of all ports of entry leading into or out of Gaza. What should they sell ea. other–rocks? Spent Israeli artillery shells?
The closest Tom Friedman has been to an Israeli artillery shell or Qassam has been his suite at the King David hotel–and that’s only when he visits Israel which prob. isn’t very often. He hasn’t written anything illuminating about the IP conflict in many, many moons. No, Friedman stopped being my analyst of choice regarding this subject somewhere about 20 yrs ago.
And you’re a moron who’s beneath contempt. Did I say you’re banned? Can I double ban you? I’ll have to look at my comment security feature to check on that.
Yeah, with eyes in the back of their head. If your eyes were where they belonged you’d see suffering wherever it rears its ugly head even if it had an Arab face.
Oh, I see. So that makes government ministers, official spokespeople, & elected legislators who’ve said precisely what I wrote here “on the fringe.” You’re as ignorant as they come.
If there are deaths of civilians as a result of that war it is the fault of the people who rain those shells down on the heads of innocents.
You’re a scummy liar. I’ve written possibly 100 times here (mostly answering numbskulls like you) that I blame Palestinian militants for the death they rain down on Sderot. But unlike you I do not blame innocent Palestinian civilians for these actions, esp. not ones sleeping soundly in their beds before being blown to bits by Israeli shells.
Hey, now that you’re banned here why don’t you go take a dump at yr own feeble blog? Excuse me, I have to go hose down the mess you’ve left here.
Does Gaydamak still have that much influence on the ground? I was under the impression that he is considered pretty weak now, but the comment above suggests otherwise.