47 thoughts on “Time: ‘Why Israel Can’t Win’ – Tikun Olam תיקון עולם إصلاح العالم
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    1. Sorry for using Hollywood lingo & not explaining myself & thanks John for doing so. “Jumping the shark” refers to a Happy Days episode towards the end of that show in which the Fonz goes water skiing & jumps over a shark. It was such a preposterous plot development that people started to realize the show was on a downhill trajectory.

      Some of my right wing pro-Israel opponents have been fond of saying I jumped the shark quite a long time ago. Happy to say I’m still going strong. Can’t say the same for Operation Solid Lead though. My comment was meant to say that Time has finally realized that it is a dead end.

  1. Oy vey! That front cover is going to have Dershowitz and Foxman hoppin’ mad! The “Yid Gestapo” (Spencer Ackerman’s term) is gonna come down on Time Warner like a plague of biblical proportions!

    PS. From Wikipedia – Jumping the shark is a colloquialism used by TV critics and fans to denote that point in a TV show or movie series’ history where the plot veers off into absurd story lines or out-of-the-ordinary characterizations, particularly for a show with falling ratings apparently becoming more desperate to draw viewers in.

  2. I probably should have given a bit more:
    From Wikipedia – Jumping the shark is a colloquialism used by TV critics and fans to denote that point in a TV show or movie series’ history where the plot veers off into absurd story lines or out-of-the-ordinary characterizations, particularly for a show with falling ratings apparently becoming more desperate to draw viewers in. In the process of undergoing these changes, the TV or movie series loses its original appeal. Shows that have “jumped the shark” are typically deemed to have passed their peak.

  3. Clear “Winning” is rare these days. I expect Hamas to wave a white flag pretty soon and Israel to stop actions after it destroys the major rocket caches in the territory and then retreat. That’s a “win”. You want the lion to lie down with the lamb. That’s the messianic age.

    1. I expect Hamas to wave a white flag pretty soon and Israel to stop actions after it destroys the major rocket caches in the territory and then retreat. That’s a “win”.

      Alas, a “win” that will never be. You’re living in a pipe dream, Tzvee. Do you know how many similar operations there’ve been in Gaza going back to 2004? By my count roughly eight. All with flashy names, all with similar purposes, all with lethal results to Palestinians. How many succeeded? None. Why will this be any different? It won’t of course. THis is the definition of insanity. You want to try the same thing that’s failed before with the firm expectation that it will work this time. But it won’t. Keep banging yr head against the wall if that comforts you. It doesn’t me.

  4. I jiust saw your piece in the “Guardian” decrying Israel’s supposed propaganda efforts. But why aren’t you aware that the “Guardian”, inter alia, is a continual source of pro-Hamas agitprop. In contrast to the good, grey NY Times (see Taghreed el-Khodary’s story in today’s edition), the “Guardian” never sees fit to report on the dirty tricks of Hamas and its allies in making sure that many civilians are among the “martyrs.”

    There are many “useful idiots” (to use Lenin’s memorable phrase) out there agitating on the part of Islamist, revanchist extremism while insisting that their concerns are merely humanitarian. It is particularly pitiful to see some Jews among them.

    By the way, Israel can, indeed, win the current battle, eliminating Hamas’s gunmen, leaders, weapons, and infrastructure in the process. It won’t be pretty—war never is. The innocent civilians in Dresden, Hamburg, and Berlin suffered far more than the Gaza population, after all. But it can be done. Which is precisely what the Israel-bashers fear most.

    1. Israel can, indeed, win the current battle, eliminating Hamas’s gunmen, leaders, weapons, and infrastructure in the process. It won’t be pretty—war never is…But it can be done. Which is precisely what the Israel-bashers fear most.

      No, I’ll tell you what I fear most. I fear an Israel gone beserk, knowing no bounds, violating every norm of western democracies & civilization, ostracized from the international community. I fear an Israel turned into Sparta with nothing to recommend itself except its army. An Israel which relies solely on its military and comes to believe it has no need to deal with its adversaries. In short, I fear an Israel on its way to destroying itself.

      As for winning the current battle: that’s been tried multiple times before by this very same IDF fighting this very same Hamas in this very same Gaza. All previous attempts failed as will this one. The U.S. media is starting to come around to this view. Obama is starting to come around to this view. Pretty soon the only ones left will be the Israeli government’s true believers like you.

  5. That’s a “win”. You want the lion to lie down with the lamb.

    Sure it would be wise for the lion to lay down among one billion lambs. If the lambs are provoked to much they simply tramp over the 12 million lions.

  6. I hope for the Palestinian and the Israeli people’s sake Hamas stops firing rockets just so Israel can stop bombing schools and hospitals. Both sides have lost lives, be it 5 or 5000.. you cant make a comparision. According to Islam’s own doctrines if you kill one life, you’re killing mankind. So you cant say just because Israel has less deaths they don’t mean anything. And although i have never agreed with Israel’s barbaric methods, i hope both sides can let bygones by bygones. Can both sides just swallow their pride and move on. Its easier said than done for me since im a canadian sitting cozy infront of my fireplace and i know about 50,000 displaced and terrorized Palestinians will beg to differ with me. I just pray to God to let no more children suffer and bring to justice those who have aggressed.

    Salaam alaikum, wa rehmat ullahi, wa barakaat ahu. (Peace be upon you, and the mercy of God, and His blessings).

  7. Absolutely disgusting. LOOK at the cover! It’s the Israeli flag behind a concentration-camp style barbed wire fence.

    Last time I checked, Gaza was under siege. Last time I checked, the PALESTINIANS, and NOT THE ISRAELIS were under siege.

    This sanctimony is disgusting. It’s not that Israel has killed innocent civilians and has subjected the Palestinians to apartheid, it’s that – from Zionists, everyone from Richard to the crazy Hebron settlers – Israel is ‘suffering’ by making the Palestinians ‘suffer’.

    The perpetrator becomes the victim. Only in America.

    Disgusting.

  8. I think I just threw up a little bit.

    Look at the second article listed on the front cover. Who is it written by? Martin Idnyk. This douchebag is still convinced Hamas broke the cease-fire.

    If the Gaza massacre leads to the dissolution of Israel as an apartheid State, it wouldn’t be cathartic to the Zionist community.

    Whether you’re of the mainstream American Jewish community or a Christian Evangelical or a Neocon, you won’t learn anything from the Israel-Palestine conflict in it’s current phase.

    You’ll learn from tactical errors as illustrated in this sanctimonious Time magazine issue. You’ll learn that apartheid is bad for JEWS because it makes you ‘look’ bad.

    You won’t learn a moral lesson and THAT’S the problem. There is no true introspection. There is no catharsis. The establishment is moving entirely within it’s own parameters.

    God bless the Palestinians. Nothing that can’t last ever does. Hopefully they will have some justice.

    1. I thought the cover story was a good one (didn’t read Indyk I must say). Keep in mind that Tony Karon, who writes Rootless Cosmopolitan, one of the better blogs about the I-P conflict & Middle East in general (& to the left of me politically), is a senior editor at Time. He surely had his hand deep in this issue.

  9. This is indeed encouraging news. It’s tragically taken a whole lot of Palestinian blood and suffering to propel this little shift in the more ‘enlightened corners’ of our media. And I must say that the Congress’s vote in support of Israel’s “defending itself” makes me absolutely sick to my stomach. 390-something to 5. Absolutely mind-numbingly disgusting. Our pathetic, bloodless, cowardly BOUGHT congress. The Israel Lobby has emasculated our congress to the point that they are truly a bunch of pathetic mindless automatons. I feel ashamed to be a Democrat. I feel ashamed to be an American. As an American citizen I am facilitating this barbarity, this barbaric murdering of Palestinian children. I can barely speak I am so disgusted, so morally desolate.

    I don’t think I can be a Democrat anymore. Our pitiable, cowardly Democratic leadership–truly unbelievable. Thank God for the two Minnesota representatives who refused to vote yes on this moral desecration of a resolution supporting Israel. Minnesota is like a little progressive pool in a sea of barbarity. I think I’ll become a Green, or something that is at least remotely reflective of Enlightenment values.

    You all must listen to Mike Malloy on NovaM Radio. The address is novamradio.com. You can stream him online. He’s the only radio talk person I know of who is speaking out against this unspeakable murder of the citizens of Gaza. What is it, something like 300 of the 800 or so murdered Gazans are children? The numbers are surely higher by now. And we’re supporting this action?!! Just unbelievable.

  10. It might be worth pointing out exactly what the ’67 borders are.

    In ’67 there were peace agreements with Jordan/Israel & Egypt/Israel.

    Under these two peace agreements the borders effected were ONLY those between Egypt & Jordan and Israel, which were predominantly a return to the Internationally recognized borders under the British Mandate of Palestine in 1948. Bearing in mind of course, that Jordan had already declared independence in 1946.

    The only other Internatonally recognized borders are those contained in 181, as per the Israeli Declaration of a Jewish State which enshrines both 181 and the Balfour declaration and under which Israel was Internationally recognized as a Jewish State IN Palestine.

    We should also bear in mind that International recognition of a state, is separate issue the to the admittance of a state into the UN as a Member.

    By declaring under 181 and being Internationally recognized under 181, Israel agreed that anything outside the borders contained in 181, were not it’s own.

    It is illegal to acquire territory through force under the Laws of War and Geneva Conventions (jus in bello http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jus_ad_bellum ), regardless of who or why a war is started (jus ad bellum).

    Between 1948 and 1949, during the War of Independence, Israel acquired, by force, 50% of the territories it had agreed in 1948, under it’s own declaration, were not it’s own. The armistice lines of 1949 and 1950 are not borders.

    For example: Najd & Al Jura, where contraversial Sderot & Ashqelon now stand, nor Nahariya to the North, have never legally been Israeli territory.

  11. LD: The “douchbag” knows what he’s talking about. Hamas and their allies violated the cease fire 38 times before Israel did. According to the tahdiya, Hamas was also supposed to prevent other groups from firing missiles. They didn’t do that and they didn’t take any significant action against those that did violate the ceasefire.

    1. Amir: You’re repeating yrself. You’ve already made precisely the same pts in previous comments. I answered them & they weren’t very persuasive to begin with. So present other arguments or don’t publish comments containing old news. It’s repetitive & boring & smacks of propaganda.

      Israel was supposed to lift its own siege as part of the previous ceasefires & always managed to find an excuse not to do so. I’m getting sick & tired of yr constantly blaming Hamas & the Palestinians for their own suffering. If you were a German Christian during WWII, you’d probably have found a reason to blame the Jews for their own extermination. Oh but that’s right, you’re Jewish and Israeli Jews can do no wrong. I forgot about that.

  12. I’ve merely represented the facts, correcting a factual error by those that say Israel was the first to break the tahadiya.
    You can make up all sorts excuses for them, but that doesn’t change the facts.
    And your comparison with the Nazis is really cute, but I’m afraid you’ve broken your own comment rules and may have to ban yourself.

  13. BTW on a prior thread I asked Richard why he thought Hamas was only offering a Hudna for Israeli withdrawal to ’67 border and not peace and mutual recognition and “talknic” above gave the answer. Anyone who thinks that this is about “the occupation” is deluding himself. It’s about the occupation of “Najd and Al Jura”. Withdrawing to ’67 border will not bring peace.

  14. LD said: “You’ll learn that apartheid is bad for JEWS because it makes you ‘look’ bad.”
    Exactly. Someone said:
    “After the Holocaust there were two kinds of Jews:
    those that said, “This must never happen to anyone again”, and those that said, “This must never happen to Jews again.”

  15. Amir is a clown.

    Hamas was expected to stop ALL rocket fire. They stopped virtually all the rocket fire.

    That’s the best you’ll get. You can’t expect this to be perfect.

    Considering, Israel’s demands were to EASE the blockade the advantage Israel is given is unfair.

    EASE = subjective. Israel gets to decide how sufficient it was in EASING the blockade. Of course it does, because you know it doesn’t give a damn about the UN or Red Cross – who were condemning the blockade.

    The terms were not fair and neither side was perfect, but that’s a inane argument. Neither side will never be perfect in these terms.

    So, you need to be practical.

    Hamas was much more dedicated to stopping the rocket fire. Even the MFA report states that the 1 rocket fired in July, 8 in August, 1 in September and 1 in October were by groups IN DEFIANCE OF HAMAS.

    So while, you apply this high standard to Hamas and the Palestinians – who were being denied food/water/electricity/etc. – you give Israel a complete pass? What a joke.

    Hamas followed the truce terms. Israel broke the truce on the 4th. They did so to draw out a response by Hamas while playing a rhetorical game.

    Hamas planned on ending the truce on the 19th of December. They wanted to then extend the truce and revise terms.

    However, it’s obvious that after Israel killed 8 Hamas soldiers on the 4th, that Hamas would not want to extend.

    Israel wanted this to happen. They went on the TV and cried and acted like the victims YET AGAIN. SO they keep telling people Hamas fired rockets and thats why the truce broke? What a bunch of fucking liars.

    They have a better PR campaign and used it to spin the lead-up to the conflict. What’s new? All Zionists have to lie and obfuscate to convince people they are the poor, helpless victims fighting nobly the wicked villainous Palestinians.

    Just utterly disgusting. What a disgraceful, shameless country Israel is.

  16. Dear Richard Silverstein:

    Go tell it to the government of Sri Lanka, whose troops are about to extirpate the Tamil Tiger separatists. About 70,000 lives, most of them civilian, have been lost in this quarter-century civil war, which has been marked by repeated indiscriminate terrorism on the part of the Tigers. (Compare casualties on all siudes in all of Israel’s conflicts).

    I expect to see your indignant comments re Sri Lanka any moment now. (Not!)

    1. How utterly tiresome. You’re simply dusting off the standard rightist pro-Israel themes as if Israel may not be criticized until all the human rights issues in the rest of the world are resolved. What balderdash! Can’t you innovate a little & come up with new lines of attack.

  17. We all pick and choose our issues.

    I don’t get why you have to bring up another issue as if Richard WOULDN’T care about it?

    So what if we all were talking about Sri Lanka then? Wouldn’t some clown come up saying that we should talk about Israel?

    And so we go, round and round.

    What an infantile notion.

  18. “That’s the best you’ll get. You can’t expect this to be perfect.”
    Once this war is over, it will be perfect. And if it’s not perfect, there will be another war. Israel is not going to tolerate a missile threat on its cities. If Hamas really cared about its people it would abandon the path of “armed resistance.”
    Your claim that Hamas stopped “virtually all the rocket fire” is not adhering to the tahadiya. Israeli also stopped virtually all the targeted killings and all the incursions into Gaza.

    1. Israel is not going to tolerate a missile threat on its cities. If Hamas really cared about its people it would abandon the path of “armed resistance.”

      Your claim that Hamas stopped “virtually all the rocket fire” is not adhering to the tahadiya. Israeli also stopped virtually all the targeted killings and all the incursions into Gaza.

      And Hamas is not going to tolerate an Israel which suffocates Gaza. So welcome to the madhouse that is the current Middle East and one of the practitioner of the Israeli brand of such madness, Mr. Amir.

      Stopping incursions into Gaza doesn’t constitute “adhering to the ceasefire.” An absence of war is not peace. Israel kept the crossings virtually closed constantly except to a dribble of humanitarian aid. That’s a violation of the ceasefire. The only reason they even allowed the dribble is so that they’re hasbara apologists like you would be able to advance the specious argument that Israel’s providing an infinitesimal amt. of aid constituted “adhering to the ceasefire” & abiding by its humanitarian commitments.

  19. So, Fossil, your basic argument is that there are countries in the world that perpetrate more evil than Israel does. Wow, you have real high ethical standards there, bub. Last time I checked we weren’t giving Sri Lanka 3 billion a year in aid and open access to our military hardware and weapons. And I don’t see a Sri Lankan cheering chorus in the U.S. media tripping over itself to celebrate and rationalize the murder happening there. If you can’t see the difference in context, then your powers of analysis leave something to be desired. As American citizens and taxpayers, we are facilitating the murder of Palestinians. All of us Americans are thus complicit & implicated in these crimes against the Palestinians because of our government’s support of Israeli actions. These are crimes against humanity. If you, Fossil, want to focus on the war crimes & murder being committed in Sri Lanka, I suggest you set up a blog and let your voice be heard. But this pathetic and incessantly used ‘Well, there are other nations doing even more awful things than Israel out there’, is so morally and intellectually vapid, as if whenever anyone criticizes Israel they are obliged to simultaneously make a laundry list of all of the other injustices going on in the world–this line is so vacuous that it beggars belief. If that’s all you apologists for Israeli war crimes have, then you’re pretty frigging lost. Take an ethics course. Try to acquire a conscience somewhere. How pathetic.

  20. Dear Warren;

    As empty-headed leftists you are perpetrating the murder of Israelis as well as Palestinians. The cheerleading on behalf of Hamas and the like has been disgraceful in itself, and has encouraged its already out-of-control megalomania and fanaticism.

    Wars are dreadful things, even when they are just. This is a rare case where the case for a just war is stronger than usual. So why does the left take such delight in excoriating Israel, while it lets the perpetrators of far worse violence get on with their bloody work without comment? To call this “neurotic” doesn’t even begin to describe the situation.

    1. cheerleading on behalf of Hamas and the like has been disgraceful in itself, and has encouraged its already out-of-control megalomania and fanaticism.

      Ho, ho. And the mindless cheerleading of apologists like yourself and the thousands of hoodwinked Israeli-flag-waving American Jews attending pro-Israel soldiarity rallies has not “encouraged” Israel’s “out of control megalomania and fanaticism???” Who ya kiddin’?

  21. Fossil. The 1.5 million Palestinians we are cheering for are not Hamas. hamas is at most 1,000 people in a political party.

  22. This is all hamas’ fault and the fault of those that voted for them, support them and make excuses for them and cheer them on. Morally speaking, I don’t feel to bad.
    When bank robber William Sutton was asked why he robbed banks, Sutton simply replied, “Because that’s where the money is.”
    If you are wondering why so many civilians in Gaza have been killed, well it’s because that’s where the Hamas. That’s where they take cover and that’s where they fight from.
    Some quotes from the Hamas covenant:
    “The Islamic Resistance Movement is one of the links in the chain of the struggle against the Zionist invaders. It goes back to 1939, to the emergence of the martyr Izz al-Din al Kissam” – so much for the occupation being the root of the problem.
    “The Islamic Resistance Movement believes that the land of Palestine is an Islamic Waqf consecrated for future Moslem generations until Judgement Day. It, or any part of it, should not be squandered: it, or any part of it, should not be given up.” – so much for a two state solution.
    “Initiatives, and so-called peaceful solutions and international conferences, are in contradiction to the principles of the Islamic Resistance Movement. ” – so much for a negotiated settlement.
    “Allah is its target, the Prophet is its model, the Koran its constitution: Jihad is its path and death for the sake of Allah is the loftiest of its wishes.” – of course death for everyone except Haniye and his friends who are hiding in some bunker somewhere.

    Of course some will claim (useful idiots) that the Hamas covenant is irrelevant. An obscure interview Haniyeh gave to the Washingtom Post (and later retracted) is much more important.

    1. This is all hamas’ fault and the fault of those that voted for them

      I never cease to be amazed by your utter callousness. Are you saying that any Gazan who voted for Hamas deserves to die in a hail of Israeli rocket fire?? You don’t feel “too bad” about entire families wiped out if the parents voted for Hamas? What kind of monster are you? They exercised a democratic right and you justify their murder?

      If you are wondering why so many civilians in Gaza have been killed, well it’s because that’s where the Hamas.

      Now I’ve heard everything. Willie Sutton, the world’s most notorious bank robber used to justify Israel’s atrocities in Gaza. BTW, where would you have Hamas be if not in Gaza? In Paris perhaps? Or Tel Aviv?

      You wingnut Hamas haters are simply pathetic. You trot out a document written in 1988, 20 years ago as if it is the governing document of Hamas today. It no more determines Hamas policy today than the 2008 Republican Party platform obligated John McCain to implement its agenda.

      And I’m not a “useful idiot,” though I will do something useful in banning you from commenting in this blog until you can become less insulting.

    1. What a disingenuous twit. You don’t give a crap about Sri Lanka or any other human rights issue. You only care about Israel & protecting it from legitimate criticism. Do me a favor. Go to the demo, take a cell phone shot of yrself & send it to me with your handle here listed in the image. Then we can talk about how critical Sri Lankan human rights are to the human condition compared to human rights for Palestinians (or Israelis).

  23. Fossil, I see that you won’t respond to my questioning of your ‘other countries do worse things than Israel does’ line that is such an empty predictable talking point of the cheerleaders of Israeli aggression. I’ve come to the conclusion that you right-wing war nuts are incapable of serious intellectual engagement. It should be beneath me even addressing your rationalizations. As for the ‘brain-dead left’, I’ll happily stand with Noam Chomsky, Gore Vidal, Daniel Barenboim and the late Edward Said & Harold Pinter, to name just a handful of intellectual (and in Daniel’s case, artistic) giants who happen to be ‘left’ and highly critical of Israel. Who do you guys have of any neuronal heft who defends and supports Israel’s actions. Martin Peretz? Charles Krauthammer? The pathetically mediocre mainstream American punditry? There’s no-one of serious worldwide intellectual weight on your side. I think thou dost project a bit.

    The fact is, it won’t matter how many Palestinian children are butchered in the end in this Israeli rampage, you will insanely find some way to rationalize, even celebrate, the murder. You guys are utterly lost–morally, intellectually, spiritually. I don’t even think you’re evil. You’re just morally indifferent & incapable of independent thought. You might have our pathetic government and conformist punditry at your back, but more and more of us Americans are waking up to the horror of the ongoing atrocity being committed by the IDF against Palestinians in Gaza.

    1. Actually, I’m sorry to say but there are some pretty smart people who support this ghastly war. Among them are Michael Walzer and Benny Morris. I’m not saying that their views are right, just that they definitely have “neuronal heft.” In Israel, there is A.B. Yehoshua.

      But I do take yr pt. I think generally we have a far more august, distinguished intellectual circle that is critical of the Gaza attack.

  24. Warren:

    Apropos of Edward Said (if, had he lived, would be in big trouble with Hamas because of his (Episcopal!!) religion:

    ——————

    One must never deride,
    Nor in any way be snide,
    To a fellow in a fez, Said says.

    One must never abuse
    Any chap in a burnoose,
    Not in word, not in deed, said Said.

    There is simply no disturbin’
    Any person in a turban.
    That’s what Said said, so I’ve read.

    If still, nonetheless,
    Said Said, you must aggress,
    Throw a stone or two at a —
    (You know who!)

  25. Point taken, Richard, I got a little carried away in what I was saying there. I would tend to place the people you mention more in a secondary intellectual tier, though, compared with world-historical paradigm shifting minds like a Noam Chomsky or a Harold Pinter. It is interesting & noteworthy that the truly exceptional thinkers, artists and so on tend to be on the side of universal humanity and tend to aver tribalism. Einstein, Primo Levi… the list goes on, were famously hostile toward nationalism and also wary/critical of Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians (in an earlier period).

    The whole braininess meme might be something of a red herring on my part anyway. Maybe it’s not that important. I guess when you know you’re outside the Establishment consensus and center of gravity of power, you draw on what extra resources you can given the asymmetry of power and influence.

  26. What is happening in Gaza right now is holocaust against Palestinian more than 1000 were killed, more 3000 wounded. Israel has to leave Gaza completely. Open the borders, the seas, the air. Let the Palestinians live like humans on their land. Occupation is the root cause for all of this. And Yes!! Israel is still occupying Gaza by controlling its borders.
    Palestinians in Gaza have been deprived from the basic needs for humanity. Students lost their access to education abroad. Pregnant women have given birth at checkpoints. Hundreds of ill people have died so far. Break the siege!

  27. # On January 13th, 2009 at 9:35 AM
    fafadi said:

    “What is happening in Gaza right now is holocaust against Palestinian more than 1000 were killed, more 3000 wounded. Israel has to leave Gaza completely. Open the borders, the seas, the air. Let the Palestinians live like humans on their land. Occupation is the root cause for all of this. And Yes!! Israel is still occupying Gaza by controlling its borders.
    Palestinians in Gaza have been deprived from the basic needs for humanity. Students lost their access to education abroad. Pregnant women have given birth at checkpoints. Hundreds of ill people have died so far. Break the siege!”

    Twaddle! When those conditions were met in 2005, Hamas celebrated its “victory” by a heavy intensification of its Qassam rocket attacks. Check out the history instead of bombastulating sanctimoniously.

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