7 thoughts on “Feeding Israel’s Military Maw: Defense Ministry Demands $15-Billion for 2013 Budget – Tikun Olam תיקון עולם إصلاح العالم
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    1. The Apartheid regime, under Vorster, did indeed prepare for war, civil and regional.
      But under Botha they began to realize that the level of mobilization their war plans required, would shut the economy down completely, and there wasn’t any way of ending a civil war rapidly without shooting, or nuking, the workforce.

      Israel faces similar problems without the vast reserve of territory and natural resources which Botha had at his disposal.
      It faces a similar problem in that a large part of the workforce might be considered “the enemy” in times of active hostilities.

      If you purchase equipment for too many soldiers, the temptation is to mobilize enough people to put it all into action, and then you don’t have an economy left to support the war effort with. It’s a balancing act and Israel is ruled by people who don’t seem to recognize the concept.

      Previous Israeli governments have sought allies rather than to multiply their enemies, the current one went and committed a high profile murder on the soil of one of its wealthiest potential allies, at least as far as Iran was concerned.

      Israel simply isn’t big enough to wield the military power its leaders aspire to. Hence the manipulation of the United States, but even America isn’t big enough to confront the entire world in the way that Israel wants it to.

      The only thing they will accomplish is to accelerate the decline of America, either into collapse, or into a decidedly non-democratic and highly militarized entity, constantly at odds with the other great powers and therefore living on borrowed time as well as borrowed money.

      Anyone thinking that American democracy is sacred, or even safe, should take note of the speed with which Greek and Italian democracy was simply switched off in favour of German-appointed technocrats the moment the bankers deemed it convenient.

      American elections already consist of a choice of two dismal alternatives.

  1. forgive me if I’ve missed something or just plain ‘dont get it’

    as a Brit living temporarily in an exceedingly hostile arab country where acidic attacks on Israel are the daily fodder of the local press and where one’s work colleagues often discuss the fact that ‘every terrorist who ever lived is an Israeli’ I cannot for the life of me understand why you think this vitriolic loathing of you can be assuaged by doing-down your own free democratic liberated enfranchised nation-state

    I am utterly baffled and bewildered by the faux-naif photo’s of people jumping around a Gazan field as if its a country village cricket green ….. do you not get it that there is 300 million arab springsters out there who’s world view is that you are the spawn of satan and they have every intention of sweeping you lot off the edge

    I live with this every day …. get a sense of reality please, there’s lots of us who think the world of Israel but you’ve got to give us a hand in letting the world know you havent got a death wish and arent going to bend over and ask for more ….. never again !!!!!

    1. You’ve not just missed “something,” you’ve missed everything. As for “not getting it,” you said it (and now I did).

      As an Islamophobic racist, why in God’s name would you want to live in a “hostile Arab country??”

      BTW, do you know the slogan “Never Again” derives from Meir Kahane, which makes you a Kahanist. You wouldn’t mind informing your Arab colleagues that you’re a Kahanist, would you?

      1. “Never Again” is in pretty common usage when referencing the horrors of the Holocaust. I don’t think it’s fair to label someone a Kahanist simply for using that phrase.

        As to the origin, historian Raul Hilberg has stated that the phrase originated in the concentration camps themselves, specifically Buchenwald, where he says the inmates put up signs reading “never again” towards the end of the war. Years later, of course, Kahane and the JDL took the phrase and used it as their motto.

        Irrespective of Kahane’s use of the phrase as a slogan for his loathsome organization, “never again” has meaning and resonance that is entirely separate. People ought to (and do) feel free to use the slogan without fear of being linked to Kahane, in my humble opinion.

        Currently, at the Dachau concentration camp memorial, for instance, the phrase “never again” is written in five languages at the International Monument.

        And on the most recent Holocaust Remembrance Day, President Obama said: “We must resolve that ‘never again’ is more than an empty slogan.” Obama could hardly be called a Kahanist.

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