New thread on Gaza and Israel's murderous actions continued from here.
Gaza and Israel IV
Mon, 2009-01-05 14:20
#1
remind
Gaza and Israel IV
Mon, 2009-01-05 17:44
#2
Try watching politics today....felt like puking. Our media sucks.
Israeli amassodor states that they had to blow up hospitals and universities because they had arms there. Don didn't even question this.
______________________________________________________________________________________
"Everybody's worried about stopping terrorism. Well, there's a really easy way: stop participating in it."
Noam Chomsky
Mon, 2009-01-05 18:51
#3
Zionist terror continues, with the world's support.
"Among the dead on Monday was a family of seven from Shati refugee camp, who were killed by Israeli navy shelling.
Three siblings from one family, as well as a girl and her grandfather, also died in the Zeitoun neighbourhood of Gaza during artillery shelling.
Emergency medical services have also come under attack with the al-Awda hospital in Jabaliya being hit by two Israeli shells, foreign human rights activists said."
Never mind. Hospitals are obviously part of the Hamas infrastructure.
Somewhere, God is watching and adding up an account.
Mon, 2009-01-05 19:55
#4
I haven't read threads I-III in full but if possible I'd like to focus on the "What to do". I think there is no point debating the merits of this most recent sickening barbarity unleashed on what in essence is a large overpopulated refugee camp, namely Gaza.
Israel's savage attack on the people of Gaza is merely political. It lost against Hizbollah in Lebanon and now wants to show the Arabs of the Levant that it is still a mighty military force that can crush at will and without consequence. Furthermore, there will be elections in 2009 and the government wants to bring a victory home after its last defeat. This is the only reason, the trapped people of Gaza will now be bludgeoned. The media has been banned from being present to view since war crime after war crime will be committed and the death toll will increase.
I was at the demonstration in Montreal last Sunday and I will participating in further protests. We now need to concentrate on the "what to do". I don't think the Canadian government can stop Israel's attack, since as Finkelstein says in essence Israel is at war with the International Community as it has refused to abide by every single resolution in the UN on this since 1967.
So what should our protests be about. First, we should be focused on a single clear issue, since the other side always changes the subject. The issue is: Freedom for Palestine which is West-Bank and Gaza with East Jerusalem as its capital as is recognized via UN res 242 for which everyone on our small planet save the US and Israel - and occasional tiny island states somewhere in the south pacific - agree on.
So our slogans and message should be constant and clear so as not divert the issue. In tandem, we need to press the government to provide humanitarian aid to Gaza now. Gaza is facing a humanitarian catastrophe, malnourishment, starvation, disease etc.
We need to raise everyone's awareness with simple, clear, easy to uderstand messages:
- Freedom for Palestine
- Humanitarian Aid to the Children of Gaza
Palestinians have suffered enough. The debates on the one-two state solution or 48/67 borders are useless right now. There is a recognized consensus, there is immediate action that must be taken now to mitigate the misery of these people. We need to focus on this, and campaign on this in a constant single-minded on-message way as was done for East Timor, South Africa etc. Simple, clear and constant message.
As for ending the occupation, it seems there are only two avenues (1) a deep change and awareness in US public opinion which can lead to US pressure on Israel to withdraw or as some experts believe (2) an important military defeat for Israel which will force it to end its occupation and constant assault.
But the pressing matter for Canadian is to mitigate the misery of Palestinians by trying to end this current attack and more likely trying to get aid to Gaza.
Mon, 2009-01-05 20:19
#5
I hear you TV. This can't be about defending or attacking Hamas, or even defending or attacking Israel. Focus on the Palestinians themselves. Good points.
Mon, 2009-01-05 21:56
#6
Thank you for your very thoughtful post, Tom. I think the perspective you propose is potentially the most practical and unifying one. The trouble is, when foreigners (like us) start arguing about one state vs. two states, we tend to get diverted from the real issues:
1. To demand respect for law.
2. To demand respect for the rights of the Palestinian people.
3. To force our own governments to take the right stand on these issues, and not fuel or finance aggression and occupation.
4. As you say, to render immediate and ongoing assistance and relief to the victims.
If we can stop arguing about Hamas and what form some future governmental arrangement should take, we will do well.
Tue, 2009-01-06 00:35
#7
This article identifies the essential perversion of Zionism quite well:
"While the fact that this information was missing from the report did not surprise me, I found myself completely taken aback by the way in which the reporter justified the convoy's entrance into Gaza. Explaining to those viewers who might be wondering why Israel allows humanitarian assistance to the other side during times of war, he declared that if a full-blown humanitarian catastrophe were to explode among the Palestinian civilian population, the international community would pressure Israel to stop the assault.
There is something extremely cynical about how Israel explains its use of humanitarian assistance, and yet such unadulterated explanations actually help uncover an important facet of postmodern warfare. Not unlike raising animals for slaughter on a farm, the Israeli government maintains that it is providing Palestinians with assistance so that it can have a free hand in attacking them."
Tue, 2009-01-06 00:39
#8
And where the hell is Harper besides AWOL? Our so-called news journalists should track him down at the ski hill or a kids hockey game and tell him to get the hell back to work, the slacker! I can't just imagine what he'd tell them, too: "Whatever Bush says goes"
Tue, 2009-01-06 00:47
#9
Harper AND Ignatieff AND Layton AND Duceppe.
All these politicos seem to be sitting tight, and none of them is being held ever so slightly accountable for a Canadian administration that is doing all it can to support the assassins in Israel.
Tue, 2009-01-06 01:04
#10
NDP's statement on the situation in the Middle East
Canada's New Democrats condemn the unacceptable escalation of violence in the Middle East causing death and injury to so many civilians in the Gaza Strip and Israel.
It is a tragedy that hundreds of civilians have again become the victims of violence in this conflict. The continuing airstrikes by Israel on civilians in the Gaza strip and the ongoing rocket attacks on Israeli civilians are serving to compound the existing civilian disaster and further harm chances for a negotiated peace.
We call on the Government of Canada to immediately call for an end to the aerial bombing of Gaza, the blockade of aid to civilians and the indiscriminate rocket attacks on Israel. Indeed, the government must urge both sides to agree to end the current hostilities immediately, reinstate the ceasefire and return to the peace process.
The Government of Canada should also work to ensure that medical and food aid is provided to the civilians of Gaza through U.N. agencies.
New Democrats believe that Canada must pursue a balanced approach to the Middle East crisis, in keeping with Canadians' deep desire for peace in the Middle East and are ready to work with the new administration in the U.S. towards a lasting peace in the region. This goal cannot be achieved while citizens in such large numbers are being killed and endangered
Meanwhile herr Harper is afraid to show up for work
Tue, 2009-01-06 01:08
#11
Wow, what an amazing statement. I beleive it only took 48 hours to wite.
Tue, 2009-01-06 01:17
#12
laine lowe
Some alternative sources for news and commentary:
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/
http://www.fromgaza.blogspot.com/
Also, an excerpt from an Open Letter from Anti-Zionist Youth in Canada:
January 5th, 2009
Like much of the world, we have spent the last week watching in
shock and disgust as Israel continues its assault on the Gaza Strip.
With the body count rising and a new tragedy in full bloom, we feel
that it is important to speak out as Jewish youth in Canada and to
denounce what Israel is doing in our name. The Jewish diaspora is
diverse and divided on its positions on the state of Israel's policies.
At this juncture in history, as Israel has committed its worst massacre
in Gaza since it began its illegal occupation in 1967, we feel that it
is crucial that Jews speak out and denounce Israel's actions that
amount to no more than war crimes committed by an apartheid state.As Jewish youth, we are diverse, but we are unified in our solidarity with our Palestinian brothers and sisters in Gaza.
Some of us are students. We are outraged by the bombing of the
Islamic University in Gaza city, as well as other civilian
infrastructure such as hospitals and mosques...
http://mostlywater.org/open_letter_antizionist_jewish_youth_canada_0
An excerpt from an opinion piece by Gideon Levy published in today's edition of Haaretz:
...The suffering in the south renders everything kosher,
as if the horrible suffering in Gaza pales in comparison. Everyone is
hungry for revenge, and that hunger is excused by the need for
"deterrence," after it was already proved that the killing and the
destruction in Lebanon did not achieve it.Yes, I know, war is war. After all, they brought this on
themselves. They are a terrorist organization and we are not. They want
to destroy us and we seek peace. Still, is there nothing here that will
stop this blood pipeline? Even those whose hearts are hardened by
"moral righteousness" will have to momentarily halt the bombing machine
and ask: Which Israel do we have before us? What will become of its
standing in the world, which is now watching the events in Gaza? What
are we inflicting on the moderate Arab regimes? And what of the
simmering popular hatred we are sowing throughout the world? What good
will emerge from this killing and destruction?It is doubtful whether Hamas will be cut down to size as a result
of this wretched war. Yet, the face of the state has been cut down to
size, as have civilian elites who are apathetic and scared. The "peace
camp," if it ever existed, has been cut down to size. Attorney General
Menachem Mazuz authorized the Ghayan killing, regardless of the cost.
Haim Oron, the leader of the "new left-wing movement," supported the
launch of this foolish war.Nobody is coming to the rescue - of Gaza or even of the remnants of
humanity and Israeli democracy. The statesmen, the jurists, the poets,
the authors, academe, and the news media - pitch black over the abyss.
When the time comes for reckoning, we will need to remember the damage
this war did to Israel: The blood pipeline it laid has been completed.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1052348.html
Some more insights from Rahul Mahajan (Empire Notes):
...In the process of constructing an occupation, the Israelis also
constructed a resistance. Hamas, originally supported by the Israelis
as an alternative to the militance of the mostly secular activists of
the first intifada (and to Fatah), started to gain support as the
dominant organizations like Fatah were co-opted into acting as local
enforcers for the Israelis (with the help of the CIA). Exploitation of
the Palestinian labor force became less and less important to the
Israelis, simultaneously making various kinds of nonviolent resistance
less possible.Economic strangulation of the Palestinians came
next, along with repeated military incursions to undermine the nascent
Palestinian state, which was pushed into resistance after all of its
collaboration gained it nothing in meaningful concessions from the
Israelis.Repeated assassination of Hamas leaders helped create
a paranoid, inflexible organization whose active members know they are
living on borrowed time.Cutoff of funds to the Palestinian
government after Hamas won the legislative elections of 2006, active
support of a split between Fatah and Hamas (especially on the part of
the United States), the creation of Fatah security forces which are
little more than armed militias of the United States, and open siege of
Gaza ever since Hamas took it over in June 2007 have created a
population with no political hope on the horizon.Without
understanding this back story, nothing about the current war, in which
the Israelis have now killed over 500 Palestinians, makes sense.From
the perspective of the people of Gaza, there are two choices: give up
and die or fade quietly into oblivion or continue to live. The stupid
and indiscriminate firing of rockets into southern Israel continues in
part because of the thousands of militants with a tenuous grasp of
reality who live among the 1.5 million people of Gaza, but more than
this, it is a way of saying, “We’re still alive. You haven’t destroyed
us yet.” If you take away everything from people, don’t be surprised if
their resistance takes irrational and immoral forms.Of course,
the argument against this analysis is that it was the Gaza withdrawal
that provoked the rocket attacks, and withdrawal is the opposite of
occupation. In truth, five months passed between the withdrawal and the
creation of a concerted international effort to squeeze Palestine. If
you control every aspect of a society’s interaction with the world,
when you have made that society fundamentally dependent on aid, you
have not ceased occupation in a moral or political sense.Despite
the above analysis, this assault is not the playing out of deep-laid
expansionist plans. Indeed, the unified Israeli commitment to unceasing
expansion has collapsed in the past several years, leaving a vast
confusion among Israeli policymakers. The Zionist program of aliyah has
failed; not only will the rest of the world’s Jews not come to Israel,
Israelis are fleeing in droves. During this period where Israelis are
struggling to come to terms with the “demographic problem” caused by
occupation, they have one comforting, familiar principle to fall back
on when dealing with Palestinians: the iron wall. A child could come up
with a better way than “Operation Cast Lead” to end the rain of
rockets, but such options simply cannot be considered in Israeli
society today.Still, the fact that the contradictions of
expansionism and Zionism have caught up with the Israelis suggests some
hope for the future – if somebody can stop them from turning Palestine
into a wasteland of anarchy and despair in the meantime.[b]Masouda
al-Samouni was preparing food for her 10-month-old son when an Israeli
missile struck. “He died hungry,” she said.[/b] If something isn’t done,
that will be as fitting an epitaph as any for all Gaza.
Tue, 2009-01-06 01:21
#13
Wow, what an amazing statement. I beleive it only took 48 hours to wite.
I can just picture the Harpers nodding up and down in rapid agreement with whatever Bushler and the Israelis tell them they should think about it. Our head yes-man and his mini-me Harpers need to start work some time after blowing $300 million on an election. But what else should we expect from a bunch o guys who've never carried a lunchpail or brown paper bag to work every morning? Someone should explain the Puritan-Protestant work ethic to our men of leisure in Ottawa.
Tue, 2009-01-06 01:21
#14
What does your last post have to do with the NDP press statement?
Tue, 2009-01-06 01:23
#15
What does your last post have to do with the NDP press statement?
How about commenting on the situation in Gaza, Webgear?
Tue, 2009-01-06 01:26
#16
Cueball
He called it crimes against humanity before. And he was right. No need for an interogation.
Tue, 2009-01-06 01:30
#17
He called it crimes against humanity before. And he was right. No need for an interogation.
1. I didn't recall his previous comment.
2. I wasn't "interrogating", just asking.
3. What's the big deal about the NDP? We're going to have another fight with Fidel as to whether the NDP statement is perfect or brilliant or not? We know it's not, and we know Fidel will never admit that. Just like some people will never admit that it's marginally better than the other 3 parties, because it actually suggests that Israel might consider stopping its barbaric mass murder, which the others don't.
Sorry for retreading old ground.
Tue, 2009-01-06 01:32
#18
Cueball
This issue is to important for another session of snakes and ladders with Fidel.
Tue, 2009-01-06 01:43
#19
It is rather disappointing that more is not being done from a Canadian perspective.
It has been all quiet on all political fronts, 400 people killed in single afternoon in the Congo and not a single word mention anywhere from any Canadian political party.
Thousands of autoworkers not working for a month and no support for them, and all the political parties are still on paid holidays.
The largest economical crisis in 80 years and nothing is being done for another few weeks.
The list can go on and on however I am too drunk and happy to waste my time here.
Everyone go back to their talking points, I am off to bed.
Tue, 2009-01-06 01:46
#20
To be fair to our yes-men in Harper's crew and our military lackeys, Hamas should stop with the rocket attacks as well. Apparently Hamas was encouraged by various US administrations as a counterweight to Arafat and the PLO. But once again, the death toll on the Palestinian side is far greater than those of Israelis. This is a long-running "war of attrition" slash deliberate genocide that Israeli and US hawks are willing to engage in.
Who lives in neighborhoods on the receiving end of Hamas rockets and Israeli bombs? I bet it's not the well-heeled Israelis, and we know that it's poor Palestinians taking the brunt of it. Why do Hamas never camouflage themselves in richer surroundings?
Tue, 2009-01-06 01:50
#21
Cueball
I'll bite. How precisely are we aiding and abetting what is going on in the Congo?
Tue, 2009-01-06 06:34
#22
Cellphones use a mineral mined in the Congo. Canadians buy these cellphones. This provides funds to various groups who then buy weapons. Blood cellphones if you will. Every text message means a baby dies, more or less.
Tue, 2009-01-06 06:50
#23
Cueball
Bollocks. Contributing to the world economy, which some people profit from and then do bad things with is complete different that directly aiding and abbetting them in war crimes.
Our first and foremost ally funnels gobs of money to Israel directly into the military forces of Israel and its society at large. We contribute too. How much military aid do we feed to armed forces in the Congo?
None.
We are talking 91 BILLION dollars in direct loans and grants to Israel, since 1949, and that is just up until the year 2000. It is the single largest foreign recipient of US government financial support since the end of WW II.
Any other red herrings you woud like throw out in your desperate search to avoid moral responsibility? Originally I thought that is what you were doing: avoiding moral introspection. But I have changed my mind I think you are desperately trying to avoid any thinking whatsoever.
[Edited to remove the word "ridiculous" and replace it with "Bollocks", because it more accurately signifies the place of origin of what I am replying too.]
Tue, 2009-01-06 07:45
#24
So you think it's OK to buy blood cellphones. Great. Next you'll be claiming blood diamonds are a great investment. Only the child amputees will argue.
see below Cueball.
Tue, 2009-01-06 07:47
#25
For Cueball. Shame on you for supporting the blood celphones. Shame!
Blood cell phones
By Hamid Golpira
You’re chatting on your cell phone and you don’t even realize that five million people had to die so you could make that call.
Of course, you’ll say, “How can that be so?”
It very well can be so and it is so.
Over 5.4 million people have died as a result of the ten-year war in the Democratic Republic of Congo, making it the bloodiest war since World War II, and one of the driving factors behind the war is the pursuit of the rare metallic ore columbite-tantalite, also known as coltan. http://www.tehrantimes.com/index_View.asp?code=185871
Your shiny new 3G iPhone may be helping fuel the deadliest conflict since World War II
Blood cell phones’ worsen crisis in the Congo
Saturday 19 July 2008 by Robin Browne
Lots of people know about "blood diamonds" such as those highlighted in the 2006 hit movie of the same name starring Leonardo DiCaprio. These are diamonds that help fuel wars in the countries they come from as warring parties fight over control of the diamond mines.
Very few people, however, know that their cell phones may be doing the very same thing. That’s because almost all electronic equipment, including cell phones, contain an element called tantalum that has properties that make it an important part of things like capacitors in electronic devices. Tantalum capacitors are used in laptop computers, pagers, mobile phones and game consoles like Sony’s Playstation.
Tue, 2009-01-06 07:57
#26
saga
Well, I see Mr. red-herring straw-man is doing a full-tilt boogie already!
Don't let the truth, or the thread topic hold you back, OO!
Comic relief aside ...
Blair: Gaza cease-fire must halt Hamas smuggling
JERUSALEM (CNN)
-- Any cease-fire in the Gaza conflict will require "clear and
definitive action" to halt the smuggling of weapons and money into the
Hamas-ruled Palestinian territory, former British Prime Minister Tony
Blair said Tuesday.
"If there is strong action on that front, so that Israel feels it has
achieved something -- namely the end of the smuggling of weapons and
finance to Hamas -- then I think it is possible to resolve this
reasonably quickly," Blair told CNN.
"If that doesn't happen, if we're not in that position, then obviously it's going to go on."
http://edition.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/meast/01/06/israel.gaza.diplomacy/
-----
"so that Israel feels it has
achieved something" ???
SO ISRAEL CAN 'SAVE FACE' ?!?!?!!!!! aaaarrrgggghhhh!!!!!
Tue, 2009-01-06 08:26
#27
"Even doctors seasoned in Gaza's many emergencies, however, are reeling from the scale and intensity of the latest Israeli assault, which has killed more than 550 Palestinians and injured 2,500 others in 10 days of fighting."
http://www.kansascity.com/451/story/965616.html
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jan/06/gaza-israel
'As I ran I saw three of my children. All dead'
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
http://LASIK-Flap.com ~ Health Warning about LASIK Eye Surgery
Tue, 2009-01-06 08:58
#28
To be fair to Blair, or anyone who is trying to actively end the invasion... thats what negotiations are about.
Israel does have to be offered something. It's most definitely not a question of justice.
Not that there is any traction at least right now. Because Israel has even publically admitted that it will settle for no less than the destruction of Hamas- period.
Unfortunately, right now it looks like there can not even be the expectation of any relief via Israeli realpolitik needs. Because the brutal game plan for Israel is inflicting as much damage as possible on Hamas and collective punishment for the people of Gaza, for as long as Israel is able to keep this up.
There probably wont be an opening for even a one sided 'truce' until Israelis start feelong this is costing them. Palestinians be damned, or the 'liberal' version- don't count enough.
One of the sick ironies is that Hamas is being strengthened while Fatah and Abbas are being weakened. And that was totally predictable. Superb conditions for increasing Israel's security.
Tue, 2009-01-06 09:54
#29
There has for decades in Israel been a sector willing to drive all Palestinians out, with whatever it takes to achieve this.
The extreme versions of that openly expressed that they would be happy to do so.
The mainstream Likud version elected to follow the 'appropriate' long term strategy... but if along the way Palestinian leadership would accept Israeli terms, that was deemed an acceptable outcome. Sharon was the recent expression of this.
In recent years, the increasingly desperate plight of the Palestinian people has not made them want to give up and take whatever Israel will 'give' them.
The complementary shift in Israel is that people have given up on reaching some kind of accomodation with Palestinians. Israelis who did not already cheer on the brutal logic of destroying Palestinian infrastructure and society, have either joined the cheerleaders or resigned themselves.
The apologists we see here on this board are representative of the 'liberal' front of that shift in Israel. So they de-contaxtualize the Hamas rockets, and have the audacity and sheer inhumanity to say that Israel is only using as much force as necessary.
I can't say what our North American apologists for Israel know, but within Israel the numbers of peope serving in the IDF means that pretty quickly the enitre population knows the real nature of the attack rather than the sanitized version presented in the media.
They know its not all about removing rocket launch sites, and military and armaments capabilities. They know its not about 'unavoidable casualties because Hamas hides military assets in the civilian population'. They know that much of the military capability of Hamas remains hidden, and that the IDF systematically attacks the above ground and open personnel and infrasrtucture of governance in Gaza.
There are two possible outcomes in this incremental march to a final solution. There is no stable outcome where Palestinians are simply driven behind walls where they cannot get back at Israel. Either all Palestinians will be killed or driven out; or the worm will eventually turn and the tide of inflicted violence will begin to turn against Israel.
Tue, 2009-01-06 10:19
#30
Three killed as Israeli forces strike UN schools in Gaza
Ma'an news
Jan 6, 2009
Bethlehem - Ma'an - Three Palestinians were killed overnight in an Israeli attack on a United Nations school that was housing people displaced by the violence in Gaza, the UN's relief agency for Palestinian refugees said on Tuesday.
In a statement circulated on Tuesday, UNRWA said that Israeli forces attacked the Asma Elementary School in Gaza City, which is currently sheltering 400 people who fled their homes in the town of Beit Lahiy.
The school was clearly marked as a United Nations installation. The three men, 24-year-old Hussein Mahmoud Abed Al Malek Al Sultan, 19-year-old Abed Samir Ali Al Sultan, and 25-year-old Rawhi Jamal Ramadan Al Sultan, were killed at 11:30 last night. The three men, all from the same family, were killed as they left the school toilet at eleven thirty last night when the school compound took a direct hit.
The director of the UN general commissioner's office in Gaza Adnan Abu Hasanah said that another UN facility, the Ash-Shouka School in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, was also bombarded. At this time there were no details available about the civilians who had taken shelter in the school.
UNRWA is strongly protesting these killings to the Israeli authorities and is calling for an immediate and impartial investigation.
"Where it is found that international humanitarian law has been violated, those responsible must be held to account," UNRWA said.
Well before the current fighting, UNRWA said it had given to the Israeli authorities the GPS co-ordinates of all its installations in Gaza, including Asma Elementary School.
"This tragic incident again illustrates the most urgent need for an end to the fighting. It also underlines the sad reality facing those fleeing the violence that unless there is a lasting ceasefire, there will remain pervasive risks to civilian lives in Gaza today," the agency added.
(from the CSOCWORK Canadian distribution list)
Tue, 2009-01-06 10:21
#31
Tom what an awesome post thank you for taking the time to write that out.
I totally agree with what you said about Israel getting a bloody nose the last time and now feel the need to flex their muscles and make a show of force.
I think they need to realize that it's okay to put their sword away.
I have a question for you. One of Israel's biggest complaints seems to be the rocket attacks right?
I'm not suggesting the rocket attacks are a justification for what their doing but the attacks DO need to stop (Not forgetting Israel needs to stop their assault). What do you suggest is the best way to begin stopping the rocket attacks aganst Israel? UN peacekeepers or observers with strict penalties against Israel if the UN is messed with?
Maybe a palastine task force or police force who's job is to track down and stop the rocket teams?
Interesting thing about Rocket attacks. I know their not very effective as an attricion type weapon buthe psychologgical impact they have on people may be more serious than people expect. I read a report that stated out of the known cases of PTSD coming out of Afghanistan for Canadian soliders [b]most[/b] have been from people who didn't leave the wire. People who lived inside the relitively safe walls of the Airfield. Why is that is a good question.
One argumnt is that most of the combat soldiers are deployed at FOBs and police sub stations, the ones coming down with PTSD are the support guys and girls. When you read a little deeper though one of the factors that pops up (and is more widely accepted) is that the rocket attacks which happen on the airfield find their victim completly unaware. Your safe then a massive explosion. Soldiers outside the wire risk exploding every bridge or culvert they roll over, or every litteral step they take. Thing isin the latter case you're not unawares. You're on your guard. You're kinda expecting something to happen, when it does it doesn't stress you out as much.
(I also read about tests done to lab rats where long story short the rats who had a 15 second warning in the form of a bell before being shocked suffered MUCH less percentage of stomache ulcers than rats who were shocked at random intervals, this example as gruesome as it is lends weight to the belief that some kind of warning allows a victim to deal with stress better)
So while I think rocket attacks in no way justify what Israel is doing I DO think it is a considerable problem (That some may not put enough weight into) which needs to addresed along with the host of other issues.
Queston is, how to stop the rocket attacks? They can be set up within minutes and the rocket team can rig up a timer using somethng as simple as a pail of waterwhich ignights the rocket 12 hours later giving the team plenty of time to get away.
If Israel stopped their assault, recognized the land belonging to palastine etc.. do you think the rocket attacks would begin to stop? Would people be more inclined to report people or dismantle the rockets?
Tue, 2009-01-06 10:30
#32
remind
There is so much flawed about your attempt at analysis realigned that I can't even be bothered to say anything other than: "for fuck's sake look at a larger picture of what you stated means"!
___________________________________________________________
"watching the tide roll away"
Tue, 2009-01-06 10:51
#33
"If Israel stopped their assault, recognized the land belonging to
palastine etc.. do you think the rocket attacks would begin to stop?"
(sarcasm) Of course not (sarcasm), since if they did, we wouldn't be able to avoid addressing Israel's actions.
Tue, 2009-01-06 10:53
#34
Hi Remind.
No problem, if you find yourself bored at sometime during the day or week please feel free to come back and point out all the flawes (not to mention maybe take a crack at answering how to stop the rocket attacks)
Tue, 2009-01-06 11:14
#35
They've been pointed out before. IE, Israel is not just looking for rocket attcaks to end, and more pointed and precise critiiques than that.
You or one of the others never respond. You just wait a while and say for the umpteenth time "how about if..."
Tue, 2009-01-06 11:19
#36
Tue, 2009-01-06 11:38
#37
Its real simple.
Israel has to be reigned in, a really long way.
Stopping the current is an immediate humanitarian neccesity.
But our apologist friends keep bringing up that minimal conditions of a solution is the necessity of the Hamas rockets having to stop.
Correct. But there's another side, and within the same timeline as the rockets having to stop.
The US has to stop giving Israel a blank check for hammering Palestinians. Without US aid Israels military might has much shorter limits. And without such limits Israel demands the 'right' to dictate terms of an accomodation. As long as Israel knows the military aid keeps coming, they will do as they see fit.
We are seeing an example of that right now. Israel even says that the rockets ending is not enough. That Hamas has to go as an independent political power. Just like Israel decided that Araft and the PLA had to go.
Apologists pretend or delude themselves that there is some kind of ideal Palestinian government that Israel could live with. The reality is that they are not even content to live with relative puppets- like Arafat. They demand abslolute puppets.
Occupied Europe during WWII proved that puppet states with even a severely limited autonomy don't work for the master state- that without the full and active presence and the full brutality of the Nazi jackboot, that the puppet regimes just couldn't take care of the job.
Tue, 2009-01-06 11:51
#38
If the US were to announce that US military aid to Israel was going to be suspended- even temporarily- all sorts of peace initiative openings would appear.
Without ongoing aid Israel can at least defend its security for a very long time- it just can't attack without limit.
The rockets may well keep coming. Thats one of the likely consequences when violent oppression doesn't even have realpolitik limits.
If the rockets keep coming- or in anticipation that they might- Israel can easily evacuate Sderot... for a fraction of the cost of the assault on Gaza. Temporary evacuations of Israeli territory would be a VERY small taste of what Palestinians face.
And it would be temporary. Rockets and suicide bombs will dissapear when their are good faith negotiations.
Not overnight of course. But the trend will be set.
But that trend has no chance of starting as long as Israel has its blank check.
Tue, 2009-01-06 11:58
#39
remind
No problem, if you find yourself bored at sometime during the day or week please feel free to come back and point out all the flawes (not to mention maybe take a crack at answering how to stop the rocket attacks)
na, I will be doing that about the time you start taking a look at the larger picture, and what exactly what you said implies, means, indicates in another wider perspective than you apparently see.
The rocket attacks actually mean sfa, BTW. They are just an excuse used by Israel and apparently yourself and others like yourself.
___________________________________________________________
"watching the tide roll away"
Tue, 2009-01-06 12:05
#40
The rocket attacks actually mean sfa, BTW.
They are like car accidents... which are also unexpected (Realigned)... except that less people in Israel die of the rocket attacks.
Tue, 2009-01-06 12:48
#41
Israel and Israeli citizens have a need for and a right to security.
They do not have a right to simply name what is required for that security.
The parallel is that firms have to be able to produce a profit. But they do not have a right to simply dictate to a union what is required for that profitability.
Israeli civil society has become too corrupted for Israelis to make a realistic assessment of what is required for their security.
What underpins Israelis capacity to simply name the terms is the unconditional military aid from the US. With that totally or effectively unconditional aid, Israel will not engage in good faith negotiations over everyones need for security.
Tue, 2009-01-06 13:01
#42
"Israeli civil society has become too corrupted for Israelis to make a
realistic assessment of what is required for their security."
I am aghast at such "helpless Israel" psychologizing and all the rationales limited to their self-interest.
Tue, 2009-01-06 13:05
#43
"Even doctors seasoned in Gaza's many emergencies, however, are reeling from the scale and intensity of the latest Israeli assault, which has killed more than 550 Palestinians and injured 2,500 others in 10 days of fighting."
That is no 'fighting', it is more the equivalent of shooting kids that are throwing rocks out of their playpen. Is there no sense of shame in the Israeli army?
Tue, 2009-01-06 13:20
#44
Realigned, thank you.
The rocket assault isn't in a vacuum it is the result of a 40 year dehumanizing occupation. Hamas is responding not only to the blockade but to the humiliation that is the daily life of Palestinians. The suicide bombers, the rockets all these things are merely the result of the ethnic cleansing and the occupation.
What Palestinians want is a life. A space to live this life freely according to their collective will.
If Israel withdraws from Palestine (West Bank-Gaza and East Jerusalem) and allows Palestinians to be free in this land and live as they wish then yes, the reason for launching rockets into Israel subsides. In fact, why would a small, poor, resourceless country which is what Palestine would be with immense economic, social and health (including psychological) issues to deal on its own, attack the local superpower (which is also a nuclear power), this would be folly.
Israel has proven that it can subjugate Palestine and Palestinians to any humiliation and bring upon them any barbarity it wishes, it has done so for 40 years without political consequence. If the Palestinians would be free of this enslavement under the Israeli gun to be able as a normal people to get on with their lives and salvage what they can of their collective well being, why would they risk even bothering their former oppressor? They know the consequences of that all too well.
Speeches aside, even Hamas has offered a 30 year truce (hudna) to Israel if it recognized Palestine within the 1967 borders. http://www.fromoccupiedpalestine.org/node/1146
30 yeas isn't an accidental number, it is enough time for at least one Palestinian generation to grow up that does not personally know a relative or a friend who was killed by the IDF.
Speeches and declarations aside, in factuality, Palestinians have in essence agreed to live on 22% percent of their historical territory. It would seem that they have compromised a plenty. The problem lies elsewhere.
Tue, 2009-01-06 13:37
#45
Thirty years is also explicitly a time frame to come to a permanent resolution od problems that cannot be immediately resolved.
IE, it would not be expected that with a recognition of Palestinian sovereignty that all Israeli settlers would have to leave. In fact, it is expected that during the interim period those remaining would maintain rights as Israeli citizens and even a protection of property rights. There are international precedents for this.
30 years is time to gradually build trust and come to negotiated permanent resolutions of issues like the settlements.
Tue, 2009-01-06 13:47
#46
I am aghast at such "helpless Israel" psychologizing and all the rationales limited to their self-interest.
I don't now how you could characterise my series of posts as rationales limited to the self-interest of Israelis.
I do address the latter. Peace settlements, and the path to them, require the engagement of all self-interests.
A rationale that is solely moralistic begats such formulations as 'Nuke the Knesset'.
Tue, 2009-01-06 14:08
#47
KenS, my guess is that as soon as the IDF left the West Bank, the 187,000 settlers wouldn't stay there. There is no way a Palestinian government would be able to allocate disproportionate resources to them, such as the massive waterways which are diverted to these settlements. The settlers would find themselves in a third world basket case with massive problems to deal with. Their communities are fully subsidized by the State of Israel at great costs to infrastructure concerns within the 1967 boundaries of Israel itself. If Palestine were to become sovereign then this new state would be responsible for all its citizens.
This is why Israel is building the wall to include these settlements as such the settlements only serve the purpose of annexation. If these settled lands can't be annexed as it is being planned then the settlers would move on their own once the army along with the subsidies go.
But you are correct, thirty years would provide for the possibilut of a new relationship between Israel and its neighbours.
Tue, 2009-01-06 14:26
#48
if a full-blown humanitarian catastrophe were to explode among the Palestinian civilian population, the international community would pressure Israel to stop the assault.
I thought the international community was condeming Israel's actions in gaza already.
-------------------------
Takes more than combat gear to make a man Takes more than license for a gun Confront your enemies, avoid them when you can A gentleman will walk but never run -Sting, an englishman in new york
Tue, 2009-01-06 14:45
#49
remind
The pro_Israeli media is working over time, just watched a news clip from CTV Edmonton where they were showing a *gasp* broken window of an Israeli, that allegedly had a "rocket" launched through it, thus according to them, proving the rockets are going further than before. But yet there was a mysterious lack of other damage in a room that would have been the consequence if a rocket had been launched through the window.
It looked more like a ROCK was launched through the window, than a rocket.
___________________________________________________________
"watching the tide roll away"
Tue, 2009-01-06 15:54
#50
In pro-Israel newspeak, a Palestinian "rocket" is probably a small rock. Should be spelled "rockette"...
Tue, 2009-01-06 15:55
#51
Cueball
Yes they shot some kid in the West Bank the other day for throwing a rock.