Eight hours of terror in southern Israel

[IR5FORMUMSIE 850]

http://www.theage.co...2234065074.html

http://www.academicj...d%20Matchin.pdf

http://richarddawkin...ar-suicide-vest

SIt down before you really embarrass yourself.

As you wish, dear.

My link

Robertson And Spencer Agree: Media Love Islam 'Cult' Because They Hate America

By Brian Tashman Created Aug 3 2011 - 1:55pm Anti-Muslim activist Robert Spencer joined Pat Robertson on The 700 Club [1] today to discuss the increased scrutiny of Spencer's writings after it came to light that they were frequently cited by the right-wing Norway terrorist [2] who killed scores of progressive youth activists and government employees. Robertson, whose American Center for Law and Justice worked with Spencer to organize [3]a rally opposing the construction of an Islamic community center near Ground Zero, previously said that people who "oppose Muslims" am like himself are similar to those who fought "Adolf Hitler and the Nazis." [4]

Spencer told Robertson, who was upset that no one in the media was telling "the truth about this cult," that the "hard left" media hate America and Christianity, and therefore "love" radical Islam. Later in the program, Robertson blasted the "anti-American" media for embracing "something out of the Eighth Century B.C." (note: Muhammad was born in 570 AD) and denounced Islam for supposedly endorsing violence and restricting the rights of women (things Robertson has never [5], ever [6] supported).

Breivik, Rightist Mass Murderer, Hates Muslims, Loves Pam Geller

Anders Behring Beivik, far-right terrorist accused of killing 80

A far-right Norwegian nationalist with ardent anti-Muslim views levelled savage blows at the mainstream political culture of his countrywith massive attacks on the government building housing the prime minister’s office and a summer camp at which young followers of the ruling Labor Party played. He killed 80 people. There are many questions raised by the savagery of this attack. How could Norwegian security allow such a thing to happen in the heart of Oslo, in a government facility housing the nation’s leader and political heart? How do we apprehend the enormity of the devastation and the fact that it was wrought by a far-right terrorist targeting the country’s liberal political leadership? But for me, another important question which no one, so far is asking is why did most of the world first think the terrorist/s responsible were Muslim, when the actual killer hates Muslims? In fact, this is what the New York Times wrote in its story which did report the political affiliation of the killer:

Initial reports focused on the possibility of Islamic militants, in particular Ansar al-Jihad al-Alami, or Helpers of the Global Jihad, cited by some analysts as claiming responsibility for the attacks. American officials said the group was previously unknown and might not even exist.

There was ample reason for concern that

terrorists

might be responsible.

How’s that again? Are the only terrorists in the world Muslim? If so, what do we call a right-wing nationalist capable of planting major bombs and mowing down scores of people for the sake of the greater glory of his cause? If even a liberal newspaper like the Times can’t call this guy a terrorist, what does that say about the mindset of the western world?

It’s absolutely imperative for the world to face the fact that for every Islamist willing to resort to violence there is a right-wing nationalist willing to do the same. We can see that in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Equally important to note that while there may be some on the left who have resorted to violence (in this country in the 1960s for example), the overwhelming share of mayhem comes from the political right. We can see that in Israel, where the extreme settler movement assassinated a prime minister and murdered fellow Israeli Jews. The same holds true here in the U.S., where a white supremacist, Jared Loughner, recently murdered a federal judge and several others in addition to nearly assassinating Gabrielle Giffords, a Jewish member of Congress.

UPDATE: Pam Geller is denying the statement below that Fjordman and Breivik are the same. And readers have noted that Breivik refers in his own name online favorably to Fjordman in the third person. Which either means that they are two separate individuals, or else Breivik is playing a double game. But even if Geller is right, Breivik clearly admires the work of Fjordman, Geller, Spencer and the other anti-jihadi bloggers and says so in his own name. If there are any Norwegian speakers who can help research Breivik’s writings and translate selected ones, please contact me.

Norwegian bloggers are reporting that Breivik is the author of a blog called Fjordman and that he’s guest blogged for Atlas Shrugs, Jihad Watch and Gates of Vienna “for years.” As Breivik, he publicly praised one of her posts. Elise Hendrick has translated a passage from Realisten which confirms that Fjordman and Breivik are one and the same:

According to his own statements, Anders Behring Breivik previously operated the blog ‘Fjordman’, and later wrote for many years under the pseudonym Fjordman for the anti-Muslim and Zionist blogs Gates of Vienna and Jihad Watch.

In fact, an intrepid friend of Elise’s has created a web page with the “collected works” of the miraculous Fjordman. Pretty soon there’ll be a Festschrift in his honor. And did you know he’s written a book (of course he has, he’s an articulate mass-murderer), Defeating Eurabia. It’ll only set you back 50 bucks to get a glimpse into the mind of an anti-jihadi terrorist. Here’s a favorable review of Geert Wilders magnum opus, Fitna penned by Fjordman. And don’t ya know that feminism leads to the oppression of women, natch. And Caucasophobia is racism, of course.

I was curious about the views of such an individual would be regarding Israel. And lo and behold, the educated terrorist doesn’t disappoint. Here is his Why Europeans Should Support Israel. With friends like this does Israel need enemies?

There may be people out there more knowledgeable about the minds of assassins, but I’ve rarely heard of articulate mass murderers. The most recent one that comes to mind is the Unabomber who wrote long treatises which were published unwillingly by several major newspapers. Perhaps readers can think of others. But generally, it appears that our man Breivik is a paragon of the pathological literary mindset.

I don’t think we can blame Robert Spencer or Pam Geller specifically for not being able to predict that one of their political allies would be a homicidal killer and terrorist. But still, if you lie down with dogs you’ll wake up with fleas. The brand of hate peddled by Geller and Spencer naturally attracts such a following. H/t Loonwatch.

Breivik’s Twitter account contains a single tweet:

One person with a belief is equal to the force of 100 000 who have only interests.

To which I’ve replied in a tweet of my own:

One person with homicidal right wing beliefs is equal to the force of 100,000 who think only Muslims can be terrorists.

My strong hunch is that there must be a substantial group which participated in this conspiracy. One man doesn’t make and plant two bombs and then travel to an island and kill 70 people alone.

Whether it is Israel, the U.S., or Norway, if we wear blinders which prevent us from seeing that Muslims are NOT the only people capable of mass political violence, then we have left ourselves vulnerable to the ascendancy of a violent far-right political culture. If you examine what happened in 1995, when Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated, the Israeli political liberal-centrist mainstream basically imploded after a series of Palestinian bombings and the onset of the second Intifada. All of which enabled the ascendancy of settler extremists and their Likud fellow travellers who have now taken control of Israel’s political discourse. People now forget that one of the most savage acts of political incitement was a speech delivered by Bibi Netanyahu from a Jerusalem balcony while members of the crowd brayed for blood vengeance against Rabin. The assassination followed shortly thereafter. Bibi, the Likud and the settlers have been the ones who gained the most politically from the murder.

I would never hold that the political left is wholly pure and virtuous, but when it comes to an impulse to violence those on the far-right largely have the market cornered.

My link

America is Experiencing The Worst Spasm of Paranoia and Bigotry of The Post-Cold War Age

By: Peter Beinart [ Posted On: 2010-09-13 ]

Post a CommentPeter Beinart

The politics of mosques and Qurans show America to be in the worst spasm of paranoia and bigotry since the Cold War. The awful irony is that persecuting Muslims at home actually endangers American security, just as the red scares of the mid-20th century aided the USSR. The term Red Scare denotes two distinct periods of strong anti-Communism in the United States: the First Red Scare, from 1917 to 1920, and the Second Red Scare, from 1947 to 1957. The First Red Scare was about worker (socialist) revolution and political radicalism. The Second Red Scare was focused on (national and foreign) communists influencing society or infiltrating the federal government, or both.

With each new attack on a mosque, each new anti-Muslim slur by a prominent politician or pundit, each new poll showing that large swaths of Americans think President Obama is lying about his faith, it becomes clearer that we are in the midst of a national psychosis: the worst spasm of paranoia and bigotry of the post-Cold War age. The interesting question is: Why now?

The answer lies in the intersection of isolationism and war. At first glance, it seems odd that America is witnessing this eruption of anti-Muslim hate now rather than immediately after the 9/11 attacks. But historically, it's not odd at all. Consider the "red scares" of the early and mid-20th century. In April 1917, the United States entered World War I. That fall, the Bolsheviks seized power in Russia. But it wasn't until more than a year later, in November 1919, that Woodrow Wilson's attorney general, A. Mitchell Palmer, began arresting and deporting thousands of communists, anarchists, immigrants, and labor radicals.

The hysteria that fueled the Palmer Raids resulted partly from World War I itself, which produced a wave of ultra-nationalism, initially targeting Americans of German descent. But by late 1919, Americans had soured on the war. Palmer's raids began, in fact, the very month that the Senate rejected the Treaty of Versailles, thus spurning Wilson's effort to permanently entangle the United States in European affairs. Less than 18 months after that, Congress passed the Emergency Quota Act of 1921, which virtually cut off immigration from Eastern and Southern Europe. The paranoid anti-communism of the Palmer Raids, in other words, represented an inversion of the jingoism spawned by war. Frustrated in their efforts to remake Europe, Americans turned their fury inward, redirecting it toward the "enemy within," which could be defeated at lower cost in money and blood.

The awful irony is that persecuting Muslims at home actually endangers American security, just as the red scares of the mid-20th century aided the USSR.

America's second red scare, which began in the late 1940s, featured a similar dynamic. Many of the politicians who screamed loudest about communist subversion in the early years of the Cold War had been isolationists before World War II. And many remained isolationists of a sort. Joseph McCarthy and other Midwestern Republicans were generally skeptical of the NATO alliance, which, like the Treaty of Versailles, required the United States to permanently commit its money and men to Europe's defense. In contrast to Harry Truman, who especially after 1950 began dramatically building up America's army and extending America's commitments overseas, Republicans like McCarthy and Robert Taft offered a cheaper, simpler strategy for the nascent Cold War. First, they proposed building up the Air Force, and telling the USSR that the U.S. would retaliate against communist aggression by dropping nuclear bombs. Second, they insisted that the communist threat was largely domestic, and could be eradicated at minimal expense by exposing the hundreds of Soviet agents nestled in the State Department. As McCarthy said in the famous February 1950 speech where he waved a piece of paper ostensibly containing the names of communist spies, "the reason we find ourselves in a position of impotency is not because the enemy has sent men to invade our shores but rather because of the traitorous actions" of people at home. It was a convenient lie, which allowed a war-weary nation to imagine that the U.S. could have prevented Eastern Europe and China from falling to communism without spilling a drop of American blood.

Joseph McCarthy, Sarah Palin and Newt Gingrich

All of which brings us to today. For many years now, the Pew Research Center has been asking Americans whether the U.S. should "mind its own business internationally and let other countries get along the best they can on their own." In 2002, Americans rejected this baldly isolationist statement by well over two to one. Last December, when Pew asked again, it found that Americans agreed with it by a margin of five points. In both 2002 and 2009, Democrats proved slightly more isolationist than Republicans, probably because of their greater antipathy to America's wars abroad. But among Democrats, isolationist sentiment has proven more stable. Where it has jumped dramatically has been among Republicans, who were 22 points more likely to endorse Pew's statement last year than in 2002.

Partly, this rising Republican isolationism is the result of no longer trusting America's commander in chief. As an internationalist-minded, religiously inclusive conservative, George W. Bush kept GOP isolationism in check, just as he curtailed GOP Islamophobia (and, for that matter, GOP hostility to Hispanic immigrants). But there's something deeper at play than just a switch of presidents. Ever since 9/11, according to opinion polls, Republicans have worried more about terrorism than have Democrats. Initially, this fear translated into overwhelming support for military action abroad. But as Republicans (like everyone else) have grown tired and embittered by America's wars, they have turned their anxiety inward, lured by the same idea that attracted Palmer and the McCarthyites: that America could guarantee its safety on the cheap by ferreting out the real threat, which resides within.

The awful irony, of course, is that persecuting Muslims at home actually endangers American security by fueling al Qaeda recruitment, just as the red scares of the early and mid-20th century handed propaganda victories to the USSR. The harsh truth is this: The United States will always have to pay a greater price overseas than most Americans want, and despite that, Americans will never enjoy the level of security they feel they deserve. That's the messy reality that Americans, and particularly Republicans, want to ignore. Far easier, as Sarah Palin and Newt Gingrich understand, to find a despised, terrified minority that you can vanquish without ever losing a GI or racking up a dollar of debt. In a few days, on the morning of Yom Kippur, we Jews will read the following, from Leviticus: "the he-goat designated by lot for Azazel shall be stood alive before Hashem, to provide atonement through it." It's an ancient idea, the scapegoat, onto which the nation transfers its burdens and sins. Now we Americans have a new one, the American Muslim, and a new set of sins for which we will, I pray, one day atone.

My link

Muslim woman says head scarf spurred threat in Ann Arbor

Muslim student says truck pulled up, man pointed gun at her

Calvin Men/ The Detroit News

Ann Arbor— A 21-year-old Muslim woman said she was the victim of a hate crime as she drove along State Street on Sunday morning.

The woman, who wears a head scarf, or hijab, told Ann Arbor police she was in her car at the intersection of State Street and Eisenhower Parkway when a driver in a black Dodge Ram truck behind her started honking and later pulled up beside her, where he hurled insults.

"I laughed about it, honestly, because it happens so much wearing a scarf that it didn't bug me," said Aisha. The Detroit News is not using her last name because of her fears of retaliation.

The comments, she said, included "You don't belong here," "You are a terrorist" and "Your people need to be killed."

Aisha said she dialed 911 on her cellphone and when she looked back, saw that the driver was pointing a handgun at her.

Police ran a check of the license plate, but could not find a match, she said. Police said only that they were looking into the incident.

The woman, a nursing student, also reported the incident to the Council on American-Islamic Relations, which asked the FBI to investigate.

"No people in America, be they Christian or a part of a religious minority, should be subjected to such threats because of their religion or faith," said Dawud Walid, executive director for CAIR Michigan.

"For any individual to be taunted because of their religion and have a firearm pointed at them is a hate crime in our mind. This is an individual who's a threat not just to Muslims, but to society at large, and they need to be apprehended."

The FBI would not confirm or deny it was looking into the incident, said FBI special agent Sandra Berchtold.

Canada: From an ex-Muslim, true Islamophobia

Source: National Post The words stung me like a jolt of electricity: "Muhammad was a child rapist." As if the slur were not sufficient, the speaker then insinuated my Islamic faith was filth. "I am 'clean' of Islam," she sneered to her Toronto audience. As far as hate speech goes, the shoe was suddenly on the other foot. By Tarek Fatah.

For years, radical Islamists have cited freedom of speech to defend their attacks on Christians, Jews, Hindus and liberal non-observant Muslims. A hateful tone is never far from the surface -- although great care is taken to couch this cancer in ambiguity and double-speak. Take for instance the Toronto imam caught on videotape praying to Allah for the "defeat of the kufaar," a thinly disguised reference to Christians and Jews.

As a Muslim, I learned very early in life to walk in my adversaries' shoes to feel their pain. This is why I have not shied away from calling a spade a spade and outing the segregationist hate mongers within my community, an effort that has paid dividends in the slow decline of overt anti-Semitism and Hinduhatred in the public religious discourse of Western Muslims.

But last week, it was not a Muslim cleric whose speech traumatized me; it was the words of an ex-Muslim.

Even a hardened secular Muslim such as myself was deeply hurt by what I heard that evening. I also was disappointed that the speech was at a synagogue, and the audience almost all Jews.

The speaker who caused me this anguish was Wafa Sultan, the Syrian-born American who shot to fame after her appearance on Al Jazeera Television in 2006, where she tore into the arguments of cleric Ibrahim al-Khouli about the ills of Muslim society. The 30-second clip went viral and won great acclaim even among Muslims who respected her for her candid and honest critique of what ails us as a people.

However, instead of using her newfound fame to challenge the established theocracies and corrupt kingdoms of the Middle east, Sultan veered off the deep end and could not resist the temptation of becoming the poster child of Islam haters, joining their ranks with the fervour of a convert.

Inside a Toronto synagogue last week, where she was debating with Prof. Daniel Pipes whether moderate Islam was a Western ally or a Western myth, Dr.

Sultan wasted no time in lashing out at her former faith. Catering to the fears of her predominantly Jewish audience, she said, "Muhammad was a Jew killer." To further inflame the crowd, Wafa Sultan delivered an astonishing account of how the Prophet had slaughtered Jews and then raped the wife of the defeated Jewish tribe.

The vitriol was so severe, it was left to the two Jewish speakers at the debate, the moderator Avi Benlolo and Prof. Pipes to praise Muslims and mention the fact that moderate Muslims were rising up against extremism. Benlolo specifically mentioned the recent 600-page fatwa by the Pakistani cleric Tahir ul Qadri denouncing suicide bombing and terrorism.

However, Wafa Sultan would not have any of that. She chided both Benlolo and Pipes for their naivete. "There is no moderate Islam," she wagged her finger at Pipes. There was only one Islam, she claimed-- the Islam of rape, murder and hate.

To his credit -- and this will surprise many of his Muslim naysayers --Daniel Pipes reminded his Jewish audience that Islam was not the bogeyman it has been made out to be. "Remember, for over 1,000 years, whenever Jews needed a place for sanctuary, they got it in Muslim lands ... The problem is not Islam, it is Islamism," he told them.

I left the synagogue deeply disturbed. In the fight against Islamofascism, Wafa Sultan's hatred of Islam was cultivating the very forces she claims to be exposing. When a questioner asked her "What is the solution?" she just shrugged her shoulders. Perhaps the answer she had in mind was too outrageous even by her own standards: Force Muslims to convert or die.

Five hundred years ago, Isabel and Ferdinand "cleansed" Spain of Islam and Muslims, but we are still here. Surely, we can think of more productive solutions -- and devote our attention to more productive minds -- than this.

My link

[ready4ONE 5,400]

SIt down before you really embarrass yourself.

Gambit? This is some sort of game? If innocent people are dying, who's winning?

Since the Israelis are neither solely at fault for everything wrong in the region, nor do they compare to the Nazis in any rational way, such statements are gambits, revealing the nature of the party making them. The comments are word games, the situation is not.

[IR5FORMUMSIE 850]

Since the Israelis are neither solely at fault for everything wrong in the region, nor do they compare to the Nazis in any rational way, such statements are gambits, revealing the nature of the party making them. The comments are word games, the situation is not.

Someone's seems to be very testy. You do yourself a disservice, I never stated that Israeli policy (not most Israelis who are decent people who want peace) was responsible for all the ills in the region. I never even suggested it, your faux pas sounds suspiciously like a Freudian Slip. The Nazis and so many other groups believed in collective punishment and the IDF practices that every, single day. That's a fact, whether you choose to colour my statement as opinion is something that I have no control over. The IDF is not as bad as the Nazis but that they use more than one technique employed by them on a regular basis, makes the comparison, no matter how distasteful, valid. Semantics aside, I like to believe everyone wants peace, how we achieve that is at issue.

[Dan and Judy 614]

SIt down before you really embarrass yourself.

Gambit? This is some sort of game? If innocent people are dying, who's winning?

I think Gambit is a legit word here. It originaly applied to chess which is an imitation of war. Innocent people dying are pawns.

The Israelies won a long time ago.

The terrorism is intended to keep them from enjoying the win.

Actually the rules imposed on this particular game of chess prevent checkmate.

The rules are imposed by powers playing there own games.

Israel is like a chess board and the Israelies have all their Knights and castles and bishops

and the palestinians have their king backed into a corner with a couple of pawns

The terrorism thing is like a palestinian pawn popping up on the board at random times in different locations.

It is annoying to Israel but it is not a game changer unless it annoys the Israelies to the point of breaking the rules imposed from without.

[Dan and Judy 614]

I think Gambit is a legit word here. It originaly applied to chess which is an imitation of war. Innocent people dying are pawns.

The Israelies won a long time ago.

The terrorism is intended to keep them from enjoying the win.

Actually the rules imposed on this particular game of chess prevent checkmate.

The rules are imposed by powers playing there own games.

Israel is like a chess board and the Israelies have all their Knights and castles and bishops

and the palestinians have their king backed into a corner with a couple of pawns

The terrorism thing is like a palestinian pawn popping up on the board at random times in different locations.

It is annoying to Israel but it is not a game changer unless it annoys the Israelies to the point of breaking the rules imposed from without.

well I started out to just say I thought gambit was ok to use but there I was on the 50yd line and I had the ball so I took it home

[IR5FORMUMSIE 850]

I think Gambit is a legit word here. It originaly applied to chess which is an imitation of war. Innocent people dying are pawns.

The Israelies won a long time ago.

The terrorism is intended to keep them from enjoying the win.

Actually the rules imposed on this particular game of chess prevent checkmate.

The rules are imposed by powers playing there own games.

Israel is like a chess board and the Israelies have all their Knights and castles and bishops

and the palestinians have their king backed into a corner with a couple of pawns

The terrorism thing is like a palestinian pawn popping up on the board at random times in different locations.

It is annoying to Israel but it is not a game changer unless it annoys the Israelies to the point of breaking the rules imposed from without.

Wow, you are getting serious on me. Gambit may certainly be used in the sense, as you so clearly pointed out, that it is like a game of chess, but the consequences and toll is in human lives. That's my beef with it. The poster who brought up the term gambit was using it as a synonym for an initial assumption or premise, I only disagreed on the factual basis for such an observation. You are quite correct, as many have pointed out including myself, that the status quo is maintained. Some maniac fires a rocket that usually hits nothing and the IDF kills a few civilians and the odd militant. Israel is under no viable threat, Hamas is never going to take over. Israel has it's full complement of pieces on the board, the Palestinians are indeed backed into a corner.

[scandal 951]

The IDF is not as bad as the Nazis but that they use more than one technique employed by them on a regular basis, makes the comparison, no matter how distasteful, valid.

Bunk. Your comparison is odious. Referring to the IDF and the oppressions of the Third Reich in the same sentence shows a callous disregard for those calculated and horrific oppressions, and does a disservice to those who suffered through them. I wonder what the survivors of Lidice or Oradour-sur-Glane might think of your comparison. Nothing the IDF has ever done in its history is in the same galaxy with the atrocities of the Nazis.

On 10 June 1944, Diekmann's battalion sealed off the town of Oradour-sur-Glane, having confused it with nearby Oradour-sur-Vayres and ordered all the townspeople – and anyone who happened to be in or near the town – to assemble in the village square, ostensibly, to have their identity papers examined. In addition to the residents of the village, the SS also apprehended six people who did not live there but had the misfortune to be riding their bikes through the village when the Germans arrived.

All the women and children were locked in the church while the village was looted. Meanwhile, the men were led to six barns and sheds where machine-gun nests were already in place.

According to the account of a survivor, the soldiers began shooting at them, aiming for their legs so that they would die more slowly. Once the victims were no longer able to move, the soldiers covered their bodies with fuel and set the barns on fire. Only six men escaped; one of them was later seen walking down a road heading for the cemetery and was shot dead. In all, 190 men perished.

The soldiers proceeded to the church and placed an incendiary device there. After it was ignited, women and children tried to escape through the doors and windows of the church, but they were met with machine-gun fire. A total of 247 women and 205 children died in the carnage. Only two women and one child survived; one was 47-year-old Marguerite Rouffanche. She slid out by a rear sacristy window, followed by a young woman and child;[3] the Germans' attention was aroused and the three were shot. Marguerite Rouffanche was wounded and her companions were killed. She crawled to some pea bushes behind the church, where she remained hidden overnight until she was rescued the following morning. Another group of about twenty villagers had fled Oradour-sur-Glane as soon as the soldiers had appeared. That night, the village was partially razed.

A few days later, survivors were allowed to bury the dead. No less than 642 inhabitants of Oradour-sur-Glane had been murdered in a matter of hours. Adolf Diekmann claimed that the episode was a just retaliation for partisan activity in nearby Tulle and the kidnapping of Helmut Kämpfe.

[IR5FORMUMSIE 850]

well I started out to just say I thought gambit was ok to use but there I was on the 50yd line and I had the ball so I took it home

You are on fire today with the analogies. :thumbs:

[scandal 951]

Some maniac fires a rocket that usually hits nothing and the IDF kills a few civilians and the odd militant.

You are really suggesting here that Israel is intentionally targeting civilians? And you say nothing of the fact that these militants are using Gaza's civilian population as human shields in their own deliberate attacks on Israeli civilians?

Good grief.

Israel is under no viable threat, Hamas is never going to take over.

No viable threat? Hamas rockets are hitting Ashkelon, Ashdod, Be'er Sheva and killing and injuring civilians there. What's not viable? If border cities in Texas or California were being shelled from Mexico with civilian lives lost in the US, you'd suggest we do nothing about it? What nation would sit back and take rocket fire on its own people?

I'm guessing you meant no existential threat, instead of no viable threat.

Hamas rocket attacks alone are not an existential threat. However Israel most certainly faces serious existential threats. Syria, Iran, and possibly now Egypt again are all very worrisome real threats to Israel's survival. And the proxy agents including Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza are part of that regional assessment of threats.

[IR5FORMUMSIE 850]

Bunk. Your comparison is odious. Referring to the IDF and the oppressions of the Third Reich in the same sentence shows a callous disregard for those calculated and horrific oppressions, and does a disservice to those who suffered through them. I wonder what the survivors of Lidice or Oradour-sur-Glane might think of your comparison. Nothing the IDF has ever done in its history is in the same galaxy with the atrocities of the Nazis.

C'mon do you expect me to look the other way when the IDF uses the collective punishment that the Nazis and so many others (they weren't the first or the last) have used. The IDF isn't the Nazis, I never said that they were. Lidice and Oradour-sur-Galne were destroyed and the locals murdered in the name of "counterterrorsim," that sounds terribly familiar doesn't it? Much of that kind of brutality went out with Deir Yassin. That wasn't perpetrated by the IDF, that's true. If you expect people to turn a blind eye to what the IDF does, then why do they engage in asymmetrical warfare, why do innocent people who have done nothing to no one die. Israeli policy vis-a-vis oppression is carefully calculated, not in the same way as the Nazis but it is nonetheless carefully calculated to make life so unbearable that the Palestinians leave or are killed or are driven to rash acts of defiance. I'm not the one who has made these statements, various ISRAELI human rights groups and ex-IDF soldiers have. That is what gives me hope for peace, the brave men and women who are standing up for what's right. Groups like B'Tselem and others who are chastised for speaking out against the madness. Perhaps it was a bit hyperbolic on my part, I'll give you that, but I believe that never again applies to all of humanity and I hope you do, too.

[IR5FORMUMSIE 850]

You are really suggesting here that Israel is intentionally targeting civilians? And you say nothing of the fact that these militants are using Gaza's civilian population as human shields in their own deliberate attacks on Israeli civilians?

Good grief.

No viable threat? Hamas rockets are hitting Ashkelon, Ashdod, Be'er Sheva and killing and injuring civilians there. What's not viable? If border cities in Texas or California were being shelled from Mexico with civilian lives lost in the US, you'd suggest we do nothing about it? What nation would sit back and take rocket fire on its own people?

I'm guessing you meant no existential threat, instead of no viable threat.

Hamas rocket attacks alone are not an existential threat. However Israel most certainly faces serious existential threats. Syria, Iran, and possibly now Egypt again are all very worrisome real threats to Israel's survival. And the proxy agents including Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza are part of that regional assessment of threats.

The IDF dropping phosphorus munitions on civilian populations has NOTHING to do with human shields. The shelling of the UN compound was justified how? Hamas rockets couldn't hit the broadside of a barn, the don't have nice helicopter gunships with the latest technology that can selectively target and apartment building. Your comparison is flawed, the IDF and Mossad could easily figure out who is responsible and arrest them. I meant what I said, Hamas isn't a threat to anyone, I'm not afraid of strawmen are you? Maybe people should be afraid that way one need never look at the fact that all these groups exist for one reason, because people have no other choice. Peaceful solutions are simple but hard to implement. Hezbollah and Hamas make a lot of noise, that's all that they do. Nobody said that peace is easy.

[Golden Gate 530]

I am talking to my friend in Palestine - in the West Bank. He says it is crazy there today. He said there were 100,000 Palestinian cars backed up at check points, and the Israeli soldier there just laughing at them. He said people have gone crazy there, and everyone who is a civilian just wants peace. He also said that the situation that happened wasn't because of Palestinians, but because Israel couldn't control their border with Egypt.

[IR5FORMUMSIE 850]

You are really suggesting here that Israel is intentionally targeting civilians? And you say nothing of the fact that these militants are using Gaza's civilian population as human shields in their own deliberate attacks on Israeli civilians?

Good grief.

No viable threat? Hamas rockets are hitting Ashkelon, Ashdod, Be'er Sheva and killing and injuring civilians there. What's not viable? If border cities in Texas or California were being shelled from Mexico with civilian lives lost in the US, you'd suggest we do nothing about it? What nation would sit back and take rocket fire on its own people?

I'm guessing you meant no existential threat, instead of no viable threat.

Hamas rocket attacks alone are not an existential threat. However Israel most certainly faces serious existential threats. Syria, Iran, and possibly now Egypt again are all very worrisome real threats to Israel's survival. And the proxy agents including Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza are part of that regional assessment of threats.

eta: Just wanted to tone it down a bit, we all want peace and I hear, despite my bombast, and value what you're saying. :thumbs: :luv:

Edited August 21, 2011 by IR5FORMUMSIE

[mawilson 2,133]

Hamas rockets couldn't hit the broadside of a barn

Damage from Grad attack in Beersheba:

Iron Dome intercepts Grad missiles over Beersheba:

[Golden Gate 530]

My friend also told me that both Palestinian and Israeli reporters were questioning the timing of this incident, because of the fact that many in Israel have been out protesting Netanyahu's policies in this past month. They aren't happy with him and then this happens to distract all.