The Israeli government has been escalating its air and land assaults against Gaza, having killed some 70-100 Palestinians there, including numerous civilians, over the past two days.
This escalation has already provoked notable political-diplomatic effects:
- 1. PA President Mahmoud Abbas has been forced to announce the breaking off of the negotiations with Israel that were supposed to be the centerpiece of tyhe Bush administration’s post-Annapolis diplomacy in the region.
2. The EU and the UN, which until now have been generally passive followers of Washington in the so-called “Quartet” arrangement, have issued public statements decrying Israel’s disproportionate use of force against Gaza.
3. The Egyptian government has been forced to agree to at least a partial and limited re-opening of its border with Gaza.
All this, just as Condi Rice is poised to visit the region again. (Will this be Abu Mazen’s Siniora-like “boo-hoo moment”? The parallels with Condi’s ill-timed visit to Lebanon even while Israeli aircraft were pounding the country to smithereens in 2006 seem inescapable.)
The Bush administration’s policy in all parts of the Middle East is in a shambles, and threatens to deteriorate even further, perhaps very quickly. I will be interested to see what calm wisdom the US presidential candidates can bring to their comments on this crisis.
(I am doing family things this weekend but hope to get back to normal JWN coverage Monday evening. Till then, please use this comment thread for thoughtful discussion of what’s going on in Israel/Palestine.)
You neglected to mention that, prior to the attacks, Hamas had started to shoot rockets not only at Sderot, but now Ashkelon, and later Ofakim. This was the original “escalation.”
For someone who likes to tout herself as an authority on the mideast (and dismiss others who dare question your shaky knowledge of the facts and the issues), I’m surprised you didn’t bother to enter that in the blog.
Of course, if you did, it would have probably been in terms of how daring and resourceful Hamas was, since violence against Israelis gets you excited.
Looks like Joshua is giving us the same calm wisdom we can expect from the US Presidential candidates. As for what happens now, I have no idea, except that the one sure loser is Abbas.
Joshua,
We all know where are the strongs and where are the weaks and desperates are in this fight. The US unconditional support is scandalous. Meno male that the UN now says something. The problem is that as long as Israel feel this unconditional support from the US, they don’t give a dam about what the EU or the UN states.
However, it seems like a shortsighted policy on the part of Israel : or are they so sure that the US will continue to support them thusly once Bush is out of the WH ?
We all know where are the strongs and where are the weaks and desperates are in this fight.
Unfotunately, Christiane, this is neither a game of golf nor a bowling tournament. The “weak” do not get an automatic handicap, and the “desparate” can be every just as much in the wrong as can those with organized armed forces.
What neither you, nor Helena, choose to pay attention to is the fact that both the UN and the EU were every bit as critical of those firing the rockets and placing civilians in harms way as they were about the “disproportionate response” of the IDF in defending its citizens.
Greetings,
I wonder what would happen if forces in Gaza stopped shooting-off the rockets?
How about this? The refugees would continue to live in misery and nobody would pay a bit of attention. Didn’t someone somewhere say, “We have nothing to loose except our chains”. That was in a different context, but probably holds true here.
Sooner or later, all of the interested parties will probably find the smarts to talk to Hamas and at least try to mediate something. A few high level politicians say that if we talk to Hamas, we would only give them more legitimacy. Well, if they would only stop and think—they would think about our real national interests and goals. After that, they would find a way to recruit the major stakeholders to become involved in a goal achievement process.
Achieving national interest goals is probably better than killing each other. Sadly, though, unless Hamas shoots the rockets and generates a response from Israel, nobody would care.
Bob Spencer
I’m sure that the ‘Polish government’ had similar problems with its captives in the Warsaw ghetto–they probably told the world it was necessary, too, because some in the Ghetto were fighting back–who were those people?
While I have feelings for the people of Sderot, it’s impossible to compare homemade rockets with F-16s and Apache gunships. Is there anybody here who would claim they’d rather be under attack in Gaza than Sderot?
It’s a fun game for the Israeli right to invent all the ways this is Hamas’ fault, but yet, the pace of illegal settlements keep going unabated–seems to be the quid to Hamas’ pro quo, no?
What you forget, Bob, is that the West – including both the EU and the US – poured hundreds of millions of dollars into Gaza and the West Bank for them to build an infrastucture so they wouldn’t have to live in misery. What happened to that money and where was it invested?
JES,
You are shameless to use such an argument, because after the Hamas democratically won the elections and as such got to name the prime minister, the US and the EU stopped giving any help. To the point that non gouvernmental help agencies were asked to distribute basic help (aka much less than what they had previously). They hoped to turn a starving population against the Hamas. This wasn’t sufficient, so then Israel closed the frontier and put Gaza under siege.
“The “weak” do not get an automatic handicap, and the “desparate” can be every just as much in the wrong as can those with organized armed forces.”
Nobody gonna respond to that one? it’s not hard.
The German administration in Poland made precisely those arguments. The occupying force always justifies its continued occupation on the need to defend itself or maintain order.
In the case of those parts of Palestine occupied since 1967 the Israelis have no intention of withdrawing from most of the territories. If the rocket fire into Israel did not exist it would be necessary to invent it, or something like it. This is not a question of israeli self defence but of continuing a sixty year old policy of expanding its de facto sovereignty, while attempting, with the help of the USA, to expand de jure sovereignty.
And so far it has worked: the US has ceded approval of “facts on the ground” in the West Bank, the wall has nipped off large and strategically vital chunks of territory and, best of all, not only Arab regimes but Palestinians with some title to legitimacy are ready to negotiate surrender.
The current terror attack on Gaza is a reminder to the world that Israel must be stopped. Its assurances that it has limited territorial ambitions are not credible. It will expand until it is prevented from going further. Its fanatical regime has developed an appetite for Arab lands which is insatiable.
Current US/EU policy towards Israel is the equivalent to the policy of appeasement practised in the 1930s. Since 1948 Israel has advanced a series of requests, of the international community, to afford it living space. It has made repeated assurances that it has no desire to expand its borders but simply to live in peace. Every assurance has been a lie, every promise has been broken.
Every time that the international community averts its eyes from Israel’s aggression it simply assures itself of a bigger crisis in the future.
At the same time Israel’s behaviour continually degrades international standards, showing the world that torture, wars of aggression, bad faith bargaining, the breaching of treaties, ethnic cleansing, expropriation of properties and the ill treatment of a captive population are all acceptable behaviours.
It is to the great credit of “hamas” that, while ready to agree to a cease fire they refuse to be intimidated by aggression. In this they are acting on behalf of all humanity, by refusing to sacrifice the principles of justice.
Nobody gonna respond to that one? it’s not hard.
I guess ‘anomalous’ isn’t up to it herself? So anomalous, just when in history has military superiority alone guaranteed peace? Obviously it isn’t in Israel’s power to end the physical threats posed by its mortal enemy to the south (note the uncompromising, genocidal language of their charter, please!)
Do you suppose Israel should simply absorb the threat to its cities posed by HAMAS and other factions’ Grad missiles (which like Katyushas are far from ‘homemade’.) Try to pretend you take Israel’s security concerns as legitimate . Now imagine… if the gunships went away, would the cross border missile attacks end? They did, and the attacks continued. Nor did HAMAS’ earlier cease fire end cross border attacks from unoccupied Gaza.
If the rocket fire into Israel did not exist it would be necessary to invent it
How bizarre. What on earth does sovereignty over Gaza offer Israelis? Back in reality the rocket fire DOES exist… it isnt something whipped up by Zionist sorcery!
It is to the great credit of “hamas” that, while ready to agree to a cease fire they refuse to be intimidated by aggression
Their earlier cease fire hasn’t ended attacks on Israeli cities. None of the HAMAS cheerleaders seems interested in this minor detail. They lack a monopoly of force in Gaza and thus aren’t qualified to offer a cease fire. They bring nothing to the table but threats.
vadim, JES and all ilks,
It’s not Hamas it’s not Abbas its not Hanyiah problem here.
Israel mad Gaza like prison and the Palestinians either in Gaza and other occupied land like to be on their own land and government.
Simply bombing Tanks, send troops cleaning the ground destroying homes arresting youth Palestinians, daily assassinations, stop pregnant women’s on the bridge who indeed to hospitals to give birth and thy did give birth but on the streets due to Israeli forces all these can not be simply for any one accepted and live under it for ever.
Did you quest yourself how these people can last living under this?
What you expect from leaders either Hamas or Abbas can offer you while his land and his people suffering till their death?
Please just be more realistic in you comments, We all know the struggle in both side but the strong side have the lead over the weak side this should be the key point to say Israel have the responsibility for all what’s happing you like or not this is the reality.
Just finished watching “The War” a documentary after Truman took power when Roosevelt died suddenly, seems that their is a mentality that dominates the powerful, to the point it becomes self-destructive ex:Nazi Germany and Japan, were in addition to the tens of millions that were killed, 6 million European Jew out of 9 million were exterminated in the name of a pure race, ethnically cleansed together with the mentally ill and the Roma .
When I stumble with comments like JES and Joshua, against the backdrop of recent comments made by an israeli deputy minister, holocaust on an occupiued I become speechless.
Rather than justifying israel’s actions in the eyes of the world, you choose to overlook an unjust occupation.
“An Israeli government minister warned yesterday that increasing rocket fire from Gaza would bring Palestinians a Shoah – the Hebrew word normally used to denote the Nazi Holocaust inflicted on Jews during the Second World War.”
Mr Vilnai declared: “As the rocket fire grows, and the range increases – and they haven’t yet said the last word on this – they are bringing upon themselves a greater Shoah because we will use all our strength in every way we deem appropriate, whether in air strikes or on the ground.”
If he or his loved ones had experienced Shoah, i doubt he will wish it on anyone!
The relentless efforts that Jewish people take to educate themselves and others about the Holocaust is not surpassed by any other event in terms of movies, books, articles, speeches…..
We will think that they will be the first to refrain from such atrocities, so the question that begs an answer, WHY ALL THESE EFFORTS
“We all know where are the strongs and where are the weaks and desperates are in this fight.”
A non-sequitur. Nevertheless, the “weaks and desperates” have had multiple opportunities to seek peace over 60 years. Instead, they opt for war.
“The US unconditional support is scandalous.”
No more than the unconditional support Iran and the Arab nations gives to the Palestinians. With one small difference. The U.S., while ensuring that Israel has the ability to defend itself from destruction (not just from Palestinians, but from the rest of the neighbors that maintain a state of war against it), has on many occasions offered to broker peace. The U.S. supports Israel but has a vision of an independent Palestinian state.
By contrast, Israel’s enemies have unconditionally supported the Palestinians not for self-defense, but in a foolhardy but nevertheless dangerous attempt to wipe out their neighbor. They support the Palestinians, but have no vision of an independent Jewish state.
No more than the unconditional support Iran
First with all Iranian filamentary words about wiping Israel, now no single word from them in this matter, neither in Arab capitals nor in Iran a single mass crowded demonstrations on the streets in Tehran shouting the long standing slogan “Death to Israeli”.!!
Joshua could you list for us Iranians support, we appreciate if any have list of Iranian support for Palestinians to listed here and show how much support Palestinians got from Iran?
BTW, north Israel very quite since 33 days war it’s reported its quietest ever state since the invasion of Lebanon in 1982?
A non-sequitur. Nevertheless, the “weaks and desperates” have had multiple opportunities to seek peace over 60 years. Instead, they opt for war.
“If I was an Arab leader I would never make terms with Israel. That is natural: we have taken their country. Sure God promised it to us, but what does that matter to them? Our God is not theirs. We come from Israel, but two thousand years ago, and what is that to them? There has been antisemitism, the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault? They only see one thing: we have come here and stolen their country. Why should they accept that?” David Ben Gurion
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_kmafp/is_200611/ai_n16937504
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karine_A
Ok, so we can now put “anamolous” in the anti-peace camp as well.
Could someone actually quote those arguments allegedly made by German occupiers? I think those arguments don’t exist. Instead, people have been parroting the lazy leap between Gaza and Warsaw so often they just assume these arguments exist. We then wind up forgetting about Gaza and arguing about Warsaw instead.
Bevin this IS a question of self defense. About Israel’s self defense response being appropriate and effective, which the high civilian death toll and low kill rate of the Sderot rockets makes highly questionable. But bevin says, “This is not a question of israeli self defence but of continuing a sixty year old policy of expanding its de facto sovereignty”. In saying so, he tries to hijack this crisis and replace it with his preexisting agenda about the occupation. And he tries to invent fantasy scenarios like “If the rocket fire into Israel did not exist it would be necessary to invent it”
And how can bevin speak for “all humanity”. I am a human being who’s a part of that humanity. I would never let extremist fundamentalist Hamas speak for me, or pass their hate rhetoric off as “principals of justice”.
Joshua: Nevertheless, the “weaks and desperates” have had multiple opportunities to seek peace over 60 years.
And they have, again and again, particularly after 1967 and 1973. Israel has practically always refused. On this sixty year time scale it has generally been Israel that has opted for war over peace.
Israel was only a few months old 60 years ago when it was confronted with horrible, public offers of a peace treaty from its horrible enemy Syria – offering to resettle 1/2 of the refugees. The monstrosity of it! Its response was to ignore them and initiate a very long string of lies about Arab diplomatic positions, which it continues with success in some quarters to the present.
For practically the entire post – 1967 occupation, Israel has had reasonable peace offers from the Arab states and a little later, the PLO, that it has always refused (even if they were termed “generous” in internal cabinet discussions). The shock of the 1973 war convinced Israel that Egypt was too strong for it to continue to reject Egyptian peace initiatives. There were the negotiations with Jordan and Syria and Madrid – Oslo. But the only time Israel came close to countering longstanding Palestinian and Arab peace offers with counteroffers that had minimal sanity, intelligence, “normal statecraft” and regard for Israeli security, to taking the easy steps to solve this strikingly easy to solve conflict, was around 2000-2001.
When israelis give up their delusional claims of moral superiority vis-a-vis the Palestinians there will be peace. As it is Israel was founded on the logic of German racial nationalism. and these days is looking more and more like Weimar 1930. I don’t like Israelis for the same reason I don’t trust krauts. Why you are all so proud to be representatives of the culture that tried to exterminate us is a question for Freudians to answer.
Beneath all these words is one simple fact: Israel, with US support, in effect declared war on the people of Gaza after the Hamas election victory. Given the refusal of Israel to talk to Hamas, and the offensive actions taken against Gazans, there was no choice but violence. What is needed now is an Israeli willingness to talk, first about a cease-fire and then about other issues. But Israel considers no option other than force.
Bevin – can you tell us all when it was that the Poles were lobbing Katyusha rockets or their equivalent into Germany?
Inkan1969 ,
I am a human being who’s a part of that humanity. I would never let extremist fundamentalist Hamas speak for me, or pass their hate rhetoric off as “principals of justice”.
The problem its not you personal argument here. The problem/ conflict is the strong side never ever forgot their 5000 dream to create Kingdome they lost and trying to wheel back the history on different claims and victimisation of their own to create a state for them in our living time.
Hamas was elected by human on the ground in Palestinians you like it or not it’s not your call it’s their call.
Same claims can be made with other side who stolen the land from them those also “extremist fundamentalist” with “hate rhetoric” starting 60 years ago against the Arabs.
Same can be said those “Neo-extremist fundamentalist” who destroyed state of Iraq, and most of you (if you are American) elected them and support them for two terms in WH.
John R,
May I add the Saudi King Abdullah Peace offer still on the table and supported by most Arab league members Israelis from day one till now refusing to take it abroad and negotiating peace with their neighbours.
What is taking place in Gaza and the West Bank is the carrying out of Israel’s grand plan. Way before 1948, this has been the plan. Ben-Gurion said it himself: “We must expel the Arabs and take their places and if we have to use force to guarantee our own right to settle in those places-then we have force at our disposal” David Ben-Gurion, Israel’s first PM, 1937.
Doesn’t sound like a peace plan to me. Doesn’t sound like a plan for a just settlement either.
It’s Manifest Destiny, the same rationale used to build the US national and territorial empire by taking land from its rightful owners, relying on scripture to justify it.
Marcia, you are correct. From “The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine” by Ilan Pappe, all well researched.
Plan C, which later evolved into Plan Dalet, was worked out by Ben-Gurion and his aides in 1937 and its aim was:
“Killing the Palestinian political leadership.
“Killing Palestinian inciters and their financial supporters.
“Killing Palestinians who acted against jews.
“Killing senior Palestinian officers and officials (in the Mandatory system).
“Damaging Palestinian transportation.
“Damaging the sources of Palestinian livelihoods: water wells, mills, etc.
“Attacking nearby Palestinian villages likely to assist in future attacks.
“Attacking Palestinian clubs, coffee houses, meeting places, etc.”
The book goes on to detail the massacres carried out in the villages, some via interviews with survivors.
“Most of the interviews with the survivors were done in 1999 by an Israeli research student, Teddy Katz, who ‘stumbled upon’ the massacre while doing his MA dissertation for Haifa University. When this became public, the University retroactively disqualified his thesis and Alexandroni veterans (who had carried out the massacre in question) dragged Katz himself into court, suing him for libel.”
I find it utterly amazing that there are voices on this blog that continue to defend that murderous, lying, venal, vicious theocracy that claims to be “the only democracy in the Middle East”. They can only be the spiritual remnants of the Alexandroni brigade.
For those Alexandroni Brigade members that still do not believe that Israel is guilty of genocide, may I quote from the 1948 UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide:
“Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part.”
Were we living in a just world, Olmert and the entire leadership of Israel would be facing another Nurmberg Court and the country would be put thru a years-long de-zionisation program.
What hypocrisy here.
Israelis and most Jews lobbing they been disgusting and horrified by the use of Holocaust” in many western countries this word may causing many problem if used.
Now in the democratic country “Israel” official stating threaten others by Holocaust phenomena! So what’s this means here?
If Israelis did not learn from the history of their victimization now they using same horrific case to show others?
So where is all that lessons, crying and victimization they making for decades which made countries, tax payers donating freely or forcibly to Israel for forgiveness for their SIN against Jews?
Image and Reality of the Israel-Palestine Conflict
By Norman G. Finkelstein
The German administration in Poland made precisely those arguments. The occupying force always justifies its continued occupation on the need to defend itself or maintain order.
Brilliant argument Bevin! It seems that you and others here have been reduced to drooling platitudes.
What is taking place in Gaza and the West Bank is the carrying out of Israel’s grand plan. Way before 1948, this has been the plan.
Well Marcia, problem is that the quote that you cite leaves out one word that Ben Gurion actually wrote in that letter to his son in 1937. The word is “not” and what Ben Gurion actually wrote was:
“We do not wish and do not need to expel Arabs and take their places.”
All the idiotic blather from the sayanim assigned to this site!
Israel is a racist nation. A vibrant apartheid is its domestic program. It deliberately became an international outlaw by its 1967 decision to dispossess Palestinians from the West Bank “by all means necessary”. There is no innocence for the Israelis. Now, now……I do not single out the Israelis or their sympathizers on these pages for special condemnation – I agree that they are no worse than, and no more savage and immoral than, the Nazis who occupied and raped Poland, Pol Pot of Cambodian holocaust infamy, the rampaging Mongolians of the 9th century, or the Spaniards who decimated the Mayans and Aztecs 550 years ago. Hate Israel? Of course! I mean after all, what else?
Yes, we must quote Ben-Gurion correctly.
“To maintain the status quo will not do. We have to set up a dynamic state bent upon expansion.” — Ben-Gurion, as quoted in Rebirth and Destiny of Israel (1954), p. p. 419.
“Why should the Arabs make peace? If I was an Arab leader I would never make terms with Israel. That is natural: we have taken their country. Sure God promised it to us, but what does that matter to them? Our God is not theirs.”–Ben-Gurion, as quoted in The Jewish Paradox : A personal memoir (1978) by Nahum Goldmann (translated by Steve Cox), p. 99.
Well, now that Kassandra is here, we’ve really reached the absolute drooling bottom.
First off, Tokhnit Dalet was a tactical plan for creating contiguity and securing supplies between isolated Jewish communities within the area designated by Resolution 181 as the “Jewish State”. While it did explicitly give commanders orders to expel villagers and destroy the villages in specific cases where these represented a threat to the defence of Jewish communities, it did not include any of the provisions that you erroneously claim above.
Further, there was no Plan Gimmel (or Plan C).
Finally, the work of Teddy Katz has been thoroughly discredited. The work was based almost entirely on oral history from one side of the battle at Atlit. There was never any physical evidence presented from the site of the village. When confronted with a law suit brought by surviving members of the Alexandroni Brigade, Katz settled out of court, and then tried to renege on the settlement after being egged on by Pappe and other political activists.
JES, during initial talk in Madrid just before Oslo peace talk there was mention one of Arab mister said while we negotiating peace today Israeli Knesset have on its wall Israel’s grand plan map, but Jonathan Enstiyen that long time by saying he did visit the Israeli Knesset before but he did not see that map?
But that map was there as one Arab negotiator tell in front of all representatives in an official meeting
I and other fools like me gave the optimists here the benefit of the doubt on Annapolis, because you insisted it was a genuine process, and Olmert would be gone if he did not contribute to it making real progress. Your clearly unwarranted enthusiasm is all still there to be read in the JWN Annapolis archive.
Now when the Annapolis “plan” such as it was is in tatters, and the deputy defence minister “unfortunately” suggests Israel will commit a bit of a Shoah on Gaza, not even the courtesy of acknowledging the failure of your such recent assertions to bear anything but the most bitter fruit. One just has to turn on the radio to hear the plain fact stated at the top of the world headlines ” Peace Process in Ruins”.
No, you erstwhile optimists have suddenly remembered you have to protect Israeli citizens, which you presumably must have forgotten to consider before and which apparently means no peace. Don’t tell me, no one for a moment suspected anyone on the Hamas side would keep firing home made rockets, especially during a blockade? You’re just going to make a surgical strike or two against the rocket launchers, right? Well it’s pretty clear you folk intend to crush as many skulls as you can while the American sun shines on you. Some of you even hint as much, and we will soon see how much more accurate these darker speculations are. But the sun always sets. However much you injure them, the Palestinian people will be there tomorrow, and the eyes of the rest of the world are now fixed on Gaza. What do you think you are doing, what lies do you tell yourselves?
by Naeim Giladi
The Link interviewed Naeim Giladi, a Jew from Iraq, for three hours on March 16, 1998, two days prior to his 69th birthday. For nearly
two other delightful hours, we were treated to a multi-course Arabic meal prepared by his wife Rachael, who is also Iraqi. “It’s our Arab culture,” he said proudly.
In our previous Link, Israeli historian Ilan Pappe looked at the hundreds of thousands of indigenous Palestinians whose lives were
uprooted to make room for foreigners who would come to populate confiscated land. Most were Ashkenazi Jews from Eastern Europe.
But over half a million other Jews came from Islamic lands. Zionist propagandists claim that Israel “rescued” these Jews from their anti-Jewish, Muslim neighbors. One of those “rescued” Jews-Naeim Giladi-knows otherwise.
The Gaza Holocaust
The continuous assault on Gaza right from the day Israel blocked off the Strip lays bare the fact that the Olmert administration has a clear-cut strategy — it would simply show no mercy to Gazans. As high-ranking Israeli officials pointed out last week, a “holocaust” would be unleashed on Gazans if Hamas doesn’t end its rocket attacks on Israeli territories. And Israel doesn’t care two hoots for the so-called peace process that was set in motion in Annapolis last year. US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will be visiting the region soon to conduct another peace mission. But the latest bout of Israeli aggression makes a mockery of any peace initiative!
According to recent media reports, Israel is using all tactics to prevent Gazans from seeking medical aid outside the territory. Therefore, along with the latest air strikes, Israeli authorities are continuing their collective punishment of Gazans with impunity. What is more alarming is the fact that the US — except for a statement or two from the White House “regretting” the loss of Palestinian lives — and other global powers are doing nothing to curb the Israeli military operations. This once again proves the fact that the international community pays only lip service to the American idea of resolving the Israeli-Palestinian issues by the end of this year. How can Israel be expected to support a Palestinian state if it is bent on wiping out from the face of this earth a significant section of the Palestinian population?
You know Salah, the case of Naeim Giladi is interesting. I have a neighbor, also from Iraq, who was also housed at Kibbutz Dafnah, presumably at the same time. His account is quite different, and he is very positive about his time on the kibbutz and the way he was treated.
Now, both of these are anecdotes (although the latter case is just from friendly conversations between neighbors, and not published for overt propaganda purposes). However, the fact is that for every Naeim Giladi, there are hundreds, if not thousands, of Iraqi Jews who integrated well into Israeli society and who tell a very different story.
kassandra, the UN definition of genocide specifically stipulates “intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such”
Obviously this applies to HAMAS, whose charter calls on Jews (not merely ‘Israelis’ or ‘Zionists’) as such to be hunted down and killed, and which calls openly for the end of the *nation* of Israel as such.
Whereas Israel is at war with HAMAS (a political party) not the Palestinian people as such (or it should be laying seige to the West Bank as well as Gaza).
I’m sure this won’t stop you from inferring all kinds of intent from what looks to me like defensive behavior, while ignoring each side’s stated position.
Anti-zionist boilerplate is completely off topic. Zionism (or for that matter Islamic fundamentalism) is not on trial here.
TimothyL, when you write, “Hate Israel? Of course! I mean after all, what else?”, you make the reasoning the pro-Israeli hardliners who back this destructive response sound justified. That they really are fighting people who hate them enough to destroy them. If you’re insulting the people arguing about these actions as “sayanim”, why should they listen to whatever you have to say?…
so the destruction of the palestinian people as a community and culture is not genocide but the destruction of the Jewish state as such is. By that logic the destruction of apartheid s africa is genocide. Note that I’m referring to the state not the people.
“Anti-zionist boilerplate is completely off topic. Zionism (or for that matter Islamic fundamentalism) is not on trial here.”
Bullshit. They’re both on trial. Absolutely.
Absolutely not. It’s the specific tactics that Israel is taking that should be on trial. The tactics that are costing so many civilian lives.
JES, it’s again and again when we talking you trying discredit the sources I quote and by saying you know this or that.
JES our talk here also WE (Me, or other friends) know many Jews and bring sources to argue the case but in all cases its coming a phenomena that you trying or you showing sources been undeniable and should be believed but our one most if not all lack of credibility?.
I give one example, it’s really buzz me, I did long time quote Wiki source about subject YOU and your ilk came with comment yah WIKI its not credible source for so…. reasons but back just few posts you quote Wiki for the case of Iraqi Jews as credible sources!
So JES when it’s come from us it’s all???? But you trying or pushing us to believe your stories presented here.
The fact is although you live in Israel which a big bounce to you but we seen most of your comments biased toward your state which is understandable but for many outsiders specially we from ME were grownup watching very close the conflicts and stories from our Mums, fathers and friends compare those unseen stories with Israelis behaviors from 1956 till now telling us a lot about what Israel is and how much love had to us!
Finally you defending David Ben Gurion, most of stores telling deferent things he is like Hitler, or Saddam with difference he lead the killing gangs and killed the native Palestinians in cool blood then prized to be a top Israeli leader.
I don’t care what he said and what he did not say, but I care what he did to Palestinians that tells us more about him with accuracy who is this monster and what crimes did all that and you still coming here defending undeniable crimes done by this monster.
vadim
Obviously this applies to HAMAS,
vadim, one simple question here, when the UN definition of genocide issued? Before Hamas creation or after?
Or its Israelis acts not covered by this law?
Roland, as someone who was one of the “optimists” to whom you refer, and who still holds out some hope, I have four words: “Later” isn’t over yet.
You want to stop the clock now and declare the whole political process dead? Fine. I’ll double down. The benchmark set at the Annapolis conference itself was the end of 2008; let’s see how things look then. You may be correct and the situation might look even worse. On the other hand, episodes like this have often proved in the past to be only a temporary setback in negotiations.
Also, there’s nothing inherently inconsistent in simultaneously engaging in peace talks and continuing to fight the war. If there weren’t a war on, there would be no need for peace talks in the first place. Israel can continue to carry on peace negotiations while responding to attacks on its cities by Grad missiles (which, unlike Qassams, aren’t “homemade,” and which, like Qassams, injure and kill). If Hamas launches a barrage of missiles at Israel in a fit of pique over the low turnout at its demonstration, then neither it nor Abbas should expect Israel to just sit there and take it. If Israel is expected to negotiate under fire – and it should be – the Palestinians should not shrink from doing the same, because negotiation is the only thing that will end the killing once and for all.
For what it’s worth, I do not agree with everything Israel has done over the past few days. The initial escalation was Hamas’, but Israel responded with an operation that doesn’t seem to have accomplished anything other than killing a lot of militants and an unacceptable number of civilians. A militarily ineffective attack is worse than none at all and is in fact a war crime. But there is no call for the sort of hysterics people are engaging in about “worse than the Nazis” or “now peace is impossible.” If the whole world followed that logic then Greece would still be at war with Turkey, India with Pakistan and Serbia with pretty much all the other Balkan nations.
Inkan, the most amazing thing about Timothy L. is that he actually believes that Zionist agents have been “assigned” to this site. Surely the Mossad has better things to do.
Zionism (or for that matter Islamic fundamentalism) is not on trial here.
extremist fundamentalist
It might be out of topic, but this interesting article to give those who bring Islamic fundamentalism each time, they need to think about it carefully before make scare of it each time they write and talk.
If we can compare the numbers with the number of Muslims in the article with the numbers of “Zionists” who support Israel and here atrocities from 1898 till now or same for neo in US who support their policies in Iraq and other places really interesting and will tell where the truth hid.
The Middle East, in many ways, is a place in transition, a well-known expert on the region said Monday.
Speaking at Stonehill College, A. Richard Norton, a visiting Boston University professor of international relations, gave a lecture called “Muslims: The other 99 percent.”
Norton said it is estimated that roughly 40,000 Muslims engage in or actively support terrorism. That is just 0.00003 percent of the estimated 1.3 billion Muslims in the world.
Starting with David and his famous little pomegranate, the vicious theocracy of Israel has continued to try to rewrite history in its own image. The theocracy may have their pilpullistic apologists in the form of Vadim and JES, but the truth even catch up with them.
In his book “The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine”, for the section that I quoted, Ilan Pappe references the Ha-Kibbutz Ha-Meuchad Archives, Aharon Zisling Archives, Ben-Gurion letters. And almost every expulsion and destruction of the villages was described in the New York Times, which was our main source , together with Khalidi (ed), All That Remains, Morris, The Birth of the Palestine Refugee Problem, and Ben-Zion Dinur et al, The History of the Hagana.
I will rely on those sources for the truthfulness of the existence of Plan C and the nature of the Dalat Plan, and not some apologist for the Theocracy of Israel, the entire history of which has been based on Lie and Deny, Deny and Lie. Not to mention the truthfulness of some New York lawyer.
Starting with David? You don’t just condemn the actions of the current government; you attack the cultural heritage of Israelis even?
A quote from the Epilogue:
“Tel-Aviv University, as are all Israel’s universities, is dedicated to upholding the freedom of academic research. The Faculty Club of Tel Aviv University is called the Green House. Originally this was the house of the mukhtar of the village of Shaykh Muwannis, but you would never be able to tell that . . .The Green House is the epitome of the denial of the Zionists’ master plan for the ethnic cleansing of Palestine that was finalised not far away along the beach, in Yarkon Street, on the thrid floor of the Red House.
“Historians working at Tel Aviv University might have supplied us with the fullest picture of the war and ethnic cleansing: they have privileged access to all the official documentation. . .Most of them, however, are more comfortable serving as the mouthpiece for the hegemonic ideology istead: their works describe 1948 as a ‘war of independence’, glorifying the jewish soldiers and officers who took part in it, conceal their crimes and vilify the victims.”
So, should we be so surprised at the language and attitudes of Vadim and JES and all the other apologists for Israel? It’s the party line.
The more I search for a parallel in recent history, a Stalinist state comes more and more to mind. There too there was only one acceptable party line.
Inkan, now you see what we must contend with. There is nothing wrong with criticizing Israel: actually, in my opinion, the current government could use more criticism rather than less. But many are not content to criticize and must paint us instead as monsters who are following a generations-long plan of genocide. Is it any wonder that many who would like to criticize Israel constructively remain silent lest they give aid and comfort to such people?
Inkan, What cultural history? Do you too believe that David built the walls of Jerusalem? Read some archaeology by reputable archaologists, for starters. The Theocracy of Israel has been trying for years to mould archaeology in its own image, starting of course with what they know best, lie and dissemble.
Take a look at some genuine fakes. The Israel Museum paid something like 550 000 USD for that pomegranate, a grand fake.
http://www.biblical archaeology.org/forgery/forgeryconference.htm
ALL FAKES.
Salah,
I think we should get some things straight here.
As I recall, I questioned an unsupported opinion from Wikipedia that you posted as fact. In contrast, I posted a cited quotation from Wikipedia (and, later, the source of that quotation itself)that stated either statistics or events that you are free to refute. There’s a difference.
Re. your quote (which you did not source), I mentioned that this was (a) anecdotal, and (b) being familiar with Naeim Giladi, is the version of an active propagandist. I clearly indicated that the first-hand evidence that I have heard – from someone who came from Iraq at the exact same time as Giladi and lived, as a refugee, in the exact same kibbutz – was also anecdotal, and that this evidence seems to counter Giladi’s. Further, I pointed out that there are thousands of Iraqi Jews who have, along with their children, integrated quite well into Israeli society – among them the current Infrastructure Minister, the Speaker of the Knesset (and former acting President), as well as many others. You can refute these facts if you so wish and can provide evidence.
As to what you may or may not have heard from your parents and experienced as an adult, I too had parents and have experienced much as an adult. My parents legally entered Palestine in 1934 (which, I guess, makes me Palestinian!) and my father served in the Haganah during the uprising in 1936-37. I have lived through several wars, and I had the experience of sitting in a sealed room, wearing gas masks, with my two daughters as missles from Iraq fell around us. I think that I am adult enough not to hold Iraqis, in general, responsible for that trauma!
You can say what you wish about Ben Gurion. I don’t agree with either of the comparsions you make.
Ben Gurion was a terrorist thug who in a just world would have been hung for crimes against humanity. His own letters confirm what he was.
More on archaeology as practiced by the Theocracy of Israel:
“Skeletons found at Masada by Yigael Yadin between. . . and later given a state burial by the Israeli government were not those of Jewish patriots but of Roman soldiers. . . Furthermore Yadin confirmed in 1982 that pig bones were found with the human ones. . .”
http://www.archaeology.org/9711/newsbriefs/masada.html
It isn’t every state that gives pig bones a state funderal!!!
Below is the link to a ceasefire petition-
KDJ
http://www.avaaz.org/en/gaza_ceasefire_now/1.php
The link for those FORGERIES that the theocracy tried to manufacture in order to cement its “god-gave-us-the-land claim” are at http://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/forgery/forgeryconference.htm
Salah, Here is the Hagana in action, JES’ father included:
The official plan for the Plan Dalet was the Yeoshua Plan, named for Yeoshua Globerman, a commander of the Hagana. . . A few days after he was killed, the intelligence unit of the Hagana drafted the blueprint for the coming months. . .
“These operations can be carried out in the following manner: either by destroying villages (by setting fire to them, by blowing them up, and by planting mines in their debris) and especially of those population centers which are difficult to control continuously, or by mounting combing and control operations according to the following guidelines: encirclement of the villages, conducting a search inside them. In case of resistance, the armed forces must be wiped out and the population expelled outside the borders of the state.” Plan Dalet, 10 March 1948
This is the Plan Dalet that JES described above as an inoocuous logistics plan. (Lie and dissemble, just can’t help it, can you?) This is the actual Plan Dalet that JES’ father participated in. Can you image Eichman’s son pridefully boasting of and defending his father’s actions? Yet this is what JES is doing. He should be crawling on his knees begging for forgiveness from the Palestinians.
JES,
with your experiences from Iraq Scuds Missiles looks not enough to you and other Israelis to learn how other humans suffer and experiences will be when Shock & Awe or millions of Cluster bombs thrown in72 hours or today in Gaza all this done by people talking about Missiles through on them and they found it its hard for them while all support got inside their home, country and abroad, today your country and your military doing the worse of the worse using HOLOCAUST style to show the people their last day in their life all this not enough to you and others to stand and rise the hand enough is enough of killing humans?
Or just we are Arabs you should “kill’all” on 5000 dream of kingdom of Israel?
When the time come people think we are same whatever color, religion, ethnic we are and let their greed and their mind of theft and evilness push out of their body and live together.
You can say what you wish about Ben Gurion. I don’t agree with either of the comparsions you make.
What your say about some one come here and prizing Saddam actions JES?
azazel, There is nothing constructive to be said about Nazi Germany, Stalinist Russia, and Zionist Israel. All three deserve utter condemnation, and so do their apologists.
The question I have is, will Helena take any action to reprimand KKKassandra’s hate speech (not at all related to the “escalation” in Gaza, or even Israelly government policy, but a complete tirade against Jewish history in general) or do her guidelines only apply to those that don’t share her biases and prejudices?
I’m far more revolted by kassandra’s hyperbolic demonization of Israelis and people arguing for Israel than any posting JES has had recently. I would never turn to kassandra’s screaming hysterics for any definition of a “just world”.
Here’s another quote from the diary of Ben Gurion, The Thug, as he was carrying out his cleansing actions:
“There is a need now for strong and brutal reaction. We need to be accurate about timing, place and those we hit. If we accuse a family –we need to harm them without mercy, women and children included. Otherwise, this is not an effective action. During the operation there is no need to distinquish between guilty and not guilty.”
These are the ideals on which the Theocratic State of Israel is founded. This is its honored founding father speaking.
Inkan, Can’t stand the truth about those founding fathers and the hallowed “light onto the world” can you? If you’re revolted, think how revolted the Palestinians and the world is watching the Theocracy in action. What is it about TRUTH that revolts you?
GISHA condemns the spiralling cycle of violence
News Release –For Immediate Release – March 2, 2008
Gisha calls on both sides of the conflict:
Remove Civilians from the Cycle of Combat
In light of the severe escalation in military offensives in Gaza over the weekend, and reports of dozens of civilians killed and hundreds wounded, Gisha calls upon Israel and militants in Gaza to take the measures necessary to avoid harming innocent civilians, as required by international law.
Sunday, March 2, 2008: Gisha expresses deep concern over the rising number of dead and wounded as a result of Israeli military activities in Gaza and rocket fire on Israeli population centers by militants in Gaza. According to news reports and UNICEF, out of 100 Palestinians dead and hundreds wounded in Gaza since last Wednesday’s escalation, at least half are civilians, including 17 children killed and 200 children injured. Israeli casualties include the deaths of two soldiers and a civilian, and injuries to dozens of civilians, including children.
Gisha condemns the violations by both sides of international law, which forbids deliberately harming civilians and forbids disproportionately harming civilians during combat operations – harm which is an expected result of Israel’s undifferentiated firing into crowded population centers. Gisha notes that Israel, as the occupying power in Gaza according to the definition provided by international law, owes an enhanced duty to protect the welfare of the civilian population in Gaza. On the other hand, the Hamas organization and militants in Gaza must immediately stop the firing of rockets on towns in southern Israel –attacks which violate the international legal prohibition against deliberately tar! geting civilians.
Gisha calls upon the international community to intervene immediately, in order to prevent further civilian casualties.
According to Sari Bashi, Director of Gisha: “The killing and wounding of hundreds of Gaza residents comes on top of a series of punitive measures that Israel has taken against Palestinian civilians in Gaza, including severe restrictions on freedom of movement and the passage of vital goods. The time has come for both sides to remove civilians from the cycle of combat.”
GISHA condemns the spiralling cycle of violence
News Release –For Immediate Release – March 2, 2008
Gisha calls on both sides of the conflict:
Remove Civilians from the Cycle of Combat
In light of the severe escalation in military offensives in Gaza over the weekend, and reports of dozens of civilians killed and hundreds wounded, Gisha calls upon Israel and militants in Gaza to take the measures necessary to avoid harming innocent civilians, as required by international law.
Sunday, March 2, 2008: Gisha expresses deep concern over the rising number of dead and wounded as a result of Israeli military activities in Gaza and rocket fire on Israeli population centers by militants in Gaza. According to news reports and UNICEF, out of 100 Palestinians dead and hundreds wounded in Gaza since last Wednesday’s escalation, at least half are civilians, including 17 children killed and 200 children injured. Israeli casualties include the deaths of two soldiers and a civilian, and injuries to dozens of civilians, including children.
Gisha condemns the violations by both sides of international law, which forbids deliberately harming civilians and forbids disproportionately harming civilians during combat operations – harm which is an expected result of Israel’s undifferentiated firing into crowded population centers. Gisha notes that Israel, as the occupying power in Gaza according to the definition provided by international law, owes an enhanced duty to protect the welfare of the civilian population in Gaza. On the other hand, the Hamas organization and militants in Gaza must immediately stop the firing of rockets on towns in southern Israel –attacks which violate the international legal prohibition against deliberately tar! geting civilians.
Gisha calls upon the international community to intervene immediately, in order to prevent further civilian casualties.
According to Sari Bashi, Director of Gisha: “The killing and wounding of hundreds of Gaza residents comes on top of a series of punitive measures that Israel has taken against Palestinian civilians in Gaza, including severe restrictions on freedom of movement and the passage of vital goods. The time has come for both sides to remove civilians from the cycle of combat.”
Screaming dogma at us doesn’t turn that into “truth”.
Wow, Quoting Ben Gurion is Hate Speech, but justifying the killing of Palestinians is just fine? What hyperbole! And when you have no answers, you hide behind the veil of “hate speech”. I’m waiting for you to use the term “anti-semitic” next, the usual when a discussion of the murderious actions of Israel gets close to truth. Why don’t you instead show what I say is not true?
Here’s some more of that hate speech, via that megalomaniac Ben Gurion’s diary:
“We will establish a Christian state in Lebanon, the southern border of which will be the Litani River. We will break Transjordan, bomb Amman and destroy its army, and then Syria falls, and if Egypt will still continue to fight — we will bombard Port Said, Alexandria and Cairo. This will be in revenge for what they (the Egyptians, the Aramis and Assyrians) did to our forefathers during Biblical times.”
This was written on the day that the Israeli army received a large shipment of modern, brand new 0.45-calibre cannons from the Communist Eastern bloc. Israel now possessed artillery unmatched not only by the Arab troops inside Palestine, but by all the Arab armies put togehter. Israel had close ties with Stalinist Russia.
Inkan, I’m screaming quotes from the Thug Ben Gurion at you. Is the diary of Ben Gurion dogma?
The obsessive fixation with the word “Theocracy” and the insistance to scream everything is dogmatic behavior. And what’s with the emphasis on ties to Stalinist Russia?
Helena’s rule is “comments that are courteous, fresh, helpful, and to the point”.
I’m far more revolted by kassandra’s hyperbolic demonization of Israelis and people arguing for Israel than any posting JES has had recently. I would never turn to kassandra’s screaming hysterics for any definition of a “just world”. Inkan1969
Can we please have Inkan banned, Helena? This is a revolting ad hominem attack.
The question I have is, will Helena take any action to reprimand KKKassandra’s hate speech
Please ban Joshua also, for worthless personal attacks.
The fact is that Kassandra’s remarks were well supported by quotations, which go far to prove her/his point. In fact, they are some of the best supported remarks, I have seen in recent weeks
Israel now possessed artillery unmatched not only by the Arab troops inside Palestine, but by all the Arab armies put togehter.
Actually the Haganah had more than artillery. They had heavy bombers, which did indeed bomb Amman. The Arabs had nothing like that. It was amazing that the Arab Legion managed to resist the Haganah. The British, who as colonial masters controlled every detail of the Arab Legion refused to permit war funding. (Alec Kirkbride, An Awakening).
Kassandra, I enjoy your cherry-picked quotes and exised quotes. Here is the continuation of your quote from Tokhnit Dalet:
In the absence of resistance, garrison troops will enter the village and take up positions in it or in locations which enable complete tactical control. The officer in command of the unit will confiscate all weapons, wireless devices, and motor vehicles in the village. In addition, he will detain all politically suspect individuals. After consultation with the [Jewish] political authorities, bodies will be appointed consisting of people from the village to administer the internal affairs of the village. In every region, a [Jewish] person will be appointed to be responsible for arranging the political and administrative affairs of all [Arab] villages and population centers which are occupied within that region.
And because Alex seems to like quotes as supporting evidence, here’s the entire text of Tokhnit Dalet:
http://www.mideastweb.org/pland.htm
I have heard Pappe speak. He is very open about two things. First that he does not believe in objective facts in the study of history – everything is a narrative, and he feels perfectly happy and honest presenting only the narrative that he himself supports. Second, that he places his Communist ideology above the scientific study of history.
And here, Kassandra, is another of your quotes unredacted:
There is no question whether a reaction is necessary or not. The only question is when and where. Blowing up a house is not enough, especially if it’s not the right one. There is a need for a brutal and firm response. We need precision in time, place and casualties. If we definitely know the (culpable) family – hit without mercy, including the women and children of this family who might be there. Otherwise the reaction will not be effective. In the actual place of action, there is no need to distinguish between guilty and innocent. Where there was no attack (ie. the family is innocent), we must not touch. (emphasis added; David Ben-Gurion, Independence War Diary, V1, p 97-98; in Hebrew)
The fact is that Kassandra’s remarks were well supported by quotations, which go far to prove her/his point.
Er — what exactly is its point? That Zionism is evil? I hope we’re not going to have a referendum on Zionism because kassandra dug up some incriminating wikiquotes!!!!!
Obviously Zionism means different things to different people. None of the Zionists on this board – nor significant numbers of Israelis- endorse any of the sentiments ‘kassandra’ is sticking in our laps, so personally I fail to see their relevance to any part of this discussion. It’s just so much hate speech, tarring us all with her make-believe ideology…
Obviously kassandra and her colleagues feel very strongly that Israel shouldn’t exist, that Zionism is inherently racist, that Israelis are black hearted villains, poltroons and jackanapes.
We get the point kassandra! But maybe you could save this very interesting discussion for the thread entitled ‘Zionists are evil.’ Otherwise its a bit tough for us Zionists to really feel involved! 🙂
vadim, one simple question here, when the UN definition of genocide issued? Before Hamas creation or after?
Before. Why? Personally i think this definition is a little bit overbroad, but then kassandra brought it up, not me. Fact is, it suits HAMAS better than Israel. You won’t find passages like this in Israel’s founding documents:
“Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it”
That’s in the first paragraph of HAMAS’ charter. See kassandra, I have no problem renouncing any of the things you allege Ben Gurion wrote, but it seems like you AGREE with the foregoing!
Amazing! Personally I hope she/he/it is never banned, but allowed to rant on and on and on. Her testimony truly reveals the mindset of the Israel-haters.
First that he does not believe in objective facts in the study of history – everything is a narrative, and he feels perfectly happy and honest presenting only the narrative that he himself supports.
You are engagingly naive about history, JES. Your version of Israeli history is also a narrative, only it tries to tell the opposite story.
By the way, your continuation quote of plan Dalet does not prove the point you want to make. It only says what was going to happen in the case that no resistance was encountered. I see they were not proposing to let Palestinians run their own affairs even then.
Actually the Haganah had more than artillery. They had heavy bombers, which did indeed bomb Amman.
Actually, Alex, when the Arab armies invaded on May 15, 1948, Israel had no artillery, no modern fighter aircraft and no tanks. They received their first artillery – two small WWI-era French field guns – immediately after the beginning of the war.
The combined Arab armies had fighter aircraft, armor and artillery, and had a virtual monopoly on these weapons from may through July 1948.
The “heavy bombers” you write of were three B-17s. They bombed Cairo, not Amman and played virtually no role in the war. (You need bombs to arm a bomber!)
u are engagingly naive about history, JES. Your version of Israeli history is also a narrative, only it tries to tell the opposite story.
Yeah yeah, why don’t you explain what any of this has to do with ending the suffering of the Palestinian and Israeli populations? If it’s about puncturing some creation myth or tarring all modern day Zionists as bigots you’re wasting your time, and ours.
Joshua, and Jes, if Iran and the Arabs, who are enemies, gave the Palestinians unconditional support, Palestine would be the most powerful nation in the region. It would be armed by America at the behest of it’s gas station attendants with the latest airpowet, armour, nuclear-capable cruise missile subs and a robust nuclear, biological and chemical weapons program. It would be a secure state living in peace with a chastened Israel, the latter aware of its status as just another state deterred from rampant criminality and biblical delusions by force and law. In that order.
But surely the mere fact that ever more people are on Israel’s case, and that every year hundreds of Palestinians are now seen as the murder victims of a cruel and inhuman occupier who applies a criminal calculus of collective punishment on women and children – already prisoners of the Israeli Ghetto, WHATEVER THE FACTS, should give Israel’s boosters a pause.
These people vote. They speak to their neighbours. They tire of wolf howls of existential imperatives and the antisemitic canard passed off as a thoughtful rejoinder to any criticism. The big lie that they all hate us cause we’re us is wearing a bit thin, particularly when the Presidents of Iraq and Afghanistan beg the Occupiers to stop indiscriminate air strikes that are killing civilians and thus winning the war of hearts for the insurgents.
A picture of a three foot round hole in a parking lot on Sderot beside a picture of a group of crying children grannies sitting atop a three story pile of rubble clearly demonstrates the positions of the weaker and the stronger, and might does not make right, even in the ghetto.
Whatever its merits Israel is losing, and as alluded to in a post above, destroying itself. I used to want to be a katsa, a helper to Israel. Now I pray for forgiveness after I hear of yet another report of Israeli extra-judidcial executions – murders – of some “militants and civilians'”, because at that moment I hope for revenge, for accountability, for wisdom, for Israel’s destruction, because it does not seem capable of stopping itself.
I’m sorry when any Israeli, soldiers aside, are killed by rockets, but I also hope more Israelis, by whatever means necessary, come to understand that no number of dead Palestinian civilians, not even at a 100:1 ratio, can secure Israel, and that blithering on about how beastly the Palestinians and their miserable little tactics are ignores how criminal, irrational and suicidal Israeli STRATEGY is, which is the main Israeli problem. Israeli strategy is engendering not just a loss unconditional support, but rather an opposition demanding unconditional justice, withdrawal to 1967 from the Occupied Territories and reparations from Israel and the world to build a Palestine from rubble.
If “Eretz Israel” was occupied by a nation of little old Mother Teresas, well, the legal state Israel, as currently governed, would still have a problem, wouldn’t it? Soon I would be buying Mother Teresa Bonds, and praying
for forgiveness for cheering everytime a little old Indian woman sets off a bomb against the Occupiers.
This may not comport with little intellectual schema of right and wrong, and objective analysis of historical and political rights and wrongs, and entitlements allegedly accruing therefrom, and unlimited special status as the world’s heretofore default object of abuse, but it is the way the wind is blowing.
hey tire of wolf howls of existential imperatives and the antisemitic canard
Something’s blowing, but it aint the wind.
Alex, I can agree that there is more than one “narrative”. This does not mean that one has to reject the alternative “narrative” out of hand, by accusing the advocate of that narrative of being an “apologist” and those of adhering to that “narrative” as being, prima facia, “liars”. In other words, there’s a difference between being “naive” and being closed-minded, bigotted and pig-headed.
I see they were not proposing to let Palestinians run their own affairs even then.
Correct. This plan related to the area designated by the UN as the “Jewish State”, and it was to be implemented by the armed forces of that state in defending the borders of that state. During wars, populations in the area of combat – particularly when they may have a propensity to side with the other side, are not generally allowed to “run their own affairs” during the hostilities.
I suggest you actually read Tokhnit Dalet and read what I initially wrote about the nature of that tactical plan and its purpose. You may then want to try and refute my claims and demonstrate how this was – as Pappe and others like to put it – a “master plan for ethnic cleansing”.
Charles,
Thank you for that touching speech. Two questions:
…if Iran and the Arabs, who are enemies, gave the Palestinians unconditional support…
Why do you think that they haven’t?
And, if they haven’t, why are you?
I hope to live long enough to see Jimmy Carter’s and Nelson Mandela’s personal letters and diaries cherry-picked for quotes.
I must correct one mistake I made. Israel did, in fact, receive its first shipment of fighter planes (Me109s) in late May, 1948. The rest stands.
The “heavy bombers” you write of were three B-17s. They bombed Cairo, not Amman and played virtually no role in the war. (You need bombs to arm a bomber!)
Do your reading also, JES, before you accuse me. You are putting out a narrative again, designed to suggest that the poor little Haganah was ill-equipped. They had as you say standard heavy bombers, much heavier weaponry than the Arabs had (from where – just guess). The B17 was the standard 2WW American heavy bomber, and the bombing of Amman has a first-rate eye-witness, the British High Commissioner.
Read Jennifer Lowenstein’s piece in today’s Counterpunch.
Okay, Alex, from where? The Haganah was ill-equipped in relation to the Arab armies. The “heavy weaponry” – apart from 25 Me109s and two antiquated 65mm field guns – arrived at the end of the first ceasefire in July 1948. By the time they arrived, there was no Haganah. That’s fact, not just a “narrative”. If you want to argue the facts, then please do.
The B-17 “Flying Fortress” may have been the standard US bomber during WWII, but the Haganah didn’t have any, and the IDF only received three in July of 1948. Whether or not they bombed Amman remains irrelevant. These three bombers had no material affect on the war.
“Read Jennifer Lowenstein’s piece in today’s Counterpunch.”
OK, I read it. Seems like the usual “portray a nasty-but-ordinary war as a holocaust driven by supremacist thinking” rhetoric to me. What’s your point?
Azazel,
I think you got Joshua’s point perfectly well.
Heaven forbid that anyone else but the Hagana babes and boys should be given the opportunity to rant here.
There is enough evidence from a myriad of sources that confirm the ethnic cleansing that was carried out against Palestinian civilians by the various jewish terrorist groups, that it is no longer in doubt. Only the most ardent zionists disclaim it and still believe that the Palestines left their homes at their free will.
You JES and Vadim et al can harness all your legal sophistry and pilpullistic arguments, but the truth is, the jews from the very beginning were bent on a policy of the most vicious ethnic cleansing. I have caught you JES, in enough utter falsehoods, to believe anything you say. As you said, the Plan Dalat was just a “logistical” plan!
Why do I call it a Theocracy? Is it not a state exclusively for the benefit of jews? Were I to run into a state exclusively for Lutherans, I would also call it a Theocracy also.
Why compare it with Stalinist Russia? I have a fairly good knowledge of Stalinist Russia and Russia in general. Nowhere was group-think and the party line more encouraged as in Stalinist Russia. Nowhere is the state version of history more powerful than in the Theocracy. Take a look at those recent Russian immigrants, those whose past was formed in Russia. They had NO trouble at all immediately believing the most hilarious zionist falsehoods. And they probably make up the most vicious portion of the squatters there. Do you want me to post some quotes from their leader, Lieberman?
And there would probably be no Israel had it not
been armed by the USSR. The USSR was the first country to recognize the UN creation.
You hasbara boys are losing. The world has seen PICTURES of the jews in action in Gaza and Palestine. You jews may call those actions on innocent civilians a nasty war or a holocaust™, there is no difference. Maybe there is a difference in your pilpullistic mind.
But for the Palestinian child driven into a refugee camp and there shot by a jewish sniper, it makes no difference.
Name another country that has dispossessed its indigenous population in modern times, driven it into refugee camps where it has slowly starved it, and then kills it at its leisure and then calls it “self defense”.
ONLY THE THEOCRATIC STATE OF ISRAEL HAS DONE IT.
“are they so sure that the US will continue to support them thusly once Bush is out of the WH ?”
They can be very sure to maintain the same cowardly level of unconditional support no matter who is in the WH. Hillary has always been very much in the pockets of the Zionist/Iraeli elements, and any concern Obama might have once entertained for the well being of Palestinians evaporated once his candidacy became serious.
Don’t worry, Kassandra, nobody’s denying you your chance to rant. And based on your use of terms like “pilpullistic” and “Holocaust (TM),” it isn’t really Israel you’ve got a problem with, is it?
And for your information, Israel is not for the “exclusive benefit” of Jews, and the term
“theocracy” is wrong because the “Jewish” in “Jewish state” refers to Jews as a people rather than as a religion. But I’m sure you already know these things, whatever reasons you may have for ignoring them.
Oh and Kassie, JES at least posted a link to the full text of Plan Dalet so that people can judge for themselves, while you’ve been caught, um, editing some of the quotes you cited.
“You jews may call those actions on innocent civilians a nasty war or a holocaust™, there is no difference. Maybe there is a difference in your pilpullistic mind. But for the Palestinian child driven into a refugee camp and there shot by a jewish sniper, it makes no difference.”
And I suppose that to the two- and four-year-old Ethiopian-Israeli children who were killed by a Qassam in Sderot (long before the Israeli siege began, and nowhere near a military target), it mattered whether they were killed by dastardly terrorists or the heroic resistance?
You know, Kassie, you’re doing exactly what you accuse the Jews (excuse me, “jews”) of doing – fetishizing the victims on your preferred side and discounting those on the other. One would think that if you oppose such tactics, you wouldn’t engage in them yourself.
To be jewish is a religion, not a race. To be Semitic is a race. The only thing that unites an Ethiopian jew and an American jew is their religion. Do you know any other country that has settlements, actually squats, for jews only? Any other country that has roads that connect those jews-only squats with roads for jews only? Israel is a Theocracy invented for the benefit of jews only.
Another bit of ethnic cleansing history for you: Sderot used to be the Palestinian village of NAJD. N A J D. It was completely destroyed by the Israeli Negev Brigade on 13 March 1948, and its 719 Palestinian inhabitans expelled to Gaza. The Palestinians have not forgotten their home, NAJD. They want the occupiers out.
JES quotes from a blatantly Zionist site. You know, those pioneers that came into an empty land and made it bloom? That describe themselves as “the only democracy in the Middle East”? Those clowns. Umm — and I believe Alex took care of those “misquotes” already. Read.
I was wondering how long it would take to pull out the anti-jew card. And you’re absolutely right. Wholly and entirely based on the jews’ own actions towards the Palestinians for the last 50 years, I have nothing but contempt for you and those that defend those actions. If that means being anit-jew to you, go for it. I would describe it as being more anti-criminal. You jews cannot dissemble forever.
Nor have I forgotten the civilians you murdered in Lebanon, nor the one million cluster bombs that you dropped on Lebanese villages when peace talks were already in progress. Three days before the end of the war. This is your version of “peace negotiations”?
Thank you for being honest, Kassandra. I will be honest in turn. I don’t believe in original sin – I know that’s a jewish, pilpullistic thing to say, but I don’t. All modern nations were founded on warfare, conquest, subjugation and ethnic cleansing – find me one that wasn’t – and Israel is guiltier than some but less guilty than others. Just as we “jews” are constantly being told to move on – that the “holocaust(tm)” is something in the past and that we’re merely nursing our victimhood if we discuss past or present persecution – so should the Palestinians recognize that Najd is now Sderot. I wish them well in their own state and I hope their children grow up free from fear, but the clock will not turn backward for them any more than for the Jews in Europe or for the Maghrebi Jewish expellees whose transit camp became Sderot city. The Palestinian suffering and ethnic cleansing is real, I will not deny it, they are entitled to remember it and they should be compensated for their losses – but they are not fetishistic icons and their claims of justice do not outweigh ours.
And for what it’s worth, I opposed the Lebanon war from the beginning, never mind the cluster bombs, but I will gladly accept your verdict of collective guilt as a “murderer” because any condemnation from you is a badge of honor.
“All modern nations were founded on warfare, conquest, subjugation and ethnic cleansing”
And no civilized person defends the crimes of the past as justification for the crimes of the present.
And I say that as a Jew.
Just wondering about big picture history. You know – 342,000 years from now when Mother Nature takes “the holey land” back. I.E., it’s under 35 metres of water for a few hundred thousand years. Y’all gonna feel very silly then.
“And no civilized person defends the crimes of the past as justification for the crimes of the present.”
Nor do I. As I said above, I hold no brief for what Israel is doing in Gaza and the West Bank in the here and now. The crimes of the present, whether illegal acts of war or illegal settlements, are not to be defended and are indeed to be fought.
However, the crimes of the past – i.e., of 1948 – are exactly that. They are done. They are no more an original sin than the expulsion of the Ostdeutsch or the ethnic cleansing of India and Pakistan, both of which happened around the same time. Where purely past crimes are concerned, we are all the beneficiaries of our ancestors’ felonies. So I object to Kassandra’s very plainly stated opinion that the crimes of the past mean that Israel and no other nation is tainted from birth, that its citizens as a whole are not decent human beings, and that all Jews are murderers who deserve hatred. She thinks that of you just the same as me, anomalous, however much an anomaly you may believe yourself to be.
I should add that the crimes of the past are equally finished with respect to the Jews of eastern Europe, not to mention those of Hebron, Kfar Darom and similar pre-1948 communities that were ethnically cleansed. We have no right to demand re-entry into any of those places without the consent of the people who live there now.
Where are the defenders of the illegal settlements? I think the residents of Sderot should be condemning the illegal Zionist squatters for putting them in harm’s way.
Settlements came before rockets, people–which is why the Zionists are so ‘hush hush’ about them.
“However, the crimes of the past – i.e., of 1948 – are exactly that. ”
No you jackass they’re also the crimes of 2008. The crime is the refugee camps. The answer to that is the Palestinian right of return. The crime is the existence of a state predicated on racism.
The past isn’t dead; it isn’t even past.
Wow Kassandra, you must feel good after that squat! Hope you got it all out.
Just a couple of things.
First of all, if you’re going to quote me, please do it correctly. I didn’t say “logistical” plan. I said “tactical” plan. There’s a difference. The rational people here can have a look at Tokhnit Dalet – the infamous Toknit Dalet – free of Ilan Pappe’s redaction and tell the rest of us why this is a “master plan” for ethnic cleansing. I also provided the unredacted Ben Gurion quote. I think it’s pretty clear that his meaning was a little more circumspect that what you had hoped for.
Second, I don’t think that anyone here denied that there was ethnic cleansing. I don’t think that anyone denied that there was a Tokhnit Dalet. I don’t think that anyone denies that Sderot is located on the ruins of Najd (or that Manhattan is located on the ruins of an Indian village with probably around the same population).
How quaint that, of all people, the jews should ask the Palestinians and the rest of the world to forget the past. Then why can’t the jews stop howling about the holocaust? Wasn’t there just another request for money, now in the name of third-generation holocaust-survivors sent to Germany? And I understand Poland has been approached also.
The jews have overreached in Gaza. The world has finally seen you as the murderers and child-killers that you are.
JES, Hagana defenders and admirers differ not a whit from serial murderers and their defenders (if there is such a being). They can save their pilpullistic arguments for themselves.
They can save their pilpullistic arguments
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
Hi all. Sorry I’ve been absent from this discussion. It seems like a bit too full-throated of a disagreement from my quick glance/read of the above. I think calling people “jackass” or writing ing in an indscriminate way about “the jews” have done this or that (as opposed to, for example, the government of Israel, the leaders of the yishuv– back in the day– or some other, more accurately specified, sub-group of Jewish persons) is completely violative of the discourse rules here.
I don’t have time to go back and do a more discriminating edit/cleanup of the comments. But if y’all want to continue this discussion please keep the discourse rules and in particular those relating to courtesy completely in mind as you do so.
“No you jackass they’re also the crimes of 2008. The crime is the refugee camps. The answer to that is the Palestinian right of return. The crime is the existence of a state predicated on racism.”
Nice day to you as well.
Interesting belief system there. Evidently, to you, the crimes of 1946 (the expulsion of the Ostdeutsch) and 1947 (the birth of India and Pakistan), which I also mentioned above, are the dead, remote past, not to be used to justify any actions today, but those of 1948 are the living present and can only be redressed by the destruction of the perpetrators. I was born after 1948, so I unfortunately missed the moment when dead past changed to eternal present all at once. It must have been spectacular.
But for the sake of argument, let’s go with your logic: a state founded on crime is criminal forever, and cannot be forgiven short of its destruction. Very well then, will you be the one to redraw the map of Europe and Asia and to oversee the evacuation of the Americas? If that’s too big a task for you, maybe you can process my request for a Russian passport, because I clearly have a right of return to the country from which my great grandparents fled after the pogrom of 1887.
It may surprise you, but I agree with our dear Kassandra on one thing: that Jews should move on from the past (although we should learn its lessons). The Holocaust is over, the pogroms are over, and we must not turn the clock back at others’ expense. But the same applies to the Palestinians: they cannot claim that they alone are eternal victims, that their rights and nobody else’s can be passed down unto the tenth generation, and that they alone are entitled to perfect justice at the expense of the peace and self-determination of others. Were it still 1947, their right to remain in their homes would ring loud and clear, but now the millions who were born in Israel and whose only chance of dignity is a Jewish state must weigh in the balance. The solution for the Palestinian refugees (and who has been keeping them in those camps for 60 years, I wonder?) is the same as for us: return to their own free and independent state.
Maybe all this makes me a racist, although I do not consider myself one. But even if so, I would rather be a racist than be at the mercy of others’ racism, and we’ve had a very long time to find out exactly how much mercy that is likely to be. Show me a world free of that, a world of justice for all, and I will give up Israel without a second thought. But I am not going to be the one to risk everything on the altar of the enlightenment when that is not demanded of others.
Jes, there’s been no support because the rulers and treasurers of the erstwhile supporters have been servile Dependants of American dispensation for their dreadful regimes, so long as the oil and the geostrategic opportunities for mayhem and mischief exist. They do not support the Palestinians because they’re not allowed, or are bribed, as Egypt was, they’re afraid of Israeli and American military prowess, which remain potent enough to topple a despot if not to the rule the result. They are content to luxuriously oppress their own populations instead of developing the military commensurate with balance in the region.
But the number one reason they don’t help is because they dissolute despots deathly afraid their own subjects would demand what the Pals get – be it democracy or Hamas theocracy, neither of which have any place for old tyrants. Those Princes must be dispatched asap, the wisdom goes.
So they don’t help because freedom is contagious.
azazel, re: “they are not fetishistic icons and their claims of justice do not outweigh ours.”
Quite right. And yours don’t outweigh any body’s, either. Eretz Israel is a fetishistic icon drawn from an old book. If Israel would just pack up and go home, to its lovely home, secure at last, pay for the mess, it’d be dandy. Its called international law and borders, and respecting both tends to peace, while not tends to chaos. And chaos tends to bite EVERYONE in the ass.
And lets think about what it you claim as just. Israel wants all the water, and offers peace without land, territorial integrity, viability or sovereignty. but never mind. Think of “Justice” in terms of who has the most to lose for a moment.
The Palestinians have a divided, occupied, poorly governed ghetto, subjected to hundreds of murders a year whose citizens and elected government are strangled by an Orwellian, Kafkaesque Justice in the form of a malign global campaign of sanctions. They are armed with slingshots.
The current guards of the ghetto are armed and handsomely funded from America, live in a civilized country with functioning infrastructure, government and economy well integrated into international political, economic and military institutions, and possess one of the mightiest armed forces and intelligence operations on the planet, inerrantly backstopped by the mightiest on the planet.
Lets say that you know that if you can’t settle, eventually, inexorably no matter how vicious the oppression, Israel is in the end so small that a few wmd’s, which in 10, 20, 30 years are the size of a laptop, would end it, and a few more Islamic states have wmd or are allied with Pakistasn, and the damned arabs are so pissed off there’s just no talking to them?
What is justice? Occupation, oppression and colonization leading to the vaunted existential crisis, the destruction of the occupier by technology, religion and frustration? Or to pack up and go back to your own much nicer half of the fence, and knock yourself out at the Wailing Wall, while a gang of erstwhile existential threats smile and wave on their way into the Dome of the Rock, to pray in celebration at the simple justice that is the product of balance and moderation, one and all being delivered to peace and security after so much blood?
I really don’t think Israel has much time left before some how, some way, the IDF, those 450,000 settlers and a pliant America just won’t be enough to hold on with, let alone worth it for the biblical fantasy of some God told me it was mine 2000 years before I existed.
This is just not realistic, doesn’t seem just to me either.
Charles, you might be very surprised at how much of your comment I agree with. The Israel I want to see is one without an occupation or settlements, alongside a Palestine that has complete sovereignty and control of its resources. I want nothing less for the Palestinians than for us, and I also believe that it is a race against time, although we may disagree as to the balance of fault for this situation.
As you can see, though, there are many who would never be content to see us on our side of the fence (I assume you are speaking of metaphorical fences). Israel to me has nothing to do with a book, for I am an atheist, and everything to do with being able to defend myself and my people against the far too many Kassandras who are still among us.
I want nothing less for the Palestinians than for us,
azazel and others like you shows very clear mindset about the Israelis case.
Sadly we feed up with these claims and word and from above comments mad here looks there are no signs that we expecting the new Israeli generations they can make change although claiming they experienced much as an adult!
We can’t see one voice here who stand against the killing of civilians with objections of using bombs to solve the problem, where we going then?
See this for your believe I want nothing less for the Palestinians than for us
“All modern nations were founded on warfare, conquest, subjugation and ethnic cleansing”
That statement is not factual. Nor is it a justification for Israels’ having been founded on warfare, conquest, subjugation and ethnic cleansing.
That statement is not factual.
Name one exception, please, denial-bot. Enlighten us!!