jvj

Oh dear - there seems to be an awful lot of tempers running hot here. Sumigo, I don't think it was Hrimnir intention to offend you. Obviously this is a controversial topic that we all seem to have quite passionate opinions about. I am about to jump in again, so I must be a sucker for punishment.

First off, there is a lot that is being said that takes aim at pretty much all Jewish people as a whole. I think it is unnecessary, and sounds an awful lot like Tall Poppy Syndrome to me. Secondly, please, lets not drag the holocaust into this. What happened then was beyond cruel and inhumane. It was pure evil at work. If anyone has anything in their recent history that comes even close to that, then by all means share your opinion, otherwise just leave it be people, please.

Next, I think we should stop talking about the Jewish community as a reference to Israel. This is a conflict between 2 nations, not one entire religion vs one tiny country. Although it may in many ways seem like Judaism vs Islam, it is actually Israel vs Palestine.

Okay, to those of you who are saying that the Israelis have a history that is seeped in blood, they are humans on planet earth, of course they as do, as we all do. But we grow. We recognise right from wrong. We recognise that terrorising civilians is wrong.

More than that, the Israelites have been there since before biblical times. Their claim to the ground and to Jerusalem is as strong as anyone's in Palestine. To take aim at the very desperate people who arrived there after WWII is a bit of a low blow I think.

I would also like to mention that even during the cease fire, Israel had to contend with 15-20 missiles being launched on them daily, while they in turn were not allowed to retaliate. Seriously, how long to you beat dog before you can reasonably expect it to bite back? It is true there is a retaliation every couple of years or so, but never before has Israel been so unwilling to compromise. Lets keep in mind, that during the non cease fire periods Israel has had up to a 100 missiles a day launched at it, every single day for 8 years now. Isn't that enough? I know these rockets are badly made and poorly aimed, but that is not really the point. Those badly made, poorly aimed missiles are still terrorising, killing and maiming the Israelis who live close to the Gaza border. Israel not only has the right to self defence, but the obligation of protecting those who live within its borders.

Akerbos, your say "If you only repel attacks, you stop at your border." I don't believe this is true. You stop when they stop attacking you and withdraw from your borders. Until then you apply necessary force to deter them.

You also say "Terrorism is all about communication. Israel does not need to use this channel to tell the world what it thinks, for all the world listen to them already. " I strenuously disagree here. Terrorism is war in its most evil form. I cannot think of any justification for it what-so-ever. I indeed have a very sympathetic ear for Israel, but as I said in my original post, they are a progressive nation. And although the Palestinians who live within the Israeli border maybe closely controlled, this is due to homeland defence and the protection of the ideals within said progressive nation. It is not there as a means to persecute them.

The Israelis are indeed a very well educated people, as I said before. And no, I most definitely don't think that means they have to entertain the thought of tolerating terrorism. Sorry I really don't!

Now onto freedom of speech. In all 3 countries I have lived in, free speech is more a privilege than a right. And although it is viewed as a right, it is not your right to abuse it. If you do abuse it by spewing vulgar untruths, that are deeply offensive to a number of people, it is enough to be hauled over the coals for. It also leads me back to Israel - one of the very few places in the Middle East, where free speech and free press are allowed. Just think about that for a second. If they lay down arms and become submissive, one of the things we in the western world hold so dear, and believe should be a basic human right, will be gone from the region.

Lastly, I would like to clarify / correct my previous post. Although I do agree with a lot of Dave's sentiment regarding the media, what I meant to type was that I very much agree with what Hrimnir wrote, even if the tone was a little on the passionate side.

Edit, Hrimnir ruined JV's board

Edit: Sumigo, i'm sorry i didnt see your latest post before i posted the below post. I appreciate the comments, and i want to stress that i have no hard feelings for anything you said, and i hope the same applies the other way around. With that being said, i'm not going to delete what i've posted below. Some of it is probably going to be a bit touchy, but i feel it has to be said. Hopefully this doesn't drive a wedge between us.

sumigo wrote:Hrimnir you can be sorry all you want.

From your very first counter point to me you prove that you dont understand what I was saying. THe American Government did commit genocide to whole tribes of Natives, what do you call giving disease ridden blankets and rotten food to an already weakened people? What do you call cutting off the breats of Native women and using them for coin purses? But whatever, believe what you want.

Hey bro, whatever, like dlerrious said, this is gonna be one of those things that we're gonna have to agree to disagree. I'm sorry i offended you, but some of the things you said are offensive to me, and i'm not jewish, i'm not even a christian, i'm a deist. I don't put any salt in any religious dogma. I say this so you understand i have no allegiances to any party here. I simply call it as i see it.

Again, you call it genocide, i don't. I again, want to stress, very much so, that i am in no way justifying what our ancestors did to the native americans during the 19th century, but to compare it to the nazi extermination jews during WWII is just flat wrong. Academia has been debating whether what happened with the native americans in the 19th century is genocide or not and have still not come to a conclusion. Pretty much nobody outside of hard-core anti semites in the academic community argues that the holocaust was anything other than a by the book definition of genocide.

And in regards to the Israel situation, my only point is that there is always another side to the story, it is apparent that the pro israeli media has done its job well. I never said that Al Jazeera was unbiased, I meant that they give the other sides point of view.

The media always has an agenda, its just like akerbos said, if the media here, such as foxnews for example, is the "pro israel" media, then al jazeera is the other side of the coin. To say al jazeera states the truth is just fantastically short sighted. I'm sorry, i know what i've said and am saying is offensive, but i can't not say it.

And trust me, I know history pretty well, I know how much the US and other countries have meddled in the middle east since WW2. So please dont talk down to me.

Nobody here has denied any of those charges. I even stated in my post that israel absolutely did take advantage of the situation post WWII, and i stated my reasons why i believe it was a reasonable and valid thing to do. You chose to ignore that part of my post.

If Israel is so innocent then why are they spying on the US? THey are suppose to be our closest ally, why spy then? We give them hundreds of billions to them every year and they use it (your and my tax dollars) and they use it against us? Israel wouldnt exist without American tax dollars supporting them. If they have nothing to hide in Gaza than why wont they let media they do not control in there?

I don't blame israel one lick for spying on anybody. The state of israel knows that the only people it can 100% rely on are its own citizens and military. They are smart for keeping an eye on their friends. The US is a democratic country, it is quite possible that we could elect a leader and congress members that wouldn't be as pro israel as previous administrations, and then what. The US pulls support for israel, or backs it down heavily, and they're completely on their own again. What do you think countries like Iran, Syria, etc, would do then. The only reason Iran hasn't started a full blown military war with Israel is because the US is its ally. If they knew that Israel wouldn't get US support i guarantee that Israel would be swarmed.

In regards to Mel Gibson, we have in this country what is called Freedom of Speech, its in the first amendment, look it up sometime, educate yourself. So what if what he said was anti semitic, its his opinion, he should be able to say it without having to grovel at peoples feet afterward. I think what he said was stupid too, but it just proves my point of how much control the Jews have over this country.

I think too often people forget that our freedoms, especially things like freedom of speech, only exist in so much as they don't impede upon the freedoms of other citizens. Yeah, he can say as many hateful things as he want, but he is going to suffer the consequences. If you think that it proves your point you are sorely mistaken. What if you were take that same comment he made and replace it with "christians" instead of "jews". Would that be justified, would you still be on here making the same statements? Because i guarantee if he had said "christians" instead of "jews" in that statement, the public fallout would have been epic, i mean huge, he would have been lambasted back to the 10th century.

I will not go on with this, after rereading your post I just figured that you really dont want to discuss this topic even though you started it, your response was condescending at best. I thought this was meant to be a discussion board, I guess I was wrong

It is a discussion board. When you have discussions you back your opinions with *your* reasoning and logic. I did exactly that. I also stated exactly when and why i felt that your opinions were unfounded. I'm sorry you took offense to that, and i stated it probably would be offensive. But nobody said that discussions have to be roses and smiles and pats on the back. You have your opinion, you backed it with what you felt was valid reasonings. I stated i disagreed with it, i stated my reasons for disagreeing with it.

But when you make blanket statements like "...Jews own all the major media news networks they force their own propaganda down our throats", without backing them up with anything even resembling proof, you can't expect people to take your opinions seriously. I know that is condescending, but its the truth. The burden of proof of your statements falls on your shoulders, not ours.

So you disagree, just say that and move on, I disagree with you, THERE see how easy it was?

Thats fine, i stated in my first post quite clearly that i took issue with what you said. If thats not a statement of disagreement, i don't know what is.

Once again, i knew before i wrote it that it would probably offend you. I will admit there were a couple of instances where i was condescending, specifically when i was discussing the statement you made regarding jews owning the media.

But here is what bothered me about your post. You get on my ass for being condescending, yet you don't even seem to realize the verbiage that you used in your post, and how insulting that would be to someone who is jewish. Let me elaborate:

But what pisses me off about that crap hole of a country...

Now put into terms that an even a Jew can understand...

You said at the end of your post that you don't want to come across as anti semitic, yet you make statements like the above. Do you honestly expect any of us to believe that you aren't at least to some degree anti semitic?

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An interesting opinion if anyone wants to read it.
http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/removing-hamas-is-the-only-solution-20090108-7ctt.html?page=-1

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This is more as a point of interest than a correction, but as far as I know Rupert Murdoch is not of the Jewish faith, and is not of Jewish descent.

Being born Australian, it is doubtful he subscribes to any religion. On his fathers side, the Murdoch's are Scottish, from the Clan Murdoch, which is a sect clan of the Clan MacDonald. His grandfather was a Reverend, although I don't know of which church. Being Scottish, I would hazard a guess and say Scottish Presbyterian. But don't quote me on that.

And just because I find this sort of useless information interesting...

Moonves is the great-nephew of David Ben-Gurion, the first Prime Minister of Israel. Interesting.

Aiaiai!

Firstly, I apologise. This post is being written without having read most of what has already been said. There's so much! So I will simply express my own views.

This conflict is ultimately about History and the legitimacy that its verdict bestows. For the Israelis, this comes down to events of roughly 2000 years ago, starting mainly with a Roman-induced diaspora (I think). This, they say, is our homeland. The Palestinians would argue (rightly, in my view) that they have just as much "right" or more than the Jewish people to the lands around Jerusalem.Since Russian Zionist Jews began emigrating to what was then (I believe) British Palestine in the 1880's/1890's, the troubles have become worse and worse. Evidently everything became even more strained by the foundation of the state of Israel in 1948.

What are my own views? What Israel does is wrong. The Palestinians pose little or no threat to Israel. Israel, as shown in the 6 day war, is far stronger than its Arab neighbours combined, or at least certainly was.
That said, the actions of Hamas, Hizbollah, etc, are clearly evil. But Israel's response is disproportionate and only fuels further hatred on both sides. By way of comparison:
http://www.moiz.ca/coffin2.htm
That's 14 to 770. Evidently there could be problems with data collection given Israel's actions preventing journalists from entering Gaza, but in general it fits the mortality pattern in conflicts between the two.

This is issue is tremendously complicated because of the amount of history involved, so instead I'll look to the future. Why did this have to happen NOW? With the Obama administration incoming, this could have been the ideal time for some kind of lasting peace deal to have been struck. Instead we have another outbreak of futile violence that offers little hope for the future.

Hamas must renounce its aim of destroying the state of Israel and claiming all of what was once Palestine, or (ideally) Fatah once more becomes the dominant Palestinian authority, rather than purely in the West Bank. The suicide bombs and rockets must stop.
Israel must end its economic warfare, impoverishing the Palestinian people through its security wall and checkpoints. It must demolish the illegal settlements of extreme orthodox Jews who have occupied land that they have no right to - something Israel has averted its eyes to in the past.

In simple terms, we must have a two state solution, with Jerusalem shared or under a UN mandate. I do find it ironic that the state of Israel, born out of European atrocities, has inflicted many of the same things upon the Palestinians.
For example:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deir_Yassin_massacre
The Haganah perpetrated many such things in the initial conquest of Palestine.

Urgh. This is so complicated. Basically, both sides have done wrong. Whilst the foundation of Israel was essentially unjust, everyone can understand why it happened. Both sides need to bury their grievances, lick their wounds, and come to the table. Neither side is innocent or holds sole entitlement to feel wronged. But Israel ultimately holds all the power in this situation, and is acting like a bully.

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Information coming out of Gaza in the wake of the nominal 'ceasefire' seems fairly grim. If anyone is interested, see if you can find the BBC podcast of "From our own correspondent" dated Jan 22nd 09. It makes interesting listening.

Israel has been accused of a number of war crimes- whether these are valid accusations or not is beyond me to say- although I will invoke the 'no smoke without fire' axiom. My real point is; what has Israel achieved? Hamas has "claimed victory" in lieu of the ceasefire, and is highly unlikely to have been irrevocably damaged and will almost certainly return to its violent ways soon enough. Fatah cannot move in to replace Hamas, because it would look like a puppet of Israel. Over a thousand Palestinians are estimated to have been killed, many more wounded, and masses of structural damage has been done to homes and other buildings in Gaza.

As far as I can tell, this war was mainly posturing on the behalf on Israeli politicians and military in the run-up to elections. Not clever.

It may be slightly offtopic, but someone just gave me this link:

http://www.normanfinkelstein.com/articl ... 11&ar=2510

I am particulary shocked by children writing "From Israel with love" on bombs...

this is well crafted propaganda, it was created to shock you.

I wonder if humanity will ever be able to see past propaganda.

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