As Operation Pillar of Defense enters its fourth day, the Israel Defense Forces continues to prepare for a ground invasion of Gaza, drafting thousands of army reservists.
The IDF struck dozens of targets in the Gaza Strip overnight, including the office building of Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh and a police building.
The only question was whether or not Israel would find a reason to attack before or after the election. Just like the last time.
BTW- the best part of this is we can expect the same predictable flame wars and series of events. I can be accused of siding with terrorists, when all I am saying is that leveling a region, killing thousands of innocents and bombing the region into the stone ages is overkill. Then the President will say something measured, like “Israel has a right to defend itself, but the response has been too much,” and then AIPAC can have Congress and a bunch of Israel first Democrats condemn the President. The only thing different this time around is that Wexler and Weiner are no longer in Congress to lead the charge.
And this and this are just ghoulish. How long before the IDF commissions Zynga to create a Warville game for Facebook?
blingee
I hope Israel deploys drones then we can all watch your head explode.
El Cid
@blingee: Actually it’s been Hamas which has increasingly been deploying UAV’s and Israel has shot a number of them down, but offhand without Googling I don’t think any of them have been (or perhaps even capable of having been) armed.
Yutsano
Sigh. Until the concept of Eretz Israel is washed out of the Israeli fundamentalist consciousness there will be no peace there.
The irony is that, if it would be allowed to develop as such, the beaches of Gaza are quite beautiful. In any other circumstance it would be a heavy tourist region.
Moeiz
Somebody should do something
Ben Franklin
Gaza is their fallback position to Iran.
A perusal of JP and other English Israeli newspapers shows a lot of support for the Zionists.
Zionism is not Judaism.
“Yisroel, spokesperson for Neturei Karta International Jews United Against Zionism: Our organization tries to educate the world about the fact that Judaism is not Zionism. They are opposites. Our religious identity, Judaism, has been hijacked by Israel. All the crimes that have been perpetrated against the Palestinian people are all being done in our name, illegitimately. Judaism is a religion, not nationalism. Zionism is a transformation to nationalism and it does not represent in any manner whatsoever the Jewish religion. We want the world to know that we suffer and cry with the suffering of the people of Palestine, and we find the existence of the state of Israel to be totally unacceptable.”
http://www.vice.com/read/what-are-the-protesters-in-nyc-saying-about-gaza
Ben Franklin
Israel created Hamas…
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123275572295011847.html
General Stuck
It would take a direct hit from one of those cheesy rockets to kill a medium size Israeli child. yawn
Though it is promising to see Cole emerge from his neti pot bunker to check the news.
KXB
Well, there are some differences. For one, Israel realizes that Cast Lead was a disaster for them. The killed over a thousand Palestinians, without ejecting Hamas from Gaza, which is what they said the goal of the operation was. Indeed, the fact that Hamas now has rockets that reach as far as Jerusalem shows that Hamas strengthened its position within Gaza over the past 4 years. The rockets main value, from Hamas’ POV is not their destructiveness – that is negligible. It is the randomness and distance that make them unnerving for Israelis.
Second – with the Arab Spring, Israel can no longer depend upon American-backed Arab despots to keep their populations under control. If this drags on too long, I’d imagine the Egyptian government will come under tremendous pressure to open up its border with Gaza on humanitarian grounds. One can imagine that along with truckloads of supplies and foods, an Islamist group could readily include crates of new rockets.
Third – Syria. More people were killed in the fighting in Syria this week than in Gaza. But, the issue of Syria is important to some of America’s Arab allies – specifically Saudi Arabia. The Saudis see Assad as an Iranian proxy, and the longer Gaza is in the news, that allows Assad time to re-establish his hold on Syria, and preserving Iran’s influence in that region.
I’d imagine that most of Israel’s military commanders are not thrilled about a possible ground invasion of Gaza. The drubbing the Israeli army took at the hands of Hezbollah was only six years ago. Hamas is nowhere near the fighting force that Hezbollah is. But no army wants to fight in a densely populated urban area. The infrastructure is Gaza already sucks – so moving heavy armor is a no go, which means you have soldiers having to go on foot, leaving them exposed to sniper fire.
What this does show is that Netanyahu is still one of the dumbest fucks in the Middle East – and there are no shortage of those in that region.
muddy
Both sides are idiots. I don’t lob things off into my neighbor’s yard because I know he can lob them right back. Don’t shit in your own nest etc. Or maybe don’t shit in the nest right next to your own, as shit is very apt to land back in your own nest. What is the fucking point? Is anyone happy with the outcome? Yet they go on shooting shit off, both sides. “He started it” and etc BS crying from both sides. pblth
Jennifer
With friends like these, who needs enemies?
Ben Franklin
‘Both sides do it” Hmmmmm. Where have I heard that before?
When 1 Israeli dies, the proportionate response; 100 Palestinians.
All the news reports is the deaths of Israelis, because they don’t have the chutzpah to report on site in Gaza.
mai naem
Isn’t Netanyahu up for election soon? Is this at least part of the reason for this? Another GWBush mind who thinks a war is a sure way to relection. I used to be a strong supporter of Israel. Not as much anymore. It’s to the point where even if a particular situation may be the fault of the Palestinians’ I still feel they deserve some of the blame because of the whole situation. It does piss me off though, that the Palestinians could have been much more productive if they has spent all their energy developing their economy instead of attacking Israel. Same goes for the Pakistanis. Spending
billions of dollars on defense by a dirt poor country is just plain dumb.
FlipYrWhig
I think it was here where I last asked this, but I forgot the answer. These notorious “rockets” that the Palestinians shoot. How big are they, and how destructive?
blingee
I made the mistake of clicking on R. Murdoch’s twitter feed. Talk about a parallel universe of cliches, dog whistles and utter bullshit. You would think this was something cooked up by theOnion.
“@rupertmurdoch
Can’t Obama stop his friends in Egypt shelling Israel?”
kilks
@Ben Franklin: I agree the coverage is slanted, but CNN did a decent job earlier with Don Lemon saying 47 or so people have died in Gaza, including the BBC worker’s son.
Could be my low expectations, but I was surprised.
El Cid
At least this will finally make the average Israeli safe from the rockets, which is of course what motivates Israeli policymakers to carry out these policies.
KXB
@mai naem:
Israel has had Gaza under a blockade for several years now. Under int’l law, blockades are an act of war, so while Hamas should be condemned for targeting civilians, it is naive to act as if their actions are a complete surprise. The Palestinians see more and more of their land being gobbled up by Jewish settlements, so if Israel has no intention to move towards a two-state solution, they see nothing lost by their actions.
Hypnos
7:55 P.M. Interior Minister Eli Yishai on Israel’s operation in Gaza: “The goal of the operation is to send Gaza back to the Middle Ages. Only then will Israel be calm for forty years.”
http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/live-blog-idf-prepares-for-ground-invasion-as-gaza-offensive-enters-fourth-day-1.478505
At least Israelis are honest about their intentions, unlike their apologists over here. But yeah, Hamas’ charter says it wants to destroy Israel. Despite them having accepted the 1967 borders.
General Stuck
@mai naem:
Why Yes. It’s the Hamas/Likud ticket running all over again.
Scamp Dog
The deal is that this interaction benefits hard-liners on both sides. Hamas shows that it can take the fight to the hated enemy! Isreali hard-liners get to go on about the monsters running Hamas, and we must strike back forcefully! The striking back kills innocents along with all the other damage, and now the hated enemy is even more hated.
So Bibi strengthens his electoral position and Hamas gets stronger as well. It’s win-win, as long as you’re not one of the poor saps getting hit by the other side’s weaponry. Or worried about getting hit.
ETA: …and the General got there first and more succinctly.
GregB
@Hypnos:
It seems the leaders in Israel are more than glad to meet them half way.
Yadda, yadda, look into the abyss, the abyss looks into you…yadda..Those who don’t remember the past are condemned to repeat it..yadda..history is full of examples of the oppressed becoming the oppressor….
the Conster
What a fucking mess. I am so over Bronze Age tribal bullshit.
Some Loser
Donald posted a wonderful link explaining how this whole thing came to be. Pay close attention to the part where the assassination of a Palestinian man is mentioned.
http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/11/who-started-the-israel-gaza-conflict/265374/
Colossus and Guardian (We are one)
And Anonymous has woken up to do what they do best-expose the weaknesses of cyber-security and unintentionally/delibrately creating their own collateral damage in the process.
One can only hope that the tide is turning.
red dog
Why don’t American Jews go and fight for their “motherland” instead of trying to justify the reasons. Oh, that would actually mean betting their own ass.
Some Loser
@Hypnos:
Regardless of their charter, Hamas has worked toward peace.
They have attempted several times. The last time was in 2008, and Israel reneged on the agreement and initiated Operation Case Lead.
@El Cid:
Israel does in fact use drone platforms.
Maude
@muddy:
It seems hopeless. It makes me wonder if the US should just back away from trying to get any talks of truce or peace.
I also wonder why the UK isn’t heavily involved in Israel/Palestine negotiations.
Mr Stagger Lee
Israel can slaughter the entire Palestinian civilian population do YouTube video of the soldiers, Dancing Gangham Style, on the corpses, yet the US government and the media will say that was OK, and for me saying this, I am now dressed with an SS uniform accused of being a NAZI. The state of a nation that is p—y whipped to AIPAC.
KXB
@Maude:
Because there are no rooms at the King David Hotel.
Some Loser
@Maude:
Because the UK (and Canada) is just as brainwashed as the United States?
muddy
@the Conster:
I think there would be a whole lot less of this bullshit if the ones wanting to fight actually had to run out there in their leather skirt deploying their bronze knives personally.
This of course goes for this country as well.
Ben Franklin
@Maude:
I also wonder why the UK isn’t heavily involved in Israel/Palestine negotiations
Because, they are similarly invested in the Zionists..
The Other Bob
A couple decades ago the world boycotted an apartheid state and they weren’t even bombing their oppressed population.
El Cid
@Some Loser: Of course they do. I mentioned it because it may be more surprising to most people that Hamas and Hezbollah do so as well. I can’t imagine anyone not presupposing that Israel had developed and used its own UAV / drones.
Maude
@KXB:
Ah, I knew there was a reason.
@Some Loser:
Maybe, but the US seems to always be sticking its neck out to negotiate some type of peace and it pretty much fails every time. Let the UK handle it.
Shawn in ShowMe
@mai naem:
Before the American colonists could fully develop their economy they had to kick out the British empire. Britain’s rivals, the French, sided with the colonists to make that happen. If the French would have aided the British instead, the colonial forces would have been massacred and the survivors resigned to second-class citizenship.
There never would have been a United States. Just like there will never be a Palestinian state. John Cole III will be sarcastically blogging against an even worse state of affairs 50 years from now. By then Israel will be protected by an impenetrable plastic dome while Palestinians fight over what’s left of Gaza’s food supply.
PeakVT
@Hypnos: “The goal of the operation is to send Gaza back to the Middle Ages. Only then will Israel be calm for forty years.”
Um, yeah.
I suppose I could hope Haaretz got that quote wrong.
Maude
@Ben Franklin:
I wonder if Turkey is going to be the one to get something done concerning an armed truce that would work. Turkey seems to have influence with Israel.
El Cid
@PeakVT:
Funny, that’s the same goal Republicans have for this whole country.
Ben Franklin
@Maude:
I think the US has to take a predominant role in this. It doesn’t help when Obama reiterates the AIPAC droning….’Israel has the right to protect itself’ without the corallary.
Anoniminous
@FlipYrWhig:
Roughly 10 kilos. See Qassam Rocket.
Some Loser
@Maude:
A peace agreement can only be met if both sides wants it. Palestinians wants it, and so do the majority of Israelis, but Netanyahu and the right wing Israeli politicians need their boogeyman. Every time peace looks like it will be achieved, the IDF creates (sometimes impossible demands) situations where peace is impossible (usually violence).
I feel bad a lot of the IDF. Not a lot of them, but there is a non-insignificant number of them who have to do horrible things or face jail time or death.
Waynski
Same as it ever was. The Israelis and Palestinians are so very boring. I’m not a gamer, but I doubt all this continuous nonsense between them would make a good video game. Make a deal you fucking pricks.
Some Loser
I hate this situation so much. It makes me so stressed, but I can hardly stop myself from arguing with people. It doesn’t help that normally sane people swallows and regurgitates plainly obvious lies. This must be how people who live with wingnuts must feel.
KXB
BTW – the next time some prick talks about how Obama does not like Israel, point out that it was Obama that ramped up installation of Iron Dome, which is protecting Israeli cities.
Violet
I just don’t care. I feel like I should care, but I don’t. They are like an old married couple who communicate by shouting at each other and occasionally breaking china. If they ever decide to go to counseling or get a divorce I’ll be interested. Otherwise, it’s just boring. I don’t care what he/she did. Make a decision. Move on.
Now the collateral damage of the actual people being killed is terrible. And now that things have changed in the middle east, who knows how this is going to work out. I just can’t summon up much interest in it. Feel like I should, but I can’t.
muddy
This is just how I feel as well. I used to pay attention, but then finally decided that there was no point until they were really making progress, and that could be never.
Raven
@Violet: Ditto
Mandalay
@muddy:
As mindless oversimplications go, that one of yours is a real humdinger.
Raven
@Mandalay: Yea, YOU have it all figured out, right?
General Stuck
I Don’t Wanna Fight (no more)
movie time
red dog
I wish someone would drop an H-bomb or two on the whole area so the Med and Red seas would join. Then the “middle east” would cease to exist or become waterworld. Harumph….
LD50
How much of this is just Netanyahu saying ‘fuck you’ to Obama for his man Romney losing?
Some Loser
@Raven:
What was objectionable about his(?)post? The idea that muddy’s post was an oversimplification of this event, or the implied idea that there is more to this and you could know more about it?
beltane
@Some Loser: Please continue to argue with people. It is important, for morality’s sake. My mother is Jewish but has always been ambivalent about Israel’s actions in general, and dependably hostile towards Likud politicians, especially Ariel Sharon whom she regards as a baby-killer. Still, she dismisses any criticism of Israel by non-Jews as anti-Semitic, and that includes any criticism she hears from me. I have learned to communicate with her on this issue using opinion pieces from people like Peter Beinart and MJ Rosenberg as proxies. It is cumbersome but worth doing IMO.
Donald
@muddy:
Nice of you to stand above the fray, but if you’re an American your government and mine has been standing behind the Israeli morons for decades, giving them weapons and moral support as they steal land and treat the Palestinians the way white people in Mississippi used to treat blacks.
So if you’re an American, your hands aren’t clean, much as you might like to pretend they are.
Raven
@Some Loser: I didn’t like it.
Raven
@Donald: Used to, where the fuck have you been?
Mandalay
@Raven:
On the contrary, I recognize that it is an incredibly complex and tragic situation, which is why pontificating comments like “Both sides are idiots” are so condescending and mindless.
PeakVT
@LD50: Very little. Internal politics and/or long-term strategy are enough to explain the actions of the Israeli government.
LD50
@red dog: The med sea and the red sea ARE joined. It’s called the suez canal.
Ben Franklin
@Raven:
You didn’t like Muddy’s comment, but you don’t give a shit about the issue?
Huh?
lacp
@mai naem: THe Palestinians don’t have billions of dollars. And it’s pretty fucking tough to “develop your economy” when you’re under a fucking embargo that makes it fucking impossible for anything to enter your country.
Raven
@Ben Franklin: Runnin around with that “mindless” shit rubbed me the wrong way. That’s what I didn’t like. You the hall monitor tonight?
Darkrose
The older I get, the more appealing it is to just move everyone out and then turn Jerusalem and the vicinity into a sheet of glass. If you assholes can’t learn to share and play nicely, then NOBODY gets it.
Way too many people have died over that particular piece of desert.
Ben Franklin
@Raven:
Just tryin to be clear. So if you just want to say FUCK everything, you might want to provide a disclaimier, cuz your attitude sucks hind tit.
Raven
@Ben Franklin: and? It don’t mean nuthin, that clear enough? Give me all that shit about how much everyone cares so much. I don’t buy it.
LD50
Well, I’m pleased that no one has wandered in and called us all nazis, but of course the night is young.
bago
Is it just me, or does the entire thing seem like a case of “The beatings will continue, until morale improves” all around? Its like addicts, doing what they know.
beltane
@Darkrose: Here is a video you may enjoy: http://vimeo.com/50531435
Some Loser
@Raven:
Fair enough. Heh, I don’t know why I am so angry. Your comment was not evening the most insulting thing on this thread.
@LD50:
I don’t usually follow the internal politics of Israel, but people from Israel seems to think it is an election ploy for Netanyahu. He ramps up the offensive on the Gaza, and he gets to say he’s
tough on crimeprotecting Israel’s borders.Gaza is convenient for Israel’s right wing as Al Quaeda
iswas for ours. The propaganda is so think in Israel that a good portion of their citizens think the Palestinians have both the means and desire to wipe them off the face of the earth and routinely reject peaceful settlements. Of course, like all right wing politicians, this is pure projection.This guy here can explain it better than me: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3517542&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=21#post409660584
Zapruder F. Mashtots, D.D.S.
I don’t think I’ve ever written anything in a thread about Israel and the Palestinians. I don’t know enough to know what I’m talking about, so I just sit back and read. (And besides, I blather on more than enough when anything about Latin America comes up in threads.)
But, having aid that, I don’t understand why Israel thinks that this stuff they’re doing is going to work in the long run. I just don’t. I don’t know how they think it’s going to help them in the long run.
I know that Palestinians have set bombs off and killed Israeli civilians. I know that there are some terrorists who have done unspeakable things in the name of Palestinians. But, without excusing what terrorists have done, there are reasons they’ve done these things.
Hell, there’s never an excuse for terrorism, but it’s unlikely that anybody has ever woken up and said, “Ah, what the hell, I think I’ll set off a bomb in a street to kill Israeli citizens for the hell of it. I have nothing against them, but I feel like killing a slew of them for kicks.” A few extremists, frustrated, like most Palestinians, go about trying to change things the wrong way.
But over the long haul–it seems to me at least–what Israel is doing isn’t going to help them. Leaving aside whether it’s right or wrong, it’s just doomed to fail. I don’t know what the answer is, but it doesn’t look to me like what they’re doing is it. If I’m far off, here, please, somebody, set me right here.
Ben Franklin
@Raven:
Then articulate that sense of phony concern, Christ ! Are you on, or need some intervention?
JPL
@Some Loser: Since Palestinians want the right of return, peace is hard to achieve. I’m not saying the Palestinians are wrong, just that peace is not that easy.
Mandalay
@Raven:
Actually you seem to be the hall monitor tonight.
You post that you don’t care about the situation (which is entirely understandable, and how a lot of people seem to feel), yet you also want to pick a fight with every man and his dog.
Donald
@Raven:
It took me awhile to figure out what you meant. So no, I don’t want to say things are wonderful in Mississippi.
But anyway, America has sent tens of billions of dollars to Israel and much of what we’ve sent to Egypt is basically a bribe for adhering to the Camp David agreement, so we’re involved up to our necks. Obama is telling Israel that they have the right to “defend themselves”, a right which only seems to apply to Israelis and not Palestinians. And Susan Rice denied that there was any evidence of war crimes in the previous Gaza War.
It’s always amazing to me to see Americans talking about how awful it is that those people over there can’t get along, as if our foreign policy hadn’t played a very significant role in making the problem a lot worse. It’s the privilege of living in a superpower. You don’t have to like how the two sides behave (I don’t), but stop acting like it has nothing to do with us.
General Stuck
@Raven:
Neither do I.
General Stuck
@Donald:
So what do you envision as a solution. Or the end game as you would have it?
Colossus and Guardian (We are one)
@red dog: I yearn for a Celestial Being
muddy
@Mandalay: The point is, they keep doing their same actions. Sorry to say both sides, which after the media performance this fall is the worst phrase ever, but it’s not like either side refrains from acting.
Personally I think the Palestinians have obviously much the worse of it, and have sadly never been able to understand why if a country was needed for a Jewish state after the Holocaust, the Germans were not ought to have provided it. I don’t get why people who were already living there get pushed out and they weren’t involved in WWII, and now they are the oppressed ones. Meanwhile, the Israelis, who you would think would be sensitive to the notion of being oppressed, don’t mind as long as it’s not against them. They keep putting up more settlements, mostly filled with fundies who don’t even go in the army or anything, or pay taxes. They have no skin in the game aside from living on the frontier.
But beyond all of that, when Gaza sends shells out, they know good and well that they are going to get shelled back X100, but they do it anyway. How’s that working out for them?
I think it’s getting to the point that Israel is practically practicing apartheid. I think we ought to condition our aid to them on bounds that they can’t keep making settlements and grinding Arabs down.
Of course my opinions on the matter mean absolutely nothing to either side, so the amount I am perturbed and how smoothly I find it hopeless don’t really enter into it, but there you are.
As an aside having to do with the geographical area, I found in a box of old travel stuff a bottle marked “water from Sea of Galilee”. The fact that this plastic bottle is near 50 years old and the water is still inside is a miracle. I think it’s better than Jesus on toast.
300baud
John Cole’s alter ago Juan Cole recently had this useful set of myths and debunkings:
http://www.juancole.com/2012/11/top-ten-myths-about-israeli-attack-on-gaza.html
Ohio Mom
@Ben Franklin: Too lazy at the moment to google this to confirm it but from the looks of the fellows in the photo in your link, I suspect the Neturei Karta Jews Against Zionism are those super-fundamentalists who think only God is allowed to re-establish Israel and that it was beyond sacrilege for humans to have done so. It’s a pretty small group.
I’m hardly a fundamentalist but I think they have a point. Contemporary liberal Judaism focuses a lot on Israel when it should be spending that time, energy and thought on helping Judaism evolve so it remains meaningful to people.
I think it’s possible that a hundred years from now, Jewish scholars will be tracing a big loss of population to people who left the fold when got tired of hearing about Israel all the time when all they wanted is what everyone wants from a religious community: a place they feel they are welcomed, inspiration to help them through the hard parts of their life, and rituals to give shape to the passing years and changes in their lives.
Donald
@General Stuck:
A two state solution along the 67 borders (with minor adjustments if the Palestinians agree). A token right of return, meaning some Palestinians are allowed back, but Israel controls how many. Ideally, with a long period of peace, people would start to get along and ultimately one might even have a one state solution. That would be logical–both peoples love the land. Palestinians want to live in their homeland and Jews have an historical attachment. I never faulted religious Jews for wanting to live in “Judea and Samaria”–I’m Christian myself and understand the Biblical attraction. It’s no excuse for what’s been going on in the past few decades.
But a one state solution is currently impossible given the mutual animosity. So a 2SS is the way to go, I think. Though the Israeli right seems determined to make that impossible.
I answered your question in good faith, though I suspect you are hoping for an angry rant and might find my thought that a peaceful state for both peoples would be the ideal (even if currently impossible) is some evidence of secret anti-semitism. I got that reaction at another blog once, so nothing surprises me.
Raven
@muddy: “But beyond all of that, when Gaza sends shells out, they know good and well that they are going to get shelled back X100, but they do it anyway. How’s that working out for them?”
It’s working out exactly how they want it to. Just like the fucking fanatics on the other side. Mindlessly simplistic, no?
Mandalay
@muddy:
A fine post, but regarding your comment:
…I think that the “futile” retaliation of the Palestinians arises from a sense of desperation and injustice rather than stupidity.
Our copyright on “Give me liberty, or give me death” expired a while ago.
Joseph Nobles
Rupert Murdoch, for whom a case could be made for the most powerful person in the global media, just tweeted this:
https://twitter.com/rupertmurdoch/status/269973016753102849
Sigh.
General Stuck
@Donald:
Not hoping for an angry rant or anti semitism. I just am no longer going to pretend that it doesn’t exist in these nasty ME threads. I have about the same end game ideal, and the question is why can’t we have it. I say you can’t get past the attitude of Hamas toward Israel, and others point to the settlement expansion and empowerment of Likud and other minority Israeli extremists.
We used to have halfway civil threads on the topic, but now days I rarely comment on them. Unless the bullshit piles up so high, like in a previous thread.
Some Loser
@JPL:
True enough. No solution for this problem will be resolved without bloodshed. Enough if Israel has a change of heart (and a new head of state) and grants Palestinians there land back, they’ll have to fight the settlers for it.
Something I don’t think is brought up enough is how very little Israel has to gain by letting the Palestinians have their land back and how much they have to lose (like pissing off the settlers). The right wing parties in Israel is happy to note this, and stuff like that cause pessimism in the Palestinians.
Poll #45 indicates that Palestinians are more worried about establishing the Palestinian state but with the right to return as a close second.
@Donald:
That is not necessarily a bad thing. The best thing the United States could do is, of course, remove all support for Israel, but this is probably better than nothing given the state of the United States.
Darkrose
@beltane: That was brilliant–thanks for the link!
Chris
@Joseph Nobles:
In one sentence he manages to hit 1) a regular old “liberal media!” lie (the media is never nearly as liberal as Murdoch & Co accuse it of being, but Israel is possibly its least liberal issue), 2) a pro-Likudnik tack (anyone who doesn’t approve of what Netanyahu’s doing must be anti-Israel!) AND 3) an old antisemetic tack (the media’s owned by the j0000000000000z!!!!! Who are also pro-Arab. It’s a CONSPIRACY, maaaaann!)
I am fucking impressed.
muddy
@Mandalay: I fully realize *why* they do it, I imagine it’s basically a natural human reaction. I guess they think it’s worth it, or they would not do it. I wonder what the overall %age is that disagrees with the policy, but gets the retaliatory shells anyway.
How many decades were we being shelled and completely outmatched 100:1 by the Brits, I forget.
Zandar
Was Operation Piss Off The Darkies taken?
Some Loser
@Raven: @muddy:
Do you know how many Palestinians are attacking Israel? I mean, can you guess the percentage? Or is this the case where it is alright to blame the crimes of the few on the many? (Is Al Quaeda finally be validated by “liberals”?)
What about the West Bank? They’ve not been attacking the Israeli, but they still have a problem with violent suppression.
Most of the Palestinians want peace through peaceful, nonviolent means. And, y’know what, they’re trying so damn hard to fulfill that.
Why are they punished because they can’t control their rightfully angry brethren? Did Martin Luther King Jr. deserve that bullet in his head because the Black Panthers? According to your logic . . .
Donald
@Some Loser:
On anti-semitism, I know that there is some, though I don’t think the previous thread showed evidence of that. I’ve seen it at other places, where anti-Zionism (which is legitimate) turns into anti-semitism. But I’ve also seen anti-semitism alleged for no good reason.
I think, though, that there is a tremendous amount of anti-Arab or anti-Muslim sentiment in the US. It’s completely mainstream among Republicans, and it’s not exactly uncommon among Democrats, though sometimes more subtle. And it’s in the press. Objective reporting of the current situation would not only talk about the rockets, but about how Israelis shoot at fishermen 2 miles off the Gaza coast, and similar sorts of things. In other words, we’d get a picture where it’s not only idiots firing rockets from Gaza into Israel, but also idiots firing into Gaza from Israel. The violence flows both ways and it’s simply not true that Israel only “responds” to provocations from Palestinians.
El Cid
If all the rockets, Hamas, the other militias, rock-throwers, mean posters, whatever, disappeared from Gaza, there’s still no incentive for the Israeli militarist state establishment and its settler paramilitary wing to stop conquering the lands they desire and taking the resources they want and dismantling any possibility of independent activities by Palestinian government. And no force able or motivated to stop them from doing so.
Donald
@Donald:
That was meant to reply to Stuck, but somehow I replied to Some Loser. Whatever.
muddy
None of that is according to my logic, I am not going to repeat several posts to put the sentences in different order. I feel a little surprised at the amount of pushback I have gotten from my apparently sloppily stated opinions. Especially since I don’t see that I said anything different than Cole in the FP post. Of course I guess it’s more to the point to take it up with me, because I actually answer people and he doesn’t waste his time.
We ought to have sanctions against Israel for apartheid is my opinion, and if I were a resident of Gaza I would do my best to keep the ones who think it’s smart to send shells to Israel from doing it, as it is counterproductive.
ETA: And when Israel does something *without* provocation, I think that says for itself how wrong it is, and so I do not mention it specifically.
Ben Franklin
@Zandar:
Most israeli Mil ops have a Biblical connotation. (Exodus 13?) Pillar of Fire was evidence of the presence of God. Not that you were requiring a response, but there it is.
Mandalay
@Raven:
I realize you have vital work to do here, picking fights with everyone over an issue you don’t care about, but please don’t forget to check there are no kids playing on your front lawn.
scav
@Chris:nDon’t forget 4) the assumption that newspapers reporting and opinions are neceesarily thise if their owners, no matter the facts on the ground, the reporters or the exitors.
Chris
@scav:
Well, that’s how Murdoch’s media works. Why should anyone else be any different?
Related: I think the most revealing commentary I’ve ever heard of the Israel/Palestine crisis was when Joe the Plumber was sent to Sderot in 2008/2009 as a PJMedia reporter, and once he was there, the only thing we got was a tirade from Joe about how media members shouldn’t cover war zones, they should just do war commercials like in World War Two, because that’s what’s patriotic.
Translation: “Even we at PJMedia can’t figure out how to report anything from here and spin it in a way that makes Israel look good. So here’s a video of us begging everyone to just stop all reporting, lest any of our viewers risk forming a remotely fact-based opinion.”
Raven
@Mandalay: Oh poor baby.
AHH onna Droid
@Ben Franklin: oh taste the fail, linking to Nuttery Kartei. Watch that beam in your eye, son.
BobS
@General Stuck: The “attitude of Hamas toward Israel” is the problem? Right. Maybe you could better appreciate that “attitude” if you framed it inside the racial and ethnic dynamics of American history and politics. I’ll make it easy for you- Israel is Mississippi circa 1964, only with a complicit US federal government this time around.
General Stuck
@BobS:
Stupid comparison
Paul in KY
@Violet: I think it’s the old married couple where the wife gives the husband spitful looks & makes a snide comment & then he beats her down to the point whyere she’s in the hospital for a month.
That kind of old married couple.
Paul in KY
@Mandalay: It is not working out. They need to try the Ghandi non-violence method. Still plenty of chance for martyrdom, just you get martyered while not fighting back.
Paul in KY
@Some Loser: Obviously, non-violence or Ghandi method, has to be agreed to by all parties in Palestine (including Hamas, etc.). It has to be a National effort, all across the board, for it to succeed.
Paul in KY
@El Cid: That is why they need a severe change of tactics.
Ben Franklin
@AHH onna Droid:
Hasbara?