BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: Greg F.
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 08:41 PM

Jim, no reliable source

Define "reliable source", FKWT.

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: bobad
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 07:20 PM

IDF forces in the Gaza Strip found a Hamas manual on "Urban Warfare," which belonged to the Shuja'iya Brigade of Hamas' military wing, the Al-Qassam Brigades. The manual explains how the civilian population can be used against IDF forces and reveals that Hamas knows the IDF is committed to minimizing harm to civilians.

Throughout Operation Protective Edge, Hamas has continuously used the civilian population of Gaza as human shields. The discovery of a Hamas "urban warfare" manual by IDF forces reveals that Hamas' callous use of the Gazan population was intentional and preplanned.

This Hamas urban warfare manual exposes two truths: (1) The terror group knows full well that the IDF will do what it can to limit civilian casualties. (2) The terror group exploits these efforts by using civilians as human shields against advancing IDF forces.

The Manual

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 02:55 PM

Jim, no reliable source has reported flechette use and no such casualties have occurred.

Your linked piece referred to "nail shrapnel."
That could only be from locally manufactured warheads.
Commercially produced munitions would not contain nails.

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: beardedbruce
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 02:47 PM

Greggie,

You need to actually learn to read sometime.

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: Greg F.
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 02:26 PM

I will wait for your sources- that should be easy to put up here IF they are real.

Et tu, Bullshot.

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: beardedbruce
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 02:00 PM

Jimmy,

Since you NEVER provide any source for your claims, it is difficult to think that they are true ( i.e., factual, and not a figment of your imagination).

I will wait for your sources- that should be easy to put up here IF they are real.

The posted reports here of journalists that were kept silent by Hamas until they left Gaza HAVE had those sources- Are you capable of providing SOME reasonable support for your claims?

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 01:51 PM

"There are reports here from those reporters who were prevented from reporting the Hamas launches and the effect of Hamas rockets on Gaza."
There are equally reports of those covering the Israeli side - two were reported to have died in mysterious circumstances
There have been reports of 62 violations against journalists by Israeli forces, including the bombing of two press cars and 14 bombs being dropped on media centres
In all, nine deaths and thirteen injuries have been recorded.
Crap indeed.
Reports from U.N. volunteers working in refugee centres attacked by Israelis, with large losses of life, have specifically decalred that not only had they been infored of the refugee status of the centres and the exact co-ordinates ON 17 occasions, but they had acknowledged and orded the occupants to stay put - then they shelled the buildings.
"Israel left ALL of Gaza and has made clear it wants NONE of it."
You are now beginning to soung like Lord Haw-Haw on speed
Having been presented with a report and photographs of Israeli fired flchette missiles, you have just denied outright their existence and said the phtofraps (dart-shaped missiles) were Hamas shrapnel - the ******* Israelis haven't even claimed this - you have invented it as an excuse for using maiming and lethal weapons on civilians.
You really haven't been taking your meds, have you?
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: GUEST,LynnH
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 01:46 PM

Netanjahu,Bennett,Liebermann & co. need Hamas in order to justify their attitudes, politics etc.......just as Hamas needs Netanjahu, Bennett, Liebermann & co. in order to justify their attitudes, politics.........a vicious circle.

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 12:11 PM

Your 1102 post was the post of a fool, I fear, Troub. I was talking of the withdrawal of 2005; there was no barbed wire in evidence then. It was subsequently erected by those inside, not by those who had left.

Go back to plucking your lute, eh!

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 11:43 AM

Troubadour, in previous incursions Hamas fighters were passed off as civilian casualties.

That is the likeliest explanation for what is happening now.
Why do you think there are so many more young men than in the general population?

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 11:37 AM

Jim, Israel left ALL of Gaza and has made clear it wants NONE of it.

It has to take control of that strip to destroy the tunnels as they are legally entitled to do in self defence because the tunnels were built to attack Israel.

Israel is not carving chunks off Gaza.
Gaza has no reason to attack Israel.

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: beardedbruce
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 11:34 AM

To quote YOU, Jimmy Boy

Utter CRAP. There are reports here from those reporters who were prevented from reporting the Hamas launches and the effect of Hamas rockets on Gaza. YOUR inability to read simple statements is YOUR problem, not mine.

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: GUEST,Troubadour
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 11:27 AM

"Injured people filmed at the scene all happened to be young men."

Devious and inane all in one!

Unless those young men were armed, uniformed, or engaged in operating a rocket launcher, you have absolutely NO basis for denying that they are civilians, other than your intention to imply that all young men are militants.

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: GUEST,Troubadour
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 11:15 AM

"In fact, Jim, would you be pleased if Israel were after all to be wiped off the map?"

No fair MtheGM! Jim has NEVER indicated any such feeling, as you WELL know.

In fact, Mike, would you be pleased if Israel were after all to wipe the Palestinians of the map, so there'd finally be peaceful extra land for Israeli settlers?

And before you answer, that is a rhetorical question, but no more insulting of YOU than YOU were of JIM!

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 11:10 AM

"WE ARE QUOTING HAMAS."
Didn't say you weren't - just said the statement was no more or less extreme than that of Israel - and certainly not of Israel's actions.
Extremist groups have threatened to wipe out Jews - Israelis atr acually in the process of wiping out Arabs - and have been for a long time.
I find the practice of blaming what is happening in Israel on the Jews - you do it all the time, which puts you on par with the worst of Islamic extremism
"The sources that the stooges keep giving NEVER state that ANY Gazans are killed by these missiles"
Neither does any other source apart from the Israeli propaganda machine and there are enough neutral observers around to see what's what (whoops, sorry - everybody who criticises Israel is automatically Antisemitic)
"How many opponents do you throw off a building to win a Palestinian election?"
About as many residents of Israel who are considered second-rate citizens because they worship at the wrong church.
INEQUALITY REPORT
Sorry Blundering Brucie - must try harder.
"But, tho I think the Israelis might be persuaded to come to the UN conference table..."
Don't know what gives you that impression, especially in the light of their having deliberately sabotaged the last round of peace talks
As far as Hamas is concerned, I have no doubt that they realise that they can't win a shooting war with Israel - a removal of the blockade and the walls would be a tremendous victory for them - as far as I'm concerned, it would be a betrayal of the Gazan's to accept anything less.
The Israelis could then claim their victory by having demolished the tunnels - faces saved all round.
"This is a group of whom we hear little or nothing!"
Not here Eddie - but some people choose to ignore their plight in all this.
Israel has been systematically ethnically cleansing the Bedouins for some years now - they have twice attempted to evict whole communities and re-house them on toxic land, they have driven settled Bedouins off ther homesteads with chemical sprays and water cannons in order to make way for Israeli settlers... a persecuted people indeed
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: GUEST,Troubadour
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 11:02 AM

"Then they left Gaza to govern itself. So the Palestinian population organised and held free elections."

INSIDE the barbed wire controlled by the IDF.

Such freedom! Wow!

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: GUEST,Troubadour
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 10:56 AM

Sorry! Last guest post was me.

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: GUEST
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 10:55 AM

"Jim, Israel is not cutting bits off Gaza."

A three kilometre strip of Gaza, where Israel has ordered the inhabitants to leave has been, and is being, reduced to heaps of rubble.

Sounds like carving chunks off to me.

None of you one eyed apologists have so far had the guts to give a straight answer to the question:

If YOUR homeland were surrounded by barbed wire and guns, and totally cut off from any outside contact, except by permission of those holding the guns, what would YOU do?

Tamely submit, or resist however ineffectually?

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: beardedbruce
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 10:24 AM

An Israeli military spokeswoman said she was checking the refugee camp attack. She said four rockets had been fired from Gaza since the truce started and two had crashed inside Israel. There were no reports of casualties or damage.


OK stooges:

What is 4 - 2 =?


Get an answer yet?



The OBSERVED misfire rate on Hamas rockets is 20-30% hitting Gaza overall.

The misfired missiles are ANTI-PERSONNEL warheads, designed to kill civilians.

The sources that the stooges keep giving NEVER state that ANY Gazans are killed by these missiles ( that kill Israelis when they are not in shelters) .

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: eddie1
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 10:16 AM

Hate to throw something else into this stinking melting-pot but.....

http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/08/israels-bedouin-caught-between-iron-dome-and-hamas/375428/

This is a group of whom we hear little or nothing! Yet more suffering in this crazy war. In 2010 I interviewed Hala, a young Bedouin woman living in the Negev. Their life was bad enough then - but far worse now!

http://www.mixcloud.com/Communitymatters/sidreh/

Eddie

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: bobad
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 10:03 AM

Can they be met half way?

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 09:48 AM

Ah, yes, Jim: your suggestion is a good one indeed. But, tho I think the Israelis might be persuaded to come to the UN conference table if the other side would too, I can't see the latter doing so -- or sticking by the terms of any 'agreement' that might be made. Who, after all, has broken every ceasefire to date? Their explicit policy -- indeed their declared raison-d'être -- is the complete destruction, not just of Israel, but of entire Jewry worldwide. They have even alienated all their natural support within the Arab world by such intransigence. And you think they'll meekly come to confer when the UN snaps its fingers. What's to 'negotiate', with such a basic declaration as instanced above anyhow? & re this UN 'peace force' to enforce ceasefire: are troops representing the UN to go in, fully armed, & fight the two sides to a standstill; or how is it to be encompassed?

Just asking

≈M≈

& how about an answer to that other question I have now asked you twice, in bold letters yet? Answer! Answer!

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: beardedbruce
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 09:25 AM

Are YOU saying it WAS?



How many opponents do you throw off a building to win a Palestinian election?

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: beardedbruce
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 09:24 AM

But for all the author's moral outrage -- outrage that is mirrored now across the world -- he declined to address the central charge that has been heard repeatedly over the years: How can Palestinian parents continue to support leaders within their community who would deliberately use their children as human shields? The fact that this Hamas war was provoked more to elevate Hamas' own standing than to achieve any concrete results -- beyond lifting an economic isolation that Hamas itself provoked -- makes the question of Palestinian passivity in that regard all the more troubling. There is nothing new about Hamas' tactics, and its leaders have been upfront about their willingness to sacrifice Palestinian children -- along with the rest of the civilian population -- in pursuit of their own strategic goals. Even as we watch image after image of stricken Palestinians mourning their dead children, we hear the corresponding words of a Hamas official: "What are 200 martyrs compared with lifting the siege?" Indeed, according to a paper in the Journal of Palestine Studies, Hamas--the elected government of Palestinians in Gaza--willfully sacrificed more that 160 Gazan children before any fighting in the digging of the tunnels themselves.

Within the progressive Jewish world -- where the anguish expressed in Golda Meir's words is deeply felt -- there is always an outcry when Israeli bombs kill Palestinian civilians, both out of moral outrage for the death and destruction and because of the ultimate bankruptcy of an Israeli strategy for which there is no endgame. But with each successive conflict, as Hamas missiles reach deeper into the country and the tunnels are deeper and longer, those voices become less vocal. While for some the broader conflicts in the region have emphasized the importance of pressuring Israel to remove settlements from confiscated Palestinian lands and live within its internationally accepted borders, for others the emergence of ISIS has only emphasized the long history of conflicts in the region and made the Hamas commitment to the destruction of Israel the sine qua non of the conflict. It is neither a metaphor nor a bargaining chip.

It is hard for many to accept the implications of that stance, but with each war Hamas aids our understanding and acceptance of their commitment. Indeed, Hamas has achieved what Bibi Netanyahu could not: it has forced progressive Jews to understand, if not accept, the logic of Israeli policies that they have long fought. Progressive Jews might have objected to Israel blocking the shipments of building materials and concrete into Gaza, but in this war the world has seen the complex network of tunnels built with an estimated six hundred thousand tons of concrete that we were told was urgently needed for schools and hospitals that were never built. Progressive Jews might have objected that Israeli was needlessly undermining Gaza economic development by preventing the development of a Gaza port, but the vast store of missiles is evidence that the boarded ships found to be filled with armaments intended to be used to kill Israelis were but the tip of the iceberg. Thus, the voices on the Jewish left have become muted.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-paul/what-part-of-hamas-strate_b_5644341.html?ncid=txtlnkusaolp00000592

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: Ringer
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 09:23 AM

"WE ARE QUOTING HAMAS. Which YOU claim was elected by the Gazans."

Er.. are you saying it wasn't, beardedbruce?

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: beardedbruce
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 08:19 AM

Jimmy boy,

"Quoting Islamic extremism is no more relevant that... "


WE ARE QUOTING HAMAS.

Which YOU claim was elected by the Gazans.

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: beardedbruce
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 08:01 AM

Clueless Kerry plays into hands of Hamas

— John Kerry is upset by heavy criticism from Israelis — left, right and center — of his recent cease-fire diplomacy. But that's only half the story. More significant is the consternation of America's Arab partners, starting with the president of the Palestinian Authority. Mahmoud Abbas was stunned that Kerry would fly off to Paris to negotiate with Hamas allies Qatar and Turkey in talks that excluded the PA and Egypt.

The talks also undermined Egypt's cease-fire proposal, which Israel had accepted and Hamas rejected. "Kerry tried through his latest plan to destroy the Egyptian bid," charged a senior Palestinian official quoted in the Arab daily Asharq Al-Awsat — a peace plan that the PA itself had supported.

It gets worse. Kerry did not just trample an Egyptian initiative. It was backed by the entire Arab League and specifically praised by Saudi Arabia. With the exception of Qatar — more a bank than a country — the Arabs are unanimous in wanting to see Hamas weakened, if not overthrown. The cease-fire they backed would have denied Hamas any reward for starting this war, while what Kerry brought back from Paris granted practically all of its demands.

Which is what provoked the severe criticism Kerry received at home, including from (among others) the scrupulously independent Washington Post columnist David Ignatius, who called Kerry's intervention a blunder.

Kerry seems oblivious to the strategic reality that Hamas launched its rockets in the hope not of defeating Israel but ending its intra-Arab isolation (which it brilliantly achieves in the Qatar-Turkey peace proposal). Hamas' radicalism has alienated nearly all of its Arab neighbors.

• Egypt cut off Gaza — indeed blockaded it — because of Hamas' support for the Muslim Brotherhood and terror attacks on Egyptian soldiers in Sinai.

• Fatah, the main element of the Palestinian Authority, is a bitter enemy, particularly since its Gaza members were terrorized, kneecapped, expelled and/or killed when Hamas seized Gaza in a 2007 coup.

• Hamas is non grata in Syria, where it had been previously headquartered, for supporting the anti-government rebels.

• Hamas is deeply opposed by Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states who see it, correctly, as yet another branch of the Islamist movement that threatens relatively moderate pro-Western Arab states.

Kerry seems not to understand that the Arab League backed the Egyptian cease-fire, which would have left Hamas weak and isolated, to ensure that Hamas didn't emerge from this war strengthened and enhanced.

Why didn't Kerry just stay home and declare unequivocal U.S. support for the Egyptian/Arab League plan? Instead, he flies off to Paris and sends Jerusalem a package of victories for Hamas: lifting the blockade from Egypt, opening the border with Israel, showering millions of foreign cash to pay the salaries of the 43,000 (!) government workers that the near-insolvent Hamas cannot.

Forget about Israeli interests. Forget about Arab interests. The American interest is to endorse and solidify this emerging axis of moderate pro-American partners (Israel, Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and other Gulf states, and the Palestinian Authority) intent on seeing Islamist radicalism blunted and ultimately defanged.

Yet America's own secretary of state doesn't see it. Speaking of Hamas-run Gaza, Kerry actually said in Paris: "The Palestinians can't have a cease-fire in which they think the status quo is going to stay." What must change? Gazans need "goods that can come in and out … a life that is free from the current restraints."

But the only reason for those "restraints," for goods unable to come in and out, is that for a decade Hamas has used this commerce to import and develop weapons for making war on Israel.

Remember the complaints that the heartless Israelis were not allowing enough imports of concrete for schools and hospitals? Well, now we know where the concrete went — into an astonishingly vast array of tunnels for infiltrating neighboring Israeli villages and killing civilians.

Lifting the blockade would mean a flood of arms, rockets, missile parts and other implements of terror for Hamas. What is an American secretary of state doing asserting that Hamas cannot cease fire unless it gets that?

Moreover, the fire from which Hamas will not cease consists of deliberate rocket attacks on Israeli cities — by definition, a war crime.

Whatever his intent, Kerry legitimized Hamas' war criminality. Which makes his advocacy of Hamas' terms not just a strategic blunder — enhancing an American-designated terror group just when a wall-to-wall Arab front wants to see it gone — but a moral disgrace.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/commentary/ct-kerry-mideast-clueless-krauthammer-oped-0804-20140804-column.html

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 07:11 AM

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-28628682

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 07:08 AM

The BBC journalist at the site said the impact was 30m outside the wall surrounding the school grounds.
Injured people filmed at the scene all happened to be young men.

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 06:10 AM

"What 'suggestion' of yours have I got? repeat it, please."
That the U,N. should be given the job of conducting peace talks and until that happens they should send in a peace force to end this carnage.
Yesterday Israel shelled another U.N. refuge centre - same old same old loss of life.
They claimed to be targeting 2 Hamas fighters driving past on a motor cycle, but as whoever it was was blown to smithereens, we'll never know who they were
Ban Ky Moon has described it as "a criminal act"
We are still awaiting the result of another attack on a U.N Centre which killed 17 and wounded over 100.
It seems that what the Israelis are doing is slaughtering civilians then    saying "t was Hamas's fault for being there" - no evidence required.
Last week, they bombed a home, wiping out an entire family - five children, including a new-born baby (a future Hamas fighter, no doubt).
An Israeli ambassador told an audience of Americans that Israel should get a Nobel Peace Prize for the number of lives it has saved by exercising "restraint" - sicker and sicker.
A leading clergyman in Dublin had denounced Israel as war criminals that should be put on trial for its crimes
The times they certainly are a-changing
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 05:57 AM

... and that not meant altogether as a trick question, Jim. I wonder myself, sometimes, whether I would have striven so to bring it about in my youth if I could have foreseen how it was all going to turn out. Seemed, as they say, a good idea at the time. But now constantly ask myself whether it really was so good an idea after all, or if we'd be better off if it hadn't happened. Blowed if I know the answer. Still, I say again, there it is and isn't going anywhere, so the questions can only be speculative whatiffery at that...

≈M≈

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 05:06 AM

What 'suggestion' of yours have I got? repeat it, please.

I am not 'throwing in my lot' with anything or anyone. I am watching what is happening with a feeling of absolute helpless horror; not unmixed with amazement at all the people
--are you one? another honest answer please--
who will make a moral equivalence between the entity who have published their intention to wipe the other, and all it adherents & co-religionists worldwide, off the face of the earth; and the other lot who are trying to defend themselves from their doing so.

But you haven't answered my main question; only the subsidiary one. So, again Jim:

Is it your opinion that Israel should never have been allowed to exist in the first place -- Honest, now? Just a simple yes or a no will do...

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 04 Aug 14 - 04:30 AM

"Eh, Jim? I can only take this to mean that Israel should now present Hamas with some more of its territory to fire some more rockets from?"
Then why not succumb to the wishes of the extremists - cut down all their fruit trees, break all their cameras and drive them out into the middle of the desert?
"In fact, Jim, would you be pleased if Israel were after all to be wiped off the map?"
You know damn well I wouldn't, and you are scraping the bottom of the barrel to suggest it
You have my suggestion - you sneer at it and have none of your own, so you throw your lot in with what is happening at present
Sorry Mike - this really is beneath you.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 03 Aug 14 - 05:24 PM

"The lesson that it was nowhere near enough."
.,,.
Eh, Jim? I can only take this to mean that Israel should now present Hamas with some more of its territory to fire some more rockets from? If that isn't what it means, then what is?

In fact, Jim, would you be pleased if Israel were after all to be wiped off the map? You might reply that IYO it should never have existed in the first place [is that your opinion, in fact? Honest, now?*]. But one can only start from here, as the well known yokel asked the way couldn't quite grasp. And there it is, and is not voluntarily about to go away.

So, seriously -- what would you?

Mmmmm?

≈M≈

*and for Christ's sake leave lip·service and all such tendentious abuse out of your reply, & just give us a straight answer to a straight question for once

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 03 Aug 14 - 02:49 PM

Quoting Islamic extremism is no more relevant that my quoting those in Israel who have demanded that all Palestinians should be driven out of the area en-mass - plenty of examples to choose from.
After the last incursion there were many demanding that all Gazan electricity and water should be cut off, forcing the Gazans to pack up and go immediately.
During this present murderous bloodbath, many Israelis have demanded that the army "push on and finish the job".
I have watched and read many many interviews with Israelis wh have said there is no room for any non-Jews.
What's your point?
As far as I can see, one bunch of crazies are saying what they would do if they had their way, another bunch of crazies have been doing it for the last three weeks.
Let me see - eenie, meenie, miny.....
For crying out loud John - we've covered this ground - why not peep your head out of your bunker and see what is happening, not what might happen.   
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: robomatic
Date: 03 Aug 14 - 02:12 PM

Hamas is making the most of the materials they have to hand, their own media outlet, the international media, the rockets they obtained over (or under) the Gaza-Egyptian border, the bodies of their people, the bodies of every Israeli victim they can obtain, and an overall strategy not unlike that of the Algerians in "Battle of Algiers".

Unfortunately for everyone, the ideological battle is kept alive by ignoring context. Ignoring the frequent attempts over the years to obtain a peace under the Aegis of America, and the many many attempts at terror from the Arabs.

The Palestinian people are not landholders with legal rights. They are DP (Displaced People). No one wants to take responsibility for them, and they are not making themselves an attractive proposition for anyone, least of all for Israel. Rather than seek an outlet where an outlet may be found or made, they double down on the proposition that they can get Israel down not to 1967 borders, but to pre-1948 non-existence.

Isolating Israel on the part of the world community, if that is what is going on, is only going to make things worse for the Palestinians. An insecure Israel is simply going to insist on an even less secure Palestine.

So there is a level at which the current festivities play to Israel's perception, that Hamas would rather shoot than talk, that every uninspected shipment to Gaza is suspect, that under the administration of Gaza by Hamas even construction materials are war materiel.

Israel tells Hamas you can keep your rockets

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 03 Aug 14 - 01:44 PM

Jim, for sure, and probably some others have tried to equate, obliquely, criticism of Israel by such as Einstein and Oz with anti-Semitism. Manifestly they are not anti-Semites. Here is a recent excerpt from Die Welt of an interview 9translated) with Amos Oz.

----------

[Q] You have been talking about a long-term solution. But what could a short-term agreement look like?
[A] The present hostilities will only stop, unfortunately, when one of the parties or both of them are exhausted. This morning I read very carefully the charter of Hamas. It says that the Prophet commands every Muslim to kill every Jew everywhere in the world. It quotes the Protocols of the Elders of Zion [anti-Semitic diatribe - the ed.] and says that the Jews controlled the world through the League of Nations and through the United Nations, that the Jews caused the two world wars and that the entire world is controlled by Jewish money. So I hardly see a prospect for a compromise between Israel and Hamas. I have been a man of compromise all my life. But even a man of compromise cannot approach Hamas and say: 'Maybe we meet halfway and Israel only exists on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.'

----------

Lest Jim, Steve (oh, I forgot he's not here anymore)or musket think I'm cherry-picking, I have provided both the German and English links for those who wish to read the entire interview:

http://www.dw.de/amos-oz-israel-kann-nur-verlieren/a-17823004

http://www.dw.de/oz-lose-lose-situation-for-israel/a-17822511

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 03 Aug 14 - 01:38 PM

"Honest, now, if you were the Knesset, or any member of the population of Israel, what lessons would you draw from that sequence of events?"
The lesson that it was nowhere near enough.
Gaza is a ghetto - it is now being referred to as the world's largest open prison.
Expecting people to continue living in those circumstances is inhuman.
Israel's 'concessions' were, in fact a demand of surrender to the status quo - would you have expected that of the residents of the Warsaw Ghetto to have been grateful for such a concession - "we won't let any more of our people take over your homes and we'll remove a handful of those that have moved in unofficially - oh, and by the way, we reserve the right to decide which leaders govern you?
Personally, the way the Israeli regime has behaved and counting the dead (Keith and co have noticeably refused to acknowledge that rather unpleasant fact, other than to give it their full support) I think the Palestinians would be insane to accept anything less than the removal of the blockade and the Berlin walls and having the U.N. on hand to see that this does not happen again.
I suggest you read what the supports of Israel have contributed here if you want some idea of how suicidal it would be to settle for anything less - these people are inhuman.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 03 Aug 14 - 01:18 PM

And you sound more like a vulgar, foul-mouthed little yobbo, I regret to observe, Jim.

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 03 Aug 14 - 12:39 PM

"Gaza does not have to be at war with Israel, and if it were not there would be no blockade."
You mean surrender itself to being a permanent ghetto
Piss of Keith - you sound more like Lord Haw-Haw with every posting
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: bobad
Date: 03 Aug 14 - 10:36 AM

Another reminder as to the "elected" government of Hamas:

Hamas won a PLURALITY (not majority) in a LEGISLATIVE election in 2006. The directly elected President (in 2005) was (and remained) Abbas. The election results were 44% for Hamas and 41% for Fatah. After Hamas failed to form a government, about a year after the election, Hamas and Fatah reached a power-sharing unity government under the Mecca Agreement (brokered by the Saudis). Then in June of 2007 Hamas perpetrated a violent coup (throwing Fatah officials off roof-tops) and illegally seized all power. Only about 20% of the PA population supported this military takeover.

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 03 Aug 14 - 10:36 AM

I suppose in the vernacular, an elected government can be said to "seize power."

They won a majority of seats on the Palestinian Legislative Council, not a mandate to rule Gaza.
They achieved that through a violent coup.

That said, Israel would never lift the blockade anyway, as any serious observer would notice.

They have eased it considerably.
They used to prohibit building materials because Hamas might use them to build military infrastructure, and they did.

Gaza declared war and Israel declared a blockade as any country would.
The difference is that most countries would apply a total blockade against a belligerent, not just an economic one.

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: bobad
Date: 03 Aug 14 - 10:30 AM

There was no blockade when Israel quit Gaza.

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 03 Aug 14 - 10:02 AM

Another reminder of a bit of quite recent "historical fact".

2004-05

The Israeli Government wanted to make concessions to the Palestinians. So they resolved to withdraw the entire Israeli presence from the Gaza Strip, bordering the Sinai Peninsula, neighbouring Egypt. They had forcibly to evict the inhabitants of some settlements who declined to leave voluntarily, and rehouse them in other parts of Israel ~~ not entirely to their delight!

Then they left Gaza to govern itself. So the Palestinian population organised and held free elections.

And who did they elect to govern them?

Why, Hamas -- who else?

With results that we are all on about here.

Honest, now, if you were the Knesset, or any member of the population of Israel, what lessons would you draw from that sequence of events?

Just asking --

≈M≈

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: Musket
Date: 03 Aug 14 - 10:01 AM

I suppose in the vernacular, an elected government can be said to "seize power." Although the only reason you would say it is that they have a single focus, for which they had no mandate, to agitate and force the backers of Israel to think again. In that, Hamas are forcing the issue. That said, Israel would never lift the blockade anyway, as any serious observer would notice. It was there before Hamas were elected.

I am reading Political diaries and by coincidence, one diarist is noting January 2009 when Israel tried bombing a democratically elected government. He notes that The UK voted for a UN resolution for a ceasefire but The USA abstained, the first time we voted differently to The USA regarding Israeli aggression. Hamas said they weren't bound by the ceasefire as they hadn't been consulted. As bad as they are, and as cynical as I am over their aims, over and above the peace that Palestinians crave for, you can't help noticing the arrogance of many Western countries, ignoring elected governments when they don't like them and supporting dictatorships when it suits.

The diarist also notes that Egypt and Saudi Arabia (remembering this was five years ago) did as they were told by The USA in the same way the maharajas and rajas did when we ran India.

Move forward five years and one thing has changed. Israeli atrocities are front page news and that makes politicians sit up and think.

Right now, they are thinking of the latest bombing of a school run by The UN. Obviously, the Israeli militants decided the world wasn't outraged enough when it happened last week so they chose another.

Steve Shaw is right though. I should leave blood to the bloodthirsty. Terrorism to the terrorist sympathisers.

Have you noticed that when you point out how Mudcat is being infiltrated by extremists and bigots, it is they who accuse decent people of the same? Guess which minister of propaganda used that tactic in the '30s?

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: bobad
Date: 03 Aug 14 - 09:35 AM

Just a reminder:

The rockets are not because of the blockade, the blockade is because of the rockets.

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 03 Aug 14 - 09:20 AM

Jim, Israel is not cutting bits off Gaza.
Gaza does not have to be at war with Israel, and if it were not there would be no blockade.

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 03 Aug 14 - 08:27 AM

Why so abusive, Jim? What good you think it does your side of the argument?

As to "historical fact". My History teacher for Higher Schools, back in the 1940s, used to say that, properly speaking, "every history essay should begin with Adam & Eve". We all knew what he meant.

So where, historically, should this thread begin:
1200 BC (Moses)?
135 AD (Hadrian's diaspora)?
1880s-90s (beginning of Jewish immigration)?
1896 (Theodor Herzl's 'The Jewish State')?
1917 (Balfour Declaration)?
1948 (Declaration of State in accordance with UN Resolution followed by invasion by all surrounding Arab states)?...

It really doesn't do to oversimplify...

≈M≈

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 03 Aug 14 - 08:07 AM

"Gaza would probably be a prosperous region and tourist destination."
At the rate Israel was cutting chunks off it, it would probably ended up as a beach with a couple of ice-cream kiosks - don't think I've ever come across such a total misinterpretation of historical fact.
"Hamas chose that."
War was a fact of life for Palestinians before Hamas was a twinkle in anybody's eye.
You really are not earning your Shekels - do your homework, you nasty little man, or you'll have to stay behind and do 100 lines after school!
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Small hope for Israel/Palestine
From: GUEST,hw
Date: 03 Aug 14 - 07:59 AM

"Never Again" for Anyone