Breaking Media, Politicians & Celebrities Since 1995

I think if you examine recent (lets say 60 years or so) history, israel is the “blow up one of them” expert around that region. Hmmm were do we start? USS Liberty? (no not the one that has recently broken the illegal israeli siege on Gaza, the other one), the USA navy ship, bombed by israeli’s in 1967. Before that we had the king david hotel blown to bits by the zionists killing many British servicemen. Oh, and dont forget the annihilation of Lebanese innocent civiliansand infrastructure in 2006. Typical jewish propaganda from this site, thing is though, we are not as blind as you would hope, people see what the jewish state really is, an illegally occupied, racist state, committing genocide against indigenous Palestinians. Ha, fat chance of you letting this one through but at least YOU have seen it.

And me.

Little Miss High and Mighty clearly hasn’t received her orders from Jerusalem this morning…

I don’t know; it’s kind of exciting.

Just who is ‘YOU’?

I’m not too keen on military service.

Are you sure it’s not ‘It could be YOU’?

“If I were an Arab leader, I would never sign an agreement with Israel. It is normal; we have taken their country. It is true God promised it to us, but how could that interest them? Our God is not theirs. There has been Anti - Semitism, the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault ? They see but one thing: we have come and we have stolen their country. Why would they accept that?” - David Ben Gurion…

uknortherner, I have sympathy with both sides (knowing folks on both as I do). It is the politicial opportunists of both hijacking their respective religions to further their own careers and interests that you want to directing your bile toward. The evil folks are those who promise the vulnerable that they will receive their reward in the afterlife if they destroy themselves to kill and maim others. The evil folks are those who inflame a soldier’s passions to the point where he will shoot a British aid worker in a street.

What riles me is that it was, once again, the hand of Blighty what done it. The Mandate was a hard thing to hammer out - and has caused problems that will persist for years and years to come - but at least only one side has nukes. Take what we did to India and Pakistan…both tooled up to the radioactive teeth, scrapping over Kashmir and indulging in brinkmanship that at times seems like a fledgling version (if the ages of countries could be equated to those of people) of what the US and USSR came to over Cuba. We all know what happens when the young ones play with matches…

[Dash it all, uknortherner. I come to Anorak to be funny. I know I only manage that about 3% of the time, but replying to posts like yours don't help my figures at all]

uknortherner, which is exacterly what I am too (dash it all is an aside to myself, one of many affectations maintained to keep my commenting here - and elsewhere, with generally more of a coprolalic cynical twist, uniquely mine in flavour).

I don’t think people are brainwashed by religion. I don’t think Islam, Christianity or Judaism (Christ! I had to look that up - most of the yiddisher lads I know rarely discuss religion) are evil. I think there are those who have used them for as long as they have existed to further their own ends. Consolidating power, land grabs, resource wars…even the good stuff like freedom fighting.
The situation in Gaza and the West Bank (which I agree is an occupation, but then so was the Roman’s stay in our country - which could be as beneficial - were it not for the bloodshed caused by the aforementioned users of innocents) is complicated by the two faiths having the same centre of mass around Jerusalem, having histories spanning centuries in the same larger geographical area, and our own involvement (in the Mandate, supplying part of Israel’s nuclear know-how and equipment in our case; supplying cash, military support and technology in the USA’s case).

When I see a Palestinian mother proudly talking about how her 16-year old son will meet a grisly end in some explosive atrocity during this - this second, bloodier intifada; or an extremely right-wing Orthodox Jew maintaining that Palestinians should be scoured from the land (translated from the Arabic-language news for me by the helpful Palestinians I know - who also rarely discuss religion) I just want to foam, froth, seethe and often cry. The young man who straps on a bomb to go to a cafe frequented by Jews today may be the one who would have discovered a cure for cancer twenty years from now. The right-wing settler who reoccupies a plot of land his own government has told him not to return to may be a teacher, or doctor, to both peoples given time and understanding…

Were it not for the whispering in their ears of those who use their fervour without regard to how it will affect them, their children, their grandchildren - if either of my examples lives to have them.

Ahmadinejhad may truly be the best thing to happen in Iran for some time. The Newtonian recoil back to fundamentalism after the Shah was deposed could not have lasted. It was a transitory state. Ahdmadinijhad acknowledging Israel’s right to exist may permit Iran to have just as much crappy and unsafe nuclear power as we and the French have. Israel would be insane to attempt a nuclear attack on Iran, Syria or any other country opposed to them. The others, even the moderate ones, would fall upon them like wolves - and both peoples around the Red Sea would suffer for it.

The mention of propaganda in your comment was what sparked off my response. Any propaganda can only be so if we allow ourselves to believe or rail against it; if we do neither than it is simply bullshit someone wants us to get upset about. Which brings me back to my point about the whisperings of those who want to use us for their own ends.

If the rest of Iran and Syria and Israel and India and Pakistan (continue until the names of all fledgling or incipient nuclear states are exhausted - include us, the US and Russia too) can think like Mahmoud appears to be, then we will only have to worry about a Chernobyl MkII and the creation of a huge glass skating rink somewhere in the world. It’ll be pretty devastating, but better the fault of some bloke who didn’t tap a dial often enough than anyone pressing a button marked ‘kill them other ones over there’. As for being experts in blowing things up, were all amateurs at it until we’ve dropped a nuke on somewhere with people in it. Fortunately that hasn’t had to be done since WW2. I hope the US of the (happily) receding past remains the only expert at that.

[I'm down to 2% now...I'm going to have to reach into my bag of knob gags]

karen, i am no bigot and find your resorting to name calling, illuminating. http://www.palestinechronicle.com/news.php?id=22285e574975c4e92771ddad85d5bf0f&mode=details#22285e574975c4e92771ddad85d5bf0f even israels prime minister acknowledges this fact that you cannot. and yes, i agree, millions of foriegners coming to a persons land, expelling the indigenous residents and ethnically cleansing the place of anyone that doesnt follow their religion could, quite likely trigger a response.

uknortherner

The same kind of displacements happened in Liberia and the Sudan and in Pakistan and many other places, the middle-East is full of tribal and sectarian conflicts, the Kurds and the Sh’ia and Christians in particular being massacred and ethnically cleansed many times - I don’t see the same kind of howling for blood that we see from anti-Israelis.

It’s not as if the millions of foreigners came because they wanted to - they were forced into it and now their descendent’s are stuck in a difficult situation and they need to find a way out of it (which is easy on paper but never easy in reality - it’s a basic security dilemma where the consequences of trust would be less than the consequences of a trust betrayed).

And you are a bigot - you hate and blame one side without caring how or why they ended up the way they did - and in adding to the emotional hysteria in the region you make it more likely - not less likely - that the Israelis will overreact to every threat to their position… they’re mentally prepared for a Masada…

I care about both sides and belong to several organisations that are working for a 2 state solution… also we’re working on bringing their narratives (which are hugely at odds) into some kind of harmony… although demographics will probably put an end to Israel as the Arab population of the country (there are Arabs in the country) is set to outnumber the Jewish population over the next few decades…

I’m sure you’ll approve of the indigenous population forcing out or killing the foreingers…

What, uknortherner - no response to my flawed and ineloquent but impassioned rambling? It was the knob gag thing wasn’t it?
Ah, well…perhaps I can redeem myself and allow a brighter, warmer soul than I to guide us both.

“Fanaticism consists in redoubling your efforts when you have forgotten your aim.”
George Santayana - from ‘The Life Of Reason’