International reaction to the Israeli election has been decidedly mixed. The UK Times hails the outcome as “extraordinary” - since when did unilateralism require anything other than contempt for the other side? - while Fairfax’s Michael Gawenda is more circumspect:
In the foreseeable future, there will be no real steps taken towards unilateral withdrawal, there will be no substantive negotiations with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, and the United States, which has still to recover from the shock of the Hamas triumph in the Palestinian elections, will be in no position to influence the course of events in the months ahead.
The paper’s editorial rightly states that peace with justice is impossible, while Murdoch’s Australian applauds Israel for simply ignoring the Palestinians. The occupied will, and should, respond appropriately.
Ehud Olmert has said that, “All Zionist parties are potential coalition partners.” He clearly doesn’t realise, or care, about the growing international opposition to an ideology that openly and proudly subjugates another people in the name of self-determination.
The US apparently recovered from the shock of the palestinians actually voting their feelings about 5 nanoseconds after the results were known.
If Olmert is not allowed to discuss abatement of goals with parties such as zionist oraginizations that have an ideology that openly and proudly subjugates another people in the name of self-determination, then Antony is telling Israel to ignore Hamas and do whatever it wants.
You can’t have it both ways, Antony. At least not and still have credibility. Examination of what Antony denounces does reveal a subtle bigotry. It is ok for Arab Muslims to have such stances, but not Jews.
You might want to rephrase that pot Chris, it makes absolutely no sense what you have written.
Chris it’s worth noting that even if Hamas wants to kick Israel into the sea (which is a matter of conjecture), Zionists not only want to kick the Palestinians off their lands they actually have the capacity to do it. As a Jewish friend of mind recently explained to me - he lives in Sydney yet he could own land in the West Bank without needing a permit, yet a Palestinian who has lived in the same spot for generations would have to pay thousands of dollars and even then is unlikely to receive ‘permission’. The Palestinian is more likely to have his/her home demolished and land confiscated. So there’s no subtle bigotry about it at all.
It is worthwhile comparing media coverage of the Israeli elections with the recent Palestinian elections. Even from before Hamas’ election there was commentary to the effect that Hamas was likely to win and this would not be good for the prospects of peace. I’m not aware of much mainstream coverage of Kadima’s (quite open) policies pertaining to the West Bank. The Wall is to seclude and partition the Palestinians. In time it is hoped that the Palestinians will behave themselves enough to fulfill the most menial labour requirements that Israel has on offer (something which the World Bank has blessed it should be noted). You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to work out how devastating this will be for any semblance of long term peace. That is, of course, assuming you have access to the facts and aren’t hampered or confused by the barrage of rhetoric and misinformation the corporate media excels in producing. It also exposes Sharon’s dream (of which Kadima is one end product)for what it is - a colonialist vision of a greater Israel eventually expunged of any natives (Palestinians).
Iqbal, well put. We live in a world where there is one set of rules for some and an opposite set of rules for others.
I heard Bolton this morning issuing threats to Iran if it didn’t come to heel. Not a mention of Israel who already has an arsenal of nuclear weapons and has never even belonged to the NPT.
The U.S. and Israel have many things in common: they believe that might is always right, that the ends always justify the means, that all problems can be solved using bombs, tanks and missiles, that spreading democracy is fine as long as you get the outcome you want, and that their religious ideology (Judeo-Christian) justifies their control of Palestine and any other part of the world they fancy.
But who will bring them to heel?
Your friend in Sydney probably does not know what he is talking about. He most liskely can not own land in the west bank. He probably could live there.
As there are no known Jewish Israeli suicide bombers, it is more likely that a palestinian home will be razed. Why would you expect it to be any different? Certainly no bigotry at play there.
I believe the Israelis no longer care what the palestinians do. They will import inexpensive labor from Asia and. I assume the Palestinians are counting on Arabs elsewhere to hire them.
What America and Israel have in common is a morality that is alien to the Arab world, as is the morality of most western nations.
There is no palestine to control.
Finally, some clarity…
Israel and America are ‘moral’ and Arabs and Palestinians are, therefore, “immoral.”
Some unbridled racism is revealed for all to see. But, of course, defending Israel isn’t racism, it’s pragamatism, right?
Antony, as always, you chose to believe what you believe, contrary to what actually exists.
If you chose to believe that arab morality is immoral, that is your choice. If you chose to believe it is a morality that is outside the western ideal of morality, that too is your choice. But that choice is closer to reality than the former.
The unbridled racism is exhibited by the Arab world. if you chose to ignore it, again, it is your choice to ignore reality.
Chris Mar 30th, 2006 at 1:08 pm
One would hardly expect there to be any. The Israeli state is the Occupier, not the Occupied; and the Israeli citizenry has the world’s forth largest and most techologically advanced army to serve it. There is simply no need for suicide bombers.
….in the mind of Chris, where little voices exist called real people.
Oh my, Chris is treating us to a display of preatzel logic at it;s very best. This is such fun, More please.
And you have most certainly chosen your own reality, one inhabbited only by “real people” and in a world of “it appears”.
Give a suicide bomber an Apaeche helicopter or and F-16 and see if he still chooses to be a suicide bomber.
How does one write so much while managing to say absolutely nothing?
As you have already admitted to understanding wht ‘real people” means, it is unbecoming for you know to make statements as if you are an ignorant ass. But it is your choice to do so.
Antony understands what you do not. Damn shame you lack an education.
Give a palestinian an apache helicopter or an f-16 and you will still have a dead palestinian.
Murdoch’s paper doen’t praise ignoring the Palestinian, it praises ignoring the genocidal mass that calls it self the master of the palestinian people.
It is a differnce on morality that allow the palestinian mother to urge her son to commit suicide if it means the death of a Jewish child.
That is why there are no Jewish suicide bombers.
Your posts are becommgni increasignly incoherent by the day Chris. How do you explain this?
Antony happens to disagree with you entirely in case you hadn’t noticed.
Whatever you say Popeye.
That doesn;t answer the question. You know very well that suicide bombers would choose to do otherwise if they had the weapons of destruction made avilabel to Israel.
If Israel were as poorly armed as the Palesitnains and as badly treated, there is no telling what some woudl be pushed to do.
Again with the never-ending racism charges. This coming from a sanctimonious little fellow who constantly accuses his detractors of crying wolf & employing the exact same tactic as a way of shutting descent.
Comical_Ali Mar 30th, 2006 at 3:11 pm
Well when you make never-ending racist statements, what would you expect?
Based on what is occuring in Iraq, it appears that suicide bombing and its martyrdom effects are preferable.
It is a morality thing. It appears, to Arabs, that suicide bombing is very moral, especially if it involves killing Jewish children. Does that make those Arabs racist?
Chris, your response to Iqbal is unsubstantiated. Why is Iqbal’s friend “probably” wrong, and why is it “most likely” that he cannot own land?
To what? What do the insurgents in Iraq have at their disposal other than IED’s? You just proved myu point, though it might take you a while to reaslie it.
In the US, Britain and Australia, those who die in teh line of duty are considered heros. Those that are wounded are given Purple Hearts. Does than mean that these countries consider killing and dying moral, epecially when it involves killing Arabs? Does that make these countries racist?
Chris Mar 30th, 2006 at 11:30 pm
You’re right. But that is merely the opening line of an introduction to an argument. It’s not the clincher of one. For example, you’ll have to counter the actual arguments made by moral philosophers such as Ted Hondrich and Michael Neumann who assert that Palestinian terrorist bombings are morally right, where the people are experiencing, have been experiencing for 30 years, and are likely to continue to experience irrespective of concilliatory actions, the violation of their most basic rights; rights that nation-states -including the Israeli state - assert are worth killing for.
Doyle,
I do not believe it is possible for anyone to ‘buy’ land in the area known by Arabs as the West Bank, unless an Arab is selling it. The land under the control of the Israeli government is leased as ownership stays with the government, due to the fact that the land is in dispute and may, once their is an Arab peace partner in more than ‘forked tongue’, the land may change hands to another government. Now, again, this is my understanding of the situation.
That does not explain why settlements are being expanded in those terrirories does it?
That was not the question.
Mayeb, but you made the observation that:
Therefore, is it not a risk to contiune developing settlements if they run the risk of being dimanteld and the settlers relocated?
Regardless of the risk, it was not the question.
From Antony’s lnk:
In Europe, left-wing activists use their supposed concern for the Palestinian people to cloak anti-Semitism. And throughout the West appeasers argue that if the US abandoned Israel, Islamic terrorists would stop attacking the US and its allies. Such suggestions are politically plain wrong and morally sinister. Osama bin Laden and his confederates hate the West for its values and since when did abandoning democracies Munich-style become acceptable? But it is easy to understand why the Israelis have looked at Hamas and the endless low-level conflict on the West Bank, and decided it is all too much trouble.
What else do you excpoect fro ma fascist rag from Murdoch?
The honest evaluation that was published. Too bad it takes a newspaper that some, without evidence, refer to as a “fascist rag”.
What lengths some here take to discredit truth.
Discrediting the truth? Hmmm. Let’s see:
Easily proven to be false seeing as this implies all of the left are anti-Semitic. Is that your position?
Misreapresenting the argument seeing as the israeli/Palestinian conflict is one of a number of issues that have created resentment in teh ME towards the US.
Seeing as this requires pre-cognition, it is an opinoin and nothing more.
The biggest carnard of them all. If this were true, then surely Sweden, Denmark and germany too would have been attacked. All independent terrorim experts dispute this outright.
All that low level conflict just appens all on it’s own and for no reason, and the Israelis are just keeping the peace.
if you consider any of this to be the truth Chris, then you must consider Wonder Land your home.
It implies that some left wing activists are antisemitic, not all on the left are such.
Now that you have been discredited again, there is no need to revisit the subject.
You have already proven your ignorance regarding the history of the middle east. No need to revisit that either.
Go on. Run away like the coward that you are. I wil assume you agree with me on the hoiles I picked in this pathetic article.
You have proven your indictrination about history of the middle east, not actual knwoledge of it, but it’s easy to see how you woudl confuse the two.
Indoctrination vs ignorance. Let’s see.
Indoctrination: To be instructed in a body of doctrine or principles.
In other words, you are asserting that I have an education on the history of the middle east which you feel does not allow your particular point of view.
Ignorance: The lack of knowledge or education.
In other words, it has been proven that you lack knowledge and most likely, education.
Seems it is better to be indoctrinated, since it does imply being educated, than being an ignorant lout such as yourself.
There seems to be enough anti-muslim backlash in the areas you noted to keep them from being attacked outright. The US represents, for those islamic fascists, the greatest of western cultures, thus the best target. But it appears those same islamic fascists hate jews more than anything else.
You;’re tight. indoctrinatino was innapropriate.
Let’s settle for bainwash.
That;s pure speculation. it could justa s easily be said that Israeli Jews are bearing the burden of anti-US sentiment as well as anti-Israeli sentiment. After all, in the eyes of many Arabs, it would appear that Israel is another US state.
bainwash? There were no negotiations. You have stated your terms. This is not the first time your foolish comments have backfired on you and you then wish to change the conditions.
It is not idle speculation that the Islamic fascist Arabs hate jews above all else. Just observing a trend shown in their religious sermons.
Note these items from the Arab press and media.
First, the Saudi military journal has an article titled “The Jews in the Modern Era” whose thesis is “The Majority of Revolutions, Coups D’etat, and Wars … are Almost Entirely the Handiwork of the Jews.”
Second, the Egyptian press (which is all government controlled) recently published an article resuscitating the blood libel that Jews use Gentile blood in religious rituals and that Jews have an obligation to annihilate non-Jews. The second largest amount of foreign aid doled out by the US goes to Egypt.
******************************************************
In terms of Arab-Israeli politics, Jews have been accused of countless sins by much of the world today. But, as is noted in terms of yet another Jewish holiday, Passover, while it is regrettable that any hardship had to be suffered even by enemies who would destroy us, as we symbolically remove drops of wine from our cups at the Seder dinner to diminish our joy of deliverance, we offer no apologies for wanting to put an end to our two thousand year-old nightmare of massacres, forced conversions, expulsions, ghettoization, pogroms, dehumanization, inquistions, dhimmitude, demonization, Holocaust, and being labeled either killers of G_d by the Christian West or “Jew Dog” killers of Prophets in the Muslim East by doing what was necessary for our own survival…working, with G_d’s timely help, for the rebirth of Israel. The Prophet Ezekiel’s vision of the Valley of the Dry Bones arrived just in the nick of time…
At a time when Arabs and their fellow jihadists and hypocrite supporters elsewhere offer no confessions and ask no forgiveness from neither G_d nor man for blowing up buses, restaurants, hotels, and schools, or deliberately targeting innocents, subjugating, enslaving, and massacring millions of non-Arab peoples (Kurds, Black Africans, Jews, Copts, Berbers, and others as well) just in the last half century alone, on behalf of the Arab nation and what they claim as “purely Arab patrimony,” Jews can honestly say that they have truly tried–repeatedly–to reach a just solution to their problems with Arabs. To any objective observer, this is not debatable.
Negotiations? What negotiations? Yu been rollign joints on the job again? backfired? Holy cow you’re medication is wayyy to strong Chris.
Woudl you care yo provide a link to exaclty what Arab press and media outlet you are referring to? Anyone can post a link from a country and try to suggest it is somehow a an admission of guilt on the part of Arabs.
One could just as easily quote Uri Avnery sayign the same thing abotu Israel and the Zionism.
“Yu been rollign joints” You are either spitting to0 hard at getting caught, again, or so drunk you make no sense.
Either way, you lost again. You must be a Hamastanian.
You’;re back to ranting like a boggoted lunatic Chris. I noticed that in the other thread you ahve become recgoinised by most on teh forum as the village idiot once again. You really are making a disater of your reputation and you probably don;t even know it.
What is clear is that you are a hate filled, racist biggot.
No you are the loser Chris. Chekc out the other threads where your pathetic posts are getting a pasting. You are turning into the lepper of this forum.
Who is the loser now?
You and your fellow Hamastanians.