Thread: The Problem with Israel

Buddy,I wouldn't mock you,nor particularly care about your squabbles with the Greeks.Just Israel.

Then why shouldn't they be called Israel?

Originally Posted by Parihaka

More actually, Jad's map is a detail.


The British arbitrarily excluded what is now Jordan from Jewish settlement, specifically as a Muslim/Hashemite homeland free of Jews.

Something is wrong with that map. Wasn't Jerusalem meant to be under special UN mandate?

As I said before, I'd like to know the name of the genius who divided the land that way.

Originally Posted by The Black Ghost

For practical reasons that obviously isnt possible because you cant meet or interact with everyone, but I am willing to bet you dont want enemies--in which case it is best to maintain a positive relationship with people whenever possible.

I became a much happier person when I became old and grouchy.

Originally Posted by The Black Ghost

Operation Desert Fox

CIA support of bombing/terror campaign in Iraq

Do you even read your own links?

From Operation Desert Fox

The December 1998 bombing of Iraq (code-named Operation Desert Fox) was a major four-day bombing campaign on Iraqi targets from December 16–19, 1998 by the United States and United Kingdom. The contemporaneous justification for the strikes was Iraq's failure to comply with United Nations Security Council resolutions as well as their interference with United Nations Special Commission inspectors.

Translation: Saddam failed to live up to the Terms of Surrender as established by the victors.

From CIA support of bombing/terror campaign in Iraq

No public records of the bombing campaign exist, and the former officials said their recollections were in many cases sketchy, and in some cases contradictory. They could not even recall exactly when it occurred, though the interviews made it clear it was between 1992 and 1995.

The Iraqi government at the time claimed that the bombs, including one it said exploded in a movie theater, resulted in many civilian casualties. But whether the bombings actually killed any civilians could not be confirmed because, as a former C.I.A. official said, the United States had no significant intelligence sources in Iraq then.

Translation: This guy who blew up buses said he was working for the CIA but absolutely no evidence supports his claim. I've read the entire article and not once that any CIA official, former or otherwise, said the CIA ordered it. Those officials said they remembered the bombings but not once did they mention they ordered it nor knew it was ordered by Langley.

Originally Posted by The Black Ghost

What? Where are you getting this information?

NDHQ.

Originally Posted by The Black Ghost

Please please cite your sources.

Your Google-fu is dismal.

Compromise resolution likely as UN opposition remains firm | World news | The Guardian
Canada intensifies support for US war on Iraq

Originally Posted by The Black Ghost

As the polls showed, foreign support for the Iraq war was critically low.

So what? Governments have a responsibility to protect their peoples no matter how unpopular the decision.

Originally Posted by The Black Ghost

Some countries said they would participate if the UN granted the invasion, but few were willing to take an active role in the war except to get US aid/cash.

Sucks to be them, didn't it? The US took the bribes off the table when they took the UN vote off the table.

Originally Posted by Doktor

Something is wrong with that map. Wasn't Jerusalem meant to be under special UN mandate?

It's just an outline

Originally Posted by Doktor

As I said before, I'd like to know the name of the genius who divided the land that way.

Some people who didn't want it to succeed

Originally Posted by Parihaka

The British arbitrarily excluded what is now Jordan from Jewish settlement, specifically as a Muslim/Hashemite homeland free of Jews.

Not really arbitrary, arbitrary was allowing the Jews in against the wishes of the locals. The severing of Transjordan and Palestine was born out of two things- British obligations to war time allies (Arabs and France) and the political maneuverings of the Arabs for an independent state. Ya the Jewish Agency was mad, the amount of land they could steal was greatly reduced. And I do mean steal since much of the land they wanted has no or very little historical ties to the Jews.

The area around Acre was never Jewish, and what we now call Gaza was likewise Philistine territory not Jewish.

Samaria hasn't been Jewish since the time of the Ayssrians, and Samaritans are not considered Jews by Jews. Even when it was Jewish it was only Jewish for a combined total of 333 years out of the last 3000 non more recent than 720 B.C until 1948.

Moab was never Jewish, but more like Samaria some kinship and similarities but a different religion and people... Edom was never Jewish either...

So where does this historical link to the land come from?

Looking at a reconstructed map of the combined kingdoms of Israel and Judea during the Iron Age (c. 1000 BCE), it's true that coastal areas to the south (Philistine states) and to the north (Phoenician states) lay outside of biblical Israel as does considerable territory to the southeast below Palestine. But not all areas of biblical Israel are included in modern day Israel. If that were the case, Palestine, except for Gaza, would be inside Israel today.

It seems to me all these fine line distinctions are moot. Israel was created by forces greater than those that opposed it. There is no more injustice in that than there is in the creation of most of today's nations. The difference is that it was more recent, and its victims are still around to challenge it.

Originally Posted by zraver

Not really arbitrary, arbitrary was allowing the Jews in against the wishes of the locals. The severing of Transjordan and Palestine was born out of two things- British obligations to war time allies (Arabs and France) and the political maneuverings of the Arabs for an independent state. Ya the Jewish Agency was mad, the amount of land they could steal was greatly reduced. And I do mean steal since much of the land they wanted has no or very little historical ties to the Jews.

The area around Acre was never Jewish, and what we now call Gaza was likewise Philistine territory not Jewish.

Samaria hasn't been Jewish since the time of the Ayssrians, and Samaritans are not considered Jews by Jews. Even when it was Jewish it was only Jewish for a combined total of 333 years out of the last 3000 non more recent than 720 B.C until 1948.

Moab was never Jewish, but more like Samaria some kinship and similarities but a different religion and people... Edom was never Jewish either...

So where does this historical link to the land come from?

What a load of bollocks. Such actions have taken place world wide throughout history up until the current day.
Samoan immigration into NZ anyone? Asian into Britain? Muslim into Europe? How about the ethnic cleansing, enforced by your government throughout the former Yugoslavia? Where's the outrage for the ethnic Germans forced marched out of their traditioal homes post WWII, with deaths numbering in the millions.

I'm sorry but repeating the same crap over and over again as though Israel is 'special' doesn't add any credence to it.

Go on, tell me how they've got different DNA again.

Originally Posted by Parihaka

What a load of bollocks. Such actions have taken place world wide throughout history up until the current day.
Samoan immigration into NZ anyone? Asian into Britain? Muslim into Europe?

I am not aware that any great powers sat down following a massive global conflict and decided that hey, lets end the Moslem and Asian problem once and for all by moving them into Europe against the wishes of the Europeans. After all from the Huns through the Mongols Asian steppe people did invade europe so they do have historical ties to the land and many of them later became moslem as well...

Yet that is what the great powers did to the Palestinians aided and abetted by the Jewish Agency that was claiming or trying to claim not jsut the historic land of Israel but also the land of her historic neighbors. If the Jewish Agency had gotten their way in 1921 there would be no Jordan despite the fact that Aman was never Jewish, the Jewish agency wanted the entire area and to hell with the local populations.

How about the ethnic cleansing, enforced by your government throughout the former Yugoslavia?

What ethnic cleansing enforced by the US? The one place that line may have some validity is Kosovo... which I did not support.

Where's the outrage for the ethnic Germans forced marched out of their traditioal homes post WWII, with deaths numbering in the millions.

Really... lets see since the Sudetenland, Pomerania and Prussia were given to the Czechs, Russians and Poles following Germany's invasion of all 3 (Russia twice) killing tens of millions how many world wars have been fought? unlike the Germans, in 1967 the Palestinians were not party to the Arab-Israeli war, the land they live in was already occupied and not subject to annexation.

I'm sorry but repeating the same crap over and over again as though Israel is 'special' doesn't add any credence to it.

Then stop saying it... and I quote, "Jews have had a constant presence in Israel for well over two thousand years. A history of wave after wave of invasion, slaughter and colonization with one constant: every wave of invasion tried to remove the Jews through slaughter, eviction or forced conversion: every wave failed. Your selective view of history reminds me of the revisionism of Islamic theological doctrine toward Judaism sine the early 1930's."

You know who else has had a constant presence there... the Palestinians (arabized Jewish and Hellenic root populations) the Samaritans (still existent ancient remnant population) so why do the Jews- the historic minority in the region since most of the Jews who stayed converted get special license to take other peoples land?

Go on, tell me how they've got different DNA again.

I didn't say different DNA, I said near identical DNA with the same genetic markers for the region that make the European Jews most closely related to the Shepardic Jews and Palestinians. Those three groups are virtual brothers but the Khazari Jews, Ethiopian and some of the other Jewish groups have no genetic links to the land- their right to take Palestinian land is based on ancestral conversion to Judaism outside of the Levant.

Israel and before them the Jewish Agency claimed that Jews deserve to have first claim on Palestine based on historic links to the land. They make this claim to the world in spite of evidence that their claim in no stronger (and for some Jewish sub groups) and often much weaker than the Palestinians based on the historical record and DNA typing. They lay/laid claim to land that was never Jewish at any point in history and have been blatantly thumbing their nose at international law and acting very much like the oppressors they had to deal with in Europe...

The most right wing of the settlers are terrorists every bit as much as the PLO/PFLP etc et al ever was and almost none of them are in jail despite years worth of attacks on Palestinians. Yet when the Palestinians fight back with tactics very much alike to what is done to them they get labeled terrorist...

Originally Posted by JAD_333

There is no more injustice in that than there is in the creation of most of today's nations. The difference is that it was more recent, and its victims are still around to challenge it.

The difference is that Israel wants to use the international system to keep the victims from fighting back or even using the international system set up to protect said victims.

I see these two threads as questions with no correct answer -(Problem with Israel, Slander against Israel). It is entirely dependant on one's point of view. Like deciding what is the best movie (of course it is far more serious than that analogy). We clearly have unresolvable differences of opinions on this question. I suppose it does provide for some heated discussion and "entertainment" value.

Originally Posted by Officer of Engineers

I became a much happier person when I became old and grouchy.

You mean you weren't always that way?

Originally Posted by zraver

The difference is that Israel wants to use the international system to keep the victims from fighting back or even using the international system set up to protect said victims.

I see Israel doing what it has to do to protect itself. Even expanding settlements is part of that, although I don't agree that that will be very helpful in the long run. In the meantime, however, an intransigent Israel benefits by an intransigent Palestine. The more time that passes without an end to the conflict, the less accommodation Palestine will get from Israel on the issue of settlements. Fair? Unfair? It makes no difference. National survival is and will always be the guiding principle for a nation in its relations with friend and foe alike.

Originally Posted by Mihais

Dok reply

Because names have values attached and hijacking names can be interpreted as hijacking of said values

You mean like homosexual unions to be called "marriages?"

But I digress...

We now return you to our regularly scheduled complaints.