World Politics / Terror / War

[techmouse]

Well it worked for Hitler didn't it.

Short term: Yes.

Long term: No.

[shonky]

Well it worked for Hitler didn't it.

Short term: Yes.

Long term: No.

Agreed. Interesting to note that when demilitarised, Germany actually managed to succeed on economic and social grounds as it wasn't piling huge resources into "defence" against it's neighbours.

Been reading this for the last little while - http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/ ... 23,00.html

which does seem to point out a few things that most other media doesn't seem to care about. The comment section has the familiar Guardian mix of name-calling and interesting information, so filter as you see fit

Apparently blowing up a country's infrastructure is a war crime - can't imagine anyone ending up in the dock over it though.

[spaceboy]

i was reading something this morning:

do u know how hard the anglo-saxons merked what was england way back when its local inhabitants-the celts?

i think over 50% of all caucasians in this country are anglo-saxon, germanic...

random i know, but u gotta love it.

[shonky]

i was reading something this morning:

do u know how hard the anglo-saxons merked what was england way back when its local inhabitants-the celts?

i think over 50% of all caucasians in this country are anglo-saxon, germanic...

random i know, but u gotta love it.

Folks should remember that when they're talking about immigration and repatriation - just how far back should we go?

Probably end up one fella with a flag telling everyone to get off his land.

Think the Celts actually invaded from somewhere else from what I recall

[techmouse]

israel has thousands of lebanese still held prisoner in israeli jails.

Incorrect.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_Israel-Lebanon_crisis

The 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict is a series of ongoing military actions and clashes in northern Israel and Lebanon involving Hezbollah's armed wing and the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). On 12 July 2006 Hezbollah initiated Operation Truthful Promise, named for a "promise" by its leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah to capture Israeli soldiers and swap them for the remaining three Lebanese prisoners held by Israel.

Always check your facts.

[ifp]

fair enough, i got the numbers wrong, but the basic point remains the same. the reason they kidnapped the soldiers was to secure the release of lebanese that israel is holding.

and got to say i disagree about the non-violence comment. up until june 9, hamas was following a unilateral cease-fire against israel for 16 months, which ended when israel bombed a family sitting on a beach. in june alone, israel killed 55 palestinians. this was when hamas was not attacking israel. so far this month 97 palestinians have been killed. palestinians will die whether they fight the occupation by force or not. the difference is that is they do not use force, the rest of the world will ignore the occupation even more than it does already.

[shonky]

http://www.ifamericansknew.org/

List of stats re:the dubious scoring between Israel and Palestine - might be worth verifying elsewhere though by the look of it.

[rickyricardo]

and got to say i disagree about the non-violence comment. up until june 9, hamas was following a unilateral cease-fire against israel for 16 months, which ended when israel bombed a family sitting on a beach. in june alone, israel killed 55 palestinians. this was when hamas was not attacking israel. so far this month 97 palestinians have been killed. palestinians will die whether they fight the occupation by force or not. the difference is that is they do not use force, the rest of the world will ignore the occupation even more than it does already.

For emphasis....especially b/c i have to grind my teeth every time Hamas or Hezbollah are pointed to as the only instigating factors to all of this (as if the beach bombings never happened....as if Isreal does still bomb Gaza despite a "cease-fire"). The reality is much more complex than the mainstream media is even willing to admit to itself, especially in here in the states where it's easy to look all world events w/ a pair of monochrome shades (b/c that's how it's reported)....as if the past never happened, and doesn't matter anymore. Gore Vidal called it a "United States of Amnesia"....that's really quite appropriate

[ifp]

http://www.ifamericansknew.org/

List of stats re:the dubious scoring between Israel and Palestine - might be worth verifying elsewhere though by the look of it.

as far as i know this is a pretty authoritive source:

http://www.btselem.org/english/statistics/Index.asp
(Israeli human rights monitoring group)

and this is pretty interesting too:
http://daccessdds.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/ ... penElement
even if you only read the summary

[techmouse]

fair enough, i got the numbers wrong, but the basic point remains the same. the reason they kidnapped the soldiers was to secure the release of lebanese that israel is holding.

Dude, you didn't just get the numbers wrong, you got the numbers wrong by a humungous factor - from 3 to "thousands" is a massive leap!

You got the "thousands" figure from somewhere - probably the number of Palestinians being detained by the Israelis, which is in the thousands - then repeated it here. Someone here may have gone on to repeat it elsewhere, and before you know it you have a massive tree of misinformation spreading out and influencing opinion.

ALWAYS CHECK YOUR FACTS. Cannot stress this enough.

and got to say i disagree about the non-violence comment. up until june 9, hamas was following a unilateral cease-fire against israel for 16 months, which ended when israel bombed a family sitting on a beach.

Unproven, and currently the subject of an international investigation.

[ifp]

and got to say i disagree about the non-violence comment. up until june 9, hamas was following a unilateral cease-fire against israel for 16 months, which ended when israel bombed a family sitting on a beach.

Unproven, and currently the subject of an international investigation.

and i'd trust an internal investigation as far as i could throw it

http://www.guardian.co.uk/frontpage/sto ... 35,00.html

[techmouse]

and i'd trust an internal investigation as far as i could throw it

http://www.guardian.co.uk/frontpage/sto ... 35,00.html

Yeah, a newspaper is far more trustworthy.

[rickyricardo]

and i'd trust an internal investigation as far as i could throw it

http://www.guardian.co.uk/frontpage/sto ... 35,00.html

Yeah, a newspaper is far more trustworthy.

well who *would* you lend more credence to? Outside sources investigating the incident (the guardian, human rights watch, etc), or the government accused of committing the act in the first place?

[pk-]

and got to say i disagree about the non-violence comment. up until june 9, hamas was following a unilateral cease-fire against israel for 16 months, which ended when israel bombed a family sitting on a beach. in june alone, israel killed 55 palestinians. this was when hamas was not attacking israel. so far this month 97 palestinians have been killed. palestinians will die whether they fight the occupation by force or not. the difference is that is they do not use force, the rest of the world will ignore the occupation even more than it does already.

okay, but i didn't mean that the palestinians are the only - or even the worse - culprits of violent action in the area. what i mean is a policy of an eye for an eye will simply prolong the region's instability and it's people's suffering. yes, alot of what the israelis have done in the past there is outrageous but without meaning to be callous i just think the palestinians (not all of them, obviously) need to swallow their pride and put down the guns/rocket launchers/bomb vests/whatever. as soon as they become peaceful protestors the israelis immediately become the sole aggressor, and as such will lose any international support that they currently enjoy.

[pk-]

and i'd trust an internal investigation as far as i could throw it

http://www.guardian.co.uk/frontpage/sto ... 35,00.html

Yeah, a newspaper is far more trustworthy.

and wikipedia is even more so?

[techmouse]

and i'd trust an internal investigation as far as i could throw it

http://www.guardian.co.uk/frontpage/sto ... 35,00.html

Yeah, a newspaper is far more trustworthy.

and wikipedia is even more so?

I would argue yes.

There are a lot of articles on W/P flagged as being biassed (bias is not a problem so long as you are aware of it), and even more which have been neutralised. The community works hard to neautralise articles which are flagged.

I think the open community process yields very good results, and independant studies have shown that in general WP is at least as accurate, and often more so, than other encylopedias.

[techmouse]

the difference is that is they do not use force, the rest of the world will ignore the occupation even more than it does already.

The state of Israel is not, as people would like to have you believe, an "occupation". It is a sovereign state which exists by mandate of the UN, and has done for most of this century.

Prior to that, the land was legally owned by Jewish settlers, who had bought the land of Ottoman and Arabs in the late 1800's. The Arabs who now claim it is theirs took the land from the Jewish settlers by force after they realised it wasn't worthless desert.

Check the history for yourself: History of Israel.

The first wave of modern immigration to Israel, or Aliyah (עלייה) started in 1881 as Jews fled persecution, or followed the Socialist Zionist ideas of Moses Hess and others of "redemption of the soil". Jews bought land from Ottoman and individual Arab landholders. After Jews established agricultural settlements, tensions erupted between the Jews and Arabs.

Before the Ottoman Empire, the land was part of the Byzantine Empire - the latter part of the Roman Empire - which spanned much of Europe, North Africa and the Middle East.

The Romans stole the land from - you guessed it - the Jews.

Largely, though, I think the history is pretty irrelevant. The fact is they're all living there now, and they need to work out how to coexist peacefully. Frankly, they're all as bad as each other in different ways.

[ifp]

http://hrw.org/english/docs/2006/06/13/isrlpa13544.htm

http://hrw.org/reports/2005/iopt0605/
and thas why i wouldnt trust the army investigation

and again on non-violence, surely it is israel as the occupying force, who should withdraw and put down its tanks, f-16s, artillery, guns, bulldozers...

i'm sure the world would be a lot harsher on unilateral palestinian violence than unilateral israeli violence, or rather it would be much easier to force them to stop.

[techmouse]

and again on non-violence, surely it is israel as the occupying force, who should withdraw and put down its tanks, f-16s, artillery, guns, bulldozers...

i'm sure the world would be a lot harsher on unilateral palestinian violence than unilateral israeli violence, or rather it would be much easier to force them to stop.

Ideologically, I agree with you.

However, the violence being levelled against the Israelis is done so at the hands of Hezbollah and the militant arm of Hamas. Sadly, the Lebanese and Palestinian governments (respectively) have very little control of either of these entities. (Or so they say).

[ifp]

and without going into all the history of the land, the legally recognised borders of israel are those at the end of the 1967 war 9the green line)

the west bank and the gaza strip are supposedly under palestinian sovereignty. since israel maintains armed forces and civillian settlements (continually expanding) in these areas, it is an occupation.