Israel/Gaza: Calling all UK forum members.

In any case, 1800iareyay has provided the most reasonable view in this thread.  Of course, what he's posted is hardly a matter of controversy, at least for those that have some regard for facts.  The key point, however, and it's one that I don't believe has been stated explicitly here, is that the Israeli government is basically on Washington's leash: for easily discerned political purposes, Washington uses Israel as a destabilizing factor in the Middle East.  In fact, this has been stated quite plainly in high-level planning documents (now available to the public).


Edited by WinterLight - January 13 2009 at 23:29

You know what? I apologize. I got carried away. But there's a supreme difference between voicing a thought-out opinion and coming in spewing a stance based on absolutely no facts. Especially one steeped in quasi-racist, dismissive language. You think Israel might be in the right? Fine. The situation isn't black and white and there are no easy solutions. But it's even harder when you make things up to suit a ridiculous platform.

i happened across this little snippet on Wiki...

^^^ Thankyou Jim. Thats an excellent post.

Here we see the problem. If this issue can generate such tension on a music forum. Imagine the hatred on the ground between the Israelis and the Palestinians.

This issue is absolute dynamite, and WILL come to a very nasty end for one or both sides. It's been going on for decades, but the stakes appear to be getting higher. Hatred for Israel in the Arab/Muslim world is increasing. Israel continues to throw petrol on the flames, through their brutality. The west, the US in particular, continues to turn a blind eye to Israels behaviour, and continues to write blank cheques for her military machine. Efforts to push Israel into negotiations are merely token, by Washington, and by the likes of our arsehole Foreign Secretary David Milliband. If people are genuinely blind to the double standards at play here, then this problem will never be resolved. We often see images of death detsruction and massacre on our TV's from all over the world. In every case, the condemnation is almost always unamamous, but this is not so with with Israel. We see childrens corpes lined up on the pavement, spattered with blood. We see hungry families crying with desparation, as aid lorries are once again blocked ort turned away from the border crossings. If this was anywhere else there would be universal outrage, even if there was no actual action as such.

Someone said, put yourself in the shoes of the Israelis, being targetted by the Hamas rockets. This is quite easy for many British people to do; having been bombed by the IRA in the 70's and 80's, having been blitzed by the Nazis in WWII. History has shown us, with regard to terrorism, that you MUST talk to the terrorists. This is how we achieved something resembling the fragile peace we have in Northern Ireland. Israels refusal to engage with Hamas is not going to help, and in the absence of negotiations, that leaves one option open to Israel: The total wiping out of the Palestinians, because everytime they bomb a school or hospital in Gaza, another seed of hatred is sown. For every dismembered child carried out of the rubble following an airstrike, another militant is born. The more carnage Israel unleash on the civillian population of Gaza, the greater the support for Hamas will be.

If we assume that the Israeli government are not idiots, then we have to assume that their strategy is one of continuing this conflict for all time, or until they are given the right prompt to actually cull the enemy on mass; perhaps an attack from Iran or Syria; the major sponsors of the terror groups.

Perhaps President Obama will take a more even hand in how he handles the ME crisis. But the pressures on him to continue the tradtional and unconditional support for Israel, will be immense, and may cost him his presidency.

To make matters worse, I heard on the news this morning, that more rockets have been fored into northern Israel, from Lebanon, perhaps opening another front in the conflict. The last rocket attacks from Lebanon were attributed to Hamas, but if these are traced back to Hezbollah, then things could get alot worse before they get better.

What a world!

All I'm going to say is this:

If someone is a real threat to me or my family or my home...

...a "proportionate" reaction is not something I'm going to entertain.

^^^ Ironically, Hamas were democratically elected to power by the Palestinian people. That didn't need to happen. It's largely Israels fault that it did.

Epignosis wrote: All I'm going to say is this: If someone is a real threat to me or my family or my home... ...a "proportionate" reaction is not something I'm going to entertain.

So what, if someone breaks into your house, not only will you kill the robbers you'll find their families?

And the analogy is flawed, because in this situation you'd be the robber, living in another person's home and getting outraged when the real owner tries to get you out of it. Now, I think Hamas is a bit silly for lobbing rockets into the area they want to move back into, but then they probably realize at this point that they're never getting back in, so they settled for revenge. Maybe if Israel had bothered to clean up Gaza when they controlled it they wouldn't have fostered another generation of hate.

Blacksword wrote: ^^^ Ironically, Hamas were democratically elected to power by the Palestinian people. That didn't need to happen. It's largely Israels fault that it did.

Maybe not a fault but with calculation ...

Blacksword wrote: It looks as though they want to bomb Gaza into submission, and take that strip of land for themselves.

But the only way that would ever work out for them is if they took it over (without all this horrifying bloodshed, although I fail to see another way they'd get it), and immediately set about improving conditions. Not trying to wipe it off the face of the Earth, the way Sharon did. Pump as much money as they can into the area, get sewage and water into the area, turn refugee camps into actual towns with real homes. And maybe, maaayyyybe, in a few generations they'll win their way to a two-state solution. People seem to think it's always going to happen in a few decades, but it's gonna take a LONG time and a lot of goodwill on Israel's behalf if they really want peace.

1800iareyay wrote: Blacksword wrote: It looks as though they want to bomb Gaza into submission, and take that strip of land for themselves. But the only way that would ever work out for them is if they took it over (without all this horrifying bloodshed, although I fail to see another way they'd get it), and immediately set about improving conditions. Not trying to wipe it off the face of the Earth, the way Sharon did. Pump as much money as they can into the area, get sewage and water into the area, turn refugee camps into actual towns with real homes. And maybe, maaayyyybe, in a few generations they'll win their way to a two-state solution. People seem to think it's always going to happen in a few decades, but it's gonna take a LONG time and a lot of goodwill on Israel's behalf if they really want peace.

that won't happen anytime soon; Israeli citizens of Palestine origin are already being treated second class in Israel, although they are citizens of that state too. sad but true