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Gaza Children Sacrificed to a Malevolent God
Hamas manipulated the deaths of their own offspring to appease the ravenous media.
Thousands of years ago, in the Middle East, cradle not just of civilization but of many gods, was a deity named Moloch. Today, he would be considered a pagan god by those of the one God of Abraham, with whom he long coexisted. But in that time, he prevailed for centuries. Like the God of Abraham, he was an angry god (though not clearly a jealous one). But the God of Abraham was more complex, and — at least later — merciful, and also loving.*
Moloch was a lot simpler. He was purely malevolent, and basically an extortionist — one that any modern gangster would recognize and admire.
His deal was basically this: “I am the bringer of the sun. Nice little city you have here. Be a shame if anything were to happen to it, like the crops dying because the sun didn’t show up. I can make sure that doesn’t happen. I don’t ask much — a temple with priests and ritual prostitutes, and an occasional sacrifice.”
His representative in the temple was an upright bull with horns and crown, gaping mouth, and outstretched arms. On sacrifice days, within him raged a fire.
The crowds would gather around and chant, and the drums would beat, and the ungodly din would drown out the screams of unknowing infant terror and keening mothers. Babies were brought up to the arms of Moloch, and through an ancient ingenious mechanism, raised up to his mouth to cruelly plummet them to the inferno below.
And to reinforce the tradition, the sun continued to shine.
But eventually, the God of Abraham became dominant in the Middle East, with three major religions worshiping him. Moloch was abandoned.
Fast forward to the early twenty-first century in the Middle East. There is a new child-sacrifice cult in the ancient land, albeit one that claims to be of the God of Abraham.
This time, the purpose of the sacrifice is not to keep the sun shining and the crops growing. This sacrifice is to placate the gods, or devils, in the news media and to help the people achieve a much different and less laudable goal — the extinction of another people.
In 2009, in the “Gaza strip,” one of the ancient Philistine cities, an Islamic group called Hamas has the goal to, as part of its charter, destroy all Jews in creation.
It lacks the military resources or competence to do so for now, but it satisfies itself with merely attempting, however ineffectually, to kill whatever Jews lie within the range of its unguided rockets. While few of them hit their marks (which, were they to satisfy their wont, would apparently be kindergartens and ice-cream parlors, or wherever young Jews would most likely be present in the highest density), they are of sufficient danger to continually disrupt the lives of those at whom they are aimed, if such a word can be applied to so crude a weapon.
But the crudity of the munitions is beside the point, isn’t it? What is important is the intent.
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Rand Simberg is a recovering aerospace engineer and a consultant in space commercialization, space tourism and Internet security. He offers occasionally biting commentary about infinity and beyond at his weblog, Transterrestrial Musings.
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238 Comments
1. C. Siegel:“You who build these altars to sacrifice your chidren/You must not do it anymore…”–Leonard Cohen , “The Story of Isaac”
Jan 17, 2009 - 11:49 pm 2. abu yussif:strange that such a supposed “moral” and extremely prudish religion doesn’t recognize there is even a moral question involved in not only targeting children for murder, but also not doing everything humanly possible to protect their own innocents. sure i have heard their twisted logic as to why, but the fact remains that they have all of the responsibility but have never lifted a finger in the defense of their own people (well, that is except for those in leadership who send their children abroad while preaching child-sacrifice). death means nothing to these perverts.
Jan 18, 2009 - 1:35 am 3. MLIC:Surely in today’s age, even the Palestinians should know between right and wrong. As much as I understand their need for their own land (which was basically taken by Jews), and their right to fight for it…sacrificing your own children in order to kill your enemy is just plain stupid. I don’t expect Hamas to get re-elected if there is ever another election planned…how can they ever justify what they are putting their own people through???
http://mylifeiscrap.com
Jan 18, 2009 - 1:40 am 4. Militants?!?:Israel declares a ceasefire, but hours after the truce took hold, Militants fired a volley of rockets into Israel, threatening to reignite the violence.
“Israel will only act in response to attacks by Hamas,government spokesman Mark Regev said. “If Hamas does deliberately torpedo this cease-fire, they are exposing themselves before the entire international community as a group of cynical extremists that have absolutely no interest in the well-being of the people-(children) of Gaza.”
Why does the MSM still call the Hamas terrorist government, Militants?
Does anyone else wonder why Egypt will not open their borders to the suffering children of Gaza?
Jan 18, 2009 - 2:02 am 5. Marc Malone:#3 MLIC – They don’t need to justify their behavior. They have the power, because they are willing to kill dissenters. (and dilefters and dirighters) The dumb Arabs don’t have the knowledge to rise up and throw off the yoke. They are too indoctrinated with their false religion. Only Judeo-Christians know how to throw off oppression.
There is nothing stupid about sacrificing their children in their war. There is nothing so cheap as an Arab life. There’ll always be more to throw into the maw. They’re indoctrinated to breed like flies… and to allow their children to be martyred.
I also get so tired of the meme of the Jews having “occupied” “Palestinian” land. The Jews initially bought their land. They conquered some, after the Arabs attacked them with the intent of killing every Jew. Much of the conquered land has been returned in peace deals… deals which have been abrogated every time by the damned Arabs.
The Arabs who actually lived in the original area of Israel are full citizens… about a million of them. They fight alongside the Jews. They are mostly Christian, and the free-est Arabs in the Mideast. They like being part of Israel. They know how good they have it. In short, it has nothing to do with Israeli occupation. It is jihad. It is Islam the death cult. The “Palestinian State” is simply propoganda… a red herring.
Jan 18, 2009 - 2:18 am 6. joeblough:… But eventually, the God of Abraham became dominant in the Middle East, with three major religions worshiping him. Moloch was abandoned. …
This three major religions business is repeated constantly.
And I find the idea that they all share “the God of Abraham” tedious, facile and shallow.
As it happens, I’ve seen no evidence that the mohammedan concept of allah developed from the judeo-christian notion of god, in parallel, shares a common historical background or even much of a theological nature.
I have seen some, albeit small, evidence that the notion of allah developed from that of an arabian moon god.
The only thing I know of that connects mohammedanism with the various Judeo-Christian faiths are:
a) the fact that both are monotheistic, and
b) mohammedanism makes reference to some of the names and stories in the bible
The contrast between the relation between Judaism and Christianity on one hand, and both of those with mohammedanism on the other is rather stark.
Christianity adopted the bible in its entirety from Judaism — added to it, no doubt — but adopted it whole. So the two share a large, detailed, common documentary basis.
Mohammedanism by contrast rejects the bible entirely — and mohammedans claim that the koran replaces the bible, or absurdly, that the bible is somehow magically a corruption of the koran that came after it.
There is no significant common documentary basis to speak of.
I am by now, almost completely convinced that the claim that allah is “the God of Abraham” is nothing more than a bizarre form of replacement theology intended, even in its original articulation, as a justification for the conquest and subjugation of Christian and Jewish people.
The author might want to reflect a bit on those verses of the koran that talk about the hostile relation between allah and the Jews and Christians, and consider whether that sounds consistent with the god of the bible — “Abraham” notwithstanding.
He might also want to reflect a bit on the relation between ancient Moloch and the modern allah.
Jan 18, 2009 - 3:00 am 7. tino:Hamas wants Jewish children to die.
What part of Kill the Infidel do you not understand?
MLIC As much as I understand their need for their own land (which was basically taken by Jews)
This is so ignorant.
Jan 18, 2009 - 3:04 am 8. Nili:Arabs have hated Jews since the beginning of time. Each generation is bred to hate. Until this is stopped the fighting will continue–no matter how many high paid politicians get together over fancy dinners. In their own TV and media they brag of using their children as shields and sending them out with bombs strapped to their bodies. Funny that all the Hamas Leaders are in bunkers and other countries screaming for their people to “fight to the death”. Yeah, peace will come.
Jan 18, 2009 - 3:06 am 9. D. Grant Chee----:Invention comes from the imagination, and is motivated by an agenda, to dominate others; in the case of islam. Islam does not seek peace but
Jan 18, 2009 - 3:33 am 10. gboisjo:rather seeks to force submission thru violence.
Bush will be proven correct; the terrorist’s are criminal thugs who must be killed or brought to justice. In the future, terror will finally be viewed as a cancer that has to be removed; lest the whole body be corrupted. In the shortterm we see the insidious progress of global terror.
When people talk about the jews taking arab land lets remember why so many Jews fled to Israel and what our Euro bretheren did to the Jews. What was it eight million or ten million awh what the heck whats a couple million dead jews one way or the other. These people were systematically destroyed by something so evil that even “Schindlers List” could not comprehend the full extent of it. So when I hear people talk about Jews taking arab land which is really Jewish land a red flag goes up and I start to get sick to my stomach.
Jan 18, 2009 - 4:11 am 11. Curious:As a result of the past three weeks of Operation Cast Lead, it is incumbent on every Muslim to aks themselves the following questions:
Jan 18, 2009 - 4:26 am 12. Ken Besig:(1) Why is Allah, praise be upon Him, allowing this “Naqbah” (terrible catastrophe) to happen to us, the only true believers, at the hands of the infidel Jews?
(2) Why is Allah,praise be upon Him, displeased with us.
(3) Can it be possible that somehow we’ve gotten it all wrong?
(4) This is only the latest chapter in more than 60 years of humiliation and failure, death and destruction. Perhaps it’s time for an agonizing reappraisal of Islam?
Only once you view Islam as a form of serious mental illness, can you begin to understand how Moslems behave in the insane and bloody way they do and how they can believe in the psychotic breakdown that is called the Koran.
Jan 18, 2009 - 4:56 am 13. Perry:It’s not complicated. Here is an exerpt from the unholy Koran:
“9.30″ : And the Jews say: Œ UzairŒ is the son of Allah; and the Christians say: The Messiah is the son of Allah; these are the words of their mouths; they imitate the saying of those who disbelieved before; may Allah destroy them; how they are turned away!
From the Œ HadithŒ , a body of
traditions relating to Mohammed and now supplemental to the Koran:
He (Abu ŒHurayahŒ ) reported the messenger of Allah as saying: The last hour will not come before the Muslims fight the Jews and the Muslims kill them, so that Jews will hide behind stones and trees and the Stone and the tree will say,
O Muslim, O servant of God! There is a Jew behind me; come and kill him.
The only exception will be the box-thorn for it is one of the trees of the Jews.
SahihŒ of Muslim , quoted by Israel and the Prophecies of Al Œ QuranŒ by Ali Akbar, Œ BismiŒ Publishers 1992, p.44) (Palestinian Media Watch in
Jan 18, 2009 - 5:17 am 14. cedarford:Israel reported in July 2001 that at least four times in recent months Palestinian religious leaders had taught publicly that this Œ HadithŒ(Islamic traditions attributed to Mohammed) is an authoritative directive of Islam today, expressing Allah¹s will that obedient Muslims kill Jews).
(In the terminology of Islam, unbelievers are Jews and Christians)
Malone – I also get so tired of the meme of the Jews having “occupied” “Palestinian” land. The Jews initially bought their land. They conquered some, after the Arabs attacked them with the intent of killing every Jew. Much of the conquered land has been returned in peace deals… deals which have been abrogated every time by the damned Arabs.
The story is more complex than you believe. Jews owned about 4% of Palestine at Partition. And a fair amount of that land was bought out from underneath tenant farmers from absentee Ottoman landlords by Zionist land agents working deals in Cairo, Ankara, Istanbul, and Beruit.
These land grabs dispossessing fedayeen (peasants) was the main cause of the 1922, 25, and 1929 riots.
Of the “attacks”, 1948 was mutual. Palestinians unhappy with what they thought was a screwing caused by Jewish bribes of UN diplomats and Soviets having their proxies vote pro-Israel – rioted and attacked Jews. The Jews, however had a long-existing, methodical plan ready and set to go if Palestinians went into violent protests, focused on ethnic cleansing, eradicating Pal villages within their Partition areas, and if that worked out well, more eradication and cleansing in the Palestinian-designated areas of Partition. The Israelis now admit this history. Many of their American backers though, brought up on only pro-right wing Zionist info, do not know this.
As for the “5 Arab Armies” – they did not form until the knowledge of Zionist cleansing reached their cities, and the “armies” were little better than civilians handed a rifle and told to fight for their Muslim kinsmen and stop the cleansing.
As for the other Wars, most were not begun by Arab “attackers: Israel, Britain, and France started the 1956 War. Israel started the 1967 war with a pre-emptive attack on Egyptian forces in the Sinai. The 73 War was started by the Arabs, but was fought outside Israel Proper. Israel started the 1982 Lebanon War.
Malone – The Arabs who actually lived in the original area of Israel are full citizens… about a million of them. They fight alongside the Jews. They are mostly Christian, and the free-est Arabs in the Mideast. They like being part of Israel. They know how good they have it. In short, it has nothing to do with Israeli occupation. It is jihad. It is Islam the death cult.
You seem to have swallowed a lot of Zionist propaganda. Arab Israelis are limited “full citizens” much as blacks were from Reconstruction to the civil rights era. Barred from many state and municipal jobs, in segregated housing and schools…under a “separate but equal” existance that is not quite equal.
Israeli Arabs are not expected to serve the Jewish State, like Jews are. They have no draft or obligation, which excludes them from other jobs besides government ones, which require the person be of the Jewish religion and have served in the military. The IDF has some, as they have Druze and bedouin serving, but as volunteers or mercenaries..
So they “do not fight alongside their Jewish brothers”….a particularly laughable bit of propaganda Americans swallowed..
Nor are they mostly Christian, they are 85-88% Muslim.
The Christian Palestinians mostly lived up in the North prior to 1948 and were especially targeted for cleansing outside Haifa and a few towns. They were run out to become refugees in Syria, Lebanon..then on to places like the USA, Europe. They hate the Zionists almost as much as the Palestinian Muslims do.
The Israeli Arabs like all the money the US, Germany, the overseas Jewish Diaspora sends – because some increase in standard of living has trickled down to them.
They are not “happy” to be Israelis…wards in a Jewish State. They sympathize with their Palestinian fellow clansmen, same tribe people on different sides of the Green Line. More and more they are speaking out, starting with the 1st Infitada when Israeli Arabs protesting in support took casualties as Israeli snipers went after Israeli Arab leaders of the protests..
What they understand is, that like blacks in 1910 knew being in the USA was better than being in Africa or Haiti, Israel has great infrastructure, excellent healthcare (universal), good schools. Things no Arab country can match. But like blacks realized, just the fact that places outside the US were far worse, that didn’t mean blacks had to be happy with being 2nd class citizens in the USA.
(They prefer to be called Palestinians who live inside Israel Proper, these days, BTW..)
Given that, those Palestinians in the Occupied lands will happily tell anyone that asks that it is all about Occupation, refusal to compensate for lost land and property when Zionists are suing away for their own losses in Europe in the same decade. It’s about Settlements, land and water grabs, and the bypass roads that carve up the West Bank into little Bantustans with Palestinians blocked from free movement.
And the USA is hated, not for its people because so many Palestinians moved there – but for it’s knee-jerk policy that has tilted to almost always favor the Zionist over the Palestinian since LBJ’s last year.
Of course the Palestinians have many well-documented flaws.
But they also have many, many well-documented grievances of crime and oppression directed at them..
Jan 18, 2009 - 5:55 am 15. SGT Ted:The charade of the victimised palestinian is old KGB devides propaganda given to Arafat et el, in order to legitimise their barbarism in moral equivalence language, when it is clear that the PLO/Hamas terrorist death cult governments want Jews dead and Israel gone. It is no mistake or coincidence that other pro-Communists, like ANSWER, follow the party line. They are of a piece.
Condemning Israel using totalitarian propaganda from a collapsed Communist regime is really ignorant.
Palestine is a war criminal nation. They use Mosques as weapons depots, they emplace mortars, rockets and ADA in schools, they don’t close the schools during fighting to use their own kids as human shields and then as propaganda props when they are killed in the return attacks.
Then moral retards show up and defend them for being war criminals by blaming Israel, when every rule of war states that once you receive fire from ANY GC protected site, then, the GC protections no longer apply.
Jan 18, 2009 - 6:10 am 16. Greg:First of all I wouldn’t call the Islamic ‘god’ the same as the ‘God of Abraham’. They are completely different – some would say opposite.
The Jewish and Christian God celebrate live and love – their top commandment seems to be ‘love one another’. The Islamic God’s top commandment seems to ‘kill the infidel’ ‘kill those who leave Islam’ ‘If you become a martyr by killing innocents you go to paradise and get 72 virgins’ [of what?].
Allah is *not* the God of Abraham.
As for the children. Islam is the only major (or minor for that matter) religion which still practices Human Sacrifices. Be it willing (Homicide Bomber), or unwilling (their victims). Each time a bomber goes off or rocket kills (Jews are preferred, however Infidels and other Muslims will also do), Islam celebrates.
They are not doing it for the media. They are doing it for their ‘god’ Allah.
Moloch may have been bloodthirsty – but at least he was upfront and honest about it.
Jan 18, 2009 - 6:58 am 17. Cybergeezer:Until Islam is treated as the disease it is, no progress shall ever be made.
Jan 18, 2009 - 7:12 am 18. mohammed:Gaza children were killed by Israeli bullets and mortars mostly supplied by America no matter how you try to spin this story.
Jan 18, 2009 - 9:15 am 19. DonJoe:Israel and America are blood thirsty as we can see from this recent attack because it’s stated aims have still not been achieved. There are 1.5 million Gazans and half of them are under 14, Israel will have to do a lot more if it is to achieve its murderous aims.
“Then the king of Egypt spoke to the Hebrew midwives, of whom the name of one [was] Shiphrah and the name of the other Puah; and he said, “When you do the duties of a midwife for the Hebrew women, and see [them] on the birthstools, if it [is] a son, then you shall kill him; but if it [is] a daughter, then she shall live.” (Exodus 1:15-16)
Islamists think nothing of suicide martyrdom.
Are mothers of martyrs are forced by their Islamic male oppresors to sacrifice their children?
Why the big brouhaha when children die due to “collateral damage?”
Could it be that the mothers a forced to act certain ways in front of the media(nites) due to the “Violent Oppression of Women in Islam?”
You watch then You decide;
http://www.terrorismawareness.org/videos/108/the-violent-oppression-of-women-in-islam/
Jan 18, 2009 - 9:23 am 20. Angel Elf:“Show me just what Muhammad brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached.”
These words, expressed six centuries ago by a Byzantine emperor, Manuel II Paleologus, in dialogue with an Iranian scholar, are just as true today.
Jan 18, 2009 - 9:31 am 21. LynnS:#14 Interesting how you fail to point out the not very well documented by the media, treatment of the Palestinians by the other Arab states including Jordan whose history of questionable existance and treatment of the Palestinians you fail to bring up. If you want to claim that Palastinians are trapped and in refugee camps by Israel and fail to mention that they are trapped by the Arab Nations well….. Also consider that the Palestinian rockets being fired are pointed at Israel but the tunnels point to Egypt. The aid comes from Israel but the weapons come from Egypt. Hamas goes underground back and forth to Egypt but have been unable at this time to go through the checkpoints. In the Islamic world Palastinians come in handy to fight the battles that the rest of the Islamic World doesn’t want to. Another words; They do the dirty work. It is to the point where they are being taught as part of the Quran and/or Hadith that their prophet predicted that it would be the Palastinians that would fight the Jews to bring in the end days and they are the Muslims who are to be the warriors for Allah directed to shed the blood of the Jews and Infidels. So many others like you fail to bring these issues up and your failure to include them in your discussions are beginning to look uninformed.
Jan 18, 2009 - 9:35 am 22. NahnCee:Back when this first started in September of 2001, I distinctly remember being sermonized by the world’s Muslims that the absolute worst thing you could do in Islam was to kill another Muslim, and the second worst thing you could do would be to kill a child. I can’t remember the reasons for this pronouncement: maybe that children were newly formed and didn’t have a soul yet and shouldn’t be killed before their time because then Allah couldn’t take them. Or some dumb thing.
It’s been several years now since I’ve heard any Muslims say the “don’t kill a child” thing, although they’re still murmuring about how bad it is to kill a fellow Muslim. And indeed the Iraqi’s got annoyed enough about it to join with the Americans and drive Al-Queda out of their country.
So does this mean that the “don’t kill children” thing was never in their Koran in the first place and they were just trying a guilt trip on Americans and Israeli’s? Or did they decide to shut in en masse lest they continue to embarrass their child-killing Paletinian brethren? Or what?
Jan 18, 2009 - 9:38 am 23. DonJoe:Unfortunately; 50 million American pre-born have been sacrificed “legally” over the past 36 years. To what end? Convenience?
“That which has been [is] what will be, That which [is] done is what will be done, And [there is] nothing new under the sun. Is there anything of which it may be said, “See, this [is] new”? It has already been in ancient times before us. [There is] no remembrance of former [things], Nor will there be any remembrance of [things] that are to come By [those] who will come after.” — King Solomon–
Jan 18, 2009 - 9:39 am 24. RW:(Ecclesiastes 1:9-11)
It’s pretty laughable that the Arab armies in 1948 were merely civilians handed rifles. How would the Iraqi army find itself so far from home like that. They weren’t “civilians” handed rifles. They were sent by other nations to destroy the Israeli state. And they failed.
Arab culture has a longstanding problem of fielding an effective fighting force. Loyalty to the tribe being one of them.
They gave it a good guy with different nations sending troops but they failed and thus we have a healthy state Israel surrounded by failed Arab states.
The children of Gaza are merrily sacrificed by Hamas and their friends in Tehran with an eye to more violence always around the corner.
There will be no peace until there is two sides willing to live in peace. And that isn’t going to happen any time soon with Hamas in the neighborhood.
Jan 18, 2009 - 9:40 am 25. James:JOEBLOUGH: Best post I’ve read in months! Thanks…
Jan 18, 2009 - 9:41 am 26. James:I’m so sick of the lie that “Jews took the Palestenian’s land”. First off, it was Jews who lived in Israel and Judea for thousands of years. It was the Europeans (Romans) who caused the diaspora 2000 years ago (and, of course, the enlightened Europeans who trIed to wipe out the Jews 70 years ago). There was no such thing as “Palestinians” before 1948. After the war, swaths of the former Israel were purchased for and by the Jews to re-establish Israel as a safe Jewish homeland. Millions were paid to absentee landlords for land that was not nearly as populated by Arabs as we are now led to believe. Finally, the Arabs who inhabited the land were given the full opportunity to remain and be part of the new nation of Israel, where today Arabs enjoy more freedoms than anywhere else in the Middle-East. But no, they made war, and continue to make war, and our “friends” the Europeans again begin to reveal their hatred for the people they tried to murder off. All hail insanity! All hail Obama the peacemaker, upon whom the peacemakers of the left pin their hopes! Let us all prepare for some crazy s*#t in the near future!
Jan 18, 2009 - 9:51 am 27. eor:How does Obama think he is going to have a “new discouse” with the terrorists? How can we talk to people who use their own children in ways that get them killed? I can’t believe those children have no feelings. They have to be terrorised themselves. Where are the mothers? My heart breaks for the innocents. There appears to be no humanity in the “religion of peace”.
Jan 18, 2009 - 10:00 am 28. zappo:Yes they are killing women & children for their “Allah” but they also understand another “front is winning the media war as well. It is just another “Tool” they have learned to use against westerners as the west is so weak they will allow themselves to be “Talked” into defeat.
Jan 18, 2009 - 10:05 am 29. tinkerthinker:Yes! And the media just went right along with it, the media has blood on it’s hands.
Jan 18, 2009 - 10:13 am 30. mohammed:‘24. RW:
Arab culture has a longstanding problem of fielding an effective fighting force. Loyalty to the tribe being one of them.’
Like some European invaders found out to their peril during the four crusades.
Jan 18, 2009 - 10:23 am 31. DonJoe:This is a bit rich coming from the country whose a** was whooped in Vietnam, Somalia and recently Iraq. Americans can only lobe missiles from a distance till nothing moves. Face to face combat? they will always do a runner or try to bribe their way out, i understand Viagra is the latest currency.
Instead of the question, “do Christians and Muslims worship the same God?” – a better question would be, “Do Christians and Muslims both have a correct understanding of who God is and what He is like?” To this, the answer is a definitive no. Because of crucial differences between the Christian and Muslim concepts of God, the two faiths cannot both be true.
The most important difference, though, between the Muslim and Christian view of God is the concept of the Trinity. Christians believe that God has revealed Himself as one God in three Persons: God the Father, the Son of God (Jesus), and the Holy Spirit.
God’s Son became a human being, Jesus Christ, to take away the penalty and power of sin by dying on the cross. After rising from the dead, Jesus went back to heaven to be with His Father. He sent His Spirit to teach men the truth through His Word, the Bible. One day, Christ will return to judge the earth; those who have trusted in Him will go to heaven, but those who have rejected Him must be separated in hell from the holy God.
Therefore, the belief in the Trinity is essential to the Christian faith. Without the Trinity, there is no incarnation of God in the Person of Jesus Christ. Without Jesus Christ, there is no salvation for sin. Without salvation, sin condemns all to hell. In Islam, Allah is not triune and does not have a son. Therefore, because of this key disagreement with the Christian faith, Muslims are not worshiping the God of Christianity.
Because the Bible provides the solution to sin, Christianity has the correct view of God. Becoming a human being, God’s Son died to pay for the sin of those who trust in Him. “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life” (John 3:16).
Jan 18, 2009 - 10:52 am 32. Peter the Bubblehead:Gee, I’m surprised we haven’t heard from Wrecking Crew, John and Pete on this thread scolding us to “Think of the poor innocent Palestinian children!”
Jan 18, 2009 - 11:05 am 33. cottus:Thank you cederford. Very helpful but one must question its relevance. I would like more information about what it would take to be a full fledged Israeli citizen. If I were a resident Israeli of Palestinian extraction, if feasible, I would volunteer for the Israeli Army, change my name to Goldfarb or something (Oh! the irony) and get with the program as best I could in what way I could. Typical minority stuff. Mainly for my children’s sake. Your story reminds me of the small farmers in the Owens Valley of California who had their farms cheated out from under them by the City of Los Angeles Dept. of Water & Power. They organized and fought back (with guns and dynamite), but eventually got with the program.
I certainly wouldn’t hang around in Gaza or some other hell hole, and I certainly wouldn’t pay a lot of attention to the heated rhetoric of macho gang leader types, no matter how sound their reasoning, how noble their calls for justice and sacrifice.
Jan 18, 2009 - 11:12 am 34. SilentWatcher:Mohammed, read something else besides the koran so you’ll know something. In Vietnam, the U.S. won the battle but lost the war because of the media. In Somalia, we won the battle, but a feckless and weak president, Clinton, pulled the men out because of media images of military corpses being dragged through the streets of Mogadishu by Islamic barbarians (a redundancy, I know). As far as Iraq, where is Zarqawi? Where is your hero Bin Laden. The first is dead. American soldiers killed him. The second is hiding behind a woman or a diaper somewhere in a cave. Americans went on the ground and beat your “holy warriors” into the dirt. Your jihadis ran like frightened girls, and they dressed up in burqas to escape the ferocity of U.S. fire on the ground. So, when you want to counter someone’s true comment about the fighting skills of the Arabs, try using the truth, something you’re likely to be unacquainted with since your koran tells you lying is fine.
Jan 18, 2009 - 11:18 am 35. Biggirl:Not suprising that even children are used for terror martydom. Remember it is in the Hamas Charter to go to war against Jews and Isreal. What has been going on is that Isreal is simply doing what every country has both the right and the dutty to do, defend its citizens, and in this case, against the terrorist group Hamas.
Jan 18, 2009 - 11:23 am 36. Craig:“This is a bit rich coming from the country whose a** was whooped in Vietnam, Somalia and recently Iraq. Americans can only lobe missiles from a distance till nothing moves. Face to face combat? they will always do a runner or try to bribe their way out, i understand Viagra is the latest currency.”
Another anencephalic speaks.
Jan 18, 2009 - 11:23 am 37. Cristina:# 14 cedarford:
Whatever the history–which you distort heavily, may I say–does it seem justifiable to you to put your own children in the harm’s way in order to regain “your” lands, unless the lives of these children are expedable but useful in the mediatic war?
If land for peace is what Palestinians wanted, why didn’t they build up Gaza into a state in 2005, after a complete withdrawal by the Israelis? Why did they destroy those precious greenhouses? Why didn’t they build schools, create jobs, etc. with all the money from international relief? Why didn’t they start developing the land into a viable entity–you don’t need much land to do it; look at Hong Kong–allowing, instead, a lack market economy thru the tunnels into Egypt, flowing with weapons, ecomomy in which Hamas takes the lion’s share?
Or is it that Palestinians don’t really want land for peace, or peace of any kind, but Israel’s destruction, at any cost?
Jan 18, 2009 - 11:28 am 38. Bless Israel:thereligionofpeace.com
Obsessionthemovie.com
prophetofdoom.net/Prophet_of_doom_Prologue.Islam
Go to these sites and you will see the truth about this cult and sick religion that claims it is about peaceII The Koran teaches it is the duty of all muslims to Convert you, Enslave you or kill all nonbelievers or infidels!! And that includes all the liberal do gooders who just say if we talk to them they will not want to kill us!! Idiots and cowards!!
Jan 18, 2009 - 11:48 am 39. Shef Rogers:When you find yourself arguing, “They purposely let their children get killed to make us feel guilty!” you might want to consider the possibility you’ve gone insane.
Jan 18, 2009 - 11:53 am 40. Gary Rosen:“#14 Interesting how you fail to point out …”
Oh, you mean C-fudd? He’s a proven liar, no need to even pay attention to his incoherent, dishonest ramblings, unless you’re into stuff like this:
http://minx.cc/?post=66320
Jan 18, 2009 - 11:55 am 41. Gary Rosen:“# 14 cedarford:
Whatever the history–which you distort heavily, may I say–does it seem justifiable to you to put your own children in the harm’s way”
In C-fudd’s universe it is always justifiable to sacrifice innocent children for the purpose of sticking it to the Jooos.
Jan 18, 2009 - 11:57 am 42. Donald Sensing:Cedarford, #14, good comments clearing up some misconceptions common in the States. I have spent time in Israel with both Arab Christians and Arab Muslims, and you are right they they both alike know that they are not full Israeli citizens in the same way that Jews are. And you are right that Christian Arabs are the small minority, in fact, the least free minority of all in Israel, and under active oppression not from the Jewish state, but most of all from Arab Muslims.
I had a conversation one day with Nadia Hilou, Member of the Knesset who is Arab-Christian-Woman, so she’s really a minority representative. But there are seats in the Knesset set aside for Muslims and Arab Muslims are MKs. And Arabs, whether Muslim or Christian, do suffer certain bigotries by many Jews.
Finally, I think your equation of the state of Arab Israelis with that of American blacks in the Jim Crow South is somewhat overstated. It’s not that bad. You are right that it’s not equal, though. The Arab Israelis I spoke were sort of conflicted – one the one hand, they knew they were not equal citizens, but on the other, they knew there was nowhere in the Middle East that they would have it so good.
It’s worth noting that large numbers of West Bank Palestinians apply every year for residency in Israel, even without citizenship, but for an Israeli to move to the bank to live is unheard of. They’re not equal, but they’re not stupid, either.
Jan 18, 2009 - 11:59 am 43. Bilgeman:Mr. Simberg:
Don’t be ridiculous…Hamas isn’t sacrificing their own children. They’re sacrificing someone ELSE’S.
Where do you come up with such nonsense?
These cats go on and on about “Martyrdom”…yet they always seem to survive when the smoke clears, don’t they?
You REALLY think they’re going to put their own little ones in harm’s way?
Puh-leeze!
As to Moloch…I wouldn’t get on too high a soapbox about that. The ancients, with finite resources, had to find SOME way of culling the population of excess mouths, didn’t they? Especially in times of famine.
I ken that adoption was a fairly common practice back in those days…especially when the “Tent Revival” was coming ’round.
By the way, we do much the same thing ourselves today…or has the purpose of an abortion clinic slipped your mind?
Jan 18, 2009 - 12:10 pm 44. Trouble:We just no longer claim to commit infanticide to appease a god.
Professionals study logistics, amateurs study tactics, mohammed plays World of Warcraft.
Jan 18, 2009 - 12:29 pm 45. nichevo:Donald, is this the first time you have ever come across Cedarford’s writings on the Internet?
Jan 18, 2009 - 12:43 pm 46. mohammed:‘34. SilentWatcher:
Mohammed, read something else besides the koran so you’ll know something. In Vietnam, the U.S. won the battle but lost the war because of the media. In Somalia, we won the battle, but a feckless and weak president, Clinton, pulled the men out because of media images of military corpses being dragged through the streets of Mogadishu by Islamic barbarians (a redundancy, I know)’
you are even dumber than I thought, george bush senior pulled the troops out of mogadishu in the early nineties, i mean the rest that were allowed to leave by aidid. I bet you will tell me that it was not reagan but some liberal left president that scampered the marines out of Lebanon in the eighties. Americas a** was whooped big time in vietnam, do some reading, real reading not the claptrap you read in nutcase driven media like pajamas media..
Jan 18, 2009 - 12:56 pm 47. Peter the Bubblehead:39. Shef Rogers wrote:
When you find yourself arguing, “They purposely let their children get killed to make us feel guilty!” you might want to consider the possibility you’ve gone insane.
Peter responds: If anyone has gone insane, it is the Arabs in Gaza and their liberal apologists in the west, because in case you haven’t noticed, letting their kids get killed and then parading them in front of TV and newspaper cameras to make westerners feel guilty is exactly what the Arabs are doing.
Jan 18, 2009 - 1:30 pm 48. Revnant Dream:DonJoe:
The best of a lot of good posts on here . Excellent digging for an historical background. Way to many people who should know better try to associate Islam’s God with the God of Abraham Isaac & Jacob. Not Abraham Isaac & Ishmael. Your correct they falsely try to portray this god as part of the Christian or Jewish tradition. Islam does used it for an excuse for war. It certainly did against Jews during Mohammed’s life. As well to try to make themselves the heirs of Abraham. Something Christians would never do. Read the book of Hebrews some time. Where grafted onto the tree of Israel by God & His messiahs sacrificial grace. That at least has been the Christian position. I Laugh when people call the NT anti-Semitic. At the end of Revelation, its the Jews who win against evil through the Messiah, not the World or Church.
Jan 18, 2009 - 1:48 pm 49. Cybergeezer:JMO
I’ll consider converting to Islam when I’m able to attend a concert put on by the Islamic Symphony Orchestra.
Jan 18, 2009 - 1:58 pm 50. Gary Rosen:“I have spent time in Israel with both Arab Christians and Arab Muslims, and you are right they they both alike know that they are not full Israeli citizens in the same way that Jews are.”
OK. Let’s compare the rights of religious minorities in Israel with the rights of religious minorities anywhere else in the Mideast, or the entire Muslim world for that matter.
Jan 18, 2009 - 2:09 pm 51. Knights13:It is easy to bash most if not all religions. I don’t know why people are fixated just on Islam. Here are some negatives picked out from other books than the quran:
Anyone arrogant enough to reject the verdict of the judge or of the priest who represents the LORD your God must be put to death. Such evil must be purged from Israel.
“If a man lies with a male as with a women, both of them shall be put to death for their abominable deed; they have forfeited their lives.”
A man or a woman who acts as a medium or fortuneteller shall be put to death by stoning; they have no one but themselves to blame for their death.
Whoever strikes his father or mother shall be put to death.
If a man commits adultery with another man’s wife, both the man and the woman must be put to death.
A priest’s daughter who loses her honor by committing fornication and thereby dishonors her father also, shall be burned to death.
If your own full brother, or your son or daughter, or your beloved wife, or you intimate friend, entices you secretly to serve other gods, whom you and your fathers have not known, gods of any other nations, near at hand or far away, from one end of the earth to the other: do not yield to him or listen to him, nor look with pity upon him, to spare or shield him, but kill him. Your hand shall be the first raised to slay him; the rest of the people shall join in with you. You shall stone him to death, because he sought to lead you astray from the Lord, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, that place of slavery. And all Israel, hearing of this, shall fear and never do such evil as this in your midst.
a wife’s marriage settlement which she is entitled to recover on her being divorced or on the death of her husband. The minimum settlement for a virgin is two hundred
WHEN A GROWN-UP MAN (7) HAS HAD SEXUAL INTERCOURSE WITH (8) A LITTLE GIRL, (9) OR WHEN A SMALL BOY (10) HAS INTERCOURSE WITH A GROWN-UP WOMAN, OR [WHEN A GIRL WAS ACCIDENTALLY] INJURED BY A PIECE OF WOOD (11) — [IN ALL THESE CASES] THEIR KETHUBAH IS TWO HUNDRED
HE WHO COMMITS SODOMY WITH A MALE OR A BEAST, AND A WOMAN THAT COMMITS BESTIALITY ARE STONED.
If a heathen (gentile) hits a Jew, the gentile must be killed.
A Jew need not pay a gentile (”Cuthean”) the wages owed him for work.
Jews may use lies (”subterfuges”) to circumvent a Gentile.
Jan 18, 2009 - 2:57 pm 52. Vince P:In a way one could say that Allah can be tied to Abraham because of where Abraham came from.
The deity Allah can trace its development all the way back to Sin, the chief crescent moon god of war of the city of Ur. God called on Abram to leave Ur behind.
The masculine crescent moon gods of Babylon and Arabia were usually always the chief god of the gods and almost always gods of war (or Fortresses)
If anyone ever pondered the true identity of this god, I think this verse from Isaiah 14 confirms some people’s suspicion.. Isaiah 14 initially is addressed to a future King of Babylon , who God is pronouncing a judgment on, but he seamlessly morphs into:
Isaiah 14:12 Look how you have fallen from the sky,
O shining one, son of the dawn!
You have been cut down to the ground,
O conqueror of the nations! (Translation: NET Bible)
The KJV translates “O shining one, son of the dawn!” to “Lucifer”, Satan.
The Hebrew is הֵילֵל בֶּן־שָׁחַר (Helel ben Shackar). This was the crescent moon god and morning star (Venus). The moon and star is the symbol of Islam today.
There is a moon on the top of every Mosque.
Muslims deny any association with any moon gods.. and they are sincere in that they are not knowingly acting on behalf of ancient moon gods, but yet Islam is nothing more than a pagan moon god religion of war with the trappings of monotheism.
Islam can more appropriately be thought of as moon-o-theistic and I recommend this free on-line book for those who want to know more about this
Moon-O-Theism: Religion of a War and Moon God Prophet
http://www.google.com/books?id=GB_R90_DlGEC&printsec=frontcover#PPP1,M1
Jan 18, 2009 - 3:25 pm 53. Knights13:“The KJV translates “O shining one, son of the dawn!” to “Lucifer”, Satan.”
Son of the dawn would mean sun rise. How the fu*& did you tie that up to the moon and star and lucifer?
Jan 18, 2009 - 3:50 pm 54. mountainaires:The bigotry and hatred in this blog post and the subsequent comments is all the proof needed that there isn’t an iota of difference between extremists in Hamas and the extremists blogging at Pajamas Media.
The sole cogent comment to the reprehensible, virulent hate-speech in this thread is #39, which pretty much says it all about Pajamas Media and its agenda:
When you find yourself arguing, “They purposely let their children get killed to make us feel guilty!” you might want to consider the possibility you’ve gone insane.
Jan 18, 2009 - 4:38 pm 55. Word to the wise:It is absurd to contrast civil rights in Israel with the Islamic Nations in the ME.
Try being a practicing Roman Catholic in Saudi Arabia. Think of the fate there of migrants workers from the Philippines.
This psuedo-legalistic “parsing” of the matter is another manifestation of the ridiculous double standards that Israel is help to. Americans should be all to understanding of this, given our own experience with the “international community”. It is perhaps the vilest manifestation of moral relativism and mulitcult casuistry and sophistry ever to come out of the Left. The very use of such intellectually dishonest rhetorics clearly expose the venality, duplicity and immorality of those that employ them.
This is purely another polemical method of the Left; one more feign to obscure the truth of the ME and their won hatred of the Jews. It is profoundly immoral and evil.
But the root of this vileness is not their hatred of the Jews, which though real is ancillary, but rather their hatred of Western civilization itself. A hatred that will be on grand display in the coming four years.
In this crisis, no serious, right thinking citizen of the West can do anything other than support the Jews and denounce the savagery of the Islamic actors and the perfidy of their enablers on the left in the West and in the international tranzi “community”.
There are hideously evil forces afoot, and our civilization hangs in the balance. The fact that we sit here and mincingly “parse” the status of Arabs in Israel shows just how debased we have become.
Jan 18, 2009 - 4:43 pm 56. cedarford:If I were a resident Israeli of Palestinian extraction, if feasible, I would volunteer for the Israeli Army, change my name to Goldfarb or something (Oh! the irony) and get with the program as best I could in what way I could. Typical minority stuff. Mainly for my children’s sake. Your story reminds me of the small farmers in the Owens Valley of California who had their farms cheated out from under them by the City of Los Angeles Dept. of Water & Power. They organized and fought back (with guns and dynamite), but eventually got with the program.
A few flaws with your ideas.
1. It is hard to volunteer and serve your Occupier or colonial ruler if you think your likely use will be to be turned against your own kind. It also sorta makes you unpopular with your own people, as the nati-communist Ukrainians, Russians, Latvians, French legions volunteering to fight for the 3rd Reich found out.
The Brits and French knew this well – they would not set native brother against brother in their military, as a general rule, save a small cadre they would use as local knowledge experts and infiltrators. When it came to serious war and killing, they practiced divide and rule.
2. It is not easy to become a Jew, especially in a land ruled by Zionists who believe being an authentic Jew is a racial thing, coming from blood or blood ties through marriage. No Sammy Davis Jrs in Zion…No Mustafa ibn-Goldfarbs either. Israel is NOT the USA, it was NOT set up to be inclusionary.
3. Your Owens Valley example breaks down in the sense that 100% of the Ownens Valley people were left living on the land and later compensated.
4/5ths of them were not forced into Mexico, told to stuff it by a people that had made getting reparations for themselves into a legal art form, and denied a right to return for 60 years to “get with the program”.
***************
Donald Sensing – Thanks for showing there are some objective people here…PJM itself is a good blog outside the Nuke Mecca crowd and those who opine based on their “feelings” without a shred of understanding of situations.
I understand the analogy with American blacks to Israeli Palestinians (or the Apartheid analogy for Palestinians outside Israel Proper under Occupation) is not a perfect one. But close enough for some useful comparisons. I’ll add a few more:
1. Both blacks and Palestinians have brought troubles upon themselves with dysfunctional culture and thuggery that have precipitated some of the historical grievances they have suffered that are meted out collectively due to some bad actors.
2. Both come from honor cultures. Most Americans grow up ignorant of the honor culture of the South which so many blacks still follow, most are ignorant of the Muslim honor culture and profess shock no Muslim has betrayed a silly thing like honor and sold out “terrorist evildoers” with rewards on their heads.
Yet it DRIVES many of those people – far more than urge to get money, “caring about wee children”, “loving peace” do. Slights are taken deadly serious….and the things that linger in black and Palestinian minds. Yes they can vote, yes they have it better than their peers elsewhere…but those slights!
3. Both had been regularly championed by a portion of the population that oppressed them. Liberal whites were “sticking up for the Negro” from the time the 1st arrived. Ineffectively save with the Civil War then civil rights era 100 years later…Same with liberal Israelis – who are used as cover and excuse by Pals. Also, importantly, by hardcore Zionists who have no intent of giving non-Jews more rights, but point out to outsiders that “many Israelis have always cared about Palestinians”.
4. For decades, Zionists were able to create the conventional American narrative of the noble, plucky Jews no longer being pushed around by “anti-Semites” – but winning against “impossible odds” against the animal barbarians who came from outside “the empty land” once hard-working, smart, cultured Jews made it all bloom.
Helped in fair measure by a MSM that was heavily run by pro-Israel Jews who thought it “good for Jews” to create some misleading propaganda.
After Palestinians finally organized, they were able to establish their own narrative in the media, which is now at least partially accepted by most nations outside the USA, where believing Palestinian claims is termed “anti-Semitism”.
American Blacks also had little control of their narrative until recent times. Either defined as violent, feckless animals by those that disliked them. Or as noble, helpless children by patronizing well-meaning whites, who Gentile and Jew alike, believed they should be helped and guided under the control of wiser whites, who would run the black schools, serve blacks better as their lawyers and politicians than blacks themselves, and set up and control groups like the NAACP, intended to mentor and uplift the simple people they were “advancing”.
(And coincidentally counting on for votes and business patronage to help their own power and wealth. And coincidentally converting blacks into clients and wiping out black professions and black-owned businesses by the 1930s in the Northeast.)
************
Cristina – Whatever the history–which you distort heavily, may I say–does it seem justifiable to you to put your own children in the harm’s way in order to regain “your” lands?
Yes, in war after war, one or both sides may find themselves having to endanger civilians, even wee childrean and cuddly civilian puppies – as a price to hang on, get a negotiated peace, even victory.
Many are judged by history as the “right choice” despite having to kill the enemy wee ones, or sacrifice your own. A good example is The Russians and “scorched earth” – which condemned millions of civilians to death – (and I personally don’t think anyy human life is more innocent by age or sex or lack of wearing a uniform than others).
In any Occupation that is resisted, civilians invariably end up in harm’s way. Your choices are few. (1)Resist and the precious wee ones, as well as others may die in reprisals, in urban fighting, in getting your “hostile Mekong Delta village” napalmed, resist openly and away from civilians and you get your best young men (also human beings, BTW) slaughtered. (2)Or you can negotiate and hope the Nazis, Zionists, Muslim, Japanese occupier has a change of heart and will “come to their senses” over the course of decades or centuries. (3)Or you can make a choice that it is better to lick enemy boots forever than jeopardize the children! the children – and their bleak future which may range from second class existence right down to short lives as slaves…
Jan 18, 2009 - 5:19 pm 57. sa:“The story is more complex than you believe.”
actually more complex or more simple depending on pov than you say. Most Palestinians only arrived in the region once the Jews starting coming to take advantage of the developing economy. The Jews had come to bring the desert to life, and the arabs starting streaming in. Under the British, who had not yet made up their minds about the Jewish state, arab immigration was encouraged and many arabs came and Jewish immigration was curtailed (with the result that european jews who were barred from immigration died in nazi europe). I have never seen an even quasi-respectable historian dispute that most palestinians arrived in the area only once the jews had already arrived, to take advantage of the economy.
If you go back further in time, during most of history of the past 2 thousand years, there were more jews there than arabs.
This is how the arabs left – contrary to what you write, when one is all done with revisionist history, most arabs fled:
https://www.commentarymagazine.com/viewarticle.cfm/1948–israel–and-the-palestinians–annotated-text-11373?page=all
It was arab leaders who encouraged the palestinians to flee and wage eternal war, and your claim of methodical plan to get them to leave is hogwash. Read the above article carefully, it’s all documented
So meost of the Palestinians were recent arrivals in the area, came to take advantage of what the Jews had built. ALmost all of them fled of their own accord swearing to destroy the Jewish state. Those who stayed, today’s Israeli arab citizens, are doing better on every measure you can think of – infant mortality, longevity, higher education levels, employment rates, etc etc – not just than arabs in other muslim countries but than muslims in europe. Yes, Israeli arabs are doing better than arabs/muslims in belgium, france, the netherlands all the enlightened countries. If the others had stayed, they’d be doing this well too. Israeli arabs would be doing even better if they were not so conflicted = on the one hand in surveys they say in overwhelming numbers that they don’t want to be part of a new palestinian state at all (and who can blame them). Yet they also support their palestinian brothers, many of whom are relatives, and too many are involved in terrorism. It’s an interesting form of “discrimination” that you complain that they don’t serve in the army, where they’d have to fight their fellow arabs and palestinians. the druze serve, you know, very loyally. One soldier killed in operation cast lead was a druze. But the Israeli arabs can’t serve. If their attitudes to terrorism changed, they would do even better than they are doing now , though I imagine they would always be released from army duty as long as their relatives were on the enemy side, for goodness sake.
Jan 18, 2009 - 5:20 pm 58. Valerie:The Hamas Covenant is a contract to make Hirabah (unjust war) as opposed to Jihad (godly struggle). Once a people agrees that it is ok to kill a neighbor, any neighbor, just because of who they are, there is no containing the damage. That is one reason why Hirabah is forbidden. Its results rebound with disastrous consequences on the innocent members of the people who engage in it. Hamas, Hezbollah, and Al-Qaeda and that bunch of dumb$h!ts in India have all managed to kill far more Muslims than the purported enemy. It is significant that, when Israel started its military action against Hamas, Hamas started killing Palestinians, even wounded Palestinians in the hospital.
Jan 18, 2009 - 5:26 pm 59. tanstaafl:There is nothing to say about people who would
Teach this to 3 year old children
Nothing.
You REALLY think they’re going to put their own little ones in harm’s way?
Hamas is sacrificing its own children in order to gain PR points among the politically correct yellers and screamers. Sacrificing them by attracting Israeli fire to where children & innocents are (school bldgs., a hospital mentioned in the piece) and sacrificing them by brainwashing them into the glories of martyrdom. The Hezbollah guys did the same thing during the summer, 2006 set-to in Lebanon, conducted operations from places they are living and mingled with their wives and children.
Children in service to the cause, it’s part of the “strategy” and many useful idiots in the world fall for it every time.
Jan 18, 2009 - 5:39 pm 60. Valerie:The real Muslim teachers have stated that Muhammed did not add anything to Christinity and Judaism
http://www.islamicamagazine.com/online-analysis/open-letter-to-his-holiness-pope-benedict-xvi.html
and repeatedly embraced the core teaching of both Christianity and Judaism, that you should love your neighbor as yourself.
http://www.acommonword.com/index.php?lang=en&page=option1
The Hamas Covenant is not in keeping with either of these statements.
The notion that the Hamas Covenant is more connected to the worship of Moloch than of Allah (or, translated Yahweh or G-d) makes sense, when you consider the ghoulish efforts by certain purported “Palestinians” to get photographs of injured or dead children with different poses and different “grieving” men. The calculated desire to set up an advertising campaign using the sacred bodies of dead children is the kind of act that the word “obscene” should have been reserved.
Jan 18, 2009 - 5:41 pm 61. myth buster:“The ancients had to have some way of culling the population,” funny, Israel never had a single famine in the entire Old Testament except when she fell into idolatry and child sacrifice. What you advocate is nothing short of cold blooded murder. Where is the modern Elijah to execute those who practice such barbarism? The same is true of our country. Abortionists, those priests of Baal, should be bound and executed for murder-for-hire. I recommend either stoning or slitting their throats and letting them bleed out into a river. Then take every last radical feminist and every last supporter and enabler of the same, who does not summarily repent of their support for sacrificing children to Choice, and put them to the sword as well. Let them choose whom they shall serve, the Lord, or Baal.
What I do know is that pagan gods are real. They are demons, not the figments of the imaginations of fools. Thus, this I repeat to Baal, Molech and Allah, “Thus sayeth the Lord, gods though you may be, offspring of the Most High, all of you, you shall perish like mortals.”
Jan 18, 2009 - 6:03 pm 62. M. Simon:C4,
The story is more complex than you believe. Jews owned about 4% of Palestine at Partition. And a fair amount of that land was bought out from underneath tenant farmers from absentee Ottoman landlords by Zionist land agents working deals in Cairo, Ankara, Istanbul, and Beruit.
These land grabs dispossessing fedayeen (peasants) was the main cause of the 1922, 25, and 1929 riots.
So if I buy a house and land from the owner I can’t kick the tenants out in order to have a place to live? Novel idea of property rights you have.
As to the rest: you start a war. You lose a war. You lose land. Most unfortunate
Jan 18, 2009 - 6:22 pm 63. M. Simon:And lest we forget. The Mufti of Jerusalem and his pal the Austrian Corporal.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amin_al-Husayni#In_Nazi-occupied_Europe
Jan 18, 2009 - 6:41 pm 64. fred:This post is in protest of the author removing an earlier post where I make certain inconvenient assertions he does not agree with. Here is a general explanation of the context of reasoning behind my offensive assertions.
If you peruse these sources at any depth, you will note the astounding dissimilarity between “Allah” and the Creator, Father of Jesus in the Bible.
1. The Qur’an – considered by all traditional, orthodox Muslim scholars to be the literal, eternal, uncreated, and unchanging words of Allah. The Qur’an is a divine dictation. Principle of “abrogation” also applies in the Qur’an, whereby later “revelations” cancel out earlier ones.
2. ahadith – the traditions of Muhammad’s deeds and words
3. The Reliance of the Traveler – the authoritative account of the life of the Prophet
If you are at all familiar with the ancient cultures which the ancient Israelites rebelled against, you will note that the deities of those cultures were vicious, cruel, and capricious. Also, take a good, hard look at what “Allah” is like. See the parallels? Look at Christian and Jewish teachings about THE NATURE OF EVIL and the very real embodiment of that evil in Satan. Last I checked, the Church has not repudiated its teaching about Satan and the agency of that evil force.
The critic of Islam, Ali Sina, himself is a former Muslim scholar and cleric. He has written a searingly critical review of the life of Muhammad, “Understanding Muhammad: A Psychobiography.” In that biography, Sina uses the expression in reference to “Allah” – “Allah” being Muhammad’s sock puppet deity, because Muhammad constantly, predictably, and reliably will send revelations which always affirm whatever it is that Muhammad desires.
Objectively, what do you call a “deity” that sanctions every vice of this man Muhammad, and in fact urges Muhammad on to disgusting violence? If you are a moral person, Christian or not, you would say that “Allah” is a wicked deity. Definitely, unmistakeably evil. The deity that calls Christians and Jews “apes and pigs.” Among other insults.
It certainly is not defamatory to call “Allah” Satan. Quite frankly, the author of this thread, in removing my earlier post which asserts this, lacks understanding of the moral context whereby any educated non-Muslim who may be a Christian or Jew can reasonably conclude this.
I can build a case for “Allah” being satanic. This cruel sock puppet of Muhammad’s certainly does set loose upon history the odious qualities of Molloch or Baal.
Jan 18, 2009 - 6:41 pm 65. Rand Simberg:This post is in protest of the author removing an earlier post where I make certain inconvenient assertions he does not agree with.
I am the author of this article. I have not “removed any posts,” nor do I have any power to do so, even if I wished. Next time you are about to make a false accusation, remember the old saying about ASSume…
Jan 18, 2009 - 7:10 pm 66. myth buster:Maybe Allah is Satan, or maybe he is one of Satan’s underlings. It makes little difference; he’s a demon just the same. Jesus will repay justly the demons who blaspheme Him by impersonating the Creator.
Jan 18, 2009 - 7:10 pm 67. Terrorist Chic « Unclemeat:[...] The return of Moloch [...]
Jan 18, 2009 - 7:10 pm 68. Tex Taylor:This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live and that you may love the LORD your God, listen to his voice, and hold fast to him.
Who was it that was saying Allah the same as Yahweh? How many Jihadists must I hear scream, “We love death as much as you life” before I know that Islam and my Judeo-Christian God are not one and the same? Diametrically opposed, as a matter of fact?
Jan 18, 2009 - 7:22 pm 69. cedarford:sa: (Dispenses more discredited Zionist lies and half truths that the world, including young Israelis not born even by the 1st Infitada, recognize as the conniving BS it is)
sa: Most Palestinians only arrived in the region once the Jews starting coming to take advantage of the developing economy.
Debunked by records of the Ottoman tax censuses of the late 19th Century, early 20th and British censuses. Also, for Christians and some Muslims expelled from “Zion”, deeds that sometimes go back 3 centuries.
sa: The Jews had come to bring the desert to life, and the arabs starting streaming in.
Debunked by British Mandate White papers of 1920, 22, and 1929 that showed Zionists were expelling fedyadeen peasants from lands they bought out underneath them. Early Zionists did start some businesses that employed native Palestinians as tiurist guides, etc…but British insistance that the population remain self-sustaining led Zionists to fire locals in favor of Jews needing to show employment in return for an entry visa.
As for “making the desert bloom”…Hardly. The West Bank was a major grainary and crop area for the Ottomans. What the Zionists found was that the Med Coastal area was arable, but only if you diverted the Jordan and strictly limited water use in the Arab hills that were needed to recharge the Med Coastal acquifer.
sa: Under the British….arab immigration was encouraged.
More BS. By 1922, the Brits knew they had their hands full with Christian, Jewish and Muslim fanatics and discouraged all from immigration except by strict quotas that actually favored the Jews over the others seeking to get into the Palestine Mandate. Over in Jordan it was different as – for Hashemite blood shed liberating the ME from the Ottomans, they allowed in the loyal tribal supporters the Hashemite King wanted.
sa: I have never seen an even quasi-respectable historian dispute that most palestinians arrived in the area only once the jews had already arrived, to take advantage of the economy.
That could be because you only read a guillable US journalist, Joan Peters..or the propaganda meisters Stalin was happy to get rid of, or foolish Christian Zionist Fundie drivel derived from every word of the Bible and Jews being the absolute truth.
Had you read respectable Israeli historians like Benny Morris, respectable ME experts like Hitti at the Princeton Center for ME Studies, or the adept historians of France, Turkey, Britain whose scholarship is based on knowing what happened when they ran the area – you would know what you believe from Crusader Comic Books or Zionist Gazette.
sa: If you go back further in time, during most of history of the past 2 thousand years, there were more jews there than arabs.
Garbage, based on records of the Roman Disapora, Christian coversion records for the Levant, Christian and Muslim records from the time of the Crusades, and the later census records mentioned before. Jews were always a minority post AD 67.
sa: This is how the arabs left – contrary to what you write, when one is all done with revisionist history, most arabs fled
At gunpoint.
sa: It was arab leaders who encouraged the palestinians to flee and wage eternal war, and your claim of methodical plan to get them to leave is hogwash. Read the above article carefully, (sa references Zionist disingenuities orginally claimed in the 50s, before British researchers and Israeli historians confimed it’s falsehoods) it’s all documented
So meost of the Palestinians were recent arrivals in the area, came to take advantage of what the Jews had built. ALmost all of them fled of their own accord swearing to destroy the Jewish state.
Christopher Hitchens posted a masterful essay, “Broadcast” which documented British researchers in the 60s exposing the Zionist lies, based on documented cleansing operations known by the 80s which included eradication of nearly 400 Arab and Christian Arab settlements, as well as analysis of all radio intercepts from the original tapes of all Arab radio broadcasts Jan-Dec 1948. Hitchens also found affidavits from Christian and Muslim Palestinians that had witnessed atrocities, witnessed ethnic cleansing. Nothing voluntary about it. And Hitchens found in memoirs of Zionist leaders that ridding Zion of it’s natives was always a Zionist goal even before Partition and that redeeming all land that could be retaken for the Sons of Zion by terror squads like Irgun or regular Army was always a critical goal.
Only in a few places like Haifa, Hitchens found, were non-Jews protected and encouraged to stay.
Fortunately, in the last 20 years since Hitchens wrote “Broadcast”, as Jewish dominance of US media and textbooks has waned, Americans are starting to get the true story the rest of the world started learning in the 60s. Academia in America is slightly ahead to that, as new students at university can expect to get a far better, and objective treatment of recent ME history than that duplicitous gruel fed to them by “Rah! Rah!” Zionists scarcely 20 years ago.
Of course Right Wing Zionists hate this. No more “from the Nile to the Euphrates” dreams. No more 1940s reparations without people asking what about the Palestinians they cleanses and stiffed out of compensation. No more “Only noble Jews are the victims!” claims that even most Israelis reject (but not ill-educated Americans)
Jan 18, 2009 - 7:31 pm 70. fred:In many examples of Jesus’ actions and attitudes towards children, recorded in the four Gospels, he reserves stern words and even anger towards people who scandalize or mistreat children. If in Jesus we see the face of God, then those powers and deities which would murder, maim, scandalize, and diminish the value of children are an affront to the Creator.
I used to be one of those Leftist Catholics who had an ambiguous or accommodative attitude about abortion. That was years ago. No more. The more I look upon the revolting diminution of life going on in both the West and in the Muslim world, the more I put distance between myself and that past Marxist, heretical hybridization of Christianity I had worked out for myself.
We live in times when more and more both what is good and pure and what is evil and vicious are being clarified right before our eyes. The wheat is being separated from the chaff.
We have to choose. Do you choose life? Or do you choose death?
Jan 18, 2009 - 7:51 pm 71. Vince P:Knights13: Son of the dawn would mean sun rise. How the fu*& did you tie that up to the moon and star and lucifer?
Venus is the Morning Star. That’s how the f*ck I knew. It’s called knowing history. Maybe you should learn some. You must be college educated to be so certain in your ignorance.
Lucifer was one of the names people used to identify the god Venus.
===============
Lucifer (l`sĭfər) [Lat.,=light-bearing], in Christian tradition a name for Satan Satan [Heb.,=adversary], traditional opponent of God and humanity in Judaism and Christianity.
In Scripture and literature the role of the opponent is given many names, such as Apolyon, Beelzebub, Semihazah, Azazel, Belial, and Sammael.
In the Vulgate, Lucifer served as a translation of the Hebrew epithet meaning “Day Star,” a name associated with the presumptuous King of Babylon in the Book of Isaiah. Some early Christian writers found a parallel in the Gospel of St. Luke, where Jesus refers to Satan falling like lightning from heaven. On this basis they identified Isaiah’s “Day Star” with Satan and concluded that there was scriptural authority for designating him “light-bearer.” In antiquity Lucifer was also the name given Venus as the morning star.
The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia® Copyright © 2007, Columbia University Press. Licensed from Columbia University Press. All rights reserved. http://www.cc.columbia.edu/cu/cup/
======================
And in the original Hebrew, the terms used there are the same ones used for the arabican crescent moon god and morning star.
Jan 18, 2009 - 8:33 pm 72. Hamas sacrificed children for media attention:[...] http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/gaza-children-sacrificed-to-a-
Jan 18, 2009 - 9:05 pm 73. john from cinncinatti:mohammed: we lost the war in vietnam but we didn’t get our asses kicked. we left somalia, didn’t they say the rangers killed over a thousand somalis in the one firefight? that number is argued. we were in lebanon as peace keepers, we got bombed for our efforts. hey tora bora was a good one, were the hell did bin laden go hide? how did it work out for the mohammedens in falluja? those pesky devil dogs really put it on them. Semper Fi, you can always count on those guys to break you off a piece. thats why i like George W. Bush he definitely knows how to get medievel on folks.
Jan 18, 2009 - 9:52 pm 74. Gary Rosen:“Academia in America is slightly ahead to that”
Can’t wait until we’re getting all our troofs from Ward Churchill and Bill Ayers!
Jan 19, 2009 - 1:48 am 75. Chris in Oz:As a student of the Bible and having read the Koran also I concluded that the ‘Allah’ of the Koran is one and the same as the ‘Satan’ of the Bible.
They share many attributes – even the same dwelling place of hell. In the Bible hell is the one place where, by definition, God cannot be. Yet in the Koran I read that this is where Allah dwells, punishing the non-Moslem. Mohammad admitted several times (including in his last preaching) that he had been overcome or indwelt by demonic forces, in this he spoke truth.
Jan 19, 2009 - 1:56 am 76. Peter the Bubblehead:51. Knights13 wrote:
It is easy to bash most if not all religions. I don’t know why people are fixated just on Islam. Here are some negatives picked out from other books than the quran: (for example…)
If a heathen (gentile) hits a Jew, the gentile must be killed.
A Jew need not pay a gentile (”Cuthean”) the wages owed him for work.
Jews may use lies (”subterfuges”) to circumvent a Gentile.
Peter writes: The big difference is not in what is written in religious books, but how much of what is written is carried out by those who follow those religions.
You can probably cite all sorts of ‘evidence’ in the Torah, Bible, etc., of books telling followers to do bad things. But how many Jews are out there regularly not paying non-Jews for the work they do? How many Jews are killing non-Jews for simple assault and battery? But you hear all the time about Islamists following the directives of their holy book and killing every so-called infidel in sight JUST because the book tells them too.
Heck, even the bible tells us Christians are allowed to own slaves. But of all the incidents you hear about lately of people holding immigrants (often illegal ones) in servitude, being trated like animals and forced to work 16, 18 , 20 hours a day, how many are Christians? None I know of. Plenty of Muslims though.
Jan 19, 2009 - 5:43 am 77. Peter the Bubblehead:54. mountainaires:
Peter responds: Okay, mountainaires, how many other religious groups can you name that purposely send their children off to kill themselves with the hopes they will be killing others at the same time?
Can’t deny the Islamists do this. Happens all the time.
Please, name a few others.
Jan 19, 2009 - 5:45 am 78. Spindok:14. Cedarford
“As for the “5 Arab Armies” – they did not form until the knowledge of Zionist cleansing reached their cities, and the “armies” were little better than civilians handed a rifle and told to fight for their Muslim kinsmen and stop the cleansing”
Not quite.
Order of battle
Arab forces 1948:
Jordon Arab Legion – The best military force in the region. British led, trained and equipped. 10,000 men 75 armored vehicles 40 artillery pieces
Egypt – 20,000 trained soldiers sent. 13 batallions, 135 tanks. 90 artillery pieces, close to 50 combat aircraft
Iraq – 18,000 regular full time soldiers sent including an armored brigade, 100 British combat planes, 1 armored batallion
Syria – 12,000 soldiers, one armored batallion 50 combat planes
Arab League – 6000 volunteers also token forces from Lebanon and Saudi Arabia as well as Palestinian irregulars
Jewish forces
– Total of about 35,000 combined Palmach Irgun and Hagana.
No armored vehicles. No combat planes. No tanks. No artillery or anti-tank weapons. No heavy machine guns. By the end of the war Israel had aquired a few planes and armored vehicles on the black market.
Weapons (produced or purchased on the black market). Light and medium machine guns (Sten guns), Grenades, 2 and 3-inch mortars, fewer rifles than soldiers. Some makeshift armor placed around trucks and buses for transport.
Spindok
Jan 19, 2009 - 6:33 am 79. Lawrence Kohn:don’t forget the hundreds of Israeli civilians many of them children murdered by Hamas in the 1990s and 2000-2003. The murders by Hamas have been going on since Israel established the Palestinian Authority in 1993; this has to be figured into the proportionality claim as well. And the rockets were growing in range and accuracy and would have continued to without Israel’s response. Now with the cease fire and withdrawal and no Israeli forces on the Philadelphi corridor the rocket build up will continue. The suicide bombings have nearly ended due to Operation Defensive Shield which destroyed the Hamas infrastructure of terror in the West Bank (with Israeli forces still in security control) and with the building of the barrier condemned by the media of course but a life saving measure and one that helps avoid mass fighting in the West Bank. Jeremiah condemned idol worship precisely for the sacrifice of children; where are our progressive liberal Protestant friends in this war against Hamas?
Jan 19, 2009 - 7:19 am 80. fred:The moderator of the forum did not like a point I had made about another example of how children are valued in Islam. I brought up the VERY TRUE FACT of Muhammad’s marriage to Abu Bakr’s six year old daughter, Aisha – the marriage being “consummated” when poor Aisha was nine years old. Abu Bakr was Muhammad’s most trusted and important lieutenant, and one of the ways in which Muhammad tested his loyalty was the fact that Muhammad desired his daughter and Abu Bakr had to give way to the Prophet’s will, which received a timely revelation from Allah that it was o.k. to take the child into marriage and later to his bed. Pedophilia – another disgusting manifestation of the Prophet’s “holiness.” And Islam teaches that the Prophet is to be emulated in all things.
So Allah/Moloch/Baal not only demands human sacrifices of children, but also demands that they be the sex toys of the chosen. Let me remind everyone that it takes the Biblical religions of Judaism and Christianity to refine our moral sensibilities so that we can name the filth for what it is.
I realize it is politically incorrect today to criticize Islam. But Judaism and Christianity are fair game, so that we can art exhibits which mock these traditional faiths and an entertainer who when she was giving a concert can masturbate on stage using a crucifix. These are the times we live in. The things I have written in criticism of Islam and the Prophet are not made up, nor are they defamatory. They can be verified in the classic texts and traditions of Islam.
Jan 19, 2009 - 7:24 am 81. Joe Pepe NYC:mohammed:
Jan 19, 2009 - 7:43 am 82. Lilith:‘24. RW:
Arab culture has a longstanding problem of fielding an effective fighting force. Loyalty to the tribe being one of them.’
This is a bit rich coming from the country whose a** was whooped in Vietnam, Somalia and recently Iraq. Americans can only lobe missiles from a distance till nothing moves. Face to face combat? they will always do a runner or try to bribe their way out, i understand Viagra is the latest currency.( I guess that’s because middle eastern men are sexualy insecure.I guess that’s why they fear women)
If by “wooped” you mean we destroyed the country then ok.
We are not great at nation building but we can topple one in 3 weeks.
1st we heard about the ground opening up and swallowing our troops in a fire islamic jibber gabber in Afghanastan.(They hid in the mountains and never even fought back)
30 days and we ran over the country.
Then we were told that Saddam the mighty arab warrior with the largest best trained army in the middle east would slaughter us.
30 days and Iraq fell and Saddam was hidding like a rat.(His troops were a big failure)
I guess Isreal lost in Lebenon and Gaza as well.
They wrecked both countries and lost a handfull of men while the real loosers lost thousands.
Did I mention they wrecked both countries in 2 weeks?
Cedarford – I really would like to see your sources – day after day you spout “facts” that are either self-evident – ie. Jews buy land and expect the former owners or their “peasants” to move on. Yes, this is generally a natural progression when one purchases a piece of land – the former owners leave, the new owners take possession – or not supported with any empirical evidence.
You state that “Jews owned about 4% of Palestine at Partition. And a fair amount of that land was bought out from underneath tenant farmers from absentee Ottoman landlords by Zionist land agents working deals in Cairo, Ankara, Istanbul, and Beruit. These land grabs dispossessing fedayeen (peasants) was the main cause of the 1922, 25, and 1929 riots.”
Indeed, the Zionists did buy up tracts of land in Britain’s Palestinian mandate prior to WWII. The land was sold to them quite willingly by the owners. The fact that the “peasants” as you term them, were displaced is because their “masters” no longer owned the land and the new owners wished to farm it themselves. If one purchases land which the current owner is leasing to another, and if one wishes to farm that land oneself that is the perogative of the new owner. The fact that the owners were quite willing to sell, should tell you a little about how much value Arab landowners placed on the “peasants”. These were no more land grabs, then my purchasing of a house and land from its owner is a land grab.
You state that “dispossessing fedayeen (peasants) was the main cause of the 1922, 25, and 1929 riots.”
In fact, the riots were part of the anti-Zionist agitation stirred up by the Husseini family,one of two families that controlled the region. Interestingly, they were not directed against Zionist settlers, but against the old Jewish communities of Safed, Tiberias, Jerusalem and Hebron that had existed for millenium. Undoubtedly, to remove as much of the historical community as possible.
http://www.zionism-israel.com/Palestine_Massacre_riots_of_1929.htm
Finally, nearly 80 percent of the Palestinian Mandate, as defined by the League of Nations, was severed by the British in 1921 and allocated to what became Transjordan. Jewish settlement there was barred.
Finally, according to British statistics, more than 70 percent of the land in what would become Israel was NOT owned by Arab farmers, it belonged to the mandatory government. Those lands reverted to Israeli control after the departure of the British in 1948. At that time, about 3 percent of the land of Israel was owned by Arabs who became citizens of Israel.
About 18 percent of the new land of Israel belonged to Arabs who left the country, at the instigation of the Syrians, Egyptians, Jordanians, etc., before and after the Arab invasion of Israel.
http://factsofisrael.com/en/history.shtml
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/myths2/cover.html
Land grabs? I think not.
Jan 19, 2009 - 8:26 am 83. Kevin:“Sacrificing” children? Who are you kidding? These children were MURDERED by the Israelis. The bombs thrown on them were thrown by Israelis. The bullets that pierced their little bodies were fired by Israelis. For a people that were dehumanized not too long ago, you seem to be doing the same to others. And why not? If you declare someone sub-human, it’s easy to kill them. That’s what the Nazis did.
Jan 19, 2009 - 9:10 am 84. mountainaires:#77 Peter the Bubblehead asks:
“…how many other religious groups can you name that purposely send their children off to kill themselves with the hopes they will be killing others at the same time?”
Jewish parents send their youth off to kill themselves in wars with Hamas and Hezbollah. Israel–a Jewish state–hopes that if their youth die, they will be killing others at the same time. The Israeli government of the Jewish state of Israel purposefully sends its children off to kill themselves with the hopes that they will be killing others at the same time.
Get a brain, Bubblehead. Extremists are extremists, whether they are Jewish or Palestinian.
Jan 19, 2009 - 9:15 am 85. Nat X:What do those semi-literates who oppose Israel think would happen if by some “miracle” the israelis disappeared from the scene?
First of all, the Palestinians would wreck all of the farms and factories, and turn the place into an unproductive, degenrate rathole sewer, just as Islamists have done wherever they gained power. There wopuld be no agriculture (except for maybe heroin production), no industry and no culture, other than some Dark Ages totalitarian garbage the Islamists call a society. It would benefit nobody other than a couple thousand fat-bellied, fat-assed, unwashed men with dirty beards and dozens of wives.
Second, do the anti-Israel idiots really think peace would come to the Middle East after Israel was gone? The Palestinians would look east to Jordan, and claim THAT is part of “Palestine” too. They would make war on ever one of their neighbors. That is what Islamists do.
Jan 19, 2009 - 9:33 am 86. Kimberley:Yes indeed the legendary concern of Muslim’s for their children surfaces again. No wonder they have equal concern for the children of others.A thoroughly despicable totalitarian ideology.
Jan 19, 2009 - 9:39 am 87. charlie:Personally, I’m tired of fanaticism, whether it’s some rabid antiabortionist spouting violent fantasies (see “myth buster”) in the name of religion, some fundamentalist Christian fascists spouting antigay hatred in the name of religion, or Islamic militants who advocate death for nonbelievers in the name of religion.
Jan 19, 2009 - 9:40 am 88. Jan:I believe that religions developed to serve two major functions in society: to answer disturbing, existential questions about life and death; and to provide a blueprint for social order. Always, there seem to be people so arrogant, so self-absorbed and so self-righteous about their religious doctrine that they would put themsevles above the rule of law, to justify the acting out of whatever patholigical, antisocial fantasies they may be harboring. Is someone a better person because they commit crimes in the name of faith?
I don’t rely on parroting religious doctrine to form my thinking. I believe it was Thomas Jefferson, who said, “to see with the eye of faith is to close the eye of reason.” More people should question whether religious “revelations” of any label have maintained social relevance because these revelations all are inherently imperfect attempts by imperfect humans to interpret divine inspiration. Who has the unmitigated arrogance to think they actually can know God’s will?
To James letter #26: There was never a Palestine? Israel existed before Palestine? Israel as a country came about after the partition in ‘48. Jews have been around as long as the Philistines (today’s Palestinians,) and although both are Semites, have never gotten along. I was raised in Lebanon and am very familiar with the Palestinian question. I know from having spoken with many Arabs from other countries, that although they are angry with what Israelis have done to the Palestinians over the years, they are even more angry at the Palestinians for all the trouble they have caused since 1948 not only to Israelis but to Lebanon and Jordan, by turning certain parts in those countries into refugee camps where they build weapons caches under schools, hospitals, etc. Hezbollah does it in Beirut. I have met many Palestinians and other Muslims who disagree with what Hamas is doing. Having said that, Israel needs to stop their radicals from invading what is left of Palestinian land which was ceded to them by Israel after ‘48. By the same token, Palestinians need to realize that they can’t demand that land they sold, legally or otherwise, now be returned to them. Not realistic. To eradicate a people based on one’s religious beliefs is an excuse used by the weak to conquer the strong. While I see both sides, having lived in proximity to both, I sympathize with the side that doesn’t seek to annihilate a people based on religious grounds. Regardless of what the Bible, Torah, or Quran, might advocate as punishment for lawbreakers, those laws were written at a time when such punishments were the norm. Time passes, people change. Killing people for thinking or believing differently is no longer acceptable behavior in most countries. What today’s Muslims are doing has nothing to do with God. It is all about ego. To willingly sacrifice women and children in order to sway public opinion, is outrageous and shows what little value radical Muslims have not only for human life but for their own people. This should be condemned by everyone. Unfortunately, people trapped in Gaza cannot complain for fear of being shot or imprisoned and tortured. Hamas’s only “raison d’etre” is to destroy Jews everywhere. After they are done with Jews, they will do the same with anyone who does not convert to Islam. While Arabs everywhere proclaim their support for Palestinians, they wouldn’t dream of moving there and helping out. It’s so easy to manifest in the streets for Gazans and then go home to one’s unbombed home, eat a warm meal, and sleep in one’s comfy bed. How many Muslims live in the ‘States enjoying all the freedoms they know they wouldn’t have back in Gaza, yet have the nerve to criticize the very government that allowed them to come here and live good lives? Dearborn, MI, anyone? Not one of them would consider moving back there. Send money to buy weapons, yes, that they will do. How about all the mosques being built in France with government funding? Instead of complaining about how things are from a safe, comfortable place, go back and help your Islamic brethren.
Jan 19, 2009 - 9:50 am 89. Anna:“Sacrificing” children? Who are you kidding? These children were MURDERED by the Israelis. The bombs thrown on them were thrown by Israelis. The bullets that pierced their little bodies were fired by Israelis. For a people that were dehumanized not too long ago, you seem to be doing the same to others. And why not? If you declare someone sub-human, it’s easy to kill them. That’s what the Nazis did.
Jan 19, 2009 - 10:09 am 90. SGT Ted:C-Fudds “source” is the Palestinian “history” manufactured by the KGB for the Egyptian Yasser Arafat’s PLO in the 60’s in order to discredit the Jews. The only reason C-Fud uses this fiction is because it targets Jews, who he thinks conspire to run the world, ala The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.
Whats funny is, if C-Fudd were to be morally consistant, he would allow for the alleged “terrorism” of the Zionist movement as being as legitimate as that of todays PLO/Hamas, because of past oppression. But, he won’t cut Joooooos the same slack he cuts for deathcult Islamists, because he’s Jew hater.
Jan 19, 2009 - 10:11 am 91. Vince P:It’s the secular people who are the ones who are blind to reality and who believe the fictions they concoct in their minds in order to feel superior to everyone else.
Their minds are so muttled that they ask inane rhetorical questions like “Who has the unmitigated arrogance to think they actually can know God’s will?”…. Gee.. there’s this book called the Bible.
It’s pretty clear what his will is for a wide range of issues.
And really.. where do these secularists get off saying religious people lack a rigorous scientific mind. Who other than these secularists bounce from one junk science crisis to the next.
And finally… how dumb can secularists be to actually , laughably, think that the Palestinians want co-existence? There is no objective basis to reach that conclusion.
So say whatever politically bigoted thing you want… you’re wrong. It’s you who blindly adhere to your myths and no amount of in-your-face aggression by the Jihadis will ever get your worthless attention.
These past ten years have revealed just how stupid the Left has become. It’s really pathetic.
Jan 19, 2009 - 10:12 am 92. Vince P:Jan is another great example of someone so stuck on herself on her cultural Marxism that no amount of counter-information will get her to recognize the truth.
And yet in her belligerent ignorance she condescends to people who barely warrant her notice.
Jan 19, 2009 - 10:15 am 93. charlie:Not all Muslims are fanatics. Most are reasonable people, who decry the criminality advocated by fanatics in the name of their faith.
Jan 19, 2009 - 10:17 am 94. BioGenesis:Most Catholics peacefully went on about their business, during the terrors of the Inquisition, endorsed by Popes, run by the Jesuits, and supported, from the beginning, by Their Most Catholic Majesties, Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain, during the ethnic cleansing of Muslims and Jews from Spain after 1492.
It is not necessary to try to discredit a religion to discredit the behavior of fanatical criminals, who invoke it to justify their barbarous inhumanity.
What if both countries were evil?
By the way I am from dearborn MI. The arabs(Teenagers anyway) here are as bad as any gang Member from Detroit.
Jan 19, 2009 - 10:23 am 95. SGT Ted:Nothing worse than basing one’s criticism on propaganda memes from a collapsed totalitarian nation.
Jan 19, 2009 - 10:23 am 96. charlie:To Vince P.: Yeah, I guess you’re right. Your religion, with the Bible, must be the right one. That was what you were brainwashed to believe from the day you were born. Everyone else’s religion is wrong, misguided, and not deserving of respect. How do you justify such arrogance and ignorance? You speak of “the Palestinians” like they are all fanatical criminals; some are, most aren’t. You paint with the same broad brush of bigotry that leads to hate crimes. “Secularists” have served society better than religious fanatics. Scientists risked religious persecution, in the name of the Bible, for proposing the existence of vacuum, containing nothing, when God is supposed to be everywhere, for proposing that the Earth is not the center of the universe, for proposing that the universe is more than the fundamentalist Christian proposition of about 6,000 years old. Talk about wearing blinders! I guess the blinders keep you comfortable. (By the way, the word is muddled, not “muttled.”)
Jan 19, 2009 - 10:47 am 97. Vince P:charlie: I’m not using religion for my military analysis.
The Palestinians are the most depraved barbaric people on earth. They got this way by design.. they are the vanguard of Islamic jihad against Israel.
So you can waste as much time as you want talking about the Bible.. you will gain no insight about anything (which is why you do divert to the Bible… you in your ignorance have nothing else to talk about)
Defending Israel is defending America… America and Israel are marked for death by the Islamists.
Why we tolerate these people is a mystery to me.. they need to be crushed . now.
Jan 19, 2009 - 11:07 am 98. Peter the Bubblehead:84. mountainaires wrote:
Jewish parents send their youth off to kill themselves in wars with Hamas and Hezbollah.
Peter responds: By that measure, Americans send their youth off to kill themselves in wars with Islamic extremists and Iraqi Republican Guard too. But those of us familiar with the real world realize that a standing army is necessary for the defense of a sovereign nation, especially one that is being constantly attacked by terrorists and those intent on its destruction.
Jan 19, 2009 - 11:08 am 99. Peter the Bubblehead:88. Jan:
Read history and learn;
The “myth” of a Palestinian people or indigenous Palestine:
In an article entitled, “The Lesson of Palestine,” printed in the Middle East Journal, October 1949, Arab activist, Musa Alami, wrote, “how can people struggle for their nation, when most of them do not know the meaning of the word? … The people are in great need of a “myth” of imagination. The myth of nationality would create “identity” and “self-respect.”
The Arab world has certainly demonstrated great skill in the “myth” of imagination. They have done such a good job that they have convinced much of the world that their “myths” are facts. Perhaps their biggest myth is the myth of Palestine. The Arab world would have us believe that the Palestinians have been in “Palestine” from “time immemorial” but were displaced by the Jews when Israel became a state in 1948. But what are the facts?
While we are not certain of the exact dates, Joshua conquered the Land God promised the Jews in the 13th century BCE. King David established Jerusalem as the capital of Israel around 1000 BCE. King Solomon built the Jewish Temple about 960 BCE. This was almost 1000 years before the beginning of Christianity and 1600 years before the rise of Islam. As Prime Minister Barak has noted, “When Jesus came to Jerusalem to celebrate the feasts, he didn’t come to a church or a mosque, he came to the Temple.” It is not the Church Mount or the Mosque Mount that is fought over, it is the Temple Mount. It was the Temple Mount centuries before Christianity tried to make it the Church Mount and Islam tried to make it the Mosque Mount.
However, not to be confused with facts, in a personal audience I had several years ago with the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, who was appointed by Arafat, he boldly declared that the Arabs had been living in the Land for 10,000 years. Based on conservative Bible chronology, that means the Arabs have been living in the Land before the Almighty created Adam and Eve.
How did Israel become Palestine and who are the Palestinians? The second Jewish war with the Romans took place in 132-135 CE. Led by Rabbi Akiva and Simon bar Kochba, the Jewish uprising was crushed by the Roman Emperor Hadrian who sought to de-Judaize Jerusalem and make it a pagan city. Hadrian renamed Jerusalem “Aelia Capitolina” in honor of Jupiter. He changed the name of Judea and gave it the name of the Jews ancient enemy, the Philistines. He called it — Palestine.
Over time, Palestine was ruled by the Roman Byzantines (312-637) [Persian interrupt 614-629], Omayyad Arabs (638-750), Islamic Abbassid’s (750-1099), Crusaders (1099-1291) [Saladin the Kurd interrupt 1187-93], Mamluks (1291-1516), Ottoman Turks (1517-1917), and the British Mandate (1917-1948). None of these rulers established a sovereign state in the Land and Jerusalem was never the capital of any empire since the time of King David. Palestine was a forgotten desolate, wasteland, but historical records show there was always a Jewish presence in the Land.
The revival of modern Jewish life in the Land began in the 1880’s with the arrival of Russian refugees from the Russian pogroms. A second wave of immigration, also from Russia, was in 1905. This was followed by later immigrations resulting in a growing Jewish population in the Land. When the Jews came to the Land, they found a malaria infested swamp in the north and an uninhabitable desert in the south. It was as if the God of the Bible had kept the Land hidden away in obscurity until the rightful owners — the Jews returned to claim it.
The Jewish pioneers did not steal the Land from the Arabs. They purchased the Land at highly inflated prices from absentee landlords living outside the Land. As the Jews worked the Land, it began to prosper. While there were Jews and Arabs living in the Land, there were many poor migrant Arab farm workers in the surrounding Arab countries who needed work. When they heard that the Land was prospering under the hand of the Jews, they migrated to Palestine to get work from the Jews. Furthermore, the British allowed many thousands of Arabs into Palestine illegally while barring the Jews from entering the Land. For the most part, the Arab Palestinians are these peasant farm workers and illegal aliens.
“Palestinians” have never been a distinct people, they have never had a sovereign land called Palestine, Jerusalem has never been their capital, there is no Palestinian language or culture, and there is no Palestinian people. It is a myth created after the Jews liberated Jerusalem in 1967.
Before the birth of the State of Israel, Arab leaders themselves denied the existence of an Arab country called Palestine. In 1937, Arab leader, Auni Bey Abdul-Hadi said, “There is no such country [as Palestine]! ‘Palestine’ is a term the Zionists invented! There is no Palestine in the Bible. ‘Palestine” is alien to us; it is the Zionists who introduced it.” In 1946, a distinguished Princeton professor and Arab historian said, “There is no such thing as Palestine in Arab history, absolutely not.”
Jan 19, 2009 - 11:10 am 100. charlie:To Vince P.: “Why we tolerate these people is a mystery to me. They need to be crushed now.” I don’t know, Vince. There might just be an innocent Palestinian man, woman or child in the mix. I agree, though, the criminals, hiding behind religious doctrine, need to be crushed now. Maybe, you’d rather “kill them all, and let God sort them out,” but whose God would that be? Only the right one, I’m sure.
Jan 19, 2009 - 11:28 am 101. Apalachian:“Sacrificing” children? Who are you kidding? These children were MURDERED by the Israelis. The bombs thrown on them were thrown by Israelis. The bullets that pierced their little bodies were fired by Israelis. For a people that were dehumanized not too long ago, you seem to be doing the same to others. And why not? If you declare someone sub-human, it’s easy to kill them. That’s what the Nazis did.
Jan 19, 2009 - 11:30 am 102. Spindok:84. mountainaires quoth thusly:
“Jewish parents send their youth off to kill themselves in wars with Hamas and Hezbollah.”
American-Jewish parents sent their youth off to kill themselves in wars with Vietnam, Europe, Iraq and Afghanistan.
(I have been to the graves in Normandy. Plenty of six-pointed stars there. My Jewish father served in Vietnam and earned a bronze star. My son is thinking about the US military now. I think college first, but OK if you want… My state district congressman is a Jewish veteran from Iraq – two tours with many awards)
Russian-Jewish parents sent their youth off to die in defense of mother Russia. Their decendants now mostly live in Israel. (I have a picture of one, my great-uncle in the Czars army. A trumpet player actually.)
German-Jewish parents in WWI sent their youth off to die in defense of their beloved homeland. On Kristalnacht they tried in vain to display their Iron Crosses and medals in their shop windows…then the Brownshirts came.
So what is the point? Jews send off their ‘youth’ to fight in wars same as anyone else.
There is a serious difference between taking an 18-20 year old with training and appropriate full-time professional leadership, in a conventional military, and literally grabbing an 8 year old, holding him kicking and screaming, in front of you to use as a shield in the midst of a firefight. Would you like to see the video?
Would you like to see videos of a mentally challenged 16 year old with bombs strapped to his body by Hamas at a Gaza checkpoint?
There is a difference between basing military assets in the basement of a hospital or school as opposed to designated military areas.
An Israeli soldier (or US, French or whatever) is not a ‘child’. All of us recognize the diffence between a defenceless 8 year old and a trained 18-20 year old in the regular military. Yes we all now how sad it is that the grey-beards send up our best ‘youth’ to die. That is hardly unique to Israel.
If you want to make a case against Israel this is not the way to go.
Spindok
Jan 19, 2009 - 11:31 am 103. Rand Simberg:To whoever is moderating comments, someone is spamming them, with the same identical (nonsensical) message using different names. See commenters “Kevin,” “Anna,” and “Apalachian.”
Jan 19, 2009 - 11:49 am 104. TDB:Isreal is responsible for the deaths of the innocent people and children they murdered. Hamas leaders I have no respect for either. But isreal leaders or anyone else saying the deaths of all those innocent women and children were the responsibility of Hamas leaders is insane. So lets go by a example: I have a person that authoritys believe may kill someone if we do not take him down emed. Ok, understandable. But this person is in a school with over three hundred children and women in it. But to get our target we will bomb the whole school, no matter what consequences or innocent lives are taken in the process. Thats insane! Do you see how insane that is? Thats called mass murder. But we blame the criminal that hid in the school among the innocent for “making” us kill all of the people in the building. Just like seriel killers, rapist, child murderes do here in the states when there caught. The death is by there hands alone but they blame it on society or another and even the victim at times. Crazy isnt it? Another example, there is a dangerous man and he is hiding among the homeless in a homeless shelter with 500 innocent people. We cant tell which one he is but he is our target and we will stop him, so the whole building is blown up and every other innocent person inside it. Is that insane? Is that mass murder? Yes it clearly is. How is anyone letting isreal do a classic switch of blame which we have all seen in chess games played between people in power with the weaker. They feel the heat of the world getting angry at them because they are doing war crimes in gaza. They strategically, like in a chess game turn it on there oponent even when there to blame for those deaths. You see this in human beings all the time. Hell the switch the blame game has been done by our boyfriends and husbands for years. Do you think what isreal is doing isnt seen for what it is? Dont insult the worlds intelligence. And use a more clever exuse for child murders than the lame, completely overused one isreal leaders tryed when they said it was them to blame and even went as far as to blame the victims by saying they follow Hamas. Its crazy and insane thinking and the innocent people are allways the ones to suffer the most. Its called mass murder, war crimes. Its called wanting control and power over others and not caring who suffers to attain it. I couldnt live anymore if at my own hands I killed that many children or was responsible for it. I couldnt go on living. But the leaders will sleep well, because they have no compassion for anyone but themselves, not even innocent children, bottom line. The world has seen and heard it with there own ears and eyes. Its not a secret everyone. It has been revealed to all, compliments of technology. Isreal cannot have a good enough reson or excuse to murder whom theyve murdered. None.
Jan 19, 2009 - 11:58 am 105. Greg London:Israel’s blockade of Gaza has been going on for 2 years. Before Israel’s three-week invasion of Gaza, half of Gazans lived below the poverty line, unemployment was at 60%, average income was $650 a year.
Amnesty international, Human Rights Watch, and even Jimmy Carter condemned Israel’s brutal blockade of Gaza as collective punishment, illegal under the Geneva Conventions.
Hamas rockets killed 17 Israelis in 2008. Most of them before July 2008, when Israel and Hamas entered into a ceasefire. The ceasefire held for four months until Israel violated it on November 4 when it sent troops into Gaza and killed several members of Hamas, and then Israel further tightened the blockade.
Hamas offered to renew teh ceasefire for a year if Israel would lift the blockade. Israel responded by bombing and invading gaza.
Hamas rockets killed 17 Israelis. Most before the ceasefire in July. The ceasefire that Israel violated.
Hamas offered to renew the ceasefire for a year if Israel would lift the blockade. Israel instead responded with a war. Israel killed 300 palestinian children and 200 adult civilians in three weeks.
Israel justified this war on teh grounds that it needed to stop Hamas rockets. Rockets that had stopped during the ceasefire. THe ceasefire that Israel had violated. A ceasefire that Hamas had offered to renew for a year if Israel would lift its blockade. A blockade that is a human rights crime on Israel’s part.
There were plenty of effective ways to stop the rockets that did NOT require the loss of hundreds of innocent palestinians.
Israel chose this war.
Jan 19, 2009 - 12:00 pm 106. Sandi:#87 charlie
you truly are a voice of reason, best post i’ve read today..i would also like to add another quote..
The inhabitants of the earth are of two sorts:
Jan 19, 2009 - 12:03 pm 107. Peter the Bubblehead:Those with brains, but no religion,
And those with religion, but no brains.
Abu’l-`Ala’ al-Ma`arri
105. Greg London wrote:
Israel chose this war.
Peter asks (incredulously): Are you seeing the same reports from the war zone I am???
Israel CHOSE to have thousands of rockets launched at their civilian towns?
Israel CHOSE to have Hamas write a charter that calls for the complete destruction of a nation and the annihilation of a religion??
Israel CHOSE to allow for a cease fire only to have their enemies re-arm and, as soon as they feel strong enough, start fighting all over again???
You, Greg, need to get your head out of the sand and see the real world for once.
Jan 19, 2009 - 12:25 pm 108. Spindok:@TDB 104
We have liberal rules here on the internet in terms of typos, etc. I screw up often. I have a tendancy to leave out key words or spelling mistakes.
Learn to use paragraphs. Just a suggestion. (both of those are crap sentances) Hardly anyone will read through a 35+ sentance rant without any sort of attempt at organization.
I do have question for Greg London 105.
You said “There were plenty of effective ways to stop the rockets that did NOT require the loss of hundreds of innocent palestinians.”
What would those ways be exactly? Why do you think they would be effective and have they been tried before?
‘Plenty’ means more than one, more than two or three in basic english. Give them to me. I think IDF, and many more concerned individuals, would love to hear about the bloodless ’stopping of rockets plan’ you propose.
Spindok
Jan 19, 2009 - 12:31 pm 109. Greg London:bubblehead, the rockets HAD stopped.
Israel and Hamas had a working ceasefire from July to November 2008. Israel violated the ceasefire. Hamas offered to extend the ceasefire for a year if Israel would lift its blockade of Gaza. Israel instead bombed and invaded Gaza.
The rockets had stopped for four months. They resumed only after Israel violated the ceasefire. Hamas offered to extend the ceasefire if Israel would lift its blockade. Israel turned down that offer and instead replied with a war that killed hundreds of women and children.
This war was not needed to stop the rockets.
Jan 19, 2009 - 12:37 pm 110. Greg London:http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/war_on_gaza/2009/01/2009110112723260741.html
The Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center, (centre-right Israeli intelligence think tank), whose December 31 report titled “Six Months of the Lull Arrangement Intelligence Report,” confirmed that the June 19 truce was only “sporadically violated, and then not by Hamas but instead by … “rogue terrorist organisations”.
Instead, “the escalation and erosion of the lull arrangement” occurred after Israel killed six Hamas members on November 4 without provocation and then placed the entire Strip under an even more intensive siege the next day
So, you might want to tell the Israeli intelligence think tank to get its head out of the sand.
Jan 19, 2009 - 12:42 pm 111. Rand Simberg:…to get our target we will bomb the whole school, no matter what consequences or innocent lives are taken in the process. Thats insane!
No, what’s insane is this idiotic attempt at an analogy. Israel takes great pains to avoid innocent deaths.
Jan 19, 2009 - 12:43 pm 112. Leatherneck:The religion of Moloch still exists. It is called abortion, and Lucifer loves it.
Jan 19, 2009 - 12:43 pm 113. Greg London:>>…to get our target we will bomb the whole school,
>>no matter what consequences or innocent lives are
>>taken in the process. Thats insane!
>No, what’s insane is this idiotic attempt at
>an analogy. Israel takes great pains to avoid
>innocent deaths.
It isn’t an analogy, its a quote:
Israel’s Minister of Public Security, Avi Dichter, believes punishment should be inflicted “irrespective of the cost to the Palestinians”
Meir Sheetrit has urged that Israel should “decide on a neighborhood in Gaza and level it”
Major-General Gadi Eisenkot said “We will wield disproportionate power against every village”
http://www.warhw.com/2009/01/15/the-war-of-words-israel-and-hamas/
Jan 19, 2009 - 1:08 pm 114. Spindok:Well sure Greg London.
7/19/08…Indirect negotiations through Egypt resulted in a six-month declared cease fire.
Four months later more than 330 rockets and mortars were fired without discrimination at Israeli population centers in the month of November.
Between that time and the end of the so-called truce, an additional 350+ rockets and mortars, including advanced range 120 mm mortars and Grad rockets (longer range and imported from Iran) were fired at Israel. Non-guided and simply released with hope of killing civillians.
During the year of 2008 there were over 3000 rockets and mortars launched from Gaza toword Israeli population centers. Nice cease fire. Yet you insist that “rockets had stopped”. May it be upon your house next time and then talk to me.
Now prove me wrong.
Now give me your “plenty of ways to stop them without requiring loss of civilian lives”
I am waiting to hear of these wonderful plans.
Spindok
Jan 19, 2009 - 1:25 pm 115. Rand Simberg:It isn’t an analogy, its a quote:
Israel’s Minister of Public Security, Avi Dichter, believes punishment should be inflicted “irrespective of the cost to the Palestinians”
Meir Sheetrit has urged that Israel should “decide on a neighborhood in Gaza and level it”
Major-General Gadi Eisenkot said “We will wield disproportionate power against every village”
And yet, they haven’t actually done any of those things.
Jan 19, 2009 - 1:25 pm 116. Greg London:in January 2008, Amnesty International demanded that Israel lift the blockade, condemning it as “collective” punishment.
http://www.amnesty.org.uk/news_details.asp?NewsID=17616
That same month, the Red Cross released a similar statement that the blockade had put Gaza in a humanitarian crisis.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2008/01/22/international/i064706S88.DTL
January of 2009, the Red Cross stated that Israel’s war against Gaza broke international law.
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2009/01/08-6
the UN human rights chief warned a special session of the Human Rights Council on Friday that violations in the Gaza Strip were severe and that some reported incidents may warrant prosecutions for war crimes.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090109/wl_mideast_afp/mideastconflictgazaunrightschief_newsmlmmd
Amnesty International joins the chorus calling for investigations into war crimes violations by Israel’s military in Gaza.
http://blog.amnestyusa.org/middle-east/un-should-investigate-war-crimes/
England’s Prime Minister Gordon Brown said “We are yet to discover the full scale of the appalling suffering, But what is already clear is that too many innocent civilians, including hundreds of children, have been killed during the military offensive.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jan/18/gaza-israel-ceasefire-gordon-brown
The president of the UN General Assembly has condemned Israel’s killings of Palestinians in its Gaza offensive as “genocide”.
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2009/01/200911321467988347.html
Jan 19, 2009 - 2:01 pm 117. charlie:Thank you, Sandi.
Jan 19, 2009 - 2:03 pm 118. Greg London:>Well sure Greg London.
>7/19/08…Indirect negotiations through Egypt
>resulted in a six-month declared cease fire.
>Four months later more than 330 rockets and
>mortars were fired without discrimination
>at Israeli population centers in the month of November.
>During the year of 2008 there were over 3000 rockets
>and mortars launched from Gaza toword Israeli population
>centers. Nice cease fire. Yet you insist that “rockets
>had stopped”. May it be upon your house next time and
>then talk to me.
Who you gonna believe? Me? Or the Israeli Foreign Ministry? According the the Israeli Foreign Ministry’s own numbers, from July to November 3, something like 14 rockets were launched, about 1 a week. And an equal number of mortars.
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article10123.shtml
The vast majority of your “3000 rockets and mortars” occurred before the ceasefire in July, or after Israel violated the ceasefire on November 4.
The Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center, (a centre-right Israeli intelligence think tank), issued a report in December confirming that the June 19 truce was only “sporadically violated, and then not by Hamas but instead by … “rogue terrorist organisations” and that “the escalation and erosion of the lull arrangement” occurred after Israel killed six Hamas members on November 4 without provocation and then placed the entire Strip under an even more intensive siege the next day.
Hamas rockets stopped after the ceasefire was signed in July.
Hamas rockets only resumed after Israel violated the ceasefire on November 4 and after Israel clamped down on the blockade on November 5.
> Now prove me wrong.
The graphs on this page were taken from teh Israeli Foreign Ministry’s own website. If the numbers are wrong, take it up with the Israeli government.
http://www.warhw.com/2009/01/06/israeli-ceasefire-violation-november-2008/
My experience has been that anyone who says “prove me wrong” is almost never willing to admit they are actually wrong.
Jan 19, 2009 - 2:13 pm 119. dele:For those who don’t know history, i suggest they go back and learn before they start making stupid claims here and elsewhere,the manner in which the state of israel came to be where it is now would continue to remain one of the worst act of treachery in world history. At the end of the british mandate in palestine, instead of declaring a state of palestine -what happened? A state of israel was declared instead and the israelis armed enough to go after unarmed palestinians, massacre them and claim their lands,this was enough to start an arab revolt which later broadened into the mideast war of 1948. The U.S in it’s usual evil tradition of causing problems for the rest of the world was the first to recognise israel as a state.Britain realising her error delayed recognizing the zionist state and instead supported the arab armies( the transjordan army).The zionist victory in the war was another act of treachery on the part of the doomed U.N,when it saw that the arabs were winning it placed an arms embargo on both parties and forced britain to withdraw it’s support for the arabs, while other nations notably the czech republic and the US kept arming israel
secretly and at the end of the so called “BREATHING SPACE”, israel emerged much stronger than before.
And as for those who blasphem and pass ill informed comments about ALLAH and islam you are right about one thing, the GOD(the ultimate creator) we muslims worship is different from the god the christians worship, a god that demands the shameful death and blood of his so called “begotten” son for him to be appeased, what a shame!!!!!
Jan 19, 2009 - 2:54 pm 120. David W. Lincoln:As long as the geography of the Arabian Peninsula is in the drivers seat when it comes to culture of those parts of the world that are Arab Aryan, what else can be expected from those who demonize those who do not engage in honour killings.
For what culture, other than Arab Aryan, engages in honour killing?
Jan 19, 2009 - 3:20 pm 121. TalkinKamel:dele, your god demands the death of innocent women and children. he demands that Moslems make permanent war against all unbelievers. According to Mohammed, he approves of rape, slavery and lies, if it helps further the on-going jihad.
Your god is a god of war, and bloodshed.
Jan 19, 2009 - 3:24 pm 122. dele:Israel had always maintained a path of war not only with hamas ,but the entire people of gaza, the israelis have always been the occupying force,placing a siege on gaza. Now tell me, what right has israel to place a blockade on gaza, just because it doesn’t reckon with the govt in place in gaza, is gaza an extension of the zionist empire?.
Jan 19, 2009 - 3:33 pm 123. Spindok:The truth is that israel was an abused child and is grown up to be an abusive adult,genocide has always been and would always be an act of heinous crime against humanity and would never be accepted as an act of self defence. If the truth be told ,what the jews are doing today is not different from what the nazis did during the 2nd world war, the jews of today are the modern day nazis
Aye Greg London.
Cite your own website and electronic intifada as proof source. Have your war. Be happy in your safe warm house in the UK. Fight to the last Palestinian in Gaza. They are sick of you and your kind. We Americans are equally sick of it. We have not changed policy for near 50 years now and we are not about to despite the melanin content of our president-elect.
So where are your Tornados to intercept the IAF jets? That is right – you cant even effect real action Aye Greg London.
Cite your own website and electronic intifada as proof source. Have your war. Be happy in your safe warm house in the UK. Fight to the last Palestinian in Gaza. They are sick of you and your kind. We Americans are equally sick of it. We have not changed policy for near 50 years now and we are not about to despite the melanin content of our president-elect.
So where are your Tornados to intercept the IAF jets? That is right – you cant even effect real action from your own land. Just bullcrap editorials and slanted reporting. Have another Guiness (I like those)and keep on bleating.
Spindok
Jan 19, 2009 - 3:52 pm 124. fred:The hudspah of people on this thread DARING to defend Islam, Paleosimians, jihad against Israel and the West, etc. is stunning. It’s as if the written record and the Islamic texts NEVER EXISTED. The 1,400 years of jihad history are forgotten, as are the (conservatively estimated by Bill Warner)270 million human being murdered by jihad. I realize our forums are open to the opposing point of view – and that’s a good thing, don’t get me wrong. But it seems these people have no sense of shame in defending the indefensible.
Here we are in the 21st century in AMERICA and there are Muslims and non-Muslims at these anti-Israel rallies shouting slogans that call for getting the ovens at Birkenau up and running again. And at some of these rallies the police will protect the Muslims and Communists and not allow counter protests across the street from the Jew-haters.
Jewish children were not spared the vicious pagan impulses of the Nazis, nor are the allies of the Nazis, the Muslim Brotherhood and its militant organizations going to spare the Jewish children. And they won’t spare Christian children either. Remember the Armenian Genocide?
Jan 19, 2009 - 4:02 pm 125. clairette:All these passionate posts about Palestinian refugees on this and many other sites makes one wonder why so many people are all fired up, all the time, about the injustices done to the Palestinian “refugees” (I also wonder how someone born in 1990, or even 1960, could be a “refugee” from someplace he/she never lived! The Jews who were expelled from Arab lands in 1948 were accepted by and assimilated into Israeli society with alacrity. Thus, no Jewish “refugees” from Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Tunisia, Iraq, etc. I myself was born in Paris after my grandparents and parents were kicked out of Germany; I was brought to the U.S. as a child. No one ever told me I was a refugee. Can’t imagine that my grandchildren (hey — that’s four generations away from Germany already!) in California might be languishing in a “refugee” camp, their lives on hold, having been taught to rage and yearn for a farm in Bavaria or an apartment in Paris they have never even seen!)
But I digress: my point is that none of you seem to care at all about any other displaced people — nearly 10,000,000 refugees worldwide — from places as scattered as Tibet, North Korea, Chad, Darfur, Afghanistan, Georgia, Myanmara, Congo — and more. What can a reader infer from this single-minded passion? It would seem you don’t care about all refugees and their suffering and displacement, only about Palestinians. Is that because their problem is with Israel? With Jews? If there’s another reason why none of you is inflamed about the situation of refugees from Tibet (hey — I think the Chinese stole their country — without a UN mandate!) or Congo, please let me know.
How many of you posters know that Palestinians are the sole group of refugees with a UN agency dedicated exclusively to their care: The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), which operates independently of the Convention on refugees. While the UNHCR actively seeks durable solutions to refugee problems, UNRWA has declined to entertain any permanent solution for the Palestinian refugees, insisting instead on a politically unfeasible “return” to pre-1967 Israel.
By operating outside the norms accepted by the international community, UNRWA has succeeded in perpetuating a growing refugee problem. By establishing its own definition of a “Palestinian refugee” and actively encouraging resettlement in Israel, UNRWA not only has failed to resolve the Palestinian refugee issue, but has also lost sight of its original humanitarian goals, subordinating them instead to the political aims of the Arab world. Moreover, by hiring from within its own client population, UNRWA has at best created a “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy with regard to terrorist activity in its midst, and at worst has become so enmeshed in the terrorist population as to be effectively held hostage by it. In the final analysis, UNRWA’s handling of the Palestinian refugee issue is both antagonistic to the achievement of peace in the Middle East and detrimental to the plight of the refugees themselves.
This is a novel point of view I haven’t seen addressed on these pages. Do you really care about refugees? Or do you just hate Israel?
Jan 19, 2009 - 4:08 pm 126. Spindok:I would like to clarify something I said above.
I mean no disrespect concerning our president elect and melanin. My disrespect is directed to those out there (mostly outside of America)who seem to think that the Barak Obama administration, by virtue therof, is going to be considerably different in the middle east. Gentler perhaps like butterflies, bubblegum, and rainbows.
I think he will push for a stronger military surge in Afghanistan. He can do that and probably has the whole package on his desk now.
He will open some diplomatic channels which were closed in the past, (maybe Syria, Iran, Hamas by the backdoor). That is dangerous business but he has appointed some hardline Democrats and right now the US has a battle trained military second to none. He is limited in dollars now which is a problem.
So far Barak Obama ought to be a great dissapointment to the Code Pink types in the USA. He seems like an eager interventionalist more than anything else.
Spindok
.
I disagree with that.
Jan 19, 2009 - 4:26 pm 127. tanstaafl:This is a reasonable website. (esp. bulletins down the right hand side)
All the back and forth, uninformed opinions about the land, rights etc. are obviated once you get inside the ethos of Hamas (and, by extension, Hezbollah) on “the Jews”.
Palestinian Media Watch
Plus, an individual writing at PJM linked her song
The Children’s Brigade
A picture is worth 1000 words. Maybe a million words.
Jan 19, 2009 - 4:27 pm 128. dele:Mr talkincamel, how much of the quran do you know (cos that is the main authority in islam)before you start saying what is not,i know your type you only rely on ill informed comments and outright lies made against islam. If you must know,there is no where in the quran where any of those ignorant claims you’ve made are stated. Just like in any other religion, there are the good ones and the not so good ones,and it is only fair that the effects of the opinions and conducts of the not so good ones should not be taken out on the rest
Jan 19, 2009 - 4:39 pm 129. TalkinKamel:I have studied the Quaran—a lot of it is derived from Judeo/Christian beliefs, and a lot of it is is incomprehensible, and much of it is hideous and bloodthirsty, urging war against anyone who opposes Islam.
In Christianity, G-d sends his son to die for mankind. In Islam, Allah wants his followers to go out and die for him.
Jan 19, 2009 - 5:11 pm 130. Peter the Bubblehead:109. Greg London wrote:
bubblehead, the rockets HAD stopped.
Peter replies: Greg, try reading an objective news story.
Israel did NOT break the ceaqse fire. Hamas did. The day the arranged cease-fire expired, Hamas started firing rockets (with longer ranges and greater accuracy. Gee, wonder what they were doing during the so-called cease fire?) at Israel.
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N27428438.htm
Jan 19, 2009 - 5:19 pm 131. TDB:To read the post of people that support what Isreal did to all those innocent children is beyond me. You all must have looked into the eyes of a severly wounded child in horrific pain and felt something. Anything? I sometimes loose faith in humanity in general when I see this lack of compassion for innocent people. It ways heavy on my heart. Human beings have done nothing for this earth but destroy it. Without us, it would not only survive, but would flourish. The work of good people that try to fix what mankind destroys is only repairing what man himself has caused to begin with. All do to the hunger of more power, control, and a selfish heart. I dont see “true” world peace ever happening. That is just an allusion or hope some have, that will never be, due to the violent, selfish tendancies in mankind. You write about how I do not write to “your” likeing. That is not important here. But I do have one ability that alot seem to not have, and thats compassion and love for “all” children no matter if there on my side of the border or not. If I didnt have that quality, I would be a hollow, pitiful person indeed. I do not right in paragraphs but I can see truth where some others cant. I see what is really important and what really matters, and what really doesnt. I see the chess games the leaders of countrys play with each other at others expense. Its very transparent. All of what is important is transparent if you dont turn your head or close your hearts. That a large amount of love and compassion for the suffering of others is not there. I see bold lies taking place, power plays, total disregard for innocent people. Murdering children is the worst crime mankind can do. It is above anything else. The blood has stained Isreal leaders hands, and will never wash off. Try as they may. I have posted “what really matters on my website” of children murdered, or suffering, crying in agony, there flesh burning off there faces and body while they scream in agony from phosperous in Gaza. I have posted photos of whole familys with children all laying dead wrapped in blankets next to each other. One that everyone has seen and thats the little girl with her head blown off or sticking out of the dirt with her body buryied. Little child that only wanted to love and be loved. Mabey only 1 and a half to two years old! The reason we have war crimes like this is because alot of people dont think “this is really what matters”. We each are responsible for our actions. No one can force or make you kill another. I will collect as many photos and videos of the atrocitys in Gaza to the innocent there and show it to as many as I can. I will keep spreading the innocents words and storys of what is happening to them and there familys there. One photo can be worth a million words. I am a photographer. These photos are “TRUTH”
Jan 19, 2009 - 5:20 pm 132. Peter the Bubblehead:Thank you Greg London….you are a man of truth and wisdom that I greatfully offer my respect to.
116. Greg London:
Peter asks: And what does ANY of that have to do with ‘bloodless’ rocket defenses?
Jan 19, 2009 - 5:21 pm 133. Peter the Bubblehead:119. dele wrote:
For those who don’t know history, i suggest they go back and learn before they start making stupid claims here and elsewhere,the manner in which the state of israel came to be where it is now would continue to remain one of the worst act of treachery in world history.
Peter responds: And here for you dele is a history lesson;
Your historical evaluation of the formation of the state of Israel is sorrowfully misleading. The Balfour Agreement was not the operative international document which founded Israel, although it was used as a small part of its rationalization.
Keep in mind that Hamas is making its most important claim on its own territory AND THE LAND OF MODERN ISRAEL, not in the name of regaining homesteads from the 1940’s, but in the name of Islam. That means that any land won by military conquest by the armies of Islam should forever remain Islamic and Jew-free (except sometimes as Dhimmis), and that the duty of all pious Muslims is to wage Jihad until all of this land (e.g., Spain, etc) is their’s again, and that would only be the beginning of a drive to conquer by military force, fear or persuasion the entire world for the glory of their Islamic God. Also, their charter, besides stating its goal of specifically wanting to eliminate the state of Israel, also sites the Koran in calling for the elimination of all Jews as a religion or people. This is what they plainly state for all the world to see if they will open their eyes.
First of all, there never was a time of no Jewish presence in the land comprising modern Israel. So if some sort of previous occupation by ethnic/religious populations, rather than more contemporary founding international diplomatic agreements is to decide legitimacy, then the fact that the jewish population of the area, waxing and waning from vast majorities to smaller minorities over a period of several thousands of years, should certainly outweigh the many, imperial conquests of the Mid East area, least of all the much more recent Islamic military conquest of just the last 700 years.
The indigenous “Palestinian” arab population in the area of modern Israel, Gaza and the West Bank, immediately following World War II, having just swelled with brand new arab immigrants just then fleeing Egypt, Syria and TransJordan to a safer environment controlled by Great Britain (also one greatly more prosperous and healthier due to the previous 50 years or so of European Jewish in-migration) to somehwere around a half-million people, were offered a very large Judenfrei country of their own, by the majority of the nations of the world in the UN declaration also creating the State of Israel. But, the arab political leaders of the time, having never given up the anti-Jewish pogroms they had perpetrated even well before establishing their war-time alliance with Hitler’s Germany, hoped that they could instead claim all of the “Palestinian” territory for themselves, killing all the Jews necessary, with the help of their neighboring Arab armies, to accomplish that goal. As history showed, they failed, and the State of Israel was indeed established. Israel was slightly enlarged over its originally prescribed borders in its various wars with Arab states out to finally eliminate the stain on their Islamic and nationalist honors which a jewish nation-state represented to them.
As to the Israeli’s treating those people in zone’s of “occupation” such as Gaza with anything less than the greatest respect possible, considering that these same people elected, support and are governed by an organization rightly labeled as terrorists, one not observing any ciivilized rules of war in its eliminationist creed of constant warfare against the civilian population of Israel, that is just plain wrong. What other countries do you know of, which when faced with unremitting attacks against its own civilian population, patiently waits and negotiates with its antagonists, and when finally provoked into self defense by the other side’s refusal to come to any agreement, finally gives advance warning, by cell phone of all things, to the civilians who might be in the line of fire, gives constant humanitarian aid to them, and has often in the past treated their wounds in Israeli hospitals? This is not only the opposite of Hamas’ actual behaviour, but it would be considered as ludicrously over-indulgent generosity by the rest of the most civilized nations in the world.
And last, if you agree that the U.S. and Israel are really the “Great and Little Satan” as often cited by such great bastions of human rights as Iran, Hamas, Hizbollah, Al Qaeda, Syria and the various radical Islamic Jihadist organizations around the world, then I would invite you to live in a place governed by their philosophy for a while to judge just how awful we are in comparison. Good luck to you, if you should my invitation, but please don’t look for our “Satanic” U.S. Marines to rescue you when you try to speak your mind in such a place.
Jan 19, 2009 - 5:24 pm 134. Leatherneck:Fred,
Excellent post. Don’t worry just because you slamed the religion of peace, they will come back with more insanity. Just like the above picture on this topic.
ROPMA!
Jan 19, 2009 - 5:26 pm 135. Peter the Bubblehead:131. TDB wrote:
To read the post of people that support what Isreal did to all those innocent children is beyond me.
Peter responds: What Israel did? You mean like DEFEND its citizens and soveregn nation? Are you saying whatever country you live in would NOT defend itself if faced with an onslaught of thousands of rockets, morters and missiles trying to kill your neighbors and destroy your way of life?
Please, defend that stance. I want to hear this.
Jan 19, 2009 - 5:31 pm 136. Shef Rogers:So Rand, any plans to comment on the three daughters of Dr. Abuelaish?
Jan 19, 2009 - 5:45 pm 137. charleywhiskey:“A man or a woman who acts as a medium or fortuneteller shall be put to death by stoning; they have no one but themselves to blame for their death.” Does this apply to CNN? Maybe the muzzies aren’t complete dolts.
Jan 19, 2009 - 6:23 pm 138. JohnQPublic:Anti-Semitism LIVES!! Not only in Europe, but on this blog!! Mountainaires, Cedarford, Kevin, Anna, Apalachian,TDB, Greg London and Dele!! The little racists are blogging their hearts out! Those Palestinians are just misunderstood! Poor little things! That’s why Egypt won’t let them in!!! They just need to be understood better!!! What has the Arab/Muslim world DONE for these oppressed brothers? NOTHING!! Anti-Semitism is on the rise in most of the world, however, not yet in the US. Let’s keep it that way. The above mentioned anti-Semites, would have us believe that Jews are in the wrong, but reasonable people know the TRUTH! Hamas is DEDICATED to KILLING…everyone, anyone, including their own people, who get in the way of their desire to DESTROY ISRAEL! INCLUDING AMERICANS!! How can these posters support them? They are either NOT American, or UN-AMERICAN!!! All of the aid poured into GAZA and the people see nothing! HAMAS uses it to buy weapons, to continue to attempt to destroy Israel. It will not happen!! Israel will NEVER be destroyed! They are God’s Chosen People. How can you explain how this small group of people holds the world’s attention? Their existence has changed the world as we know it! Why does the world care about a country not even as large as New Jersey? AMAZING! We must stand on the side of reason, and truth. Support Israel, and let these anti-Semites know that we will not TOLERATE their HATE!
Jan 19, 2009 - 6:36 pm 139. JohnQPublic:119. dele wrote:
For those who don’t know history, i suggest they go back and learn before they start making stupid claims here and elsewhere,the manner in which the state of israel came to be where it is now would continue to remain one of the worst act of treachery in world history.
—-
OK DELE: You must have been one of my former students, right? Special Ed! I see it in your writing! I have taught for a very, very long time, and I recognize your inability to express yourself in ENGLISH. Don’t take it personally! I know you are doing your BEST. But, sometimes Dele, those who do write/speak English have a hard time deciphering illiterate writing. Don’t get mad…learn English! Study hard…and when you can come back to this blog, and speak in an intellgible manner, people will listen! However, with your poor mastery of the language, many will write you off after reading only a sentence or two. That is what I did, and I am sure many here will do! But after reading your comment(s) I decided you were sincere, though uneducated, and perhaps with additional study/schooling, will prosper in your acquisition of the English language! In addition, other’s acceptance of your offering anything meangingful to the ‘history’ arguments, may indeed be seriously compromised by your inability to express yourself coherently. Having said this, I just wish very, very, stupid plebian’s such as yourself, will stop adding to the cacophony of inane postings!
Jan 19, 2009 - 6:53 pm 140. Blue Collar Todd:Thank you,
Have a good day!
And in America Moloch is called Choice.
Jan 19, 2009 - 6:57 pm 141. JohnQPublic:TDB:
To read the post of people that support what Isreal did to all those innocent children is beyond me. You all must have looked into the eyes of a severly wounded child in horrific pain and felt something. Anything? I sometimes loose faith in humanity in general when I see this lack of compassion for innocent people. It ways heavy on my heart. Human beings have done nothing for this earth but destroy it. Without us, it would not only survive, but would flourish. The work of good people that try to fix what mankind destroys is only repairing what man himself has caused to begin with. All do to the hunger of more power, control, and a selfish heart. I dont see “true” world peace ever happening. That is just an allusion or hope some have, that will never be, due to the violent, selfish tendancies in mankind. You write about how I do not write to “your” likeing. That is not important here. But I do have one ability that alot seem to not have, and thats compassion and love for “all” children no matter if there on my side of the border or not. If I didnt have that quality, I would be a hollow, pitiful person indeed. I do not right in paragraphs but I can see truth where some others cant. I see what is really important and what really matters, and what really doesnt. I see the chess games the leaders of countrys play with each other at others expense. Its very transparent. All of what is important is transparent if you dont turn your head or close your hearts. That a large amount of love and compassion for the suffering of others is not there. I see bold lies taking place, power plays, total disregard for innocent people. Murdering children is the worst crime mankind can do. It is above anything else. The blood has stained Isreal leaders hands, and will never wash off. Try as they may. I have posted “what really matters on my website” of children murdered, or suffering, crying in agony, there flesh burning off there faces and body while they scream in agony from phosperous in Gaza. I have posted photos of whole familys with children all laying dead wrapped in blankets next to each other. One that everyone has seen and thats the little girl with her head blown off or sticking out of the dirt with her body buryied. Little child that only wanted to love and be loved. Mabey only 1 and a half to two years old! The reason we have war crimes like this is because alot of people dont think “this is really what matters”. We each are responsible for our actions. No one can force or make you kill another. I will collect as many photos and videos of the atrocitys in Gaza to the innocent there and show it to as many as I can. I will keep spreading the innocents words and storys of what is happening to them and there familys there. One photo can be worth a million words. I am a photographer. These photos are “TRUTH”
Thank you Greg London….you are a man of truth and wisdom that I greatfully offer my respect to.
Jan 19, 2009 – 5:20 pm
“To read the post of people that support what Isreal did to all those innocent children is beyond me. You all must have looked into the eyes of a severly wounded child in horrific pain and felt something. Anything? I sometimes loose faith in humanity in general when I see this lack of compassion for innocent people. ”
TDB: Isreal is spelled Israel….All children are innocent! Even in WWI and WWII and the Revolutionary War, and the Civil War they were innocent. However, war is Hell and the innocent die. Anyone, except a psychopath, looks into the eyes of a severely wounded child and feels something!! Don’t loose (did you mean ‘lose’?) faith in humanity…Americans are the MOST compassionate people in the WORLD! Should we have STOPPED WWII because innocent children would die? You are just not being realistic! Is nothing worth fighting for? Would you fight for your children?
Jan 19, 2009 - 7:22 pm 142. Oscar the Grump:I’m really amazed at all of you. You see but don’t understand. You have to look closely and understand what you see. I watch a BBC report on how children were being targeted by the Israelis. In it was the usual shots of children wrapped up for burial, grieving mothers and chanting hordes. After that they show children who were wounded and in an Egyptian hospital. The doctor was so upset he was beside himself. “How could anyone do this?” Then he showed two x-rays to the BBC cameraman. Both were horrible. The first x-ray was of an eight year old boy with a bullet in his head. “What did this child do to deserve this?” He went on, “Evidence is that these children were shot up close.” If you looked really closely at the x-ray and understood what you were seeing, you saw a 7.62 caliber bullet lodged inside the child’s skull. The Israelis fire 5.56 caliber weapons. The round was not Israeli, it was fired from a Kalachinkov or Hamas weapon. The second x-ray was of another head wound where the bullet went all the way through the child’s head. It left a track through the soft brain tissue. A 5.56 caliber weapon fired at close range would have exploded the child’s head. There would have been little left of the head at all. Again, I suspect a Kalachinkov wound. Could it be possible that Hamas was murdering their own children in order to keep the civilian body count high?
Also I recommend a book from Joan Peters “From Time Immorial” It’s great reading and gives an accurate account of the Middle East.
Jan 19, 2009 - 9:30 pm 143. Knights13:“The moderator of the forum did not like a point I had made about another example of how children are valued in Islam”
They must be valued since their population is pretty large don’t you think?
Jan 19, 2009 - 9:36 pm 144. Oscar the Grump:A totally different thought:
Jan 19, 2009 - 10:05 pm 145. Joe Mama:The world wails for the plight of the Palestinians kicked out of their land etc. I hear nothing about the 800,000 Jews who were kicked out of Moslem countries right after that. And,by the way, their properties were confiscated. I met one Jewish man from Egypt. His family was in Alexandria for over 500 years. He had a thriving business and property, everything was taken from him. How about all the Iraqi Jews who had to leave? They had been in Iraq since the Babylonian times, or close to three thousand years. Where are their rights? I want TDB, Cedarford or Mohammed to explain that to me please.
Anyone ever hear of any Palestinian kings, literature, language, or references at any time in history?
There are none because the myth of a Palestinian is a lie. They are all Arab actors who are playing their role as victims to buy time for their planned genocide of the Jews in Israel.
In fact the only people in Israel with ties to the land are the Jews, who were expelled by the Romans a long time ago, and who have never given up title to their land. The religion was founded to remind all of them about where they are from.
I think it is time for forced conversions of these Arab human shields to Judiasm. This would at least solve the endemic problem of Arab ignorance and violence.
Jan 19, 2009 - 10:59 pm 146. Oscar the Grump:Joe mama, Judaism does not believe in forced conversions unlike other religions.
Jan 20, 2009 - 12:21 am 147. roGER:“Beyond that, the Jews even want the children of Hamas to live.”
The statistics (300+ Palestinian children killed) don’t seem to support this statement.
Jan 20, 2009 - 3:39 am 148. SAF:146: Oscar the Grump:
Not only doesn’t Judaism believe in forced conversion but part of the conversion process, by Jewish law, is that the Rabbi must try and talk the person out of conversion.
Jan 20, 2009 - 5:22 am 149. Rand Simberg:““Beyond that, the Jews even want the children of Hamas to live.””
The statistics (300+ Palestinian children killed) don’t seem to support this statement.
Of course they do. If it were the goal of the Israelis to kill children, if they weren’t trying to minimize the casualties, the toll would be much higher, by orders of magnitude. It’s stupid to think otherwise, given their military capabilities. There are, after all, hundreds of thousands of children in Gaza.
Jan 20, 2009 - 6:38 am 150. LynnS.:What is larger than Gaza and larger than the West Bank, is Islam and Islam teaches hatred for the Jews, Islam teaches death to the Jews. Islam teaches that the Jews must be wiped off the face of the earth. Islam teaches that there will be no other faith but Islam. Islam teaches that their prophet is the final prophet and over all the others. Islam teaches that Allah is Greater over the Jewish G_d, over the Christian G_d. Islam teaches that the only sure path to paradise is killing for Allah. Islam teaches that woman are half the value of men, their testimony half the value. Islam teaches woman are evil, can be physically abused. Islam owns one-fourth of the world. Islam wants the entire world. Islam forces conversions. Islam’s punishment for leaving the faith is death.
If the Jewish People leave Israel as they have done in the past they will be hunted down as they were in the past. Israel and the Jews are not hiding behind the rocks and the trees as Islam said they would. The rocks and the trees are not calling to Islam, “Here is a Jew!” Islam is hiding behind women and children and men who have not let Islam into their heart. Islam conquers people but Islam is not in the heart of many people even though they are forced to proclaim they are Muslims. Islam terrorizes their own people and murders their own people. To defend those who send their little ones into battle and teach their little ones it is their highest honor to kill themselves and murder others is unforgivable as we very well know. Those who defend this are themselves guilty of this grave sin. The protests and anger should be directed at the faith that has made part of the world a prison for the people and great burdensome stone around their necks. When you defend this you are showing your own heart of stone.
Jan 20, 2009 - 6:50 am 151. mountainaires:Did Hamas use White Phosphorous? No. Israel did, a war crime. Read about it, if you have the courage of your convictions. Then, if you support Israeli war crimes, you can cheer Israeli horrors.
Blind and burnt: Mahmoud, 14, young victim of banned white phosphorus shelling
Sheera Frenkel in Cairo
Israel’s three-week offensive in the Gaza Strip may be over but Mahmoud Mattar, 14, will not be able to sense the quiet that has descended on his home town of Jabalya.
Blinded in both eyes, with third-degree burns over much of his torso, Mahmoud lies unconscious in the Sheikh Zayid Hospital on the outskirts of Cairo. He has said little since January 6, when an Israeli attack on his village in northern Gaza left him nearly dead on the street outside his mosque. Doctors say that he will never see again — and that the burns on his body were caused by white phosphorus, a controversial incendiary weapon that Israel originally denied using.
“He was walking to the mosque when the attack started,” his uncle, Nahad Mattar, said. “Two of his friends who were walking with him were killed instantly. Their bodies are in pieces. He was hit by something and his body began to burn.
“There were bits of blood and skin all over him. We couldn’t tell what was his and what was other people.”
Witnesses in Jabalya describe thesigns of white phosphorus shelling — thick white smoke, a strong smell and fires that burn until covered with sand — and say that dozens more experienced burns in the same attack.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article5549100.ece
Jan 20, 2009 - 8:03 am 152. mountainaires:Want to know how this Israeli strategy you cheer on will help Israel? Then read on, if you have the courage of your convictions. I doubt many of you truly know what you are cheering.
Commentary No. 249, Jan. 15, 2009
“Chronicle of a Suicide Foretold: The Case of Israel”
Israel has now entered into a phase of the precipitate decline of its strategy. It may be too late for Israel to pursue any alternative strategy, in which case it will have committed geopolitical suicide.
[...]
Now, Israel has invaded Gaza, seeking to destroy Hamas. If it succeeds, what organization will come next? If, as is more probable, it fails to destroy Hamas, is a two-state solution now possible? Both Palestinian and world public opinion is moving towards the one-state solution. And this is of course the end of the Zionist project.
The three-element strategy of Israel is decomposing. The iron fist no longer succeeds, much as it didn’t for George Bush in Iraq. Will the United States link remain firm? I doubt it. And will world public opinion continue to look sympathetically on Israel? It seems not. Can Israel now switch to an alternative strategy, of negotiating with the militant representatives of the Arab Palestinians, as an integral constituent of the Middle East, and not as an outpost of Europe? It seems quite late for that, quite possibly too late. Hence, the chronicle of a suicide foretold.
by Immanuel Wallerstein
http://www.binghamton.edu/fbc/commentr.htm
Jan 20, 2009 - 8:05 am 153. Greg London:” If it were the goal of the Israelis to kill children, if they weren’t trying to minimize the casualties, the toll would be much higher,”
Israel invaded when it did because Bush was a lame duck president and Obama wouldn’t be inaugurated till january 20.
Israel has repeatedly stated in the last few days that Israeli troops will be out of Gaza by the time Obama is inaugurated.
If Israel held back its military, it was because it knew it if went too far, it would eventually cause so much international condemnation that Israel would suffer consequences. It got so bad the the US *abstained* from a UN resolution condemning Israel and demanding an immediate ceasefire. Given that the US usually vetoes any resolution the least bit critical of Israel, the abstaintion meant Israel had gone far enough that it coudln’t count on US being it’s big dog in the UN.
Everything Israel did militarily was for political reasons. Israel used as much force as it thought it coudl get away with. And when it was over, Israel is withdrawing before Obama gets inaugurated so that Obama isn’t forced to criticize Israel.
“by orders of magnitude. It’s stupid to think otherwise,”
In three weeks, Hamas rockets killed 3 Israeli civilians. In three weeks, Israel’s war killed 300 Gazan children alone.
That’s 2 orders of magnitude. And you want me to congratulate you because Israel didn’t kill 3000 children? How many more orders of magnitude will you be an apologist and propagandist for?
300 children in Gaza in response to 3 Israelis?
Is there any number of dead that Israel could inflict on innocent Gazans before you would finally say its too much? If not, is that moral?
Jan 20, 2009 - 8:19 am 154. Oscar the Grump:to Rand Simberg
Jan 20, 2009 - 8:21 am 155. Peter the Bubblehead:How do you explain an AK47 round in a child’s head or the track of another in another child’s head. Are you going to say the “Jews” did it? Get real. How many of the 300 dead children were killed by their own just for propaganda purposes? Why? A picture is worth a thousand words somebody else in the site said. How many of those pictures were created for our media? Believe me nothing bothers me more than seeing a child maimed or killed. It hits viscerally. Explain those bullets wounds to me please.
151. mountainaires:
Peter responds: White phosphorous is a conventional weapon and “is not outlawed or banned by any convention.”
http://www.ngo-monitor.org/article/hrw_anti_israel_campaigns_and_white_phosphorous_condemn_first_correct_maybe_later0
Jan 20, 2009 - 8:32 am 156. LynnS.:mountainaires is the voice of reason to explain the unreasonable. An excuse for parents to raise their children to kill themselves and murder others. An excuse explaining why suicide murderers are heroes and their mothers exalted as ideal. An excuse to take children from parents and teach them to be soldiers of death for Allah. An excuse for why the world cannot live in peace until Israel gone. The air is thin in the higher elevations making it hard to think clearly. Mountainaires has chosen the wrong guide to take him/her to the top and what is worse probably has a choice unlike many Muslims who face death if they question or leave Islam.
Jan 20, 2009 - 8:42 am 157. Rand Simberg:300 children in Gaza in response to 3 Israelis?
This is a truly stupid metric.
Israel’s response was perfectly proportionate, by any sane usage of that word. A proportionate response is one that does what is required, and no more than required, to achieve the military objective (in this case, to end the rocket bombardment, which is unacceptable, regardless of how many Israelis have been killed). Those children died because Hamas committed (and continues to commit) war crimes in launching rockets from populated areas in which it was not possible to interdict them without killing the human shields there.
Jan 20, 2009 - 9:21 am 158. DonJoe:300 children in Gaza in response to 3 Israelis?
Who are providing the numbers of dead children; Those who train their children to be suicide bombers?
Furthermore; Where is the forensic proof that these children/collateral damage was killed by the Israelis and not Fatah families executed by Hamas?
I thought it was an honor to be martyred in jihad.
Talk about spin and double standards.
Jan 20, 2009 - 9:56 am 159. Greg London:“Israel’s response was perfectly proportionate”
PERFECT? Oh my god. You’ve got to be kidding me. Israel’s actions were PERFECT?
You wouldn’t change a single outcome of Israel’s three-week war against Gaza? All three hundred children killed? Another two or three hundred unarmed civilians killed?
That was PERFECT?
“Those children died because Hamas committed (and continues to commit) war crimes in launching rockets”
Dude. Seriously. Have you read the Geneva Convention?
Israel cannot kill civilians simply because Hamas killed civilians. The Geneva Convention doesn’t prohibit the killing of civilians, and then provide an escape clause if the other side does.
Show me an escape clause, or start dealing with reality.
Meanwhile, stop this propagand that Palestinian children were killed because Hamas did this or that. Palestinian children were killed by Israeli guns and bombs. Just like Israeli civilians have been killed by Hamas rockets and mortars.
Each side needs to be held responsible for their individual actions. Enough of this “It’s their fault that I had to kill civilians” spin.
Hamas rockets killed 17 Israelis in 2008, most before the July ceasefire that Israel violated November 4.
Israel’s three-week war against Gaza killed 600 civilians.
And you say that was a perfect response? A proportionate response? There was no other way to stop the rockets? After a ceasefire was workign for four months, Israel was forced to not only violate that ceasefire, but to tighten an illegal blockade of all of Gaza? No other choice could have been better? Absolutely PERFECT?
Prime Minister Gordon Brown: “what is already clear is that too many innocent civilians, including hundreds of children, have been killed during the military offensive”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jan/18/gaza-israel-ceasefire-gordon-brown
UN human rights chief says severe violations in Gaza
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090109/wl_mideast_afp/mideastconflictgazaunrightschief_newsmlmmd
Human Rights Now calls for investigation of war crimes.
http://blog.amnestyusa.org/middle-east/un-should-investigate-war-crimes/
“There is a well-grounded view that both the initial attacks on Gaza and the tactics being used by Israel are serious violations of the UN charter, the Geneva conventions, international law and international humanitarian law,” said Richard Falk, the UN’s special rapporteur on the Palestinian territories and professor emeritus of international law at Princeton University.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jan/14/israel-gaza-un-court-palestine
Israel’s current assault on the Gaza Strip cannot be justified by self-defense. Rather, it involves serious violations of international law, including war crimes.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123154826952369919.html
International Committee of the Red Cross Says Israel Broke International Law in Gaza
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2009/01/08-6
Israel shells a UN school, killing 30, mostly children.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090106/ap_on_re_mi_ea/ml_israel_palestinians
Jan 20, 2009 - 10:07 am 160. dele:Mr johnQpublic, the english teacher,i can express myself well in english and that i have done, you are the only one who have responded in this idiotic manner to my comments,if you don’t have anything meaningful to contribute to the issue being discussed (other than try to find grammatical errors where none exist),just shut up
Jan 20, 2009 - 10:13 am 161. Greg London:“A proportionate response is one that does what is required, and no more than required, to achieve the military objective (in this case, to end the rocket bombardment, which is unacceptable, regardless of how many Israelis have been killed).”
Except military force was not needed to stop the rockets. The rockets had stopped for four months from July to November during a ceasefire. Israel violated the ceasefire, killed several members of Hamas, and then tightened its blockade.
After that, Hamas rockets resumed.
If Israel simply wanted to stop the rockets, it would have maintained teh working ceasefire. Once Israel violated the ceasefire and rockets started up again, Israel could have found another way to stop the rockets other than to bombard and invade Gaza, killing hundreds of innocent people.
And yes, the number of Israelis killed determines the level of response that is proportional. THe Geneva Convention does not allow a country to respond to a single civilian death by launching nuclear weapons at the country that caused that death and kill thousands in response.
Would an Israeli nuke stop the rockets coming out of Gaza? certainly. Would the Geneva Convention allow it? Would it be morally acceptable? Absolutely not.
This is what most Israeli apologists absolutely *refuse* to acknowledge. They say this is WAR and war is hell and some civilians are going ot be killed and whatever number of civilians we kill is the “proportional” response as long as we get a military victory.
No. That isn’t how the Geneva Convention works.
Hamas rockets killed 17 Israelis in 2008. Most before the ceasefire in July. The fact that the ceasefire was working says that there could have been some kind of non-military solution to this problem. But even if one were to respond militarily to the resumption of rockets after Israel violated the ceasefire, that military response still must remain proportional. And pretty much at this point, only the die-hard Israeli apologists and generic neo-conservatives who think war solves any problem are saying Israel’s response was proportional.
Jan 20, 2009 - 10:23 am 162. LynnS.:#159 Greg London: Congratulation you are doing a fine job defending the Islamic Jihadi’s right to hide behind men, women, and children. You should also address how Israel has forced the Islamic Jihadis to hide their guns, bombs, and rockets in schools, UN buildings, ambulances, mosques, etc. When will the world see that the Islamic Jihadis are being forced by Israel to do what they do. You should also make clear that it is Israels fault that the Islamic Jihadi’s raise their children to kill themselves and murder other people. It is rare that we see such a clear concise analysis of this situation and who the real enemy of peace is.
Jan 20, 2009 - 10:25 am 163. Rand Simberg:You wouldn’t change a single outcome of Israel’s three-week war against Gaza? All three hundred children killed? Another two or three hundred unarmed civilians killed?
Of course I would, if I could. But those were unavoidable deaths, given Hamas’ ongoing war crimes, if the rockets were to stop.
Have you read the Geneva Convention?
Of course I have. Apparently you’re unfamiliar with it, though, since you seem unable to recognize Hamas’ ongoing war crimes.
Israel cannot kill civilians simply because Hamas killed civilians.
No one said they could.
Why are you wasting time flaunting your ignorance and illogic here?
Jan 20, 2009 - 10:32 am 164. Rand Simberg:And yes, the number of Israelis killed determines the level of response that is proportional
No, it does not. Even if no Israelis are killed (because they manage to get to their shelters in time), continually lobbing rockets at civilians is an ongoing act of war, and a nation has a right to take whatever means are necessary to end it. Any resulting casualties to the belligerent, including civilians and, yes, children are ones they bring upon themselves.
And the word is “proportionate,” not “proportional.” And you obviously have no concept of its meaning in just-war theory.
And you continue to ignore, or make excuses for Hamas’ blatant war crimes (e.g., establishing military headquarters in hospitals). You are demonstrably a moral midget.
Jan 20, 2009 - 10:54 am 165. SAF:Hamas has made it clear in action, on radio, on TV and in print their desire to wipe out Israel. In a sane world Israel would starve them and bomb them until a) they change their minds or b)no minds left to change.
It is Israel’s duty to protect their citizens. So far as they get an “F” in my book.
Jan 20, 2009 - 11:16 am 166. Oscar the Grump:Dear Greg London
Jan 20, 2009 - 12:34 pm 167. Ramos:Please state the facts accurately. Hamas might not have fire a single rocket during its “cease fire” That may be true. However they let Islamic Jihad and other groups continue firing rockets at Sedrot on a daily basis.
Let me emphasize a daily basis. They were in power in Gaza and could have stopped the attacks immediately. They didn’t and even winked at their allies. You state only partial facts to back your point. If a political group in Canada opposed the USA and fired missiles at us and the Canadian government did nothing about, we certainly would hold the Canadian government responsible. Please don’t quote the Islamo-Facist babble to try to convince us of your truth. Scratch you and we would find an anti-Semite under the skin. It wouldn’t matter what cause you would embrace the Palestinians, white power, or the new left, you would still be a Jew hater. It really comes out. You better take a real look at yourself. Something is not right.
It is only proper to condemn the killing of civilians (on such a large scale) regardless of whoever is behind it, and please will you just leave islam and other muslims out of this,just hold the arabs and the jews responsible for whatever mess they make in the mideast.
And one more thing , not all those who condemn the israeli attacks are anti semitic like some people here claim,even some jews condemn the attacks. Israel should consider lifting the blockade on gaza and allow international monitors take over, blockade in itself is an act of war
Jan 20, 2009 - 1:13 pm 168. Greg London:“And you continue to ignore, or make excuses for Hamas’ blatant war crimes (e.g., establishing military headquarters in hospitals).”
No. I’ve said Hamas should be held responsible for Hamas’s actions. Israel should be held responsible for Israel’s actions.
You on the other hand continue to hold Hamas responsible for Israel’s actions when you try to spin the truth into crap like this: “Those children died because Hamas committed war crimes”. No. those children died because Israels guns and bombs killed them.
“You are demonstrably a moral midget”
a midget among self-proclaimed intellectual giants. I was wondering when the personal attacks would start.
I posted several links to the UN, Amnesty, Red Cross, and several other organizations who all say Israel should be investigated for war crimes regarding its recent war against Gaza. Attacks by Hamas do not give Israel carte blanche to wage war however it wants. But no doubt, they are all midgets to your superior intellect.
Jan 20, 2009 - 1:46 pm 169. Oscar the Grump:Ramos
Jan 20, 2009 - 1:54 pm 170. Ramos:Have you ever heard of a self hating Jew. That’s a Jew who has swallowed so much of your sh’t that he really believes it. The blockade may be an act of war, so is everything Hamas is doing. You’re mighty sensitive about Islam and Muslims. Why isn’t Islam and the Moslems sensitive to the Christians, Jews, Hindus, Buddists or even the black Moslems of Darfur ? Huh? Oops, where is there a word about the hundreds of thousands of black Muslims murdered by Arabs in Darfur. I know its not PC to talk about Arabs killing other people even Muslims. Let me answer that for you, its not Palestinian.
Greg london you’ve made your point just let the issue rest, i’ve noticed that many of those who post comments on this site tend to get insultive when you don’t share their views, that isn’t proper.
Jan 20, 2009 - 2:07 pm 171. Greg London:“Please state the facts accurately. Hamas might not have fire a single rocket during its “cease fire” That may be true. However they let Islamic Jihad and other groups continue firing rockets at Sedrot on a daily basis. Let me emphasize a daily basis.”
Well, I already quoted the Israeli Foreign Ministry and the Israeli think tank that disagree with you. During the July to November ceasefire, about 12 rockets were launched by “rogue terrorist organisations”. That’s less than 1 a week. In April, before the ceasefire, there were 400 rockets in that month. Over a dozen every day.
The ceasefire was working. If Israel hadn’t violated it in November, it might still be in place. Hamas offered to extend the ceasefire for a year if Israel would agree to lift the blockade and Israel refused. Instead, Israel continues its current “unilateral” ceasefire, meaning Israel refuses to enter into any agreement that would give concessions in exchange for a formal ceasefire with Hamas that would last a year.
If Israel wanted a formal and functional ceasefire with Hamas to guarantee the rockets will stop, it could have one. The ceasefire agreement presented by Egypt was just that, a one year formal ceasefire if Israel would withdraw from Gaza and lift the blockade. Instead Israel refuses to make concessions just before the election.
Jan 20, 2009 - 2:17 pm 172. Greg London:oscar: “The blockade may be an act of war, so is everything Hamas is doing.”
Yes, and we should hold each side responsible for their actions in accordance with the law.
The geneva convention outlaws Hamas rockets against Israeli civilians. The geneva convention outlaws Israel’s collective punishment against civilians in Gaza. ANd the geneva convention outlaws Israel’s military from attacking Hamas militants with disregard for civilian casualties.
The law should be enforced.
Anyone arguing “Hamas broke the law, so we can break the law too” is advocating lawlessnes.
Both sides should be held accountable to international law equally. Both sides should be held responsible for their actions.
We need to bring back the rule of law and drop this rule by force or rule by war.
Jan 20, 2009 - 2:25 pm 173. Ramos:Oscar the grump
There is no need for you to get overly aggressive in your response, and yes i am sensitive about islam and muslims ,but that does not imply that myself or the majority of muslims are not sensitive to x-tians,hindus e.t.c or that we support any of those attrocities you cited in your comments.
And please when you direct your comments at me , leave out the foul words like “sh-t”. Thank you.
Jan 20, 2009 - 2:29 pm 174. Oscar the Grump:Ramos
Jan 20, 2009 - 4:01 pm 175. Oscar the Grump:Gee, did I misspell it again? Sorry about it. I’ll try harder next time.
Greg London
You almost defended Israel. I’m proud of you. If you are referring to international law, please clarify that. Do you mean the UN, the Hague, or the Geneva convention. If you mean the UN you’re talking about an Arab/Moslem voting group that practically controls it and censures Israel on a daily basis. That’s some justice. If you are talking about the Hague, you are talking about Eurabia. Again some justice. If you are talking about the Geneva convention, why do its rules only apply to Israel? Why can the Arabs act as if it doesn’t apply to them. What rule of law are you referring to?
By the way the news broadcasters put the number of missile strikes much higher than your source. I watch ABC news, does that make me ill informed?
As for the last brokered cease fire, we saw what that resulted in. Oh yes, I remember the blockade, that caused Hamas to attack. Lets give them a year this time. Israel is a souverin country. It is under no obligation to supply a government bent on destroying it with anything.
Show me the international law on that.
By the way your statistics just make me feel warm and fuzzy.
Jan 20, 2009 - 4:26 pm 176. Rand Simberg:I posted several links to the UN, Amnesty, Red Cross, and several other organizations who all say Israel should be investigated for war crimes regarding its recent war against Gaza.
In other words, you posted links from organizations that never call out Hamas on its ongoing blatant and obvious war crimes (which is the point of this article). Yet we’re supposed to take them (and you) seriously?
Please slink out with your tail between your legs. But we know you’ll continue to shill and propagandize for war criminals.
Jan 20, 2009 - 5:19 pm 177. Rand Simberg:The geneva convention outlaws Israel’s collective punishment against civilians in Gaza. ANd the geneva convention outlaws Israel’s military from attacking Hamas militants with disregard for civilian casualties.
Ignoring you inability to understand the use of the shift key, there is no “collective punishment against civilians in Gaza.” There is punishment against Hamas, and unfortunately, because they are war criminals, and use civilians as shields, civilians sometimes suffer.
If there were true “collective punishment,” as you insanely suggest, there would be no civilians left in Gaza (it’s certainly what they would do if they had Israel’s weaponry). And they have so much “disregard” for civilian casualties, as you insanely suggest, that they treat and save civilians in Israeli hospitals.
But please, continue to flaunt your insanity. Or mendacity…
Here’s an idea. Why don’t you actually read my article, instead of shilling for a child sacrifice cult?
Jan 20, 2009 - 5:29 pm 178. Oscar the Grump:Good going Rand
Jan 20, 2009 - 6:09 pm 179. Greg London:Let me repeat: the Palestinian child with the head wound who’s x-ray was shown on the BBC had a 7.62mm round in his head. That’s an AK47 round, a Hamas weapon. The track in the second child’s head couldn’t have been from an Israeli weapon fired at close range. It would have blown the kid’s head off. Again I suspect an AK47 round. Why did Hamas shoot its own children. Is propaganda worth the life of even one child?
“there is no “collective punishment against civilians in Gaza.” There is punishment against Hamas, and unfortunately, because they are war criminals, and use civilians as shields, civilians sometimes suffer.”
The Red Cross, Amnesty International, the UN, and at least two Nobel Peace Prize winners have called Israel’s blockade against all of Gaza to be collective punishment against all of Gaza. You can make linguistic arguments to the contrary, but the facts on the ground override whatever labels you try to apply to it. All these organizations say that Israel’s blockade has create a human rights crisis.
Before Israel’s war, 50% of the people in Gaza live below the poverty level, unemployment was at 60%, average income was at $650 a year. Many rely on humanitarian aid for food and water. After Israel’s war, things are only worse. estimates are that Israel inflicted 2 billion dollars of damage on Gaza, the civilian infrastructure is destroyed, the electrical grid is shot, water lines destroyed, etc. Estimates are that it will take 5 years to rebuild.
Oh, and in summer of 2007, Israeli Deputy defense minister Matan Vilnai began preparing a plan on behalf of his boss, the Defence Minister Ehud Barak, to declare all of Gaza a “hostile entity”. Not just “hamas”. ALL of Gaza.
Israel’s Minister of Public Security, Avi Dichter, believes punishment should be inflicted “irrespective of the cost to the Palestinians”; Not “irrespective of cost to Hamas” to Palestinians.
Meir Sheetrit has urged that Israel should “decide on a neighborhood in Gaza and level it” not “target Hamas and level it” entire neighborhoods of Gaza.
And to quote the Jeruselem Post: “it would be pointless for Israel to topple Hamas because the population [of Gaza] is Hamas.”
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1226404716066&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FPrinter
While you make linguistic arguments that therre is a distinction between Hamas and Gazans in general, Israel’s politicians continue to disagree with the existence of such a distinction. Hamas is Gaza. Gaza is Hamas.
And in the end, it doesn’t matter what anyone says if the facts on teh ground say that Israel disregarded civilian casualties. It doesn’t matter if you “felt bad” or if you “really wanted to kill cvilians”. The Geneva Convention does not require a “confession”. What matters is teh facts on the ground. And many international organizations say the facts on the ground indicate Israel disregarded the civilian casualties it was inflicting.
Jan 20, 2009 - 7:23 pm 180. Greg London:“As for the last brokered cease fire, we saw what that resulted in.”
Yeah, Israel violated it on November 4, tightened the blockade even further on November 5, and Hamas rockets started up immediately after that.
“Oh yes, I remember the blockade, that caused Hamas to attack.”
Back in 1967 when Egypt blockaded Israel, Israel called it an act of war. Israel put a blockade on Gaza when Hamas won the elections in 2006. Did you think an act of war against all of Gaza would cause Gaza to suddenly embrace Israel’s love and generosity?
“Lets give them a year this time.”
Israel violated the first cease fire. It had been working from July to November. Four months. Then ISrael violated it by sending troops into Gaza and killing several members of Hamas.
“Israel is a souverin country. It is under no obligation”
no obligation except for international law.
Jan 20, 2009 - 7:29 pm 181. LynnS.:Funny how Hamas cries that the Israelis are starving the Palastinians by denying them the aid of food and water yet they still manage to have the money to buy and smuggle munitions through the tunnels from Egypt. I remember seeing the markets in Somalia filled with guns and would think the same thing; They have the money to buy guns, rockets, ammunition yet nothing for food.
The Palestinians the elected warriors for Islam’s fight against Israel with their full arsenal of weapons; guns, rockets, men, women, children, the media, the world, Greg London, Ramos, mountainaires and on and on.
Jan 21, 2009 - 5:33 am 182. cedarford:Greg London Dude. Seriously. Have you read the Geneva Convention?
Israel cannot kill civilians simply because Hamas killed civilians. The Geneva Convention doesn’t prohibit the killing of civilians, and then provide an escape clause if the other side does.
Uh, dude…you might benefit from reading the “Conventions” yourself soometime. The goal is to minimize civilian casualties while waging war against targets that of necessity, will include civilian deaths.
And a soldier is no less “innocent” than a child or a woman simply for the fact that they are male, in their teens, and are expected by their society to fight. Having to kill the best young men a society assembles is no less a tragedy than killing some “wee ones”, who themselves are going to be cuing up, many against their will, if they are male and tough and fit and smart enough to pick up arms when their time comes.
Both sides should be held accountable to international law equally. Both sides should be held responsible for their actions.
We need to bring back the rule of law and drop this rule by force or rule by war.
Oh please, spare us the vapid fantasy of the existence of accountibility to international law and the presumption of some body that enforces “rule of law”. I see no such agency – just a lot of loudmouthed Leftist Jewish and Euro lawyers filing lawsuits against Bush, Burma, Congo, Zimbabwe, the Sudan, Israel….their precious asses thousands of miles from danger, and no one else willing to die for their trite little dreams of being the regulatory and oversight body nations at war must obey.
Jan 21, 2009 - 7:31 am 183. Greg London:“The goal is to minimize civilian casualties while waging war against targets that of necessity, will include civilian deaths.”
Speaking of vapid fantasies, it doesn’t matter how many civilians Israel has ever killed, you will accept it as “necessity”. Hamas rockets killed 17 Israelis in 2008. Israel killed 600 civlians in three weeks.
If it had been a thousand dead palestinian civilians, you would still defend it. If it had been 2000, you would still defend it. If it had been 3000, you would still defend it. There is no number you will not defend. One can see this is true just by looking at the argument given by the apologists: You cannot condemn Israel for killing civilians because Israel could have killed MORE civlians IF IT WANTED.
Israel could have used cluster bombs and white phosphorous and napalm and even nuclear weapons against the civilian population of Gaza, the apologists argue. Since Israel didn’t use these weapons, Israel met the requirement for avoiding civilian casualties.
Note that the argument basically comes down to this:
Israel didn’t kill as many as it COULD HAVE, therefore it killed ENOUGH TO BE MORALLY ACCEPTABLE.
Its little different than the moronic argument that there are bigger attrocities going on in the world at the Congo or Darfur or insert name here, so the world should focus on those attrocities, and if the world focuses attention on Israel, it isn’t because Isreal committed any attrocities, it is because the world is picking on Israel.
Basically, if Israel kills fewer people than any current or recent attrocity going on anywhere in the world, it’s OK.
Really, these two morally relativistic arguments are at the heart of a lot of propaganda.
We’re not as bad as we could be, so we’re goood enough. We’re not as bad as they are, so we’re good enough.
Jan 21, 2009 - 8:07 am 184. Rand Simberg:If it had been a thousand dead palestinian civilians, you would still defend it. If it had been 2000, you would still defend it. If it had been 3000, you would still defend it.
Maybe, maybe not. What is important is not the number, but whether or not it was militarily necessary. This is the point that you do not understand.
There is no number you will not defend. One can see this is true just by looking at the argument given by the apologists: You cannot condemn Israel for killing civilians because Israel could have killed MORE civlians IF IT WANTED.
That’s not the argument, but I can see why you would want to pretend it is. Straw men are always easier to knock down than actual arguments.
I’ll explain it one more time, and type it slowly, so that perhaps you’ll understand it this time.
A proportionate response has nothing to do with how many are killed. It has everything to do with whether or not the action taken is the minimum necessary to achieve the military goal. For instance, nuking Gaza would be a disproportionate response, because the goal (which despite your inability to comprehend it) is not to kill civilians, but to end the means of the enemy to make warfare, can be achieved with much more precise and targeted means.
But when your enemy is committing war crimes by hiding themselves and their weapons among civilians, it is acceptable and proportionate to take whatever means are necessary to kill and destroy them, while taking as much care as possible to minimize civilian casualties, though it is not possible to eliminate them, due to the war crimes being committed. And those collateral casualties are the responsibility of the war criminals who are hiding among them.
Jan 21, 2009 - 8:56 am 185. tanstaafl:And those collateral casualties are the responsibility of the war criminals who are hiding among them.
Quite cowardly, those war criminals. A style of warfare beyond despicable.
But, hey, when you declare that you …love death more than we (infidels) love life maybe some logic within that construct.
Jan 21, 2009 - 9:22 am 186. mountainaires:Israel is wantonly slaughtering innocent civilians in order to collectively punish Palestinians. This massive slaughter will not secure Israel, nor will it eradicate Hamas. In fact, it will create more hatred and more danger for Israel. Moreover, Israel is destroying its own country from within, justifying brutality against another population By demonizing Palestinians, and enlisting Israelis to support crimes against humanity, Israel is brutalizing its own people psychologically, teaching generations of Jews to scapegoat and demonize Arabs. It’s a very dangerous tactic to employ, as Jews well know.
Hitler’s Willing Executioners:
“Germans’ antisemitic beliefs about Jews were the central causal agent of the Holocaust. They were the central causal agent not only of Hitler’s decision to annihilate European Jewry…but also of the perpetrators’ willingness to kill and brutalize Jews. The conclusion of this book is that anti-semitism moved many thousands of “ordinary” Germans — and would have moved millions more had they been appropriately positioned — to slaughter Jews. Not economic hardships, not the coercive means of a totalitarian state, not social psychological pressure, not invariable psychological propensities, but ideas about Jews that were pervasive in Germany, and had been for decades induced ordinary Germans to kill unarmed, defenseless Jewish men, women, and children by the thousands, systematically and without pity.”
Brutalizing “the other” because you can get away with it:
http://www.counterpunch.org/oloughlin03112008.html
The Myth of Israel’s Strategic Genius:
http://walt.foreignpolicy.com:80/posts/2009/01/17/the_myth_of_israels_strategic_genius
In addition to imposing a crippling economic blockade on Gaza, Israelis killed over 5,000 Palestinians in the 2nd Intifada (2000-2008), compared with about 1,000 Israeli deaths in that same period. And this was before the Gaza operation began.
http://www.btselem.org/English/Statistics/Casualties.asp
http://walt.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2009/01/18/deterrence_theory_101
Jan 21, 2009 - 9:25 am 187. Rand Simberg:Israel is wantonly slaughtering innocent civilians in order to collectively punish Palestinians.
This is stupid. If they were “wantonly slaughtering innocent civilians” the death toll would be much, much higher.
Jan 21, 2009 - 9:29 am 188. mountainaires:Israel will have more enemies in the world, and few, if any, allies. Israel is now a pariah state; it’s own historian, Avi Shlaim, calls Israel a “Rogue State.” Israel cannot continue on this path of militarism, demonization, and brutality. This is an important perspective by Kolko; time to stop the delusional hate Mr. Simberg. You’re not a friend to Israel.
January 21, 2009
How to Inflame the Entire Muslim World
Jan 21, 2009 - 9:41 am 189. mountainaires:Understanding Gaza
By GABRIEL KOLKO
http://www.counterpunch.org/kolko01212009.html
Palestinians are so sub-human, according to this Israeli argument that “Israel has the right to defend itself,” that for 13 Israelis dead, an appropriate and proportionate response is 1300 Palestinians dead, and 5000 maimed, 50,000 homes destroyed, major government buildings destroyed, and more.
It would be laughable, if it wasn’t so horrifying. So, Mr. Simberg, really, your delusional thinking and hate-speech here are what is “stupid,” not to mention morally and intellectually bankrupt.
“Not even high intelligence and a sensitive spirit are of any help once the facts of a situation are deduced from a political theory, rather than vice versa.” — Robert Conquest, author of The Great Terror, Stalin’s Great Purge 1936-1938
ISRAEL’S RIGHT TO DEFEND ITSELF
By Joseph Massad, The Electronic Intifada, 20 January 2009
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article10221.shtml
Jan 21, 2009 - 9:55 am 190. Rand Simberg:…time to stop the delusional hate Mr. Simberg.
I have no “hate,” delusional or otherwise. I think that (like most leftists) you’re simply projecting.
Jan 21, 2009 - 9:57 am 191. tanstaafl:“moutainaires” is one of those individuls who sits on various forums around the internet simply to propagandize.
By citing a bunch of links (see esp. counterpunch, what’s next, rense.com ?) he lamely endeavors to lend credibility to his talking points.
His mind and his “thinking” (such as they are) are impermeable to anything that doesn’t match the pre-set concrete.
Jan 21, 2009 - 10:54 am 192. mountainaires:I’m a military veteran, and I voted for John McCain. I’m not projecting. I’m rejecting your assertions, and calling them hate-speech and propaganda lies. By making such vile assertions, based on nothing but lies, you are engaging in bigotry. But your bigotry reflects on Jews, and it reflects badly.
Your hate-speech about Arabs is despicable; as despicable as the hate-speech about Jews. What’s more, your assertions are ludicrous; Palestinians love their children as much as any parent loves their child.
Let me put this to you in another way, to illustrate the utter banality [as Hannah Arendt would put it] bankruptcy of your assertions:
In addition to being evil, subhuman animals, Hamas is stupid, because as everyone has known for some time, Gazans are barely surviving and suffer from rampant malnutrition, with 80% living below the poverty line, like the animals they are. So, in the event that Hamas is wasting children to make a public relations point, they are wasting valuable nutrition which they will need to fight their wars with the annointed and G*dly Israeli state. So, might I suggest that in another era, when 1.5 million Irish were being oppressed and starved to death by the English, Jonathan Swift came up with A Modest Proposal to solve the problem of those evil and subhuman Irish too. I’m sure Mr. Simberg would agree that Hamas being so evil as to purposefully waste children in such a reckless fashion, that he should support such a proposal…
Jonathan Swift: A Modest Proposal
http://www.gutenberg.org/catalog/world/readfile?fk_files=852817
http://www.freeessays.cc/db/18/emt186.shtml
Jan 21, 2009 - 11:07 am 193. delarosa:176 rand simberg
Hi rand, if we should disregard the UN, RED CROSS and AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL, then who should we take seriously? the israeli media?. At least he hasn’t mentioned al-jazeera .
Can you be a little bit polite when you convey your points, we don’t need the insults
Jan 21, 2009 - 11:46 am 194. mountainaires:Report on Israel’s use of Chidren in War:
http://www.childsoldiersglobalreport.org/content/israel
Jan 21, 2009 - 12:11 pm 195. Rand Simberg:I’m rejecting your assertions, and calling them hate-speech and propaganda lies.
Yes, we know you are. But simply calling them that doesn’t magically render them that. We live in the real world here.
Your hate-speech about Arabs is despicable;
Ignoring the fact that I haven’t made any “hate-speech” (is there a stupider phrase in political discourse?), I said nothing about “Arabs.” I was simply relating facts about Hamas.
Palestinians love their children as much as any parent loves their child.
(Ignoring the fact that there’s no such thing as a “Palestinian” — they’re Arabs) I’m sure that many of them do. But not all. Hamas loves them so much that they hide behind them when they make war.
Jan 21, 2009 - 12:17 pm 196. delarosa:Hi Rand,
Jan 21, 2009 - 12:58 pm 197. Rand Simberg:Of course we know those living in palestine are arabs,but we have arabs who are egyptians,syrianns,iraqis e.t.c,please tell me what do we call the arabs who were born and are still living in palestine?
There is no Palestine (that was simply an arbitrarily defined region under the British). Gaza is historically part of Egypt, and its inhabitants are culturally Egyptians (as Yasir Arafat was). The West Bank is part of Jordan (or was, until they lost in in the 1967 War, when it became part of Israel). You call them Arabs, who live in Gaza or the West Bank.
Jan 21, 2009 - 1:27 pm 198. Oscar the Grump:mountainairs
I’m surprised at you. You’re a veteran of which war? Exactly how did you participate? Did you ride a desk or did you ride a tank? Were you in combat? Did you have to fight for your life? Did you come away from a battle with your pants full of feces and urine because of the fear and terror of it? Did you ever throw up from the smell of rotting human flesh? Or just plain throw up from fear. That’s what war is.
Israel does what it has to. Its not pretty, its not glorious. However, it is absolutely necessary. Believe me there will be plenty of Jewish boys (veterans) with nightmares about their experiences.
You don’t have to be a Jew to dislike Arabs or Moslems. Excluding anything Jewish: Mumbai, Darfur, The bandits of Northern Congo, Southern Sudan, Somalia, Northern Nigeria, 9-11, the US African embassy bombings, The London bombings, the Indonesian bombing,
the French riots, Southern Russian school massacre, the Russian playhouse massacre, the Saudi oil weapon, the Barcelona train massacre, the terror in the Phillipines
I’m sorry that’s all that I can think of listing right now. I’m sure other people can come up with bigger and better lists.
Just what are you defending?
Jan 21, 2009 - 1:43 pm 199. mountainaires:Mr. Simberg, I’ll have to repeat your own challenge: Saying there is no such thing as a “Palestinian” does not magically make it true. Israelis use the term Palestinian.
Bodies continued to be pulled from the rubble that used to be the cities of the Gaza Strip today, and the death toll in Israel’s 22-day way has now passed 1,400. 5,500 others were also wounded. In addition, two children in Gaza City were killed when they found an unexploded shell from the conflict. .
In what appears to be the first deliberate post-war killing, Israeli forces opened fire on a Palestinian farmer in the Northern Gaza Strip, killing him. The farmer was reportedly returning to his farm near the border to assess the damage done to it during the war when the troops shot him.
Of course, dialogue is more difficult right after wanton slaughter of thousands of civilians, and the devastation of an entire infrastructure. Certainly, Israel would know that fact.
Dialogue with Hamas is only path to peace, urges novelist
Israeli writer who lost son in Lebanon accuses his countrymen of ‘cruelty’
By Ben Lynfield in Jerusalem
Wednesday, 21 January 2009
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/dialogue-with-hamas-is-only-path-to-peace-urges-novelist-1452297.html
Jan 21, 2009 - 2:42 pm 200. Rand Simberg:Israelis use the term Palestinian.
Some do, some don’t. Why would I care that some are confused or mistaken? Obviously, it’s become a term of convenience for people who happen to live in the territories lost in 1967, but that doesn’t make them a nation, or people, or culture. They are Arabs.
Not that there’s anything wrong with that.
Dialogue with Hamas is only path to peace, urges novelist
What does “dialogue” with someone whose charter, and primary motivation in life, is to kill you look like? Of what value is it? How does one compromise? “How about only killing half of us”?
And why would I care what a “novelist” thinks? As I said, I’m more interested in reality. It’s a shame that you aren’t.
Jan 21, 2009 - 3:08 pm 201. Oscar the Grump:mountainaires
Jan 21, 2009 - 3:43 pm 202. Oscar the Grump:Have you ever tried to sit down with an Arab and try to talk things over. Let me tell that I have tried. Its like trying to talk to a wall and get a response. I was naive enough to try. You can only dialogue with somebody who wants to dialogue. If you think that they haven’t tried to talk to and negotiate with Hamas you’re wrong. They won’t even sit at the same negotiation table with a Jew. Arafat sat down and negotiated. For that he was handed a country. He didn’t get all he wanted; but, he got something he didn’t have before. Had Arafat negotiated at Camp David in good faith he would have gotten still more. That doesn’t sound like a venomous Isreali plot. They were giving him a country, they were giving him money, they even gave him weapons. Hamas could easily do the same thing. Instead, they start two wars with Israel, refuse to talk, and turn on their well financed propaganda machine. By the way, you bought their “line”, hook, line
and sinker. Let me help you here, “Sucker!”
mountainaires
Jan 21, 2009 - 3:46 pm 203. Knights13:Oops! I almost forgot, you never answered the questions I posed to you earlier.
“Palestinians are so sub-human, according to this Israeli argument that “Israel has the right to defend itself,” that for 13 Israelis dead, an appropriate and proportionate response is 1300 Palestinians dead, and 5000 maimed, 50,000 homes destroyed, major government buildings destroyed, and more.”
Israel has over 300 F16s and about 200 F15s. Which other country with a population of 7 million has that kind of package? Their GDP has to be in the trillions or all their money goes to the military.
Jan 21, 2009 - 3:50 pm 204. mountainaires:“Israel has over 300 F16s and about 200 F15s. Which other country with a population of 7 million has that kind of package? Their GDP has to be in the trillions or all their money goes to the military.”
Israel cannot support itself without an annual aid package from the United States, which is generally reported as $3 Billion. [Congressional Report]. However, the true amount is hundreds of billions over the years. Without that US aid, Israel would be incapable of functioning, much less slaughtering civilians in Gaza. In fact, Israel’s weapons systems come from the US–and Israel has never paid the US for them–and Israel turns around and sells some of those weapons systems to China. The US has rebuked Israel several times for it over the years. I doubt Israel listens to these warnings. Some day, if the US is in a war with China, we’ll be fighting our own weapons systems in the hands of the Chinese, thanks to Israel. With friends like these…
The Gaza Bombshell
Now, you can know the rest of the story…
http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2008/04/gaza200804?printable=true¤tPage=all
Jan 21, 2009 - 4:06 pm 205. Oscar the Grump:Knights13
Aren’t you the kettle trying to call the pot black? These terms like sub-human has never appeared in anything I’ve read coming from the Israeli side in reference other human beings. Israel was founded by people who were demonized in Europe in exactly that way. They were not only demonized, they were tortured, and murdered. How dare you even suggest using words that way.
In response to the weapons Israel has. Can you give me a weapons count on Iran, or Syria, or just the Hezbollah. When you live in a rough neighborhood you have to play rough too.
Remember one thing Israel didn’t start the shooting. Hamas did. And after they started they hid behind women and children. Now they use fools like you to spout their poison.
Had Hamas stopped firing its missiles into Israel, Israel would have stopped too. They fired till the end and they fired from behind their women and children.
Checkmate, fool.
Jan 21, 2009 - 4:10 pm 206. Oscar the Grump:mountainaires
Is that you again? You keep evading my questions about you. Come on we all want to know.
About Israel,
Do you know Israel has its own weapons industry. If you look at all the videos of this Hamas war, all the tanks Israel used were made there. The F15s used were of Israeli design, American built but Israeli design. Half of all the modern electronic war components this country uses are Israeli designed. When this country has a problem with component design it often goes to Israel to iron out any problems.
There is such an overlap that it is hard to designate what is American and what is Israeli.
“What if we go to war with China” what a stupid thing to say. All China has to do is stop sending us manufactured goods, we would collapse in a month with no shot fired. They don’t need weapons to beat this country. They can buy it.
By the way, this civil war you mention is nothing new. The US constantly meddles in other countries affairs. You name a country and we’ve tried to influence their body politic in some way. That is standard operating procedure. That is how the US influenced an Israeli election and had Netanyahu beaten by a more moderate individual. Had Hamas been toppled by the PLO we wouldn’t even be having this discussion. This war would never have happened.
Jan 21, 2009 - 4:40 pm 207. Rand Simberg:Is that you again? You keep evading my questions about you. Come on we all want to know.
Actually, I don’t care. I think it amusingly stupid that he (or she?) thinks that we will find emitted nonsense more persuasive if we somehow imagine that it is from a vet, or someone who voted for McCain.
Jan 21, 2009 - 5:21 pm 208. Oscar the Grump:Rand,
Jan 21, 2009 - 6:39 pm 209. Knights13:God, you’re tough. I voted for McCain.
“Checkmate, fool.”
What are you exactly checkmating? I just pointed out that Israel for whatever reasons spends way too much money on the military with proportion to its GDP. This means they are draining their citizens money from other social services or they get the money from somewhere else.
“They fired till the end and they fired from behind their women and children.”
I think they fire from fields mostly and then just step away from the place since it leaves a trail. They might be stupid but not stupid enough to fire from indoors.
Jan 21, 2009 - 6:51 pm 210. Knights13:“With friends like these…”
I don’t think we have friends in the middle east. We might have interests but that’s about it.
Jan 21, 2009 - 6:53 pm 211. Midwestern US:Greg London, and Mountainaires:
For every anti-Israeli link you post, (like they’re even unbiased?) I can post 10 which justify what Israel had to do, and expose the disgusting psychological games of Hamas’ terrorism for exactly what they are.
You don’t like the death-toll? Blame Hamas. Blame Iran and Syria, blame Muslim Extremism. Blame the UN for being so afraid of their own militant Islamics that they try to stab Israel in the back repeatedly. Blame the Hamas agenda that swears them to murder all Israelis, and a mentally ill mandate that arabs must target innocent Jews all over the world, which shows you EXACTLY the filth we’re dealing with here.
Is this even just about Israelis and poor misunderstood Palestinians? You have Al Qaeda, you have Pakistan and Afghanistan in turmoil from the cancerous Taliban, with India being dragged into the fray. Maybe you were happy when a British subway got hit by terrorists? If you want to sell out England to these death-mongers, go ahead, but Israel and the US aren’t tolerating the sickness.
You want to talk about war crimes though? Yes, by all means, lets do that. Every single rocket fired by Hamas into Israel…EVERY SINGLE ROCKET OF 6000… WAS A WAR CRIME… deliberately aimed at CIVILIANS. AFTER Israel pulled out of Gaza. Israel HAD to shut the borders because of Hamas suicide bombers.
Now the Palestinians are getting a taste of what they have sworn to do to other people and they don’t like it? Wow, that really is a shame. At least the Israeli’s weren’t dancing in the streets celebrating the civilian casualties, which were not intentional.
I also just read from a legitimate news source that the warning messages Israel was giving Palestinian civilians were given to Hamas, who then deliberately sent mothers with children into those locations. Hamas have also been butchering Fatah members as being “Israeli collaborators” and throwing their corpses into the rubble.
By the way Greg, I remember England helping bomb the crap out of Germany in WWII after Germany was rocketing English civilians. Therefore I must attack England’s right to exist apparently?
The two of you should be careful not to break a leg while doing the goose-step like good little nazi propagandists.
Jan 21, 2009 - 7:49 pm 212. Oscar the Grump:Let me get back to moutainaires,
I looked at your statistics about the second intifada, btsalem’s categories are redundant. Their body counts are inflated. Btsalem’s statistics are not to be believed. The Professor’s article you qoute pulls a number out of the air without ever backing it.
Now let me give you some facts about the second intifada. What started it was the al-Dura ‘killing’. It was reported to the world by France 2 news. I remember seeing the video of the attack by Israeli security forces on this poor unarmed father and child. After reviewing it a few times the holes above the two attacked persons seemed awfully large. Right away I suspected that it wasn’t an Israeli weapon being fired at them. (which I mentioned to my wife.)
Later when it was investigated it turned out that for the Israelis to have shot at these two persons, the bullets would have had to go at least one block down the street and make two right hand turns to come it at that angle. I don’t know of any bullet that can do that yet. It was later shown to be a total hoax. The child was never shot as purported and he never died. This was the ignition of the second intifada.
Later other videos would appear. One man was shot and carried to the ambulance three times to later walk around unscathed. Another video showed a funeral litter being carried. The dead man fell off only to climb back onto the litter. (it had to be a miracle.) We don’t know how many deaths were staged for their propaganda value. One of my professors once told me,” Believe none of what you hear and only half of what you see.”
I’m sure that there were fake deaths in this recent Hamas war. Unfortunately there were many real deaths. The facts are they stopped the cease fire and fired rockets and mortars at Israel. What did they think would happen? Now they cry poor me, look at what the Israelis did to us.
Had Hamas faced a less moral nation, they would have wiped out the entire Gaza population.
Jan 21, 2009 - 8:20 pm 213. hanmattan:The people who inhabit an area of land can change. It’s now time for the Palestinians to accept that those lands aren’t for them anymore.
This can be seen by the Palestinians using suicide bombings and such, tactics that fall below the standards of honorable human beings. That’s where the proof is: your standards fall too low, it’s time to go.
Israelis need to heed the warning and not let their standards fail them. It’s time to purge the Zionists who take advantage of Palestinian intransigence to pursue some sort of vainglory, as well.
Jan 22, 2009 - 1:09 am 214. Peter the Bubblehead:209. Knights13 wrote:
They might be stupid but not stupid enough to fire from indoors.
Peter writes: Yes. Yes, they are that stupid. I saw an article on another web site about news broadcasters in Gaza being surprised when Hamas terrorists started firing weapons right out the windows of the floor directly above the news studio libe during a broadcast. Probably in the hope Israel would shoot back and they could accuse the ‘evil Jews’ of deliberately cutting off television broadcasts and killing innocent impartial news journalists.
Jan 22, 2009 - 5:55 am 215. Peter the Bubblehead:Here’s the link for the attack conducted from a TV studio I mentioned above.
http://littlegreenfootballs.com/article/32495_Video-_Al_Arabiya_Studio_Used_As_Rocket_Launching_Site
Jan 22, 2009 - 6:01 am 216. tanstaafl:…thinks that we will find emitted nonsense more persuasive if we somehow imagine that it is from a vet, or someone who voted for McCain.
That definitely struck me as a rather odd form of self- justification or self-defense.
Indicating that “mountainaires” is probably something like a convert to Islam, maybe in Britain, & a guy who attends some radical mosque where he gets a constant stream of the bilge he propagates.
Jan 22, 2009 - 6:03 am 217. Rhein Gold:I’ve always found it fascinating that the Arab countries in or near Gaza and the West Bank seem to do little if anything at all to ease the plight of their fellow Arabs. Oh they demonstrate pretty well, and burn U.S. and Israeli flags with the best of em and maybe send some small amount of food or medical assistance but for the most part don’t really do very much. I wonder why that is? I wonder why the other Arab countries don’t seem to want to have very much to do with the Palestinians. I wonder why that is?
Jan 22, 2009 - 10:27 am 218. Knights13:“http://littlegreenfootballs.com/article/32495_Video-_Al_Arabiya_Studio_Used_As_Rocket_Launching_Site”
Why aren’t they recording the smoke trail? If it were from right below this lady then there would be a lot of smoke right infron of the windows to see.
Jan 22, 2009 - 11:21 am 219. Knights13:On another note; the buildings are targeted due to military operation. Not because someone might have launched a missile from there. They take out hydro, roads and try to kill of the supply of the enemy. No, they are not trying to hit one terrorist with a 500 pound bomb. I mean of course if the pilot saw a few goofs around a toyota truck doing something familiar he’d drop a present but that’s not why the other bombs hit all these other buildings. The whole point is to paralize the enemy,cut of the recources and shock them from trying to fight. Israels problem is that their enemy is already shocked and paralized. It’s a large concentration camp. You can’t shok someone even more then they already are. Some of these people have ZERO hope. None. School, work, what’s that?
The offensive has ended and what we have is billions in Israeli taxpayer money, billions in damage, Hamas is still there. The objective is not clear neither is the conclusion.
At the end of the day most will say; HA?
Jan 22, 2009 - 11:34 am 220. tanstaafl:pssttt, rhein, the word on the street is…(I think you already know…)
Arab countries don’t have much use for or liking of the individuals living today in Gaza & the West Bank.
Iraqis in particular do not have a lot of use for the “Palestinian” workers who were in their country…(they were outraged when Saddam, in his waning years began making $25,000 payments to each family of a “Palestinian” suicide bomber). Egyptians, Jordanians …possibly even Iranians, a country whose shi’ite government conducts proxy war against Israel by supplying (sunni) Hamas & (shi’ite) Hezbollah reportedly share much the same sentiment.
The ongoing situation between Israel & adjacent territories is, of course, useful to Al Qaeda & friends. Over recent years, that (endless) dispute has climbed higher and higher on Al Q’s list of things to be PO’ed about.
Today, reportedly, al-Libi has called for terror attacks in Britain to avenge Israel’s operation in Gaza.
These people are completely nuts
Jan 22, 2009 - 11:42 am 221. Oscar the Grump:Knights13
Jan 22, 2009 - 12:24 pm 222. Oscar the Grump:Oscar is back. Your little discussion about the little green footballs was amazing. Where did you get all that wisdom? Let me see: It was a high rise building, I assume the building has four sides. (tell me if I’m wrong) Maybe the missile was fired from one of the other sides? Duh! Don’t ask me where the smoke was I’ll tell you directly.
Knights12 and a half
Jan 22, 2009 - 12:37 pm 223. Knighst13:Videos explicitly showed missile launches from populated areas. Or is that not hiding behind women and children.
Peter the Bubblehead that little green footballs video was excellent. Keep up the good work.
“Knights12 and a half”
It’s Knights13.
“I assume the building has four sides. (tell me if I’m wrong) Maybe the missile was fired from one of the other sides?”
The person filming could get to the other side to film the trail since the trail would be obvious. Maybe the situation was tense but judging from the ladies body language, that doubtful. All I see is some lady talking about a rocket getting launched from below her. How does she know it was a rocket and not an airstrike without seeing the rocket or its trail and if she could see it from her side what is blocking the camera’s view?
Jan 22, 2009 - 1:20 pm 224. Knighst13:lady’s****
Jan 22, 2009 - 1:21 pm 225. Oscar the Grump:Knights12 and a quarter
Jan 22, 2009 - 2:14 pm 226. Peter the Bubblehead:This was an al-Arabia broadcast not something manufactured. It was a fixed set, try moving a mounted TV camera. And, somebody in the “news” room just told her. If you look and listen you will see it all.
By the way, an air strike would have blown up the lady’s****
218. Knights13 asks:
Why aren’t they recording the smoke trail? If it were from right below this lady then there would be a lot of smoke right infron of the windows to see.
Peter explains (as if to a small child): Gee, maybe because, like US news studios, that isn’t a real window behind her?
Jan 22, 2009 - 3:56 pm 227. Peter the Bubblehead:219. Knights13 wrote:
On another note; the buildings are targeted due to military operation. Not because someone might have launched a missile from there.
Peter responds: Isn’t attacking a weapons-laden building the very definition of a military operation? It isn’t a single spit-ball being launched from these places. If one rocket or morter is fired, it is pretty safe to assume there are probably a large number of weapons inside as well, perhaps even an entire storage cache? To ignore a building BECAUSE terrorists are launching weapons from it would be the HEIGHT of stupidity for a military force!
Jan 22, 2009 - 3:59 pm 228. Knights13:“By the way, an air strike would have blown up the lady’s****”
Not quiet; you feel the air strike from far away as you would feel the shock of any explosion. So, again, I want to see someone launching a rocket from a small room which I would find hilarious. Either they are relly stupid or that rocket carries like a 15g warhead. Either way; that is hilarious.
And Peter; you don’t hide your rockets where you lauch them. There is no way Hamas would launch from a storage location. But, Hamas would love enemies like you though. I can see why.
Jan 22, 2009 - 4:35 pm 229. Oscar the Grump:Knights12
Jan 22, 2009 - 5:54 pm 230. Oscar the Grump:That was weak and you’re getting weaker. You can’t accept it as truth even when it was put out by al-Arabia. As for somebody launching a rocket from a “small” room, you have no indication of its size. They don’t have to be in the room to fire it. They can use a timer or a remote control. What do you think, they use a match. When collateral damage is no issue then anything is possible even if it is “relly stupid”. Isn’t that hilarious?
The thing you said about Hamas not “lauching” from a storage site is true.
They are not that stupid. Did you see the video Israeli posted? It was really neat. Israeli aircraft were dropping bunker busters and occasionally they would hit a hidden cache of munitions. Whole neighborhoods were blown away by the explosions. Too bad you couldn’t be there. Needless to say you were missed.
Knights 11 and a half
Jan 22, 2009 - 6:09 pm 231. Peter the Bubblehead:One more thought. According to my physics course, sound and a shock wave travel at different speeds. When they are both together, they are close. If it is farther away, you would hear the sound then feel the shock wave. Watch the video and interpret what you see.
228. Knights13 wrote:
And Peter; you don’t hide your rockets where you lauch them. There is no way Hamas would launch from a storage location. But, Hamas would love enemies like you though. I can see why.
Peter responds: And that’s why the IDF has been posting videos of attacks on buildings where weapons have been fired from (like Mosques, another war crime) and recording secondary explosions from the weapons cache in there blowing up after the primary strike? Because NO ONE stores weapons within easy reach when you’re shooting at an enemy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jwP_LusgPAw
That’s like saying we don’t store torpedoes in the torpedo room because that’s where we launch them from.
Jan 22, 2009 - 6:30 pm 232. Knights13:“Too bad you couldn’t be there. Needless to say you were missed.”
Well, we all have to go sometime. You have not answered the question.
The person filming could get to the other side to film the trail since the trail would be obvious. Maybe the situation was tense but judging from the ladies body language, that doubtful. All I see is some lady talking about a rocket getting launched from below her. How does she know it was a rocket and not an airstrike without seeing the rocket or its trail and if she could see it from her side what is blocking the camera’s view?
“Watch the video and interpret what you see.”
There is some lady talking. I’m amazed how you measured the distance of the actual explosion from the video. Oh wait; that’s just you making up stuff.
Jan 22, 2009 - 7:10 pm 233. Oscar the Grump:Knights11 and a quarter
Sound travels at 670 miles per hour. If you don’t believe me look it up. A shock wave traveling through another media is much slower. It can actually be observed with your eye. If the two coincide they haven’t had much time to separate. A reverse example would be being shot at a long distance. Being the bullet is going faster than sound, you are dead before you hear it. Please you’re welcome to try the bullet one as an experiment. If you live through it you can call me a liar. Now let’s see if have the brains enough to at least look up what I’ve given you and at see if its right.
By the way, you’re still getting weaker. All you come up with is conjecture. If you think I’m making up stuff, look it up. Prove me wrong. I welcome the challenge. Please.
Peter the Bubblehead
Jan 22, 2009 - 10:02 pm 234. ishkaa:By golly you came up with another great video. Keep up the good work! I really enjoyed seeing that one.
‘NahnCee’
…
‘Back when this first started in September of 2001…’
What the hell is that even supposed to mean?
Jan 23, 2009 - 11:03 am 235. Peter the Bubblehead:ishkaa, it means that NahnCee is trying to imply all of this is Bush’s fault, because every liberal looney lefty knows terrorism, especially Islamic terrorism, didn’t exist until Bush entered the White House.
Jan 23, 2009 - 2:35 pm 236. Knights13:“Sound travels at 670 miles per hour. ”
When I did my calculations it was usually in the form of approximately 332m/s in air. I’d have good faith in your conversion to miles per hour which is completely irrelevant to what I was discussing.
Let me ask another question: how does this answer my question? It doesn’t.
“By the way, you’re still getting weaker. All you come up with is conjecture. If you think I’m making up stuff, look it up. Prove me wrong. I welcome the challenge. Please.”
That’s the thing; your video doesn’t prove anything. There is some lady talking and you have this as proof.
“http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jwP_LusgPAw”
Again, I see two strikes in that video. Both strikes there is huge debris flying upwards with explosions following the strikes. You have concluded other weapons exploding and I see two bunker busters from an F-15 exploding.
Jan 23, 2009 - 3:31 pm 237. Knights13:“Please you’re welcome to try the bullet one as an experiment.”
No thanks; seeing fighter jets fly by is enough.
“Please you’re welcome to try the bullet one as an experiment. If you live through it you can call me a liar.”
No, what you would do is have a brick barrier in between a higher target and the bullet. Than someone shoots the bullet to hit the target above you. That way you can see the bullet hit the target and hear the sound. Then you can come back and answer to a cavemen hell bent on killing.
Jan 23, 2009 - 3:37 pm 238. Oscar the Grump:Knights11
OK
feet per mile approx. 5700
times number of miles 670
times inches per meter 12
45828000 inches per 670 miles
divided by
inches per meter 39
divided by minutes
per hour 60
divided by
seconds per meter 60
answer approx. 326.41 meters per second
I think that is close enough.
You totally and intentionally miss the point I make. To you the world is still flat because that’s what you see.
You’re conclusion is interesting, myopic, but interesting. Explain to me why the second explosion is bigger than the first. Try this also, go on to pajama media to “Why we must kill our neighbor” and find the blog by Israeli. It has the bomb hits at the tunnels. Explain to me what those second explosions (which are greater) are.
By the way thank you for calling me a caveman. I’ll accept it along with the other names you folks call me: monkey, son of a monkey, pig,
nazi, racist, baby killer—–and I’m sure you can come up with more.
From my perspective you rate no number after Knights. Maybe you should call yourself Daze.
Jan 23, 2009 - 5:21 pm