# West should be more "tolerant" of holocaust deniers...



## 48Highlander (18 Dec 2005)

It seems the Iranian administration is pretty determined to piss off the US.   In support of their president stating that the holocaust never happened, and that Israel should be wiped off the face of the earth, Iran's foreign ministry recenty stated that "the west" should "learn to listen to different views":



			
				http://today.reuters.com/News/newsArticle.aspx?type=topNews&storyID=2005-12-18T102039Z_01_FLE836834_RTRUKOC_0_US-IRAN-ISRAEL.xml said:
			
		

> TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's denial of the Holocaust is a matter for academic discussion and the West should be more tolerant of his views, Iran's foreign ministry spokesman said on Sunday.
> 
> Ahmadinejad last week called the Holocaust a myth and suggested Israel be moved to Germany or Alaska, remarks that sparked international uproar and threaten diplomatic talks with Europe over Iran's nuclear programme.
> 
> ...


----------



## Slim (18 Dec 2005)

*NEXT...!!*
Mark my words!


----------



## Jungle (18 Dec 2005)

Maybe Iran should be more tolerant of the West... more specifically the US.


----------



## DFW2T (18 Dec 2005)

Slim said:
			
		

> *NEXT...!!*
> Mark my words!


You said it brother!   Looks like I may have work for a little while!

DFW2T


----------



## Pencil Tech (18 Dec 2005)

Slim said:
			
		

> *NEXT...!!*
> Mark my words!



Yeah, well it should have been more like "FIRST!!", but I guess Iraq was a bigger threat.  :


----------



## Cloud Cover (18 Dec 2005)

The thought of that is downright sobering. There are hundreds of thousands of supporters of Iran in this country because of its open hostility to Christianity and the Jewish religion - and the West in general, and probably millions more who indirectly support them. If the US goes after Iran, we will see American and Canadian blood spilled in North American cities as well, IMO. 

Any Western incursion into Iran would likely involve a massive effort to prepare for domestic terrorism as a necessary first step which would likely be domestically opposed on a number of fronts- political, judicial and social. Any efforts taken to deal with the enemy at home will necessarily involve a suppresion of fundamental freedoms across a broad spectrum which would affect all of us. 

I prefer the slow route- breathe life into the opposition in Iran and let them kill each other rather than try and kill us.


----------



## DG-41 (18 Dec 2005)

The key way to prepare to defeat any enemy - or any potential enemy - is to put yourself in their shoes and try and understand their point of view.

The vast majority of people are not crazy, and at the core of any action or statement, there is a rational explination that makes the action taken or statement uttered understandable. And one you understand the adversaries' motives, then you can start figuring out how to defeat him.

This becomes very difficult for any Westerner to do when we start talking about Isreal, because all our perceptions are filtered through the lens of WW2 and the Holocost. Anything anti-Isreal is automatically anti-Semitic, and that in turn tars whoever is uttering the anti-Isreali statements with the Nazi brush. And as soon as you are seen as being in league with or sympathetic to the Nazis or the Nazi cause, you are automatically evil and irrational, just like the Nazis were.

But see things through Arab eyes for a moment. The land that currently constitutes Isreal used to belong to Arabs. Jerusalem contains a (some?) Muslim holy sites. Then all of a sudden, foreigners and infidels took this land away, and used it to create a homeland for this third group of people, and justified this land grab by pointing out just how badly this third group was mistreated at the hands of of non-Arabs.

His point here is "Why should Arabs (the Palestinians) lose their land and freedom because Germans slaughtered Jews?" He asks "Why wasn't Isreal carved out of German territory after WW2, instead of out of Arab territory?" And you know something? I think those are excellent and entirely valid questions.

Yes, it is all couched in inflammatory rhetoric. That may be flowerly language that translates poorly to English, or it may actually reflect the man's true beliefs; I don't know.

But the core complaint in the Middle East steams from the Western decision to create the state of Isreal in Palestine without adequate consultation with the actual Palestineans, and then the subsequent mistreatment of the Palestineans at the hands of the Isrealis. This is a problem that the West made for itself; first by executing the Holocost (the Nazis were Westerners) and then by imposing the state of Isreal on the Arabs in (what I believe) was a legitimate good-faith attempt by the West to atone for the Holocost.

I am simplifying a very complex situation into a couple of paragraphs; there is MUCH more to the situation than all this, and it is entirely possible that the President of Iran really is an anti-Semitic racist - certainly (and sadly) the word does not lack them. But we in the West need to understand the nature of the Arab complaint against Isreal, and realize that it isn't just good old fashioned Nazi-esque anti-Semitism rearing its head again; that there really IS a legit complaint in there at its core, and that we have some degree of responsibility for that complaint existing.

DG


----------



## Michael Dorosh (18 Dec 2005)

DG ans whiskey have the most intelligent responses so far in this thread - well stated.


----------



## DFW2T (18 Dec 2005)

Michael Dorosh said:
			
		

> DG ans whiskey have the most intelligent responses so far in this thread - well stated.


I think you mean  DG UND VISKEY...............


----------



## GO!!! (18 Dec 2005)

Many good points brought up here.

Interestingly, Israel so strongly identifies with the US and their fight with "global terrorism", despite the fact that their own nation was founded partly as a result of the murderous activities of the Irgun Tsvai Leumi, a zionist terrorist ogranisation comitted to forcing the british out of palestine.

If anything, modern terrorism in the post WW2 context was defined by the Irgun in 1931 to 1948, as they orchestrated bombings and assassinations of british officials and their families. The Israelis themselves demonstrated that terrorism is an effective means of furthering a political agenda, and their support of US activities in Iraq seems to me, to ring a bit hollow. 

The Irgun was every bit as bloodthirsty and ruthless as the religious zealots that attack coalition forces. The President of Iran brings up an interesting point when he questions the difference between Iran and Israel in respect to the possession of nuclear weapons. Both nations are controlled by a religiously homogenous elite, both nations have official ties to a fundamentalist version of religion, and both have strong ties to terror activities. Yet one is given nuclear weapons, while the other is threatened with war for even the possibility of trying to acquire them.

A wee bit of a double standard - no?


----------



## Jungle (18 Dec 2005)

GO!!! said:
			
		

> A wee bit of a double standard - no?


Israel is a democracy... Iran is not. Israel is not threatening it's neighbours, Iran is.


----------



## GO!!! (18 Dec 2005)

Jungle said:
			
		

> Israel is a democracy... Iran is not. Israel is not threatening it's neighbours, Iran is.



Israel has ATTACKED it's neighbours on a regular basis for the last thirty years! It also denies citizenship to Arabs that live there, and the right to vote. It is also the only democracy to deny citizenship to the children born there, if they are of the "incorrect" ethnicity.

Quite the democracy!

Israel is a nuclear power controlled by religious zealots, just like Iran, it has attacked it's neigbours, just like Iran, and has a government that ignores the wishes of the majority who reside there, just like Iran.


----------



## 48Highlander (18 Dec 2005)

GO!!! said:
			
		

> Israel has ATTACKED it's neighbours on a regular basis for the last thirty years! It also denies citizenship to Arabs that live there, and the right to vote.



Excuse me?  Israel has Arab citizens working within it's government!  Almost 20% of the Israeli population is Arab, and they enjoy a higher standard of living per-capita than Arabs anywhere else in the middle-east.

In fact, when Israel was initialy formed they invited Arabs to become citizens of the state of Israel.  The Arabs in what is today called Palestine were not forced out of their homes by "zionist aggression", they left because the Arab states told them to get out of the way while they exterminated Israel.  The vast majority left on their own, expecting to return as soon as the Jewish Problem had been eliminated.

As for the idea that Israel is a terrorist state or that they've been atacking neighbouring states for years...well, let's not go there.  Let's just say that anyone who's read about the history of the region from an impartial perspective would be hard pressed to paint the Israelis as the bad guys.


----------



## Infanteer (18 Dec 2005)

LLLLLLLEEEEEETTTTTSSSSS GET READY TO RUMBLE!!!!!!

Geez, we haven't beat this horse for a while - everyone bored over the holiday season?


----------



## 48Highlander (18 Dec 2005)

Infanteer said:
			
		

> LLLLLLLEEEEEETTTTTSSSSS GET READY TO RUMBLE!!!!!!
> 
> Geez, we haven't beat this horse for a while - everyone bored over the holiday season?



Let me get some egg-nog into me first


----------



## Jungle (18 Dec 2005)

GO!!! said:
			
		

> Israel has ATTACKED it's neighbours on a regular basis for the last thirty years!


Israel has been on the defensive since 1948... as for the rest, 48Highlander is correct.


----------



## Shec (18 Dec 2005)

Just to correct some of GO!!!'s factual inaccuracies about Israeli democracy:

1.     9 Arabs and 2 Druze are freely elected Members of the Knesset, ie.   Members of Parliament.
2.     One of them is a Cabinet Minister, and he was not kicked out of office for publicly refusing to sing the National Anthem.
3.     Re:   religious zealots controlling nuclear policy (ie, the bomb).   The fact that the extreme ultra-right wing religious Kach party was outlawed hardly reinforces your assertion.     

Next...?


----------



## Infanteer (18 Dec 2005)

An interesting thing to explore would be the difference of the source of conflict pre and post 1972.   Before 1972, Israel was on a defensive against Egypt, Syria and Jordan and a PLO that was largely a puppet of these states; conventional states threatened to "push the Jews into the Sea".

Post 1972, the PLO becomes its own entity, militant islamist thought overtakes left-wing nationalist ideology in the Middle East leading to groups like Hamas and Islamic Jihad.   Moderate Palestinians have the impetus to rise to arms in the Intifada.

The conflict has indeed morphed from "3rd Generation" to "4th Generation".   Preemptive attacks and/or counterattacks by the IDF against other states has been replaced by generally on-going insurgency conducted by a smattering of insurgent organizations and/or terrorist groups.   The occupied territories, which have been referred to as physical highground, seem irrelevant in an age where the IDF is the dominant military force in the region - rather, the shift is to the moral level; Lebanon, the Occupied Territories, and the Intifada certainly complicate the argument of an Israel holding this moral highground.

Add religious nuts on both side to the mix, and you got a nice mess.   Islamic states and a Jewish state fighting for control of a pile of sand - this one is as tribal as it gets.

(Here is an interesting program)


----------



## Shec (18 Dec 2005)

Thanks for the link to the PBS program Infanteer but don't get sucked in by the media hyperbole. The Kahanists are the supporters of the same outlawed Kach party I referenced above.  They constituted the majority of the settlers who were removed from Gaza and are the same lunatics who assassinated Rabin.   As both immigrants and religious zealots they do not have the support of the secular body-politic who, to put it simply,  resent a bunch of cranks just off the plane and who have never served in the IDF or paid taxes telling them how to live.     And despite their high birth-rates and moral self-righteousness their chances of dominating Israeli life diminishes with each new BMW that cruises down Dizengoff Street.


----------



## Cloud Cover (18 Dec 2005)

whiskey601 said:
			
		

> The thought of that is downright sobering. There are hundreds of thousands of supporters of Iran in this country because of its open hostility to Christianity and the Jewish religion - and the West in general, and probably millions more who indirectly support them. If the US goes after Iran, we will see American and Canadian blood spilled in North American cities as well, IMO.



Ahem. Just clarify, I was referring to Iran as being hostile to Christianity and the Jewish religion- and not Canada. To my knowledge it is still okay to be Christian or Jewish in Canada, althoug apparently some beg to differ. Thanks for all the kindly worded PM's.   >

Cheers.


----------



## sheikyerbouti (18 Dec 2005)

I would just like to step in here for a second and point out that although there may be some concessions towards the Arab population with respect to standard of living, they are still treated as second class citizens in many respects.

 Try hitching a ride, employment is curtailed and many arabs are underpaid for the worst jobs they have to perform. The actions of Kibbutzim are of note as they are among the most repressive when it comes to their treatment of Arabs, many of whom provide the cheap labour necessary to conduct their businesses and continue with their economic vision.

 Although I have not as yet had the privilege to visit Israel, many of my Jewish friends have gone over to serve or to live on a kibbutz and depending on where you are (urban vs rural), the experiences of the Arab population can be quite dramatic. One of my closest friends was employed as an agricultural pesticide applicator and according to him safety goggles and masks were not provided to the Arab workers who had to work in the clouds of toxic pesticides that followed the tractor along the tree lines. On the same kibbutz, housing was not provided to the Arab workers, many of whom had been lifelong employees, instead they were required to live outside of the confines of the kibbutz as they were deemed undesirable even though guest workers of no religious affiliation were welcomed without question. Arab workers were also required to feed and water themselves even though the other (non-Arab) workers were provided with 3 square a day. In the rural areas there is still, undoubtedly, great hostility towards the Arab. 

 Israel has problems like everywhere else, they are just compounded by a siege mentality which is counter-productive to achieving peace in their neck of the woods. Once the Knesset gets a better handle on its financial stability we will see many changes for the better as there will be better recognition paid to all economic contributors regardless of ethnicity. In fact peace would be a great boon to their fiscal bottom line as the full productivity of the large Arab labour pool could be effectively tapped. As Bob Marley put it so well... "A hungry man is an angry man".

BTW , just read Shec's post and he represents the transition well. As prosperity increases there is greater potential for effective, sustainable and democratic change.


----------



## Cloud Cover (18 Dec 2005)

sheikyerbouti said:
			
		

> Israel has problems like everywhere else, they are just compounded by a siege mentality which is counter-productive to achieving peace in their neck of the woods.



Those are good points, and I am in no position to doubt the veracity of the claims made,  but on the issue of "siege mentality" - it seems implicit that Israeli desire for security is very well founded and is in fact not an artificial construct. Perhaps until very recently - the siege was and remains a reality.

Cheers


----------



## 48Highlander (18 Dec 2005)

sheikyerbouti said:
			
		

> I would just like to step in here for a second and point out that although there may be some concessions towards the Arab population with respect to standard of living, they are still treated as second class citizens in many respects.
> 
> Try hitching a ride, employment is curtailed and many arabs are underpaid for the worst jobs they have to perform. The actions of Kibbutzim are of note as they are among the most repressive when it comes to their treatment of Arabs, many of whom provide the cheap labour necessary to conduct their businesses and continue with their economic vision.
> 
> Although I have not as yet had the privilege to visit Israel, many of my Jewish friends have gone over to serve or to live on a kibbutz and depending on where you are (urban vs rural), the experiences of the Arab population can be quite dramatic. One of my closest friends was employed as an agricultural pesticide applicator and according to him safety goggles and masks were not provided to the Arab workers who had to work in the clouds of toxic pesticides that followed the tractor along the tree lines. On the same kibbutz, housing was not provided to the Arab workers, many of whom had been lifelong employees, instead they were required to live outside of the confines of the kibbutz as they were deemed undesirable even though guest workers of no religious affiliation were welcomed without question. Arab workers were also required to feed and water themselves even though the other (non-Arab) workers were provided with 3 square a day. In the rural areas there is still, undoubtedly, great hostility towards the Arab.



I can't vouch for the accuracy of your claims, however, I'm going to point out the point at which the relevancy of such arguments falls apart.  There is a HUGE difference between a "second class citizen" status which is the result of individual mindsets, and the systematic type of discrimination which exists in many third-world nations.  Picture Jews attempting to live in any Arab state, and try to tell me that they would not be subject to systemic discrimination at all levels.

An argument similar to yours can be made about mexicans living in the US as well as, say, chinese immigrants in Canada.  Certainly both of our great nations have sweat shops and underground prostitution rings.  In many cases, immigrants spend thousands of dollars to get into the country, only to be subject to poor living conditions and forced labour.  However, Canada, the US, and even Israel, provide the same legal and civil rights to all of their citizens regaurdless of race or religion.



			
				sheikyerbouti said:
			
		

> Israel has problems like everywhere else, they are just compounded by a siege mentality which is counter-productive to achieving peace in their neck of the woods. Once the Knesset gets a better handle on its financial stability we will see many changes for the better as there will be better recognition paid to all economic contributors regardless of ethnicity. In fact peace would be a great boon to their fiscal bottom line as the full productivity of the large Arab labour pool could be effectively tapped. As Bob Marley put it so well... "A hungry man is an angry man".



Peace has little to do with the way they treat their citizens.  Israeli Arabs might not all feel they are being treated fairly, however, the vast majority of them are quite aware that they're far better off living in Israel than in any neighbouring state.

As far as the seige mentality and the desire for peace go, Israel has repeatedly demonstrated their desire for peace in the way they have dealt with other nations.  At Camp David in 1978, Israel agreed to return a land area about twice the size of present-day Israel to Egypt in return for peace.  Similar deals were made in the past with Syria and Jordan.  The only current problem is the question of Palestine.  Israel has managed to make peace with every neighouring nation EXCEPT Palestine, and that's largely due to the fact that Palestine does not attack through traditional military means, and doesn't have a government capable of controling the terrorist networks which continue to wage war on Israel.  If Palestine weren't in such a wretched state, they would have doubtless reached an agreement with Israel decades ago.  The current problem isn't the mindset of Israelis, it's the inability of the Palestinian Authority to control matters within it's own borders.


----------



## Infanteer (18 Dec 2005)

Shec said:
			
		

> Thanks for the link to the PBS program Infanteer but don't get sucked in by the media hyperbole. The Kahanists are the supporters of the same outlawed Kach party I referenced above.



Yes, but all the social forces in the region need to be considered to get a better picture of what is going on.   Sure, notions like Israel's democratic government and the hope for the Palestinian Authority to move along now that Arafat is gone, but this doesn't change the fact that groups like Palestinian Islamic Jihad and the Kahanists have an impact on what goes on in the region.



			
				Piper said:
			
		

> Can we get some examples of when Israel attacked a neighbour without being threatened or provoked please?



Suez?  The US and the USSR obviously felt that their collusion with France and Britain was a clear-cut case.

Try reading about Beirut.   The siege certainly doesn't strike me as a benign defensive measure.



			
				sheikyerbouti said:
			
		

> I would just like to step in here for a second and point out that although there may be some concessions towards the Arab population with respect to standard of living, they are still treated as second class citizens in many respects.



As for the Occupied Territories, my reading of Friedman (a political analysis of the conflict) and Hammes (a military analysis of the conflict), among others, leads me to conclude that there is a degree of culpability in the hands of Israel for todays mess.   Friedman's look at the Shin-Bet's activities at the time seems indicative of this.

Anyways, how did we get to this?   I thought we were flinging mud at that Iranian idiot for denying the Holocaust happened?


----------



## sheikyerbouti (18 Dec 2005)

First off, I was not making a representation of the ostensibly legal situation which is designed to promote and preserve fundamental rights. What I was speaking about was the reality that the Israeli population has made a cultural distinction with regards to their fellow citizens.


 My argument is fine provided you realize that the Israeli situation is unique in that it has evolved as the result of some very complicated developments that have compounded themselves over time. You (48th) cannot equivocate the situation of Arab-Israeli's with that of immigrants in North America many of whom have no birth right or legal entitlement to their position. I am not saying that we are above many of these issues, just that we have developed legal mechanisms which dictate our treatment of said illegals. In Israel's case there are concerns over the timely and equal application of justice be it social, human, or economic. 

 I never mentioned the Palestinian issue as it is separate from the treatment of ostensibly Israeli citizens' hence my assertion that there is truly a second class of citizen which has been created. These people are given certain rights which are ignored or abrogated in the face of a legal environment which presumably prevents such conduct. I was careful to make said distinction as the treatment of Arabs is generally better in Urban environs when compared with that of rural areas


 With specific respect to the Palestinian question, it is irresponsible to assert that the Israeli position is legally grounded. The have been numerous abrogations of duly negotiated agreements by both sides. The Palestinians, in my personal opinion, are justified in their pursuit of sovereignty by any and all means necessary. This doesn't mean that Israel is not entitled to retaliate but rather that both sides in the dispute are justified according to their current ideologies to pursue a largely militant tangent which is counter-productive towards achieving peace.

 True reconciliation will only be achieved through mutual recognition of both sides' legitimate and illegitimate arguments for their cause.

On a side note I suggest that you informally approach any and all Jewish or Israeli brethren you may be fortunate to know and ask them if Israel is under attack. You may be surprised to find how deeply ingrained the siege mentality truly is. This is an inevitable conclusion reached by many who have had their history tempered by such ideas as the Diaspora,Sykes-Picot, the holocaust, or even subsequent battles since the war for independence. This mentality is only further strengthened by the 3 intifadeh and a barrage of political intervention in Israeli determinations. An excellent recent example would be the fracas generated by the Syrians vis a vis the Red Cross' adoption of a new symbol which is sensitive to Jewish belief.

Good discussion, let's keep it going and let reason prevail. In the interests of healthy debate, I hope this thread is not locked.


----------



## 48Highlander (19 Dec 2005)

Agreed, good points, and I'm glad to see you make the distinction between government policy and social influence.  I don't doubt that there is a level of discrimination against Arab citizens - the Israelis would have to be almost inhuman for there not to be.  After 9/11, voilence against muslims, arabs, and even hindus in north america increased almost overnight.  Ignorance truly knows no bounds, and those members of our society who are xenophobic by nature don't need much of an excuse to mistreat others.  I can only imagine what would happen if we were subject to a decade of almost daily attacks.  I can't justify such behaviour, but I can entirely condemn it either.  I suppose the same could be said of the Palestinian situation, except that the actions of the Palestinians are even more self-destructive.

Also, I won't argue that a seige-mentality didn't exist in Israel, but rather, that it isn't limited to the standard dig-in-and-fight mindset.  Considering their treatment over the last century, you certainly can't blame them for thinking they're under attack by most of the world; especialy considering that the highly vaunted UN has passed more resolutions against Israel than the total resolutions against ALL other nations, and that even supposedly democratic and civilized nations such as Canada regularily vote for such resolutions.  They are however actively seeking solutions, whether they be military, political, economic, or whatever.  It seems that after a few decades of "seige-mentality" they learned to try new methods to defend themselves.


----------



## GO!!! (19 Dec 2005)

Piper said:
			
		

> Can we get some examples of when Israel attacked a neighbour without being threatened or provoked please? I'm really quite interested in where you think Israel attacked people on a 'regular basis'.



So we are able to invade sovereign nations for the purpose of killing their political leaders on the basis of being 'threatened or provoked'?

Since the six day war in 1967, Israel has launched pre-emptive strikes against such major targets as the Osirak reactor in 1981, right up to the assassinations of various religious and political leaders as recently as yesterday, usually with missiles, and massive associated collateral damage.

I suppose the attacks on camps like Jenin and Ramallah are justified as long as Israel is sufficiently threatened as well.

The fact of the matter is that the only way nations today can guarantee the inviolability of their borders is with a nuclear deterrent, and a will to use it. Iran and Syria will no longer be candidates for intimidation if they have the ability to incinerate Tel Aviv at the first sign of the violation of their borders.

Additionally, the President of Iran brings up a good point when he suggests that Israel be moved to Canada, the US or Europe. If the rest of the world was so keen to have a Zionist homeland, why did they not give it to them out of their own land, instead of carving it from existing nations?


----------



## Michael Dorosh (19 Dec 2005)

GO!!! said:
			
		

> Additionally, the President of Iran brings up a good point when he suggests that Israel be moved to Canada, the US or Europe. If the rest of the world was so keen to have a Zionist homeland, why did they not give it to them out of their own land, instead of carving it from existing nations?



Jews have more of a historical claim to ground in Jerusalem than on Madagascar (which is where Hitler and co. briefly considered exiling the European Jews) or Baffin Island, I should think.


----------



## zipperhead_cop (19 Dec 2005)

Gee, relocate Israel.  How would you pitch that?  Hey guys, I know you have a nice Mediteranean beach side spot here, and you have fought day in and day out to retain what is arguably yours, but we have this GREAT available spot just a day north of Medicine Hat all for YOU!  What a prize!  And even if they were dumb enough to go (and they don't seem too dumb) as soon as they got there you can bet New Tel Aviv was built on a native burial ground and there would be a land claim.  Next thing you know, the Oka gang is shooting at them, and we have a war.  Of course, the Indian Act requires us to pay for and coddle our precious indiginous persons, so heres the Canadian military fighting against the Israelis.  Whose armoured corp do you think would prevail?
If you put aside who is right and wrong, think about who you would rather support.  Israel is far closer to a Western country than Palistine, and they are not trying to purge all elements of our society from the planet.  Remember the aim of Islam;  to work endlessly until the world is a perfect Islamic state.  Anybody other than me have a problem with that?  The Israelis are not going anywhere, so the world has to accept that.  
Whoever made the point about Palistine having to get their $h_t together before they can hope to go forward was bang on (sorry for the credit drop).  Unfortunately, all politics is the same in that if there is something that gets people worked up, if you flog it, people with clamour to you and you will get support.  Anyone in Palestine that wants to be in power pretty much has to be an Israel hater, regardless of how much that holds their country back.  Until Palistine sucks back a whole bunch of "this is how it is, get over it" they can look forward to continued bull dozer drive through windows and sidewinder missle/mercedes tag games.


----------



## Michael Dorosh (19 Dec 2005)

zipperhead_cop said:
			
		

> Israel is far closer to a Western country than Palistine, and they are not trying to purge all elements of our society from the planet.



You post this as if "western countries" have more of a "right" to exist than others.  Gee, why do the Islamics feel threatened?


----------



## zipperhead_cop (19 Dec 2005)

"We" dont seem to have a problem with "them".  "We" are all about appologizing for the British Empire, and being politically correct, and "they" seem to need to tear down everything that is not Islamic.  I could really care less how Islamic states conduct themselves.  And if the people there don't like it, do something about it.  
If Islamics are somehow threatened by us mearly existing, what are we supposed to do about that?  Remember when Communism was just trying to "exist"?  We were all pretty ramped up about that and ready to go kill Ivan the red commie dog.  We have never done anything to these people, other that just exist.  And please dont trot out the Crusades.  If it happened a thousand years ago, its time to get over it.


----------



## sheikyerbouti (19 Dec 2005)

Let's get one thing straight. 

 The palestinians are not threatening anyone other than Israel. They may have conducted some extra-territorial actions but they were by and large, targeted at Israeli's.

 A clear and concise distincton must be made between radical Islamists and their muslim brethren. If every muslim is our perceived enemy then we have a very large problem on our hands.

 On a side note, the Palestinian question might have been solved a long time ago if it wasn't for fervent nationalists on both sides who have contorted the issue to keep themselves in power. Anyone who is seemingly proactive either gets assassinated or alienated by their power base thus rendering them impotent to effect change.


----------



## GO!!! (19 Dec 2005)

What we need to get clear is the idea that Israel is anything but a present day white settler regime.

"We" (as in the western world we) installed the Zionists in Israel for a variety of reasons. They are surrounded on all sides by the locals, who were displaced. 

If the western world was really finished apologising for the British empire and the holocaust, we would allow the Israelis and Arabs to duke it out once and for all, without western support for either side. There will never be peace in the Middle east without a clear victor, which will result in the death or displacement of one group. 

Israel has become too much of a liability for the western world. We need to make peace with the Arab world more than we need Israel as an ally, and this peace with a billion of the world's inhabitants will not be possible while the west is propping up a settler regime in Israel.


----------



## Brad Sallows (19 Dec 2005)

>Israel has ATTACKED it's neighbours on a regular basis for the last thirty years!

How often is "regular basis"?  Daily? Monthly? Yearly?  Once a decade?


----------



## enfield (19 Dec 2005)

GO!!! said:
			
		

> allow the Israelis and Arabs to duke it out once and for all, without western support for either side. There will never be peace in the Middle east without a clear victor, which will result in the death or displacement of one group.



If we did that, Israel would have owned Egypt, Syria, and Jordan in 1956. It was outside intervention that saved those countries in every war - it was US, Russian, and UN pressure that kept Israel from occupying Cairo and Damascus. 
Only recently has Israel been a large recipient of foreign military aid. For 1948-1972, the Arab states received far more weapons, equipment, and advisors (from the USSR) than Israel. There was a massive US donation of weaponry in the Yom Kippur War, but I believe it came after the tide had turned. 

For better or worse, Israel's position has demanded an aggressive stance and a first-strike defence policy. Israel is so small that the first war it loses, it will cease to exist, so it can't afford to risk anything and can hardly afford to allow it's enemies to choose the time and place of war. This doesn't excuse or justify everything Israel has done, but I think it explains it. The 1956 War had very dubious justification, and the Lebanon War was quite dubious as well; the 1967 War was entirely justified as a pre-emptive measure.  

I say the problem is 50-50, both sides (Arabs and Israelis) have made both antagonistic and peaceful moves. In a meaningful way, the problem of Arabs states vs. state of Israel is solved - no Arab state would dare attack Israel, despite the rhetoric. I think the Israeli issue is kept alive by Arab leaders as an issue to inflame and unite their people, and as a unifying force in the region. 

Regarding the Palestinians: Israel *cannot* absorb the Palestinians. That would mean the end of Israel, period. Palestinians do (or will) outnumber Jews, and would swamp the Jewish state. Whether morally right or wrong, Israel can never accept the Palestinians. 
The Palestinian issue has largely been artificially created by the Arab states: Arab states refuse to grant citizenship to Palestinian refugees, refuse to absorb them into their states, and purposeful keep them in massive refugee camps that ensure they continue to be a festering problem. The Palestinians are the only refugee group from the 1940s that has not been resettled and absorbed - everyone else managed to find a home. The Palestinians are certainly victims, despite the misguided and disgusting way in which they fight for their freedom. They are victims of international relations and of Arab political policies as much as Jewish policies. 

In the end, I support Israel (despite its flaws) because it is the only democracy in the Middle East. It is the only place in the Middle East where an elected Arab sits in a real legislative body. It is the only state in the region with a meaningful Supreme Court and Constitution.


----------



## Shec (19 Dec 2005)

GO!!! said:
			
		

> , we would allow the Israelis and Arabs to duke it out once and for all, without western support for either side. There will never be peace in the Middle east without a clear victor, which will result in the death or displacement of one group.



What a brilliant and incisive piece of strategic thought -   the final solution to the Middle East problem.   I commend you on your grasp of the situation.

Infanteer was bang-on when he wrote above "this one is as tribal as it gets."    The essential historical fact is that this has been going on since Cain slew Abel which in turn means it isn't going to stop any time soon.     So the challenge is one of containment rather than escalating tbe conflict.    The ME is the cradle of civilization and letting powers armed with NBCW go at no holds barred means the ME   will be the tomb of civilization.      So a viable alternative is one of diplomatic brokering and possibly classic peacekeeping which I would like to think   is a value that a veteran of the world's pre-eminent peacekeeping army would subscribe to.

In that vein, pursue the 2 state solution and if need be send in a buffer force.   UNEF worked for 10 years until Nasser kicked them out.    UNDOF has been keeping the Israelis and Syrians apart for over a generation now.   Not a perfect solution but I think one that is preferable to a mass bloodbath, regardless of where one's sympathies lie.


----------



## enfield (19 Dec 2005)

sheikyerbouti said:
			
		

> Let's get one thing straight.
> 
> The palestinians are not threatening anyone other than Israel. They may have conducted some extra-territorial actions but they were by and large, targeted at Israeli's.



The following is hardly exhaustive (I just got tired of copying and pasting from http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ho/pubs/fs/5902.htm) but I think Palestinian terrorism has gone international a few times... 

Attack on the Munich Airport, February 10, 1970: Three terrorists attacked El Al passengers in a bus at the Munich Airport with guns and grenades. One passenger was killed and 11 were injured. All three terrorists were captured by airport police. The Action Organization for the Liberation of Palestine and the Popular Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine claimed responsibility for the attack.

Munich Olympic Massacre, September 5, 1972: Eight Palestinian "Black September" terrorists seized eleven Israeli athletes in the Olympic Village in Munich, West Germany. In a bungled rescue attempt by West German authorities, nine of the hostages and five terrorists were killed

Attack and Hijacking at the Rome Airport, December 17, 1973: Five terrorists pulled weapons from their luggage in the terminal lounge at the Rome airport, killing two persons. They then attacked a Pan American 707 bound for Beirut and Tehran, destroying it with incendiary grenades and killing 29 persons, including 4 senior Moroccan officials and 14 American employees of ARAMCO. They then herded 5 Italian hostages into a Lufthansa airliner and killed an Italian customs agent as he tried to escape, after which they forced the pilot to fly to Beirut. After Lebanese authorities refused to let the plane land, it landed in Athens, where the terrorists demanded the release of 2 Arab terrorists. In order to make Greek authorities comply with their demands, the terrorists killed a hostage and threw his body onto the tarmac. The plane then flew to Damascus, where it stopped for two hours to obtain fuel and food. It then flew to Kuwait, where the terrorists released their hostages in return for passage to an unknown destination. The Palestine Liberation Organization disavowed the attack, and no group claimed responsibility for it.

Entebbe Hostage Crisis, June 27, 1976: Members of the Baader-Meinhof Group and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) seized an Air France airliner and its 258 passengers. They forced the plane to land in Uganda. On July 3 Israeli commandos successfully rescued the passengers.

TWA Hijacking, June 14, 1985: A Trans-World Airlines flight was hijacked en route to Rome from Athens by two Lebanese Hizballah terrorists and forced to fly to Beirut. The eight crew members and 145 passengers were held for seventeen days, during which one American hostage, a U.S. Navy sailor, was murdered. After being flown twice to Algiers, the aircraft was returned to Beirut after Israel released 435 Lebanese and Palestinian prisoners. 

Achille Lauro Hijacking, October 7, 1985: Four Palestinian Liberation Front terrorists seized the Italian cruise liner in the eastern Mediterranean Sea, taking more than 700 hostages. One U.S. passenger was murdered before the Egyptian government offered the terrorists safe haven in return for the hostages' freedom. 

Egyptian Airliner Hijacking, November 23, 1985: An EgyptAir airplane bound from Athens to Malta and carrying several U.S. citizens was hijacked by the Abu Nidal Group.

Airport Attacks in Rome and Vienna, December 27, 1985: Four gunmen belonging to the Abu Nidal Organization attacked the El Al and Trans World Airlines ticket counters at Rome's Leonardo da Vinci Airport with grenades and automatic rifles. Thirteen persons were killed and 75 were wounded before Italian police and Israeli security guards killed three of the gunmen and captured the fourth. Three more Abu Nidal gunmen attacked the El Al ticket counter at Vienna's Schwechat Airport, killing three persons and wounding 30. Austrian police killed one of the gunmen and captured the others.

Aircraft Bombing in Greece, March 30, 1986: A Palestinian splinter group detonated a bomb as TWA Flight 840 approached Athens airport, killing four U.S. citizens. 

Kidnapping of William Higgins, February 17, 1988: U.S. Marine Corps Lieutenant Colonel W. Higgins was kidnapped and murdered by the Iranian-backed Hizballah group while serving with the United Nations Truce Supervisory Organization (UNTSO) in southern Lebanon. 

Bombing of the Israeli Embassy in Argentina, March 17, 1992: Hizballah claimed responsibility for a blast that leveled the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires, Argentina, causing the deaths of 29 and wounding 242.


----------



## 48Highlander (19 Dec 2005)

GO!!! said:
			
		

> What we need to get clear is the idea that Israel is anything but a present day white settler regime.
> 
> "We" (as in the western world we) installed the Zionists in Israel for a variety of reasons. They are surrounded on all sides by the locals, who were displaced.
> 
> ...



Sorry GO, you're RTFO on this one.

"We" didn't just one day decide, hey, there's this great spot full of brown people, let's kick them all out and throw the Jews in there.  If you know your history, you'll realize that Jerusalem and the surrounding area have always had a significant Jewish population.  And they've fought over the area for centuries, just as Christians and Muslims have.  If there's one thing the Christians and Muslims have in common, it's that during the Crusades they all had a wonderfull time slaughtering Jews.  So the whole area has been a shit-pit for centuries.

So, along comes the second world war, with it's millions of displaced jews.  Where do we put them?

Well, you can stick them somewhere in Europe....where there's a pretty good chance they'll get slaughtered again.

I suppose China or Japan could have been considered, but we would have had to fight another war just to get them to allow it.

You can try and relocate them to North America, but shipping millions of people over the ocean isn't exactly a quick procedure.

OR, you can stick them in the middle-east.  Where they've had some sort of a claim to the land for a while, and they ALREADY have their own communities set up.


So that's what they did.  Keep in mind that at the time the whole REGION was called Palestine, and was a protectorate of the Brits.  Jordan, Israel, and Palestine didn't exist as individual entities.  When the Brits finaly got sick of Jews and Arabs killing eachother, they turned the problem over to the highly-vaunted UN.  It was the UN which decided to partition the land in order to solve the problem.
  80% of that land went to the arabs.  Actualy, more accurately, 90% went to the arabs.  80% was used to make jordan, 10% to make palestine.  You remember how "we" partitioned Yugoslavia?  UN did the same thing when they created Israel - they took the areas which had the highest Jewish population, and made them into a Jewish state.

As to the idea that it's a "white settlers regime", do you have any idea how silly such a statement is?  For one thing, a I've already pointed out, some 20% of the country is Arab.  For another thing, as I've ALSO already pointed out, the vast majority (and I mean VAST) of the land they'e captured has been returned to the states they captured it from, in return for a promise of peace.  A settler-oriented government would hardly return land, especialy when Israel is so small that on a clear day you can stand on the roof of a tall building and see three of it's borders.

I'd love to know where you're getting these ideas man.


----------



## GO!!! (19 Dec 2005)

48Highlander said:
			
		

> Sorry GO, you're RTFO on this one.
> 
> "We" didn't just one day decide, hey, there's this great spot full of brown people, let's kick them all out and throw the Jews in there.   If you know your history, you'll realize that Jerusalem and the surrounding area have always had a significant Jewish population.   And they've fought over the area for centuries, just as Christians and Muslims have.   If there's one thing the Christians and Muslims have in common, it's that during the Crusades they all had a wonderfull time slaughtering Jews.   So the whole area has been a crap-pit for centuries.


Interesting analysis since Russian Jews were far more numerous than ME Jews, and there were more Jews in eastern europe even after WW2. 



> So, along comes the second world war, with it's millions of displaced jews.   Where do we put them?
> 
> Well, you can stick them somewhere in Europe....where there's a pretty good chance they'll get slaughtered again.
> 
> ...



How did we know they would have been slaughtered in Europe? And who made the brilliant call that the Arabs would welcome them with open arms?

All we did here was pick a group of people unable to oppose us, and take a big slice of their land for the Jews to call home. I think this was the most anti-semitic move of all - here you have the west being so tolerant that they were willing to export all of the Jews somewhere else, where, coincidientally, the locals are too weak to fight them off.



> OR, you can stick them in the middle-east.  Where they've had some sort of a claim to the land for a while, and they ALREADY have their own communities set up.


Good to hear that only the Jews had a claim to Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Nazareth and Judea. 

I suppose the fact that Arabs far outnumbered the Jews in Palestine, that they also had "some sort of claim" and that three major religions hold this area as a "holy land", and that there were and are Arab communities already set up is of no importance because the UN said so.




> So that's what they did.   Keep in mind that at the time the whole REGION was called Palestine, and was a protectorate of the Brits.   Jordan, Israel, and Palestine didn't exist as individual entities.   When the Brits finaly got sick of Jews and Arabs killing eachother, they turned the problem over to the highly-vaunted UN.   It was the UN which decided to partition the land in order to solve the problem.


The brits were turned off palestine by the fact that they had a crushing war debt to the US, and that they could no longer control their colonial posessions, and by the presence of a ruthless and bloodthirsty Jewish terrorist organisation called the Irgun who bombed and killed british administrators and their families _a la_ Hizbollah until they got what they wanted. The problem was deposited in the UN's lap. 

Keep in mind that the UN was composed of the Security Council and little else in 1948, so Israel was created by the Allies (US,UK,USSR,China, France) The UN was not some amorphous identity making random assertations - it was the west.



> 80% of that land went to the arabs.   Actualy, more accurately, 90% went to the arabs.   80% was used to make jordan, 10% to make palestine.   You remember how "we" partitioned Yugoslavia?   UN did the same thing when they created Israel - they took the areas which had the highest Jewish population, and made them into a Jewish state.


The argument here is "quality vs quantity" Jordan was landlocked, and only egypt was permitted access to both the Med and Red Sea. Control of Lake Tiberius and the Jordan river was also instrumental in the control of water rights.



> As to the idea that it's a "white settlers regime", do you have any idea how silly such a statement is?   For one thing, a I've already pointed out, some 20% of the country is Arab.   For another thing, as I've ALSO already pointed out, the vast majority (and I mean VAST) of the land they'e captured has been returned to the states they captured it from, in return for a promise of peace.   A settler-oriented government would hardly return land, especialy when Israel is so small that on a clear day you can stand on the roof of a tall building and see three of it's borders.



So?

According to the 2001 census, 23% of Canadians are visible minorities, does that make us any less of a colony? The majority of Israelis who reside in Israel were born elsewhere -  49.3% in fact.(http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/is.html#top) which means that they moved there to settle. Since they did'nt create any new land, or bring it with them, it must be taken from someone else. 

And imagine that, the people that that land was take from are mad - who'd a thunk it?




> I'd love to know where you're getting these ideas man.



Surprisingly enough, my own reading. Several years ago, I was dumbfounded by the consistent level of carnage the Middle East brought to my television screen, and I resolved to study it for myself, in an objective manner, if possible. I soon found that there is no objective reporting from the Middle East, but that the facts were readily available, if only one could look past the lies and half truths perpetuated by both sides of the conflict.

My conclusion was that Israel is a white settler regime. It was created by force and is maintained by force, the previous residents of the area are treated like second class citizens, and any possibility of the ethnic composition of an area of the country being changed in favour of the previous residents is quashed, either through encouraging more settlers to move in, Torah and Uzi in hand, or by giving portions of it back, and calling it a "concession for peace". 

The same type of regime existed in South Africa for a time, but it was condemned and sanctioned by the west. Why is Israel so different?


----------



## 48Highlander (20 Dec 2005)

Alright, sure.  There's plenty of inaccuracies in what you've written, but this debate has already been gone over too many times for me to bother with it again.  In the end I have just one question for you:

When will you be emmigrating out of Canada in order to give the Indians their land back?

Untill then, most of the comments you're making about Israel are hypocritical in the extreme.


----------



## Blue Max (20 Dec 2005)

I once read in a book, ( can not remember the title now ) a claim that the early Nazi plan to deal with the Jewish people that they had in detention was to ship them to Madagascar. Obviously if this was ever a real plan it did not happen, but I still could not help thinking that subsequently Madagascar would have been turned into paradise, just like the Jews turned the desert into orchards.


----------



## GO!!! (20 Dec 2005)

Yeah of course, you guys are right.

No one should critisize Israel, after all, they are so much better than their neighbours, so they must be right.

The fact that the problems in the ME right now are largely the result of western tampering (installing large groups of immigrants armed with nuclear weapons, drawing borders where there were none, lumping ethnic groups who hated each other together, then bringing down ideologically disagreeable governments) seems to be lost on you guys.

Israel is a liability to the west that compromises the possibility of peace between the Arabs and the western world. Our blind support of such a regime is foolhardy and shortsighted. In short, we need the Arabs as allies more than we need the Israelis.

As for me being hypocritical in not "giving the indians their land back", I may not be givin it back, but I am not building walls around their communities and assassinating their leaders with Apaches and Hellfires either. Comparing the NA indian to the palestinians is RTFO.


----------



## Jungle (20 Dec 2005)

GO!!! said:
			
		

> As for me being hypocritical in not "giving the indians their land back", I may not be givin it back, but I am not building walls around their communities and assassinating their leaders with Apaches and Hellfires either.


If they started to conduct weekly suicide attacks in your community you would...


----------



## 48Highlander (20 Dec 2005)

Jungle said:
			
		

> If they started to conduct weekly suicide attacks in your community you would...



Yep.  Oka Crisis ring a bell?  We called in the army for a fairly minor conflict.

How about the FLQ crisis?  Martial law?  All over a couple mailbox bombs and an assasination.

Now try to imagine what would happen if American Indians decided to form a coalition and begin to bomb coffee-shops, bus stops, schools, etc.

We might have managed to find a way to live in peace, but it wasn't because WE did the right thing - it was because the Natives were generaly willing to make deals and take what we gave them.  They have a much more valid grievance against us than palestine does against Israel.


----------



## GO!!! (20 Dec 2005)

48Highlander said:
			
		

> Yep.   Oka Crisis ring a bell?   We called in the army for a fairly minor conflict.
> 
> How about the FLQ crisis?   Martial law?   All over a couple mailbox bombs and an assasination.
> 
> ...



The FLQ crisis has nothing to do with indians, or israel!

The internal use of the CF and the imposition of martial law also has no relation to the Israeli question.

NA indians will never resort to violence against us as long as we continue to pay them vast sums of money for wrongs committed almost 200 years ago. NA indians do not outnumber us 10 to 1, and we are not killing their leaders every time a native does something dumb. We hold the individual responsible. We do not exclude indians from living in our cities, deny their children citizenship, force them through checkpoints in order to go home or to work etc.


----------



## Clément Barbeau Vermet (20 Dec 2005)

GO!!! said:
			
		

> All we did here was pick a group of people unable to oppose us, and take a big slice of their land for the Jews to call home. I think this was the most anti-semitic move of all - here you have the west being so tolerant that they were willing to export all of the Jews somewhere else, where, coincidientally, the locals are too weak to fight them off.



All we did here is give back a very small slice of Israel to Jews because this land was THEIRS, it has been been taken away from them by the Arabs. Since these Arabs had COLONISED a BIG part of Israel (Cisjordania, Jerusalem, west of Jordan, parts of Gaza and the very west of Sinai) the ONU decided that the new Israel would be what it is today. The Arabs were not happy=war.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  For the ''poor arabo-palestinians''...when the Israelis arrived in Gaza, most of it was sand, dust and rocks. The Israelis took these lands, and as Blue Max said, have turned them up into orchards. Now, more than 6 million people (almost as much as the pop. of Qc.) live in an area which is about 40 km wide for half of its width.

To the ones that are saying that Jews comming from Europe, America and Russia stole the lands of some arabo-palestinians, the ancestors of these Jews in question were moved from their country by the Arabs. To me it makes cense to give back a country (1/5 the size of the original one) to some people that have been oppressed for more than 2000 years by the rest of the world.

And for Iran, I just do not get that these guys have not wet learned not to attack Israel. Either they are extremely stubburn or immensely stupid. Maby both...


----------



## zipperhead_cop (20 Dec 2005)

So after all the finger pointing, what then?   Do we decide that Israel are bad guys and go smooch Arab butt to attempt to make peace?   How long after Israel gets annexed do you think it would take for those Arab states to start looking northward?   To go support their poor put down brothers in Muslim Albanian areas and maybe "make things better" in Turkey and so on.   Anyone who thinks that there is not an undercurrent of Islamic expansion has not been paying attention.   And who would you rather trust?   I think we have seen more than enough examples of middle east trustworthiness in Saudi Arabia, Syria, Iran and Iraq.   They smile and clasp their hands and say "Plees, my frien, you belief me, I could not lie, on my children life, I tell de trute" and within seconds they are blading you.   Look at the long leash that Saddam Husein had and he wasnt even an Islamist in the good books until after the Americans attacked.   
And dont forget the nature of the religion itself.   It requires its followers to work endlessly to forward the Islamic causes.   There is no end game, just keep smashing on until the planet is all Islamic.   These are the people we should sell the Israelis out to?
At least the Israelis make an effort towards diplomacy.   But what are you supposed to do when EMS workers are picking up toddler body parts in a roadway whose crime was nothing more than going to school?   Sure, they go in hard and obliterate an entire building, but if you see how complicit that whole population is with the terrorism, how can they not all be to blame.   It doesnt take a rocket scientist to know that after an Israeli school bus is blown up, and you and your neighbors are all partying in the street with the picture of the newly dead a$$hat and your next door neighbor is a Hammas leader that your house may be getting a new Hellfire sky light.   Hey stupid, dont be there!!   And all of the Israeli examples of poor behavior I have been seeing lobbed out are all from 20 years ago.   
Who is going to still be with us 20 years from now?   50 years?   My money is on the Israelis, not the fairweather Arab states.


----------



## xFusilier (21 Dec 2005)

> To the ones that are saying that Jews comming from Europe, America and Russia stole the lands of some arabo-palestinians, the ancestors of these Jews in question were moved from their country by the Arabs. To me it makes cense to give back a country (1/5 the size of the original one) to some people that have been oppressed for more than 2000 years by the rest of the world.



Actually they were moved by the Romans, by your logic perhaps Israel should have been established in the Vatican.  It is generally believed that the remenants of the Jews that stayed in the Levant converted to Islam during the Arab Crusades.



> For the ''poor arabo-palestinians''...when the Israelis arrived in Gaza, most of it was sand, dust and rocks. The Israelis took these lands, and as Blue Max said, have turned them up into orchards. Now, more than 6 million people (almost as much as the pop. of Qc.) live in an area which is about 40 km wide for half of its width.



Agriculture, has alway been occuring in the Gaza Strip as well as the Occupied Territories, the only difference is the Israelis applied the principles of intensive agriculture and irrigation, the fact that they managed to develop large tracts of arable land where there was not, speaks only to Israeli application of technology not to Palestinain sloth.



> How long after Israel gets annexed do you think it would take for those Arab states to start looking northward?  To go support their poor put down brothers in Muslim Albanian areas and maybe "make things better" in Turkey and so on



Not much of a worry in Turkey, largely the history of the Turkish state has been the army ensuring that it remains a secular republic, and seeing as the Turks have the largest army in NATO....



> "Plees, my frien, you belief me, I could not lie, on my children life, I tell de trute" and within seconds they are blading you.



Wow, that was absolutely brillant, tell me now that you've managed to bring the debate to an all time low, perhaps you could purportrate offensive stereotypes about Israelis in the interest of bringing balance to the debate.

The current intifada came about for a few reasons.

1.  Neither side, Israeli or Palestinian had any intention of implementing the Oslo accords
2.  Election of a Right-wing gov't in Israel, culminated by the election of Ariel Sharon, who was basically the equivalent of the Palestinains electing Adolf Hitler, such is the revulsion the Palestinians hold for the man (see Sabra and Shatilla)
3.  Economic warfare being waged by the Netanyahu gov't through the implementation of closure on the West Bank, and the Israeli goverment warning tourist companies to stay away from the west bank
4.  Expansion of settlements in the West Bank
5.  The withdrawl of the IDF from South Lebanon which translated to a victory for Hezbollah on the Arab Street, and further increased the appeal of armed struggle in the Occupied Territories.

In the words of King Abdullah, sorting out the current situation in the Occupied Territories should be seen as a key stone in the war on terrorism, but in order for this to happen Israel is going to have to realize that it will have to make some real sacrifices in terms of territory, and it is politically unwilling to do this.  The only real solution to the problem will be to have the American gov't tie economic and military aid to Israel (of which they are the largest recipent) to progress at the peace table.



> And all of the Israeli examples of poor behavior I have been seeing lobbed out are all from 20 years ago



Look up Sabra and Shatilla, or read Robert Fisk's Pity the Nation,with specific reference to the conduct of the IDF during Operation Grapes of Wrath, specifically with reference to the shelling of refugees sheltering near a FIJIBATT posn.


----------



## xFusilier (21 Dec 2005)

You would be correct, I'm talking about modern turkey, ie post revolutionary Turkey. As for asking Emperor Constantine, meet me in Constantinople with a flashlight and a shovel, and we'll ask him together.


----------



## Infanteer (21 Dec 2005)

:boring:

I've lost track of the conversation.  Who is the root of all evil now; the Jews, the Palestinians, the Arabs or the Americans?


----------



## zipperhead_cop (21 Dec 2005)

"Wow, that was absolutely brillant, tell me now that you've managed to bring the debate to an all time low, perhaps you could purportrate offensive stereotypes about Israelis in the interest of bringing balance to the debate."

a)  I imagine that these debates can get lower if we put our minds to it. ;D
b)  I appologize if my phonetic attempt at an accent was somehow offensive to you (are you put off by all accents or just Arabic ones?).  I havent quite got my Yiddish phonetics down, but rest assured when I do I will try to offend some other members at that point.
c)  My use of the dialect style comes from my personal experience in many situations, and was just an allegory for many global flip flops that we have witnessed over the years.  If you have many personal experiences to the contrary, then how wonderful for you.  If your experience comes from newsprint and in between book hardcovers, try not to get too ramped up.  This sort of stuff does happen, and for the record I acknowledge that it is NOT ALL THE TIME.


" but in order for this to happen Israel is going to have to realize that it will have to make some real sacrifices in terms of territory, and it is politically unwilling to do this"

So we should view Israel's force evacuation of settlers this week as what?  A cleverly disguised false attempt at a solution?  Regardless of the history, the only side that makes any genuine attempt to make things better is Israel.  And just wait.  As soon as the mood on "Arab Street" starts to turn a little more reconcilliatory expect some jagoff suicide bomber to go in, kill some innocents and provoke a military reaction.  And for what?  To keep the jihad nice and hot, and keep the popular support of the people who probably dont have a whole lot of access to unbiased media.  I cant quote them, but I do recall a PLO leader in recent years stating that even if Israel up and left the area all together, they would still hunt them out and try to exterminate them, because it is their holy duty.  How are you supposed to let your guard down and hold out the proverbial "olive branch" to that?  I'd build a big friggin wall too, and say "prove that you have a good reason to be in my country".  
Everyone thus far has expressed some kind of sympathy for the situation for both the Israelis and Palestinians  over there and agrees that a lasting peaceful resolution is the only thing that matters.  How about we start lobbing some suggestions around, and maybe someone who can do something about it might make it happen?


----------



## Clément Barbeau Vermet (21 Dec 2005)

xFusilier said:
			
		

> Actually they were moved by the Romans, by your logic perhaps Israel should have been established in the Vatican.



Good idea...N0, not at all. Why re-create a country on an other continent when the original country is in Palestine?                                                                                                                                      

The Romans did not move the Jews from Palestine, they simply occupied it until they were kicked out. It is the Arabs that did it. Not all at once, put over the centuries.


----------



## Shec (21 Dec 2005)

xFusilier said:
			
		

> Actually they were moved by the Romans, by your logic perhaps Israel should have been established in the Vatican.   It is generally believed that the remenants of the Jews that stayed in the Levant converted to Islam during the Arab Crusades.



Not entirely true.     There has always been an unconverted Jewish presence in Jerusalem and in Safed.   The Moslems more or less tolerated Jewish religious freedom as long they were an unpoliticized and passive minority.     

A couple more observations.     Gaza's essential public utilities (power, telephone)   and infrastructure have been provided by Israel.   Unlike the Berlin Blockade the service has never been severed.

Finally, GO!!! - what's wrong with selective assassination of enemy leaders?   Seems like a legit military tactic to me.   You would prefer carpet bombing perhaps?


----------



## Infanteer (21 Dec 2005)

Clément Barbeau Vermet said:
			
		

> The Romans did not move the Jews from Palestine, they simply occupied it until they were kicked out.



Uhh, then can someone explain to me what the _Diaspora_ is?


----------



## Infanteer (21 Dec 2005)

Shec said:
			
		

> Finally, GO!!! - what's wrong with selective assassination of enemy leaders?   Seems like a legit military tactic to me.



+1 - and from what I understand, it has been effective in really screwing with Hamas organization.

The notion of "assassination" becomes a sticky debating point between "law enforcement" and "military" approaches to dealing with terrorists.   There were multiple occasions where the US had the ability to take out Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan prior to 9/11 but refused to do so due to legal ramifications that the Justice Department pushed in its "G-Man" mentality to taking out terrorists.   After 9/11, I think this preference has faded (thankfully) and despite the fact that the US seems to condemn Israel's "retributive" tactics, there seems to be tacit approval due to the fact that the US has used the same methods to take out Al Qa'ida figures (ie: the Predator Hellfire strike in Yemen).

There was a good editorial in the National Post a few days back by the fellow who Spielburg's new movie Munich is based upon that dealt with the notion of "retributive attacks" - I think it was taken from the reprint of George Jonas' Vengeance.


----------



## zipperhead_cop (22 Dec 2005)

We'll see if it works.  I would bet a chunk of cash that the Israelis have made a real dent in their organization and the terrorists are providing the illusion that they are interested in talking so they can regroup and reorganize.  If anything, they should press the attack and wipe them out once and for all.  Not too huggy feely, but decisive.


----------



## GO!!! (22 Dec 2005)

zipperhead_cop said:
			
		

> We'll see if it works.   I would bet a chunk of cash that the Israelis have made a real dent in their organization and the terrorists are providing the illusion that they are interested in talking so they can regroup and reorganize.   If anything, they should press the attack and wipe them out once and for all.   Not too huggy feely, but decisive.



Using a ceasefire to "regroup and reorganise" just like the Israelis did during the Yom Kippur war in 1973, when the US supplied them with over 22,000 tons of gear using their shiny new C5 Galaxies?

What a dirty trick!  :


----------



## R0B (22 Dec 2005)

48Highlander said:
			
		

> I can't vouch for the accuracy of your claims, however, I'm going to point out the point at which the relevancy of such arguments falls apart.  There is a HUGE difference between a "second class citizen" status which is the result of individual mindsets, and the systematic type of discrimination which exists in many third-world nations.  Picture Jews attempting to live in any Arab state, and try to tell me that they would not be subject to systemic discrimination at all levels.
> 
> An argument similar to yours can be made about mexicans living in the US as well as, say, chinese immigrants in Canada.  Certainly both of our great nations have sweat shops and underground prostitution rings.  In many cases, immigrants spend thousands of dollars to get into the country, only to be subject to poor living conditions and forced labour.  However, Canada, the US, and even Israel, provide the same legal and civil rights to all of their citizens regaurdless of race or religion.
> 
> Peace has little to do with the way they treat their citizens.  Israeli Arabs might not all feel they are being treated fairly, however, the vast majority of them are quite aware that they're far better off living in Israel than in any neighbouring state.



Obviously, you've never been to Israel. Israeli Arabs feel as if they're being mistreated, and they are. They might have the civil and legal rights in theory, but these rights are often disregarded in practice.  



			
				48Highlander said:
			
		

> As far as the seige mentality and the desire for peace go, Israel has repeatedly demonstrated their desire for peace in the way they have dealt with other nations.  At Camp David in 1978, Israel agreed to return a land area about twice the size of present-day Israel to Egypt in return for peace.  Similar deals were made in the past with Syria and Jordan.  The only current problem is the question of Palestine.  Israel has managed to make peace with every neighouring nation EXCEPT Palestine, and that's largely due to the fact that Palestine does not attack through traditional military means, and doesn't have a government capable of controling the terrorist networks which continue to wage war on Israel.  If Palestine weren't in such a wretched state, they would have doubtless reached an agreement with Israel decades ago.  The current problem isn't the mindset of Israelis, it's the inability of the Palestinian Authority to control matters within it's own borders.



Israel has only demonstrated its disregard for the Arab world. This land you mention it returning was land that it had recently seized by force and placed under military occupation. Israel had no intention of ever keeping it. Israel has been able to make peace with every neighboring state except Palestine because it isn't located in the middle of any other neighboring states. 



			
				48Highlander said:
			
		

> Sorry GO, you're RTFO on this one.
> 
> "We" didn't just one day decide, hey, there's this great spot full of brown people, let's kick them all out and throw the Jews in there.  If you know your history, you'll realize that Jerusalem and the surrounding area have always had a significant Jewish population.  And they've fought over the area for centuries, just as Christians and Muslims have.  If there's one thing the Christians and Muslims have in common, it's that during the Crusades they all had a wonderfull time slaughtering Jews.  So the whole area has been a crap-pit for centuries.
> 
> ...



You really have no idea what you're talking about. I'm curious as to whether you're a pathological liar, or if you've been lied to all this time, and you actually think you're recounting facts.

Jews have been immigrating to Palestine since the early 1800s. During the late ninetieth century, Zionism became popular, and many more Jews moved to the Palestine area. Theodore Herzl first requested from the Sultan that the Jews be given a state in Palestine but despite his generous offers, he was denied because the Sultan did not want to wrong the Arab Palestinian population. Herzl was later successful in convincing the British to create the British Mandate of Palestine for the Jews after the First World War. I should note, maybe, that the First World War occurred before the Second. Over 100,000 Jews entered Palestine during the 1920s, and anti-Semitic violence exploded as soon as they arrived, culminating in the Great Uprising, which began in 1936. By 1945, there were some 450,000 Jews in Israel. Most had come before the outbreak of major hostilities, and they were not "put" there by Allies. In fact, the British refused to lift restrictions on Jewish immigration to Palestine and accept the bulk of Jewish displaced persons in Europe, despite a formal request from President Truman.



			
				Blue Max said:
			
		

> I once read in a book, ( can not remember the title now ) a claim that the early Nazi plan to deal with the Jewish people that they had in detention was to ship them to Madagascar. Obviously if this was ever a real plan it did not happen, but I still could not help thinking that subsequently Madagascar would have been turned into paradise, just like the Jews turned the desert into orchards.



Zionists considered Uganda, Argentina, Madagascar and Palestine as future homes for the Judenstaat. Palestine was ultimately selected because of its historical significance, and because it already had a community of European Jews.
Madagascar would probably have been a great choice. The small native population could have easily been exiled to mainland Africa, and as an island, it would be pretty easy to defend.



			
				Clément Barbeau Vermet said:
			
		

> To the ones that are saying that Jews comming from Europe, America and Russia stole the lands of some arabo-palestinians, the ancestors of these Jews in question were moved from their country by the Arabs. To me it makes cense to give back a country (1/5 the size of the original one) to some people that have been oppressed for more than 2000 years by the rest of the world.



Why not give back 1/5 of the United States to the Amerindians?


----------



## muskrat89 (22 Dec 2005)

> I'm curious as to whether you're a pathological liar



.. and I'm curious as to whether you've read the Conduct Guidelines. Keep it civil please.


 Army.ca Staff


----------



## 48Highlander (22 Dec 2005)

Ah, yes, R0B.  I was wondering when you'd show up.  Now I get to ignore your gormless diatribes in this thread too.


----------



## zipperhead_cop (22 Dec 2005)

Why not give back 1/5 of the United States to the Amerindians?

Right.  Why dont we all go back to our counrties of origin, destroy all the cities and motorized m/v's, live in a big commune back where we all came from and eat kidney beans with every meal so we can fart the ozone layer back to its original glorious state.

EVERY identifiable group feels as though they have been mistreated.  It is a great way to get attention and advantage for themselves.  As a 10th generation Scotocaust survivor there are many injustices that I could claim but chose not to.  I am going to go WAY out on a limb, and predict that if no suicide bombings ever happened again in Israel, or even if one happended the authority in Palistine did more than make a poo-poo face and say "we dont condone that" then you would see some progress.  Everyone agrees that the Israelis did some harsh things over the last 50 years to secure their state, and they may well be sleeping in the bed that they have made.  But one thing you can bank on is that until the useless terror attacks stop, they will never let their guard down and nothing will ever pan out for the Palestinians.


----------



## Infanteer (22 Dec 2005)

GO HOME NORMANS - the illegal occupation of William needs to end....


----------



## zipperhead_cop (22 Dec 2005)

Hey, my uncles name is Norman.  I take offence. ;D


----------



## DG-41 (22 Dec 2005)

> EVERY identifiable group feels as though they have been mistreated.



And that's the problem here. All the people involved here - ALL of them - have both been victimised AND behaved very badly. In order for things to move forward, someone is going to have to give up on the cult of the victim and start taking responsibility for their own sins.

Nobody holds the moral high ground anymore.

The most effective thing would be the US applying heavy pressure to Israel. Isreal is the only place where the US has an effective lever, and it would go a long way towards making nice with the Arabs.

DG


----------



## 48Highlander (22 Dec 2005)

DG-41 said:
			
		

> The most effective thing would be the US applying heavy pressure to Israel. Isreal is the only place where the US has an effective lever, and it would go a long way towards making nice with the Arabs.



   :blotto:

So let me get this straight....The US should pressure ISRAEL....a country which has continualy made attempts at obtaining peace...and has managed to restrain itself from simply wiping the pally's off the face of the earth (the easy solution) in favour of conducting targeted assasinations?

Which will ofcourse lead to...what?  Do you honestly beleive that such a scenario would DEcrease the number of attacks being conducted by Palestine?


----------



## Infanteer (22 Dec 2005)

Can we just stick all of them in Nunavut?  They can defend Northern Sovereignty between wiping eachother out....


----------



## Cdn Blackshirt (22 Dec 2005)

This is the MOST buggered up thread I have ever read on this site.... 

The terrorist apologists who are somehow trying to justify the actions of Palestinians who in turn are acting as proxies for their Jew-hating neighbours is appalling. 

How many Jewish Schools, Synogogues and Media sources teach that a genocide of the Palestinian people should be national objective?

How many parades are held with young Jews carrying fake guns and celebrating suicide bombings?

How many Jews have recently snuck into Palestinian Camps and stabbed to death young women and their children?

There is one antagonist in this situation and the other is trying to build a wall to hide behind.  Guess which one is which!

And so for GO! and everyone else who condones the murderous and vile actions of the arabs towards the Israelis, I say shame on you.  

May you one day come face-to-face with someone who wishes to behead you based solely on your ethnic heritage or religion because your attitudes are little different than those of the murderers of Daniel Pearl.



Matthew.


----------



## R0B (22 Dec 2005)

Piper said:
			
		

> I think we have seen the practical application of that often distasteful theory...Might is Right.
> 
> Simply put, Israel is stronger then its enemies (it's managed to win its wars) and has the backing of the strongest nation on earth (for now). GO doesn't like Israel, I do, ROB doesn't, 48th does. You could aruge this until you grow grey hair. What really seems to matter is, short of wiping that part of the world off the map (like some sort of perverse Iranian fantasy), Israel is here to stay by virtue of their power (and their alliess power).



I like Israel, but I don't think we should ignore the fact that they're a belligerent national socialist state. Israel stole its land, just like we stole ours. That's not right, but to me what matters more is the fact that they're a western democracy surrounded by comparatively primitive Islamic regimes.


----------



## Infanteer (22 Dec 2005)

Cdn Blackshirt said:
			
		

> This is the MOST buggered up thread I have ever read on this site....
> 
> The terrorist apologists who are somehow trying to justify the actions of Palestinians who in turn are acting as proxies for their Jew-hating neighbours is appalling.
> 
> ...



:boring:

Yeah, now you got it - all those dirty Muslims are a bunch of terrorists working for fat-cat foreigners!  Anything else from the back of a cracker-jack box?

PS.  This conflict has been a local one for the last couple decades.



> And so for GO! and everyone else who condones the murderous and vile actions of the arabs towards the Israelis, I say shame on you.
> 
> May you one day come face-to-face with someone who wishes to behead you based solely on your ethnic heritage or religion because your attitudes are little different than those of the murderers of Daniel Pearl.
> 
> Matthew.



I'm pretty sure GO!!! has met folks like that, so can the moral tough-talk.



			
				R0B said:
			
		

> I like Israel, but I don't think we should ignore the fact that they're a belligerent national socialist state.



National socialist?   C'mon man; don't be a fool.



> Israel stole its land, just like we stole ours.



Nah, it's called conquering it - but I think we've established that that point is irrelevant now; let's acknowledge the fact that nobody is going away and move on from there.


----------



## Infanteer (22 Dec 2005)

Hey, since this thread was originally intended to bash that Iranian nut-job, here is some good, clean Saturday Morning Cartoons from Iranian State TV.  Nothing like teaching the 5 year olds to stick it to the "blood-thirsty zionists".... :-\

http://memri.org/bin/articles.cgi?Page=subjects&Area=jihad&ID=SP101805


----------



## 48Highlander (22 Dec 2005)

and some more:



			
				http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/meast/12/19/iran.music.ap/ said:
			
		

> Iran bans Western music
> Ruling takes country back to Khomeini days
> 
> TEHRAN, Iran (AP) -- Hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has banned Western music from Iran's radio and TV stations, reviving one of the harshest cultural decrees from the early days of the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
> ...



Western Music BAD!  Suicide Bombers GOOD!


----------



## Shec (22 Dec 2005)

R0B said:
			
		

> Israel has only demonstrated its disregard for the Arab world. .





The following is excerpted from of the Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel proclaimed by its first Prime Minister David Ben Gurion on May 14, 1948:



> WE APPEAL â â€ in the very midst of the onslaught launched against us now for months â â€ to the Arab inhabitants of the State of Israel to preserve peace and participate in the upbuilding of the State on the basis of full and equal citizenship and due representation in all its provisional and permanent institutions.
> 
> WE EXTEND our hand to all neighbouring states and their peoples in an offer of peace and good neighbourliness, and appeal to them to establish bonds of cooperation and mutual help with the sovereign Jewish people settled in its own land. The State of Israel is prepared to do its share in a common effort for the advancement of the entire Middle East.


(source:   http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/Dec_of_Indep.html )

Yup, sounds like callous disregard to me.


----------



## Infanteer (22 Dec 2005)

I think Samual Huntington is just shaking his head and saying "I told you so" right now....


----------



## Clément Barbeau Vermet (22 Dec 2005)

R0B said:
			
		

> Why not give back 1/5 of the United States to the Amerindians?


 
I don't think there would be enough Amerindians to occupy such a territory, but I think they should do something like that but in smaller scale. Maby they could have done it a few centuries ago.


----------



## R0B (22 Dec 2005)

Infanteer said:
			
		

> National socialist?   C'mon man; don't be a fool.



I'm not trying to imply some sort of connection to nazism, but could describe Israel more accurately than as a national socialist state?


----------



## Infanteer (22 Dec 2005)

R0B said:
			
		

> I'm not trying to imply some sort of connection to nazism, but could describe Israel more accurately than as a national socialist state?



I'd say a liberal democracy with strong theocratic elements.


----------



## zipperhead_cop (22 Dec 2005)

That cartoon link from Infanteer is pretty chilling and is a great example of why this conflict is not going to end well.
As for Highlander's post;  everyone knows that Kenny G is the root of global disharmony and is the Devils own right hand on earth.  Iran got that one right ;D


----------



## a_majoor (5 Jan 2006)

Just give it all back to the Wooley Mammoths.

I'll watch my little piece of Mammoth territory for them until they show up to reclaim it  ;D ;D ;D


----------



## Cloud Cover (5 Jan 2006)

a_majoor said:
			
		

> Just give it all back to the Wooley Mammoths.
> 
> I'll watch my little piece of Mammoth territory for them until they show up to reclaim it  ;D ;D ;D



I'll have you know that no Mammoth ever took a drink from the Thames. At least not a proper one.


----------



## a_majoor (5 Jan 2006)

Well then. its all mine! Mine, I tell you! MINE!!!!!


----------



## Glorified Ape (5 Jan 2006)

I thought I might go to Africa, dislocate a few thousand people off their land, and claim it as my rightful possession since my primate ancestors evolved there a few million years ago. Then, when I'm opposed, I'll garner some Western support, playing on their heartstrings by bringing up the persecution of my Scottish ancestors at the hands of the British. Once I'm secure in my possession, I'll import other Scot-Germanic Canadians and send them out to colonize what little land the displaced original residents have left. I'll justify all this by constantly referring to my ancestor's persecution in Scotland, beating that horse until it's atomized. I'll throw in a healthy, religiously backed, race-based superiority notion to inspire pride in the population and an eternal sense of entitlement to that which isn't theirs. 

So who's coming with me?  :threat:


----------



## 48Highlander (5 Jan 2006)

Glorified Ape said:
			
		

> I thought I might go to Africa, dislocate a few thousand people off their land, and claim it as my rightful possession since my primate ancestors evolved there a few million years ago. Then, when I'm opposed, I'll garner some Western support, playing on their heartstrings by bringing up the persecution of my Scottish ancestors at the hands of the British. Once I'm secure in my possession, I'll import other Scot-Germanic Canadians and send them out to colonize what little land the displaced original residents have left. I'll justify all this by constantly referring to my ancestor's persecution in Scotland, beating that horse until it's atomized. I'll throw in a healthy, religiously backed, race-based superiority notion to inspire pride in the population and an eternal sense of entitlement to that which isn't theirs.
> So who's coming with me?  :threat:



Doesn't work, you have to be a VISIBLE minority, opposing a WESTERN state.  Any other situation won't get any attention.  Case in point:  nobody seems to give a crap about Tibet any more; a peacefull country that got sacked and brutally oppressed by China.  I can't recall the last time I heard a leftie speak out against Chinese oppression of the Tibetans, nor can I seem to recall any UN resolutions against China in the last decade or two.  But just look at the uproar generated over the Israel vs Palestine situation.

So if you modify your plan, convert to Islaam, and decide to stake out your rightfull portion of Israel, you'll have all the backing you need.


----------



## Glorified Ape (5 Jan 2006)

48Highlander said:
			
		

> Doesn't work, you have to be a VISIBLE minority, opposing a WESTERN state.  Any other situation won't get any attention.  Case in point:  nobody seems to give a crap about Tibet any more; a peacefull country that got sacked and brutally oppressed by China.  I can't recall the last time I heard a leftie speak out against Chinese oppression of the Tibetans, nor can I seem to recall any UN resolutions against China in the last decade or two.  But just look at the uproar generated over the Israel vs Palestine situation.



Lefties are always complaining about Tibet - look at all the celebrities that have spoken up about it, all the attention given the Dalai Lama in the media, etc. 



> So if you modify your plan, convert to Islaam, and decide to stake out your rightfull portion of Israel, you'll have all the backing you need.



I dunno - it worked for Israel and they weren't really opposing a Western state, though some groups attacked the Brits when they still held Palestine. I think you're right, though, that colonialist tripe isn't as tolerated nowadays... well, with the exception of Israel. 

On the Iranian note, I'm participating in a Directed Studies class simulation of the Pacific campaign of WWII with a prof whose run a simulation of a US invasion of Iran with some Iranian expert from McGill. I haven't had a chance to pick his brain about it yet, but intend to and hopefully I can relay some of his thoughts on the whole Iranian issue. If he ever gets around to publishing the stuff, I'll see if I can't get some excerpts for here.


----------



## GO!!! (5 Jan 2006)

Glorified Ape said:
			
		

> I dunno - it worked for Israel and they weren't really opposing a Western state, though some groups attacked the Brits when they still held Palestine. I think you're right, though, that colonialist tripe isn't as tolerated nowadays... well, with the exception of Israel.



I'm glad I'm not alone in my opinion of Israel as a colonist regime - where were you over the holidays?


----------



## 48Highlander (6 Jan 2006)

Glorified Ape said:
			
		

> Lefties are always complaining about Tibet - look at all the celebrities that have spoken up about it, all the attention given the Dalai Lama in the media, etc.



We must not be watching the same media.

Here's an experiment; Google Search results:

Free Tibet:            6,760,000
Free Palestine:     16,100,000

Tibet Occupation:            786,000
Palestine Occupation:    5,340,000

and just to compare the temperments of the two countries:

Palestinian suicide bombings:    139+
Tibetan suicide bombings:            0


I rest my case.



			
				Glorified Ape said:
			
		

> I dunno - it worked for Israel and they weren't really opposing a Western state, though some groups attacked the Brits when they still held Palestine. I think you're right, though, that colonialist tripe isn't as tolerated nowadays... well, with the exception of Israel.



eh?  rephrase your last, over.


----------



## Infanteer (6 Jan 2006)

48Highlander said:
			
		

> I can't recall the last time I heard a leftie speak out against Chinese oppression of the Tibetans, nor can I seem to recall any UN resolutions against China in the last decade or two.



Just ask Britney Spears - I remember him arguing for it based on history.


----------



## 48Highlander (6 Jan 2006)

Infanteer said:
			
		

> Just ask Britney Spears - I remember him arguing for it based on history.



Awesome, I'm glad to know there's an exception to the rule.


----------



## Roger (6 Jan 2006)

Being a old guy and I do not know if anyone else has some memories of the past, but I was stationed in Germany in October 6, 1973 when Syria and Egypt invaded Israel with the support of Saudi Arabia and other Arab states and also the support of the Soviet Union (Airlift of equipment). Israel almost lost the war. The USA came to the aide of Israel (Airlift of equipment and new aircraft) Israel came back in a desperate counter attacks and started to win taking the Golan from Syria and all of the Gaza from Egypt.

At the time the Soviet Union and the United states where having words and the Soviets threatened to invade western Europe if Israel did not call a cease fire and cross the Suez into Egypt. And Saudi Arabia started the first oil embargo.

I was getting ready to go on leave and my leave was cancelled and everyone in Germany was called to alert, one minute your packed and one your way to Canada the next you digging a trench in the German country side wondering how long your unit will last if the Soviet Army invades.

And in 1967 I was in school and I remember our teacher had us read the newspapers to learn current events and to discuss what was going on during that war, from what I remember there was a dispute between Israel and Syria and Egypt moved there troops to the front and demanded that the UN peacekeepers withdraw, they then blockaded the gulf from Israeli shipping, with the Syrian and Egyptian army at there borders the Israeli army surprised everyone by launching an attack on both Syria and Egypt and forcing both countries to sue for peace in six days.

Yes Israel has not had the perfect past, in fact in the 1940’s the where terrorist, they even kidnapped and murdered British soldiers, but I would not say that they where the ones who started most of the wars in the area.


----------



## Glorified Ape (6 Jan 2006)

GO!!! said:
			
		

> I'm glad I'm not alone in my opinion of Israel as a colonist regime - where were you over the holidays?



At my folk's place in Toronto, revelling in my sloth and doing little else but reading science fiction and stuffing my face with turkey. Ditto on the Israeli colonialism opinion. "Settlers" - christ, they don't even try to hide it. Maybe next they can pass out some infected blankets. 



			
				48Highlander said:
			
		

> We must not be watching the same media.
> 
> Here's an experiment; Google Search results:
> 
> ...



What case are you resting? That "lefties" never cry out about Tibet or that it never gets media attention? I believe you just provided 6 760 000 examples to the contrary. 

As for suicide bombings - what's your point? That Buddhists aren't prone to suicide bombing their enemies? Point conceded. I'd expect a Buddhist to suicide bomb about as much as I'd expect a fish to walk upright. Buddhists seem to prefer self-immolation.  



> eh?  rephrase your last, over.



You said that in order for a national independence/homeland handout to be made, one has to be a visible minority opposing a Western state. I countered with Israel - whereby a non-visible minority (arguably) got the handout without opposing a Western state (excepting some terrorism in Palestine against the British prior to Israel's inception). My response was a bit convoluted, apologies.


----------



## 48Highlander (7 Jan 2006)

Glorified Ape said:
			
		

> What case are you resting? That "lefties" never cry out about Tibet or that it never gets media attention? I believe you just provided 6 760 000 examples to the contrary.
> 
> As for suicide bombings - what's your point? That Buddhists aren't prone to suicide bombing their enemies? Point conceded. I'd expect a Buddhist to suicide bomb about as much as I'd expect a fish to walk upright. Buddhists seem to prefer self-immolation.



 :

Alright fine.  I'm sure you understood what I mean, but let me be more specific.  The "lefties" speak out much more often against "oppresion" by western states, no matter the cause or circumstances, than they do against oppression by anyone else.  They're too focused "fighting for the rights" of suicide bombers, terrorists, and oppresive regimes to bother speaking up for peacefull monks and peasants.

The point to showing the number of suicide bombings was, as you well know, to display the utter idiocy behind the choice of causes that these people select.  On the one hand you have a peaceful country occupied by an oppresive regime.  On the other, you have a semi-civilized sort-of-nation which continuously targets civilians in a country which is only "occupying" a small portion of their land, and that largely for self-defence.  Which of the two do you suppose is a more logical, and more worthwhile cause?




			
				Glorified Ape said:
			
		

> You said that in order for a national independence/homeland handout to be made, one has to be a visible minority opposing a Western state. I countered with Israel - whereby a non-visible minority (arguably) got the handout without opposing a Western state (excepting some terrorism in Palestine against the British prior to Israel's inception). My response was a bit convoluted, apologies.



Alright, so either be a minority opposing a western state, or be a minority in the proccess of being exterminated.  Although you could argue that Germany was a western state....or that at the time we really had no concept of west vs east or third world.  I'm talking about todays rules; as you may have noticed things have changed a bit since then 1940's.


----------



## Kilo_302 (8 Jan 2006)

The double standard in the media pertaining to the Israeli-Palestine conflict is indicative of the way the West views that conflict. When a Palestinian blows himself up and kills Israeli civilians, he is correctly called a terrorist. But when a Jewish settler decides to even the score by shooting a few Palestinians, its called "tragic" a "horrific" event , but the settler is never referred to as a terrorist. In one case, in 1995, an active IDF Major, wearing his uniform walked into a mosque and shot 21 palestinian civilians. In the ensuing demonstrations, in which witnessing journalists say that Palestinians threw rocks, a further 25 were gunned down by IDF personnel (and dont say that rocks are lethal weapons) . Again, this event was called a "tragedy". Imagine a Palestinian walking into a synagogue and killing innocent Israelis, he would be, and again I say correctly, called a terrorist. But if an Israeli does the same thing, its tragic, comparable to the "office shooting", meaning its totally inexplicable, and unexpected. Without even getting into who owns what land, or what the UN said, there is a definite bias in the media and Western governments, which fuels misguided public opinion, which in turn prolongs the conflict. This is excluding official IDF operations which are also responsible for many more civilian deaths, and could be, in some cases, defined as terrorist acts.


----------



## GO!!! (8 Jan 2006)

Kilo, 

You are absolutely right. Ever read an eastern paper? A few of them refuse to even say "Israel" they use the term "Zionist entity".

Settlers are referred to as "invaders", and stories start with statements like "Tensions rose to a boiling point in the Ramallah concentration camp today, when Zionist forces of occupation massacred an innocent crowd seeking the return of their political prisoner sons, brothers and fathers. Helicopter gunships returned that night, killing four elderly men in a Mercedes, and levelling a hospital."

The Israeli version would say "Israeli police in Ramallah were surrounded by an armed, rock throwing crowd who outnumbered them 3 to 1. They shot their way out, to avoid being swarmed. The head financier and spiritual leader of Hamas was finally located and killed, in an effort to stop the rocket attacks on Israeli citizens, however, the vehicle was being used to transport explosives, and the ensuing fire burned a local hospital to the ground."

The truth is probably somewhere in between.


----------



## 48Highlander (8 Jan 2006)

Kilo_302 said:
			
		

> The double standard in the media pertaining to the Israeli-Palestine conflict is indicative of the way the West views that conflict. When a Palestinian blows himself up and kills Israeli civilians, he is correctly called a terrorist. But when a Jewish settler decides to even the score by shooting a few Palestinians, its called "tragic" a "horrific" event , but the settler is never referred to as a terrorist. In one case, in 1995, an active IDF Major, wearing his uniform walked into a mosque and shot 21 palestinian civilians.



And I suppose, according to your definition, that the gang-bangers who wounded 7 bystanders in Toronto would also classify as terrorists eh?

Or if not, maybe the Columbine kids?  Or maybe Mark Lepine?

Don't even try answering that.  We both know that there's a difference between a criminal and a terrorist.  Acts of murder commited when individual Israelis snap and decide to fight their own personal wars are NOT terrorist acts.  And they're also extremely rare, so any questions of "bias" are irrelevant.  I'm sure the first few attacks by Palestinians were also not called terrorist attacks.  If on the other hand, Israelis formed a group called the Zionist Liberation Organization, dedicated themselves to exterminating all Palestinians, and commenced weekly attacks against civilian targets in Palestine, you'd see the same response to them in the media as you do against the PLO and Hamas sponsored attacks.



			
				Kilo_302 said:
			
		

> Without even getting into who owns what land, or what the UN said, there is a definite bias in the media and Western governments, which fuels misguided public opinion, which in turn prolongs the conflict.



Really.  In that case, would you care to try and explain why such a large percentage of westerners side with the Palestinians?



			
				Kilo_302 said:
			
		

> This is excluding official IDF operations which are also responsible for many more civilian deaths, and could be, in some cases, defined as terrorist acts.



Ah I see, you're one of those.  Ok then.


----------



## Kilo_302 (8 Jan 2006)

Then tell me 48th, what is this "large percentage" of Westerners who "side" with the Palestinians. And do they side with those Palestinians who have committed terrorist acts, or with those who peacefully oppose the Israeli occupation? Or both? The world is not black and white. 

And yes I am one of "those" who recognize that at times, some Israeli military operations, particularly in Lebanon in the early 80s, did actually target civilians. The Israelis themselves admit this latter fact. The Kahan commission inquiry into the Sabra and Chatila massacres in 1982 found Sharon "personally responsible" for aiding the Phalangist milita in killing 1700 Palestinians civilians. 

Keep in mind 48th, no one here is saying that the Palestinians are absolved of all guilt just because they are legally (according to the UN and international law) in the right. Anyone here could list hundreds of terrorist attacks committed by the Palestinians, and these attacks are despicable when they target civilians. But one of the belligerents in this case has attack helos, tanks, soldiers etc, while the other has home made bombs and small arms. In total about 3-4 times more Palestinians than Israelis have died since the beginning of the latest Intifadah. 

48th I do not undertand why you are so eager to dismiss facts that can be readily proven, and instead prefer to fall back on rhetoric about Palestinian terrorists. Facing the facts does not at all mean you have to come down on any one side.


----------



## privatesteve (8 Jan 2006)

The west always preaches freedom of speech. If people wanna try and deny it then they can go ahead. 

Revisionism is hardly a crime.


----------



## Glorified Ape (8 Jan 2006)

48Highlander said:
			
		

> :
> 
> Alright fine.  I'm sure you understood what I mean, but let me be more specific.  The "lefties" speak out much more often against "oppresion" by western states, no matter the cause or circumstances, than they do against oppression by anyone else.  They're too focused "fighting for the rights" of suicide bombers, terrorists, and oppresive regimes to bother speaking up for peacefull monks and peasants.



I agree that Western states often get a large proportion of attention, given their lesser proportion of abuses versus dictatorships/totalitarian regimes. That may or may not be a function of the fact that Western states (most) actually seem to care about abuses and change is actually possible, but I'm not a HR activist or anything so I couldn't really say. I don't think the rights of terrorists/suicide bombers are really the main concern of most activists, but rather the common folk being subjected to whatever it is that the activists are complaining about - particularly in Israel's case. By the "concerned for the rights of terrorists" thing, I assume you mean all the hooplah about the Gitmo detainees and related issues. I can see both sides - one has to recognize that many of the detainees are not innocent people but at the same time, the legal regime established in most Western countries is there for a reason and some view the recent changes to this regime and/or its circumvention through loopholes to be a disturbing development. 



> The point to showing the number of suicide bombings was, as you well know, to display the utter idiocy behind the choice of causes that these people select.  On the one hand you have a peaceful country occupied by an oppresive regime.  On the other, you have a semi-civilized sort-of-nation which continuously targets civilians in a country which is only "occupying" a small portion of their land, and that largely for self-defence.  Which of the two do you suppose is a more logical, and more worthwhile cause?



The standard for Western/democratic countries is always higher than for the nondemocratic ones. It's true - there's a certain degree of irony in the focus which many groups have on Western abuses. I don't see it as an either/or scenario, though, where one can only decry one groups' abuses at a time. I think the reason Western states attract so much attention is that they claim to be the beacon of light and role model for the rest of the world but have yet to clean up their own backyards in many cases. The hypocrisy of it is what sets off so many people, methinks. It's like the Western world is an officer telling the troops to run faster while he rides behind them in a jeep - it's hard to take him seriously or respect him. 

As for Israel, occupying Palestinian lands and dumping settlers on them is actually injurious to Israeli security, as I see it, because it provides no shortage of impetus for attacks. There will ALWAYS be groups who'll attack Israel solely because it exists but I dare say the support for such behaviour amongst the Palestinian population would dry up substantially if Palestinians were given their rightful lands and allowed self-determination. As for civilian targeting, Israel has had no qualms about it in the past. I don't see either side as morally superior, but I do believe that the Palestinians have a legitimate grievance with Israel (and Britain, the UN, the US, etc). I don't necessarily support their tactics, nor do I believe them to be morally preferable or superior to Israel's solely because they have a grievance. 



> Alright, so either be a minority opposing a western state, or be a minority in the proccess of being exterminated.  Although you could argue that Germany was a western state....or that at the time we really had no concept of west vs east or third world.  I'm talking about todays rules; as you may have noticed things have changed a bit since then 1940's.



You have a point, though I'm sure people thought things had changed since the British (and Canadian) and American colonial practices in North America but Israel seems to be doing its damndest to prove such people wrong.


----------



## Shec (8 Jan 2006)

Glorified Ape said:
			
		

> As for Israel, occupying Palestinian lands and dumping settlers on them is actually injurious to Israeli security, as I see it, because it provides no shortage of impetus for attacks. There will ALWAYS be groups who'll attack Israel solely because it exists but I dare say the support for such behaviour amongst the Palestinian population would dry up substantially if Palestinians were given their rightful lands and allowed self-determination.



Oh yeah, and then they will all sit around the campfire singing_ Kumbyah_.  They got Gaza given to them what do they do with it?   They start launching Qassam rockets against Ashkelon.   That is the shape of things to come and that is a compelling justification for setting up a defensive buffer on the West Bank and surveying everything beyond it and within range for IDF artillery.


----------



## 48Highlander (8 Jan 2006)

Glorified Ape said:
			
		

> I agree that Western states often get a large proportion of attention, given their lesser proportion of abuses versus dictatorships/totalitarian regimes. That may or may not be a function of the fact that Western states (most) actually seem to care about abuses and change is actually possible, but I'm not a HR activist or anything so I couldn't really say. I don't think the rights of terrorists/suicide bombers are really the main concern of most activists, but rather the common folk being subjected to whatever it is that the activists are complaining about - particularly in Israel's case. By the "concerned for the rights of terrorists" thing, I assume you mean all the hooplah about the Gitmo detainees and related issues. I can see both sides - one has to recognize that many of the detainees are not innocent people but at the same time, the legal regime established in most Western countries is there for a reason and some view the recent changes to this regime and/or its circumvention through loopholes to be a disturbing development.



And many view it as a good thing.  Either way, I'm glad we agree that western states get a massively disproportionate ammount of negative attention when engaged in any sort of violent behaviour.



			
				Glorified Ape said:
			
		

> The standard for Western/democratic countries is always higher than for the nondemocratic ones. It's true - there's a certain degree of irony in the focus which many groups have on Western abuses. I don't see it as an either/or scenario, though, where one can only decry one groups' abuses at a time. I think the reason Western states attract so much attention is that they claim to be the beacon of light and role model for the rest of the world but have yet to clean up their own backyards in many cases. The hypocrisy of it is what sets off so many people, methinks. It's like the Western world is an officer telling the troops to run faster while he rides behind them in a jeep - it's hard to take him seriously or respect him.



Not really.  It's more like an officer saying "either do PT properly on your own time, or I'm gonna come out and run you into the ground".  You're free to ignore him, disrespect him, and call him a hypocrite, but next week, when you're doing a 25km ruck-run with said officer, just remember you brought it on yourself.

Western states aren't perfect, no, but comparing the human rights record of a country like Canada, the US, or Israel, to states like Palestine, Iran, Iraq....well, you'd have to be a few rounds short of a full load to even make the comparison.  Could you imagine that sort of logic in Canada?  Some guy gets arrested for robbing a bank....and suddenly there's 200 university students protesting outside the jail because the officer who arrested him was seen jay-walking.



			
				Glorified Ape said:
			
		

> As for Israel, occupying Palestinian lands and dumping settlers on them is actually injurious to Israeli security, as I see it, because it provides no shortage of impetus for attacks. There will ALWAYS be groups who'll attack Israel solely because it exists but I dare say the support for such behaviour amongst the Palestinian population would dry up substantially if Palestinians were given their rightful lands and allowed self-determination.



And this would take....how long exactly?  A hundred years maybe?  In the meantime, attacks against Israel would intensify.  So what you're saying is that Israel should pull out of the "occupied" territories, thereby increasing the ammount of risk to their own citizens, on the off chance that maybe in a century or so the Palestinians might have a change of heart.  Please.  You're better than that.

Also keep in mind that a VERY large portion of the Palestinian population beleives that ALL of Israel is or should be Palestinian territory.  Giving them back the "occupied lands" won't do jack; those individuals will simply see it as a sign that the glorious PLO is defeating the heathen Zionists, and will assume that if they redouble their efforts they'll eventualy succeed in pushing Israel into the sea and getting all of "their" land back.

AND keep in mind that other Muslim states have a vested interest in maintaining the conflict between Israel and Palestine.  Even assuming that the majority of Palestinian people had a change of heart overnight, the terrorists organizations could always find funding and personnel through outher nations.

So with all those things in mind, explain to me how exactly withdrawing from the "occupied" territories will gain ANYTHING for Israel.



			
				Glorified Ape said:
			
		

> As for civilian targeting, Israel has had no qualms about it in the past. I don't see either side as morally superior, but I do believe that the Palestinians have a legitimate grievance with Israel (and Britain, the UN, the US, etc). I don't necessarily support their tactics, nor do I believe them to be morally preferable or superior to Israel's solely because they have a grievance.



I see.  And because Canada and the US have both targeted civilians in the past as well, we also don't have any sort of moral superiority, right?

When you come right down to it, I can't think of a single nation which has never targeted civilians.  So we're all moraly equal, eh?



			
				Glorified Ape said:
			
		

> You have a point, though I'm sure people thought things had changed since the British (and Canadian) and American colonial practices in North America but Israel seems to be doing its damndest to prove such people wrong.



....I'm not even going to attempt to devine what aspect of Israel you're insulting with that statement.


----------



## sheikyerbouti (8 Jan 2006)

The relocation of settlers from Gaza to the West Bank smacks to me of a form of the colonialism he is referring to. If Israel were truly sincere, they would have prevented Gaza settlers from relocating to other disputed territories. By tacitly allowing this to occur, it certainly denotes a degree of colonialism. Another example would the posturing as of late by the Israeli government with respect  to East Jerusalem and their indixcations that they would impede voting by Palestinians. Denying individuals the right to exercise their vote is powerfully oppressive, especially when it comes to nascent rights. I must admit that permitting Palestinians to vote helps them solidify their historical claims to the area and thus impedes the Israeli's claim to the area.

 Another underhanded example as of late seems to be the incremental acquisition of properties by Jewish groups in areas of concern (mainly East Jerusalem). Essentially they are conquering from within but this effort is somewhat unnecessary as the Israeli's are hesitant  to recognize the property rights of many Arabs anyways.


----------



## Kilo_302 (9 Jan 2006)

> I see.  And because Canada and the US have both targeted civilians in the past as well, we also don't have any sort of moral superiority, right?
> 
> When you come right down to it, I can't think of a single nation which has never targeted civilians.  So we're all moraly equal, eh?



No one here is saying that other Western nations have never targeted civilians. However, this board has shifted to being primarily about Israel. The US has trampled human rights in the past, as have the French in Algeria, the UK in pretty much any former colony. And of course, almost every single regime in the Middle East with the possible exception of Iran under Mossadegh. The list pretty comprises every nation that has ever existed. But that isn't the point. Israel is supposed to be the beacon of democracy in the Middle East, and it has vast support from the West particularly the United States. I think someone else already mentioned this on this thread, but you cannot point to other examples of past wrong doing to absolve a particular case. I am sure that most people on this board are aware of other human rights abuses and state terrorism committed by many other nations, but at this point, we are not discussing them. If people insist on comparisons I would argue that if there were three "tiers" of human rights abuses, nations like Iran, China, Saudi Arabia, Iraq under Hussein would be in tier 1, or the worst offenders.In this category, nations openly restrict free speech, imprison political opponents, and execute/torture dissenters. Nations such as Israel and the United States would be tier 2. Nations in this category would feature free speech domestically, have free markets, but abroad would prosecute illegal wars, carry out illegal assassinations, stage coups of democratically (and otherwise) elected governments, and generally not practice what they preach at home. Nations such as Canada, Sweden, and others would be tier 3. These nations, while definitely being guilty of past crimes, and still being guilty of current foreign/domestic policy that could be seen as morally wrong, are not overtly committing crimes that are defined as such by the UN and international law. This being said, there is a definite linkage between morally questionable policies and economic/military status in the world, at least in a Western sense. If Canada was a more powerful nation, I have no doubt that our human rights abuses would increase in a parallel manner.


----------



## Glorified Ape (9 Jan 2006)

48Highlander said:
			
		

> And many view it as a good thing.  Either way, I'm glad we agree that western states get a massively disproportionate ammount of negative attention when engaged in any sort of violent behaviour.



Indeed, agreed. 



> Not really.  It's more like an officer saying "either do PT properly on your own time, or I'm gonna come out and run you into the ground".  You're free to ignore him, disrespect him, and call him a hypocrite, but next week, when you're doing a 25km ruck-run with said officer, just remember you brought it on yourself.



The primary difference being that the troops are in the military of their own volition and thus recognize the officer as having legitimate authority. For the West to assume some rightful authority over the rest of the world is dictatorial and paternalistic to say the least. 



> Western states aren't perfect, no, but comparing the human rights record of a country like Canada, the US, or Israel, to states like Palestine, Iran, Iraq....well, you'd have to be a few rounds short of a full load to even make the comparison.  Could you imagine that sort of logic in Canada?  Some guy gets arrested for robbing a bank....and suddenly there's 200 university students protesting outside the jail because the officer who arrested him was seen jay-walking.



Yes, the comparison is ridiculous. You give a good analogy, but it leaves out that the police officer also acts as jury and executioner, arrested the guy outside his jurisdiction, and had a prior working relationship with the guy in which the officer paid him substantial sums of money and provided other assistance in order to secure influence for personal benefit in the criminal underworld. 



> And this would take....how long exactly?  A hundred years maybe?  In the meantime, attacks against Israel would intensify.  So what you're saying is that Israel should pull out of the "occupied" territories, thereby increasing the ammount of risk to their own citizens, on the off chance that maybe in a century or so the Palestinians might have a change of heart.  Please.  You're better than that.



It's not an either/or scenario - Israel is just as capable of maintaining its security without occupying Palestinian lands and most definitely without colonizing them. The new Palestinian Authority isn't what it was under Arafat and I think some progress is being made. It needs to improve its policing, but given the fact that Israel ties both its hands behind its back at any possible opportunity, one can't expect leaps and bounds unless Israel commits to actually facilitating Palestinian independence. 



> Also keep in mind that a VERY large portion of the Palestinian population beleives that ALL of Israel is or should be Palestinian territory.  Giving them back the "occupied lands" won't do jack; those individuals will simply see it as a sign that the glorious PLO is defeating the heathen Zionists, and will assume that if they redouble their efforts they'll eventualy succeed in pushing Israel into the sea and getting all of "their" land back.



Well, in all honesty it is Palestinian territory but what some people believe and what will be are two different things. As I said, there'll ALWAYS be groups that hate Israel for simply existing but I wouldn't count them as the majority. I think most Palestinians would be quite happy simply to be left alone by Israel and be allowed to develop their own country. 



> AND keep in mind that other Muslim states have a vested interest in maintaining the conflict between Israel and Palestine.  Even assuming that the majority of Palestinian people had a change of heart overnight, the terrorists organizations could always find funding and personnel through outher nations.



This is true, but doesn't mean that Israel shouldn't allow Palestinians autonomy. Israel has had no qualms about attacking other nations willy-nilly whenever the thought crosses their minds so I don't see why they wouldn't just continue it after a Palestinian state has formed. 



> So with all those things in mind, explain to me how exactly withdrawing from the "occupied" territories will gain ANYTHING for Israel.



As I said, because it removes 90% of the impetus behind the intifada and associated problems. It's not a magic cure-all but it's a start and at the end of the day, the fact still remains that Israel is going to have to grant independence to the Palestinians at some point. The longer the occupation/colonisation goes on, the more hatred is going to build up (and rightfully so). 



> I see.  And because Canada and the US have both targeted civilians in the past as well, we also don't have any sort of moral superiority, right?



In what context? If we were fighting for our independence from an oppressive occupying force, then I'd accept any and all means necessary to realise that end and make things as painful as humanly possible for the occupying state. Britain did the same thing when their nation was threatened by Germany. The Dutch and French resistances did the same thing to the Germans, even killing their own civilians if they collaborated. Were they capable of bombing German cafes and nighclubs, I'm sure they'd have done it. The IRA has had no qualms about killing for its independence and one wonders if the independence movement would have received the political attention it did if the English hadn't had to seek some political solution to exploding mailboxes. Even Israel has had its share of terrorists, both during its independence movement and afterwards but we seem to conveniently forget that fact whenever the person doing the killing worships Allah instead of Jehova (which are the same god, anyway). Likewise the Christian Phalangist militias in Lebanon had no problems slaughtering civilian Palestinians (with Israeli support to boot). 

Are we (the West) morally superior in that context, no? I'm sure we'd be engaging in similar acts were in the same position with the same motivation. Perhaps not suicide bombing, but terrorism most definitely. I don't view morality as being an all-encompassing field - there are different morals for different contexts. I don't view polygamist Mormons as being morally inferior because they have multiple wives. If Mormons starved their children and beat them regularly as a part of their faith, I'd view them as morally unpreferable in that context. Moral superiority is a dangerous concept as morality is largely relative. As long as the people of a group agree on a moral framework and don't harm other groups, I have no problem with them nor do I believe them inferior. I may not like what they do, but I have no right to dictate morality as though there was one moral code by which everyone is supposed to live. 



> ....I'm not even going to attempt to devine what aspect of Israel you're insulting with that statement.



I was insulting Israel's colonial practices like moving settlers onto land that isn't theirs, bulldozing Palestinian homes, etc. 



			
				Kilo_302 said:
			
		

> No one here is saying that other Western nations have never targeted civilians. However, this board has shifted to being primarily about Israel. The US has trampled human rights in the past, as have the French in Algeria, the UK in pretty much any former colony. And of course, almost every single regime in the Middle East with the possible exception of Iran under Mossadegh. The list pretty comprises every nation that has ever existed. But that isn't the point. Israel is supposed to be the beacon of democracy in the Middle East, and it has vast support from the West particularly the United States. I think someone else already mentioned this on this thread, but you cannot point to other examples of past wrong doing to absolve a particular case. I am sure that most people on this board are aware of other human rights abuses and state terrorism committed by many other nations, but at this point, we are not discussing them. If people insist on comparisons I would argue that if there were three "tiers" of human rights abuses, nations like Iran, China, Saudi Arabia, Iraq under Hussein would be in tier 1, or the worst offenders.In this category, nations openly restrict free speech, imprison political opponents, and execute/torture dissenters. Nations such as Israel and the United States would be tier 2. Nations in this category would feature free speech domestically, have free markets, but abroad would prosecute illegal wars, carry out illegal assassinations, stage coups of democratically (and otherwise) elected governments, and generally not practice what they preach at home. Nations such as Canada, Sweden, and others would be tier 3. These nations, while definitely being guilty of past crimes, and still being guilty of current foreign/domestic policy that could be seen as morally wrong, are not overtly committing crimes that are defined as such by the UN and international law. This being said, there is a definite linkage between morally questionable policies and economic/military status in the world, at least in a Western sense. If Canada was a more powerful nation, I have no doubt that our human rights abuses would increase in a parallel manner.



Excellent post, though I'll hazard to guess that you're going to catch serious flak over putting Canada in a better category than the US. Be prepared to suffer the "you anti-American bum" assault en masse.  :warstory:

Incidentally, funny you should point out Mossadeq - who was it that backed the coup that threw him out, again? Ohhhhhhh yeah, that's right - the US and Britain. Good thing they got him booted - the government they have now is far preferable to that pesky secular, pro-democratic one Mossadeq was running.


----------



## 48Highlander (9 Jan 2006)

Kilo_302 said:
			
		

> If people insist on comparisons I would argue that if there were three "tiers" of human rights abuses, nations like Iran, China, Saudi Arabia, Iraq under Hussein would be in tier 1, or the worst offenders.In this category, nations openly restrict free speech, imprison political opponents, and execute/torture dissenters. Nations such as Israel and the United States would be tier 2. Nations in this category would feature free speech domestically, have free markets, but abroad would prosecute *illegal wars*, carry out *illegal assassinations*, stage coups of democratically (and otherwise) elected governments, and generally not practice what they preach at home. Nations such as Canada, Sweden, and others would be tier 3. These nations, while definitely being guilty of past crimes, and still being guilty of current foreign/domestic policy that could be seen as morally wrong, are not overtly committing crimes that are defined as such by the UN and international law. This being said, there is a definite linkage between morally questionable policies and economic/military status in the world, at least in a Western sense. If Canada was a more powerful nation, I have no doubt that our human rights abuses would increase in a parallel manner.





Funny.  I'd really LOVE to hear you attempt to explain what exactly constitutes an "illegal war"   :  Or if you somehow manage that, to explain when either the US or Israel has been involved in one.

Methinks thou hast put too much faith in Michael Moore's teachings.


----------



## combatcamera (9 Jan 2006)

48Highlander,

Have you ever been to Israel?


----------



## 48Highlander (9 Jan 2006)

combatcamera said:
			
		

> 48Highlander,
> 
> Have you ever been to Israel?



If you wish to exchange tourism information, PM me instead of interrupting the discussion


----------



## combatcamera (9 Jan 2006)

Seriously, have you ever been there?


----------



## combatcamera (9 Jan 2006)

48Highlander,

My guess is that you've never even been to the Middle East.  Am I correct?


----------



## Glorified Ape (9 Jan 2006)

48Highlander said:
			
		

> Funny.  I'd really LOVE to hear you attempt to explain what exactly constitutes an "illegal war"   :  Or if you somehow manage that, to explain when either the US or Israel has been involved in one.
> 
> Methinks thou hast put too much faith in Michael Moore's teachings.



An illegal war, by international law, is a war of aggression wherein one state attacks another state without first being attacked - like Germany in WWII, Iraq in the Gulf War, the US in 1812, the US in Vietnam, the US in Grenada, the US in Cuba, the US in Iraq, Israel in the Six Day War, and similar acts of aggression such as the Israeli bombing of Iraq in 1981, the Israeli bombing of Syria in 2003, the Israeli bombing of Tunisia in 1985, etc. 

The proscription against aggressive war came out of the Nuremberg Trials which, ironically, were spearheaded by the US. The Charter of the International Military Tribunal states that: 



> Article 6. The Tribunal established by the Agreement referred to in Article 1 hereof for the trial and punishment of the major war criminals of the European Axis countries shall have the power to try and punish persons who, acting in the interests of the European Axis countries, either as individuals or as members of organizations, committed any of the following crimes.
> 
> "The following acts, or any of them, are crimes coming within the jurisdiction of the Tribunal for which there shall be individual responsibility:
> 
> ...



Funny tendency those tables have of turning...


----------



## 48Highlander (9 Jan 2006)

?



> Article 6. The Tribunal established by the Agreement referred to in Article 1 hereof for the trial and punishment of the major war criminals of the European Axis countries shall have the power to try and punish *persons who, acting in the interests of the European Axis countries,* either as individuals or as members of organizations, committed any of the following crimes.



Last I checked neither Israel nor the US has acted in the interest of European Axis countries  

And last I checked the US was in Vietnam in order to take over from the French and assist the South Vietnamese, therefore it was a legitemate action, much like in South Korea.

As well, as far as I remember, the first Gulf War was not considered "illegal", and it never realy ended.  The lack of warfare during the decade in between GW1 and GW2 was a conditional ceasefire, and Sadam violated the conditions of that ceasefire numerous times.  Even if you could argue that wars could ever be considered illegal, you certainly coundn't argue that it would be illegal to resume hostilities due to one side not upholding the terms of the ceasefire.  That's without even mentioning the fact that numerous UN mandates implied that a second invasion was in the works if Sadam didn't co-operate.

So your quote is irrelevant, and your examples are of questionable accuracy at best.


----------



## combatcamera (9 Jan 2006)

48Highlander,

You seem to be quite the expert on Middle East affairs, considering you've never been there.


----------



## TCBF (9 Jan 2006)

"An illegal war, by international law, is a war of aggression wherein one state attacks another state without first being attacked - like Germany in WWII, Iraq in the Gulf War, the US in 1812, the US in Vietnam, the US in Grenada, the US in Cuba, the US in Iraq, Israel in the Six Day War, and similar acts of aggression such as the Israeli bombing of Iraq in 1981, the Israeli bombing of Syria in 2003, the Israeli bombing of Tunisia in 1985, etc."

Hey GA, don't forget the guys on the left side of the bus.. the Russian invasion of Poland in 1921, of Finland during WW2, the NK invasion of SK, the Chinese invasion of SK, the Chinese invasion of Tibet, the Russian invasion of Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania,   the Iraqui invasion of Kuwait, etc.

You have a bunch of Commie professors or something?  I sure hope my tax dollars aren't supporting such brain-washing!

 ;D

Tom


----------



## combatcamera (9 Jan 2006)

Tom,

You're not from Thunder Bay are you?


----------



## Kilo_302 (9 Jan 2006)

> And last I checked the US was in Vietnam in order to take over from the French and assist the South Vietnamese, therefore it was a legitemate action, much like in South Korea.



Vietnam would have been legal if the South Vietnamese government that "invited" the United States to intervene had been legitmate, and had not been installed by the United States. Since it was not, the war in Vietnam is technically an invasion. You bring up the fact that the United States "took over from the French". The French were a colonial power, so if the United States indeed took over for them, it merely replaced a repressive colonial power. Not something to be proud of, considering how often the United States has spoken out against colonialism, as well as the history of the US as being a colony itself. When you call Vietnam a legitimate action, consider that 2 million Vietnamese, the vast majority of civilians died, most of them in massive indiscriminate air raids. There was actually a deliberate effort by US forces to drive civilians into "strategic hamlets" by bombing them out of the countryside. Legitimate action indeed.


----------



## Glorified Ape (9 Jan 2006)

48Highlander said:
			
		

> ?
> 
> Last I checked neither Israel nor the US has acted in the interest of European Axis countries



The Nuremberg Trials were much of the foundation of the international legal regime which sprouted after World War II, including its institutionalisation in the UN. The UN Charter built on the concepts developed at Nuremberg, to which the US, Israel, Canada, etc. are signatories. Furthermore, the abstention from aggressive war (and genocide) are peremptory norms in international law, meaning that one does not have to be party to any treaty/etc. to be subject to them. 



> And last I checked the US was in Vietnam in order to take over from the French and assist the South Vietnamese, therefore it was a legitemate action, much like in South Korea.



The French and Vietnamese were already in peace talks (the Geneva Peace Accords) long before the conflict between the US and North Vietnam. The division of North and South along the 17th parallel was temporary and contingent upon political resolution through the accords. Thus the internal political strife was exactly that - internal. Neither the Northern or Southern governments were legitimately representative of Vietnam. The US didn't like the level of communist influence that unification would entail, and so started a counter-unification movement under Diem. When Diem didn't get the support he needed, the US aided a military coup to overthrow him (after which he and his brother were assassinated). Then there were the South Vietnamese and US actions along the North-South line, in response to which the Gulf of Tonkin happened. After that, the US was at war with North Vietnam, for all intents and purposes. The North didn't initiate hostilities, the US did. 



> As well, as far as I remember, the first Gulf War was not considered "illegal", and it never realy ended.



Iraq's actions against Kuwait in the Gulf War were illegal, hence why the war had UN approval. I didn't mean the Allies were acting illegally, I meant Iraq as it attacked Kuwait without sufficient provocation. 



> The lack of warfare during the decade in between GW1 and GW2 was a conditional ceasefire, and Sadam violated the conditions of that ceasefire numerous times.  Even if you could argue that wars could ever be considered illegal, you certainly coundn't argue that it would be illegal to resume hostilities due to one side not upholding the terms of the ceasefire.  That's without even mentioning the fact that numerous UN mandates implied that a second invasion was in the works if Sadam didn't co-operate.



The ceasefire (UN resolution 687) was brought into force under the auspices of the United Nations (more specifically the Security Council). There's no provision in the ceasefire for individual states to resume hostilities without the authorization of the Security Council - it makes sense seeing as how the Security Council (and UN by extension) holds authority over the ceasefire. The British Foreign Secretary had stated that there was no extant legal basis for action and another British diplomat admitted as much (though in argument for action): 



> "Among ourselves, we operate on the basis of laws and open co-operative security," said Robert Cooper. "But when dealing with more old-fashioned kinds of states outside the postmodern continent of Europe, we need to revert to rougher methods of an earlier era - force, pre-emptive attack, deception," he wrote.
> 
> "Among ourselves, we keep the law but when we are operating in the jungle, we must also use the laws of the jungle".



I won't bother to touch on the idiocy and hypocrisy of his statement as it pertains to the application of law, as it's painfully evident. 



> So your quote is irrelevant, and your examples are of questionable accuracy at best.



You didn't touch on many of my examples and the quote is far from irrelevant. While the Treaty of Westphalia may have established the the sanctity of sovereignty, it was Nuremberg and the UN Charter (building thereon) that really dealt explicitly with aggression. Robert Jackson (US Supreme Court Justice and Chief Prosecutor at Nuremberg) said ""No political or economic situation can justify [the crime of aggression]... If certain acts in violation of treaties are crimes they are crimes whether the United States does them or whether Germany does them, and we are not prepared to lay down a rule of criminal conduct against others which we would not be willing to have invoked against us." The International Court which presided over Nuremberg said "To initiate a war of aggression, therefore, is not only an international crime, it is the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole." 

Not surprisingly the UN Charter (building on Nuremberg and a seminal document in international law) states: 

"Article 1
The Purposes of the United Nations are:

To maintain international peace and security, and to that end: to take effective collective measures for the prevention and removal of threats to the peace, and for *the suppression of acts of aggression* or other breaches of the peace, and to bring about by peaceful means, and in conformity with the principles of justice and international law, adjustment or settlement of international disputes or situations which might lead to a breach of the peace; "

It defines aggression as "...the use of armed force by a State against the sovereignty, territorial integrity or political independence of another State, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Charter of the United Nations, as set out in this Definition." (Resolution 3314, Article 1) 

And states that "*The First use of armed force by a State in contravention of the Charter shall constitute prima facie evidence of an act of aggression.*" (Article 2). 

Being a signatory to the UN Charter (and thus recognizing the force and effect of the laws set out therein), the US, Israel, and any other signatory either has to recognize its subordinacy to international law or admit to hypocrisy and being diplomatically non-credible. 



			
				TCBF said:
			
		

> "An illegal war, by international law, is a war of aggression wherein one state attacks another state without first being attacked - like Germany in WWII, Iraq in the Gulf War, the US in 1812, the US in Vietnam, the US in Grenada, the US in Cuba, the US in Iraq, Israel in the Six Day War, and similar acts of aggression such as the Israeli bombing of Iraq in 1981, the Israeli bombing of Syria in 2003, the Israeli bombing of Tunisia in 1985, etc."
> 
> Hey GA, don't forget the guys on the left side of the bus.. the Russian invasion of Poland in 1921, of Finland during WW2, the NK invasion of SK, the Chinese invasion of SK, the Chinese invasion of Tibet, the Russian invasion of Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania,   the Iraqui invasion of Kuwait, etc.



Absolutely - I mentioned Iraq vs. Kuwait (I referred to it as the Gulf War). The focus of the point was more our (the West's) difficulty in abiding by the standards that we, ourselves, set. Since the Soviet Union is now defunct and China has never (since Mao anyway) abided by this standard (nor formed it), I don't see them as particularly relevant. 

You're right though - China, North Korea, Vietnam, etc. are all severely sub-standard in their practices. Last I checked, though, they weren't really behaving as the world's self-appointed leader and moral authority. If we want to lead by example, we're going to have to abide by our own standards first. 



> You have a bunch of Commie professors or something?  I sure hope my tax dollars aren't supporting such brain-washing!
> 
> ;D
> 
> Tom



GAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!!! Why does it always have to be about the professors? My professors offer a distinct lack of opinion, as a habit. I know you're being facetious, it just always seems to come back to my being at school. Believe it or not, I decide my own opinions. I'm a big boy now and I'm quite capable of brainwashing myself, thank you very much. ;D


----------



## 48Highlander (9 Jan 2006)

Kilo_302 said:
			
		

> Vietnam would have been legal if the South Vietnamese government that "invited" the United States to intervene had been legitmate, and had not been installed by the United States. Since it was not, the war in Vietnam is technically an invasion. You bring up the fact that the United States "took over from the French". The French were a colonial power, so if the United States indeed took over for them, it merely replaced a repressive colonial power. Not something to be proud of, considering how often the United States has spoken out against colonialism, as well as the history of the US as being a colony itself. When you call Vietnam a legitimate action, consider that 2 million Vietnamese, the vast majority of civilians died, most of them in massive indiscriminate air raids. There was actually a deliberate effort by US forces to drive civilians into "strategic hamlets" by bombing them out of the countryside. Legitimate action indeed.



2 million bombed eh?  Sorta like the "300,000" killed in Iraq right?  ;D

2 million vietnamese probably WERE killed as a result of the war, however, a good chunk of that number was a result of NVA actions AFTER the US left.  Seems the communist government that took over didn't much like free thinkers, scholars, and disidents.  Big surprise there.


----------



## Glorified Ape (9 Jan 2006)

48Highlander said:
			
		

> Seems the communist government that took over didn't much like... scholars...



Gee, kinda like alot of posters on Army.ca where scholars are concerned, eh?  ;D


----------



## combatcamera (10 Jan 2006)

Hmmm?  My guess is you kids haven't even been to the countries you seem to be experts about.


----------



## 48Highlander (10 Jan 2006)

Glorified Ape said:
			
		

> Gee, kinda like alot of posters on Army.ca where scholars are concerned, eh?  ;D



damn edumacated fellers think they know allthing  



			
				Glorified Ape said:
			
		

> The Nuremberg Trials were much of the foundation of the international legal regime which sprouted after World War II, including its institutionalisation in the UN. The UN Charter built on the concepts developed at Nuremberg, to which the US, Israel, Canada, etc. are signatories. Furthermore, the abstention from aggressive war (and genocide) are peremptory norms in international law, meaning that one does not have to be party to any treaty/etc. to be subject to them.



Right, but what you quoted was not part of the UN charter, so it doesn't really support what you were saying.  Quote the right document next time!   ;D

As far as "aggressive war" goes, is there really any other kind?   I understand what you're saying, but it's too difficult to define exactly what constitutes an "illegal war".  In some cases it's pretty clear-cut, but in other circumstances, such as the most recent US invasion of Iraq, and our own assistance in their invasion of Afghanistan...well, there's a lot of room for interpretation.  And the problem is that most of the "judgements" are based on little more than popular opinion.  Plus the problem of enforcement.  International law is a joke unless there's an impartial body which can enforce it.  The UN is neither impartial, nor can it enforce it's own decisions, so it's rather difficult to put any faith in it's laws.



			
				Glorified Ape said:
			
		

> The French and Vietnamese were already in peace talks (the Geneva Peace Accords) long before the conflict between the US and North Vietnam. The division of North and South along the 17th parallel was temporary and contingent upon political resolution through the accords. Thus the internal political strife was exactly that - internal. Neither the Northern or Southern governments were legitimately representative of Vietnam. The US didn't like the level of communist influence that unification would entail, and so started a counter-unification movement under Diem. When Diem didn't get the support he needed, the US aided a military coup to overthrow him (after which he and his brother were assassinated). Then there were the South Vietnamese and US actions along the North-South line, in response to which the Gulf of Tonkin happened. After that, the US was at war with North Vietnam, for all intents and purposes. The North didn't initiate hostilities, the US did.



See, there's a good illustration of why it's so difficult to define "illegal" as far as warfare goes.  Correct me if I'm wrong, but the north had been receiving support from both the USSR and China for quite a while before the US came on the scene.  The US didn't like the idea of another country going Red, so they stepped in to back their own candidate.  Now you can define that as colonialism, or as an "aggresive war", or as an act of self-defence.  A fairly strong argument can be made for any of the above, but once again, as long as there isn't an imparital body to rule on the legality of the situation, and to enforce it's decision, there's no way to say which definition is right.



			
				Glorified Ape said:
			
		

> Iraq's actions against Kuwait in the Gulf War were illegal, hence why the war had UN approval. I didn't mean the Allies were acting illegally, I meant Iraq as it attacked Kuwait without sufficient provocation.
> 
> The ceasefire (UN resolution 687) was brought into force under the auspices of the United Nations (more specifically the Security Council). There's no provision in the ceasefire for individual states to resume hostilities without the authorization of the Security Council - it makes sense seeing as how the Security Council (and UN by extension) holds authority over the ceasefire. The British Foreign Secretary had stated that there was no extant legal basis for action and another British diplomat admitted as much (though in argument for action):



I'll have to do some more research into that, but I'll accept your explanation for now.  I'm really not familiar with all the details of the ceasefire.  I really don't understand why the US would agree to have the UN lay out the terms for the ceasefire.



			
				Glorified Ape said:
			
		

> You didn't touch on many of my examples and the quote is far from irrelevant. While the Treaty of Westphalia may have established the the sanctity of sovereignty, it was Nuremberg and the UN Charter (building thereon) that really dealt explicitly with aggression. Robert Jackson (US Supreme Court Justice and Chief Prosecutor at Nuremberg) said ""No political or economic situation can justify [the crime of aggression]... If certain acts in violation of treaties are crimes they are crimes whether the United States does them or whether Germany does them, and we are not prepared to lay down a rule of criminal conduct against others which we would not be willing to have invoked against us." The International Court which presided over Nuremberg said "To initiate a war of aggression, therefore, is not only an international crime, it is the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole."
> 
> Not surprisingly the UN Charter (building on Nuremberg and a seminal document in international law) states:
> 
> ...



Leaving aside the fact that the UN carries out it purpose very selectively, it seems that by that definition ALL wars are "illegal".  Which brings me right back to the absurdity of the concept.  If the body charged with enforcing these laws cannot stay impartial and cannot enforce it's own decisions, then these laws become irrelevant.  Imagine if our courts always sided with individuals of a certain ethnic background, and our police were unable to enforce the law.  What purpose would our judicial system serve?  The country would fall back on vigilantism, and the people would make and apply their own rules as they saw fit.  The "law" would cease to be relevant.



			
				Glorified Ape said:
			
		

> Absolutely - I mentioned Iraq vs. Kuwait (I referred to it as the Gulf War). The focus of the point was more our (the West's) difficulty in abiding by the standards that we, ourselves, set. Since the Soviet Union is now defunct and China has never (since Mao anyway) abided by this standard (nor formed it), I don't see them as particularly relevant.
> 
> You're right though - China, North Korea, Vietnam, etc. are all severely sub-standard in their practices. Last I checked, though, they weren't really behaving as the world's self-appointed leader and moral authority. If we want to lead by example, we're going to have to abide by our own standards first.



Bull.  Sure, "we" have to be consistant, but we don't have to follow all the rules that we set.  A police officer has the right to search you if he beleives you may be violating the law.  The ETF reserves the right to break down your doors and charge your house with weapons drawn.  Yet we do not give the same rights to the average citizen.  The body in power will always give itself powers which those it proposes to regulate do not have, and the same rules apply on the global level.  Beleiving otherwise is delusional at best.  So the only thing that "we" have to do is ensure that we have good cause when we invade another country.  Wether the rest of the world agrees or not is irrelevant, although it's a good idea to seek the advice and support of other global powers.


----------



## combatcamera (10 Jan 2006)

48Highlander,

What a BS artist you are.


----------



## 48Highlander (10 Jan 2006)

Piper said:
			
		

> It was actually quite an interesting discussion to read, until that.
> 
> Got any facts/points to add to back up that statement?




Here's the entirety of his contribution to this thread:



			
				combatcamera said:
			
		

> 48Highlander,
> 
> Have you ever been to Israel?





			
				combatcamera said:
			
		

> Seriously, have you ever been there?





			
				combatcamera said:
			
		

> 48Highlander,
> 
> My guess is that you've never even been to the Middle East.  Am I correct?





			
				combatcamera said:
			
		

> 48Highlander,
> 
> You seem to be quite the expert on Middle East affairs, considering you've never been there.





			
				combatcamera said:
			
		

> Tom,
> 
> You're not from Thunder Bay are you?





			
				combatcamera said:
			
		

> Hmmm?  My guess is you kids haven't even been to the countries you seem to be experts about.





			
				combatcamera said:
			
		

> 48Highlander,
> 
> What a BS artist you are.



Great eh?  Looks like Combat Camera is about as usefull and informative on these forums as it is when they publish articles.


----------



## TCBF (10 Jan 2006)

"I'm a big boy now and I'm quite capable of brainwashing myself, ..."

- Rather successfully, too, evidently.

 ;D 

"Tom,

You're not from Thunder Bay are you?"

- Does it show?  What gave it away?  My lumberjack shirt, braided armpits, or "Easy-Rider" (TM) rifle rack?



Tom


----------



## Clément Barbeau Vermet (10 Jan 2006)

Glorified Ape said:
			
		

> An illegal war, by international law, is a war of aggression wherein one state attacks another state without first being attacked



Then ALL wars are ''illegal wars'' because one country has to start the war so their can be a war.


----------



## Glorified Ape (10 Jan 2006)

48Highlander said:
			
		

> damn edumacated fellers think they know allthing



I don't know jack but what little I do know I like to argue about. 



> Right, but what you quoted was not part of the UN charter, so it doesn't really support what you were saying.  Quote the right document next time!   ;D



The two are in the same spirit, and the Nuremberg example was more poignant because it was the US spearheading the entire effort. 



> As far as "aggressive war" goes, is there really any other kind?   I understand what you're saying, but it's too difficult to define exactly what constitutes an "illegal war".  In some cases it's pretty clear-cut, but in other circumstances, such as the most recent US invasion of Iraq, and our own assistance in their invasion of Afghanistan...well, there's a lot of room for interpretation.  And the problem is that most of the "judgements" are based on little more than popular opinion.  Plus the problem of enforcement.  International law is a joke unless there's an impartial body which can enforce it.  The UN is neither impartial, nor can it enforce it's own decisions, so it's rather difficult to put any faith in it's laws.



I wouldn't characterize the World Court and ICJ as unfair institutions, it just so happens that politicians and alot of officers don't like being held accountable for their actions. The refusal by some Western countries to submit to the ICJ/World Court only emphasizes the fact that the West loves to apply its standards to everyone but itself and spout pretty rhetoric without actually adhering to it when it's inconvenient. So much of Western idealism, to coin a phrase, is just 'sound and fury, signifying nothing'. 



> See, there's a good illustration of why it's so difficult to define "illegal" as far as warfare goes.  Correct me if I'm wrong, but the north had been receiving support from both the USSR and China for quite a while before the US came on the scene.  The US didn't like the idea of another country going Red, so they stepped in to back their own candidate.  Now you can define that as colonialism, or as an "aggresive war", or as an act of self-defence.  A fairly strong argument can be made for any of the above, but once again, as long as there isn't an imparital body to rule on the legality of the situation, and to enforce it's decision, there's no way to say which definition is right.



Agreed, Vietnam is a tricky one and it's subject to differing interpretations. As for an "impartial body" - we'll never get one as long as states refuse to cede some sovereignty to the laws they want applied to everyone but themselves. 



> I'll have to do some more research into that, but I'll accept your explanation for now.  I'm really not familiar with all the details of the ceasefire.  I really don't understand why the US would agree to have the UN lay out the terms for the ceasefire.



It's debatable, as everything seems to be, but to me it seems clear that the ceasefire wasn't made or supervised unilaterally by the US, but rather by the UN. As such, it's UN jurisdiction, not US. But again, we could argue either side to death. 



> Leaving aside the fact that the UN carries out it purpose very selectively, it seems that by that definition ALL wars are "illegal".  Which brings me right back to the absurdity of the concept.  If the body charged with enforcing these laws cannot stay impartial and cannot enforce it's own decisions, then these laws become irrelevant.  Imagine if our courts always sided with individuals of a certain ethnic background, and our police were unable to enforce the law.  What purpose would our judicial system serve?  The country would fall back on vigilantism, and the people would make and apply their own rules as they saw fit.  The "law" would cease to be relevant.



Hence the somewhat anarchic system of international relations. The concept of aggressive war isn't really absurd, it's similar to an assault case - if you strike first, you're generally in the wrong. All war, I would think, is aggressive war insofar as one side must always strike first. Thus if things worked like they're supposed to, anyone who strikes first would be charged and rightfully so. If politicians (and/or senior officers) were likely to suffer personal punishment as a result of waging aggressive war, I dare say they'd be less likely to engage in it (I'm not saying it's a 100% deterrent, but it would certainly help). 



> Bull.  Sure, "we" have to be consistant, but we don't have to follow all the rules that we set.  A police officer has the right to search you if he beleives you may be violating the law.  The ETF reserves the right to break down your doors and charge your house with weapons drawn.  Yet we do not give the same rights to the average citizen.  The body in power will always give itself powers which those it proposes to regulate do not have, and the same rules apply on the global level.  Beleiving otherwise is delusional at best.  So the only thing that "we" have to do is ensure that we have good cause when we invade another country.  Wether the rest of the world agrees or not is irrelevant, although it's a good idea to seek the advice and support of other global powers.



Why wouldn't we have to follow the rules that we set? Are we above our own laws? The police officer searching the home is subject to the same laws as the searchee and regulation, oversight, and review. The searchee has an avenue for appeal and grievance. We cannot reasonably claim ourselves to be justified in executing any action against another state (except in rare circumstances - IE genocide, humanitarian intervention, aggressive war - which incidentally are identified by the UN as the few occasions justifying force) unless we submit to a higher authority for review and, if needs be, punishment. Otherwise we're just the self-appointed dictator, which hardly jives with our "yay yay democracy" tripe that we pour on everyone everytime we're looking for an excuse to do something. 

Who is to determine what constitutes sufficient cause for invasion? The invader? It's completely unreasonable and in complete defiance of our society's principles. We are not the judge, jury, and executioner of the Earth, self-appointed by virtue of our belief in our own moral superiority. If we're going to behave like it, we need to shut up about democracy, liberty, the rule of law, etc. and openly admit that we're nothing more than self-interested, self-righteous twinks with no more legitimacy or morality than the people we're busy pointing fingers at. I'd be far happier knowing that we're not trying to hide it through some pathetic propagandistic veil that's not fooling anyone but ourselves and those few poor souls ignorant enough to buy what we're selling because they're starving and desperate.  

Don't get me wrong, I believe in democracy, the rule of law, and all that glorious stuff but advancing it unilaterally, unequally, from the end of gun, and with no regard for the ideals we're supposed to live by is not the right way to go about it. 



			
				TCBF said:
			
		

> "I'm a big boy now and I'm quite capable of brainwashing myself, ..."
> 
> - Rather successfully, too, evidently.
> 
> ;D



Hey now, no more than you or anyone else.  ^-^



			
				Clément Barbeau Vermet said:
			
		

> Then ALL wars are ''illegal wars'' because one country has to start the war so their can be a war.



All wars are illegal insofar as one side is waging aggressive war, yes. The defending or intervening parties are not criminal since they didn't initiate. See my response to 48's points for more. Everyone has a right to defend themselves or intervene on behalf of an illegally attacked party but states have no more legitimate justification in agression as I do in kicking in my neighbour's door and hacking his head off with a lawnmower blade because I don't like the way he minds his garden.


----------



## TCBF (10 Jan 2006)

"Hey now, no more than you or anyone else."

- Fair comment. 

Tom


----------



## Brad Sallows (10 Jan 2006)

>admit that we're nothing more than self-interested, self-righteous twinks with no more legitimacy or morality than the people we're busy pointing fingers at.

Morally speaking, intentions count as well as actions.  It is entirely possible for us to wage aggressive war for reasons which place us morally on a higher plane than others who wage aggressive war.


----------



## TangoTwoBravo (10 Jan 2006)

"_Inter arma silent leges_: in time of war the law is silent."

I had to raid my basement bookshelves to find the latin version of this quote (quite a feat, after five moves), which was one of the few lines I remembered from the course.  The author of the book would disagree with me, but I tend to agree with the spirit of the quote.  "International law" is, to me, somewhat of a mirage when it comes to war (remember Lisa Simpson and her model UN charter in the Lord of the Flies episode?  ;D ).  I should add that about 95% of my fellow students and my professor vehemently disagreed with me on these points.  

My own belief is that we can certainly try to regulate the conduct of war (treatment of prisoners, civilians etc), but that efforts to "criminalize" the act of war itself are futile.  States will do must states think they must do and then live with the consequences of their action or inaction.  Your aggressive war is my pre-emptive strike.

Cheers,

2B


----------



## Kilo_302 (11 Jan 2006)

> 2 million vietnamese probably WERE killed as a result of the war, however, a good chunk of that number was a result of NVA actions AFTER the US left.  Seems the communist government that took over didn't much like free thinkers, scholars, and disidents.  Big surprise there.



The figures I quoted were from the time that American forces were in theatre, not after they left. It seems that I could say anything, backed up by facts, and you would argue with it because it spoils your romantic notion of war.


----------



## 48Highlander (11 Jan 2006)

Kilo_302 said:
			
		

> The figures I quoted were from the time that American forces were in theatre, not after they left. It seems that I could say anything, backed up by facts, and you would argue with it because it spoils your romantic notion of war.



It's become evident over your last 18 posts that you're a weee bit of a conspiracy theorist, so you'll forgive me if I take your "facts" with a grain of salt.

Even assuming 2 million Vietnamese civilians did die while the US was in theater, you'd be hard pressed to show it was as a result of US actions.  You'd also have a hard time showing that the majority of those deaths wouldn't have occured wehter or not the US was there.


----------



## zipperhead_cop (11 Jan 2006)

I feel the pretense for GW2 should have been better tricked out in the way of the sell job and PR.  The WMD angle proved to be too thin and each of the countries that refused to support a UN mandate probably had their own intel that told them the US was floating a red herring.  Unfortunately, simply stating the obvious and necessity of going in would not have carried the day.
But none the less, it is a righteous war.  Whether or not the States should have acted on its own is only a point of international law.  The fact is that Iraq was for years in blatant contravention of the cease fire agreements and should have been subject to whatever pounding they were asking for.  What was the option?  To ignore Iraq and let  Saddam continue to do whatever he and his psycho kids wanted to?  Continue to let Iraq be a training camp for terrorists, and give cash money to the family of suicide bombers in Palestine?  After 9-11 the States had to get their sh_t sorted out in a hurry and get a grip, or there would have been plenty more terrorist actions within their borders.  Stomping on Afghanistan was a good start, but they had to sort out the other countries that had institutional support of Islamic terrorism.  There were lots to choose from, but Iraq was the easy choice.  Been there already, pussy military that will cave in a heartbeat, lots of oil to pay back some of the huge cost of going in and cleaning house.  
It was also a useful gesture to show that the United States will act against any sh_trag anywhere it wants to without the UN's blessing.  People bitch that they have appointed themselves the "World Police" but I say they got the position by default.  It could be a topic of much debate, but if the US had sat on it's hands on Iraq and let them again get away with ignoring the UN resolutions, what do we thing that North Korea would be doing right now?  Or Iran?  Or Syria and Jordan?  Maybe the war on terror is a shooting war now, but inaction only emboldens these groups and creates an atmosphere of invincibility (also no doubt arguable, but I believe it).  
If the UN had some teeth/balls then it would not have had to come to this.  Their adopting the "haha we told you so" attitude with Iraq will cost money in the long run to the US, but it will bite them in the ass when the oil tankers are steaming into Texas, with Euro gas at $3.50/l and ours holding at $1.00.

And if you want war stats, baby I got war stats!

http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/warstat2.htm

Enjoy!


----------



## Glorified Ape (11 Jan 2006)

Brad Sallows said:
			
		

> >admit that we're nothing more than self-interested, self-righteous twinks with no more legitimacy or morality than the people we're busy pointing fingers at.
> 
> Morally speaking, intentions count as well as actions.  It is entirely possible for us to wage aggressive war for reasons which place us morally on a higher plane than others who wage aggressive war.



By our own standards? Sure. But that's not really very impressive - I'm pretty good at justifying things to myself when I want them, too. If I tried hard enough, I could probably justify robbing a bank to myself as stimulating the local economy as long as  the money I steal gets spent in local businesses. As for intentions, one can always claim lofty, sweet ambitions but when one's behaviour and one's incessantly espoused values clash, intentions are suspect. 



			
				2Bravo said:
			
		

> My own belief is that we can certainly try to regulate the conduct of war (treatment of prisoners, civilians etc), but that efforts to "criminalize" the act of war itself are futile.  States will do must states think they must do and then live with the consequences of their action or inaction.  Your aggressive war is my pre-emptive strike.
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> 2B



We didn't take the same approach to Germany when trying its leaders. I'm not referring to the crimes against humanity angle, but the charges of aggression. 



			
				zipperhead_cop said:
			
		

> If the UN had some teeth/balls then it would not have had to come to this.  Their adopting the "haha we told you so" attitude with Iraq will cost money in the long run to the US, but it will bite them in the *** when the oil tankers are steaming into Texas, with Euro gas at $3.50/l and ours holding at $1.00.



That's really what it comes down to, isn't it? That's a perfect example of what I meant regarding real vs. claimed intent. 

I agree that the UN needs "teeth and balls" but their lack thereof is a function of (amongst other things) the Security Council neutering them whenever it doesn't fit the interests of the SC. 



> 2 million



From what I've read, the 2 million figure is accurate but I seriously doubt that all of those deaths can be attributed to the US. I think the 2 million figure is a total for the entire conflict, likely including the Vietnamese killed by the North.


----------



## Kilo_302 (11 Jan 2006)

Well the 2 million casualty estimate is exactly that - an estimate. There is information that suggests casualties were as high as 4 million, so when I say 2 million died in Vietnam it is because that figure has been academically accepted since the war's end in 1975. However, that does not mean that it is a bit on the low side Obviously not all these casualties were inflicted by the US, but considering only one side conducted massive strategic air raids, and used air power rather indiscriminately it is a sure thing that most casualties were. I think it would also be easy to prove that these casualties would not have occurred if the US had not intervened. Without a US intervention, the North would have won by the mid-60s at the absolute latest. ARVN troops were under-equipped without US kit, and remained unmotivated throughout the war. The South only existed because the US supported it. By the late 60s, nearly its entire economy was based on having a half million US soldiers based there. Bars, prostitution, etc were its biggest generators of income. Its clear that without any US intervention, the French would have left anyways, because they could not afford to stay, and the North would have united the country by 1965 at the latest. As for casualties, most of the Vietnamese in the South would have supported the North, Ho Chi Minh was a nationalist first, not a communist. If the South had collapsed by 1965 (I think this would have happened much earlier, but we will say 1965 for arguments sake) Vietnamese casualties in total would have been well under 600,000, as most of the 2-4 million who actually died did so after 1969.


----------



## Brad Sallows (11 Jan 2006)

What makes you so certain the North Vietnamese might not have murdered a couple of million people after successfully concluding a military campaign in the mid-'60s?  Re-education can be an arduous and painful process.


----------



## Fishbone Jones (11 Jan 2006)

Brad Sallows said:
			
		

> What makes you so certain the North Vietnamese might not have murdered a couple of million people after successfully concluding a military campaign in the mid-'60s? * Re-education can be an arduous and painful process.*



Yup. Just ask Pol Pot, ooops he's dead. You can still ask Brother Number 2, Nuon Chea, or Khieu Samphan, President of the Khmer Rouge.


----------



## zipperhead_cop (12 Jan 2006)

Kilo_302 said:
			
		

> I think it would also be easy to prove that these casualties would not have occurred if the US had not intervened. Without a US intervention, the North would have won by the mid-60s at the absolute latest. ARVN troops were under-equipped without US kit, and remained unmotivated throughout the war. The South only existed because the US supported it.



What do you think they were doing there???  Burning off old ordinance?  Conducting an extended field exercise?  Has everyone forgotten Ivan the Red Commie Dog so quickly.  Viet Nam was an extension of the Cold War and a demonstration to the Soviets that the US would not sit idly by and let an area get annexed by a communist regime.  Of course the French were pulling out.  It was a shooting war.  How are they supposed to conduct a shooting war without proper lines of retreat and sufficient white flags?  They were totally unprepared.



			
				Kilo_302 said:
			
		

> By the late 60s, nearly its entire economy was based on having a half million US soldiers based there. Bars, prostitution, etc were its biggest generators of income.


Sounds like Windsor, so whats wrong with that? ;D


----------



## combatcamera (12 Jan 2006)

48Highlander said:
			
		

> Here's the entirety of his contribution to this thread:
> 
> Great eh?  Looks like Combat Camera is about as usefull and informative on these forums as it is when they publish articles.



48Highlander,

Read all about me:  http://www.frankhudec.ca/CHRONICLE_JOURNAL.htm  Like Tom, I'm from Thunder Bay too.  Been to Israel and the Middle East and a few other places as well .....


----------



## GO!!! (12 Jan 2006)

combatcamera said:
			
		

> 48Highlander,
> 
> Read all about me:  http://www.frankhudec.ca/CHRONICLE_JOURNAL.htm  Like Tom, I'm from Thunder Bay too.  Been to Israel and the Middle East and a few other places as well .....



I have to say, I've met a number of people who are egotistical about their employment in the CF, some with good reason, but an Air Force Photographer takes the cake. Who do you think you are?

<Edited upon cooling off>


----------



## combatcamera (12 Jan 2006)

Thanks for that GO!!!

Actually, I worked with Garth in Burma in 1996.  No ego here.  Just telling you what I've done.  No BS either.  I was already a 3RCR Sgt in Anti-Armour Platoon  when I remustered to photo in Germany in 1991, and I'm glad  I don't walk around with blinders on like some here do in their views about our professional military - though I've met a few anal-types in my travels.  That's really quite sad for a guy like you - 921 posts and all.


----------



## muskrat89 (12 Jan 2006)

GO!! Re-read the Conduct Guidelines, particularly the "respect between users" section. Maybe it was just the way I read it, but I wasn't feeling a whole lot of respect, right there.

You're a switched-on dude, well-spoken, and have the benefit of real experience to back up a lot of your opinions. There's no need to use the 12-pound sledge every time you make a post, particularly when a tack-hammer would suffice.

Thanks in advance


----------



## combatcamera (12 Jan 2006)

GO!!! said:
			
		

> I have to say, I've met a number of people who are egotistical about their employment in the CF, some with good reason, but an Air Force Photographer takes the cake. Who do you think you are?
> 
> <Edited upon cooling off>



No problems.  Already forgotten.  

Here's what I do in my job:  http://www.combatcamera.forces.gc.ca/netpub/server.np?find&defaultjoin=and&field=Keywords&op=contains&value=+&field=Description&op=contains&value=hudec&site=combatcamera&catalog=photos&template=results_e.np&sorton=IPTC%20-%20DateCreated&ascending=0

Like I said on another thread, we get to work on operations with all three branches of the Forces, which I appreciate and respect.


----------

