Here is a DailyMail link from Google news search.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1110212/Israel-drops-leaflets-Gaza-warning-civilians-escalation-violence.html

Speaking of Israel dropping leaflets, check this awesomeness out. I wish I could be that self-possessed.

I’m trying to decide whether that’s because the libruhl medya refuses to recognize how terribly concerned Israel is about Palestinian safety, or whether only those sources were willing to dignify that ludicrous sentiment by reporting it.

It might be that FOX News, due to their ideology, is granted easier entree into this conflict, and can therefore report on more details?

I don’t think there is any “safe” place from airstrikes in a place about twice the size of D.C. and much more densely populated. Which is why this is a horrible strategy.

The strategy is only horrible if it is designed to a) stop the occasionally deadly nuisance of the rocket attacks and b) lead to a peaceful solution.

The strategy is a smashing success if it is designed to a) kill and demoralize the residents of Gaza; b) further radicalize the same, driving them further into the arms of Hamas, which will c) make Hamas even more determined and militant, which will d) make them convenient targets for even more heavy-handed collective punishment.  The endgame, of course, is to clear “Eretz Yisrael” of the Arab infestation so that the Israelis can extend their Lebensraum into those God-promised ancient lands.  As long as our corporate media continue to carry water for the right-wing Zionists, I think the completion of the ethnic cleansing from tiny Gaza is just a bit of time away.

If ethnic cleansing is the goal, why remove the “settlers” to begin with?

Hell, why is 20% of the population in Israeli proper Arab?

I know you didn’t want to focus on the FOX News link thing, but I thought I might hypothesize about why FOX News stories come up first so frequently in search engines. They pay for a service that places anything from FOX News first when some searches for a current event. So when you put in a search for something like the Israel/Hamas conflict, FOX News resources come up first. I don’t know the name of the service, but I’ve heard it advertised on the radio, and FOX News is mentioned as a customer.

Anywho, I think “war on terrorism” is the most counterproductive thing ever. Terrorism is unique in that there’s not that much of a difference between terrorists and the people who are killed by military in retaliation. They’re both civilians, and bombing civilians, purposely or unintentionally, only creates more sympathizers for the terrorists. Diplomacy is key in combating terrorism (and probably preventing terrorism, too).

A couple of weeks ago on Meet the Press, someone Israel official person (I don’t know her title, but she wasn’t just some random person) said something along the lines of “The Palestinians should blame Hamas for any Palestinian deaths during this conflict because Hamas is a terrorist organization and they started this.” That might make sense on paper, but people who just got blown up or watched their family members get blown up don’t think that way. They’re going to, rightfully, blame the people who dropped the bomb on them and their loved ones. Furthermore, such a statement totally undermines democracy. The Palestinians voted in Hamas. If Israel and the US don’t like it, tough shit. And if Israel thinks civilian casualties are justifiable because the Palestinians exercised their right to vote a terrorist organization into power, then that’s highly insulting and undemocratic.

That’s just an excuse, though. “You should blame Hamas.” The Israelis are in charge of their weaposn and actions. However, they’re not paying the price in lives—-the Palestinians are. Basically they’re telling the Palestinians, “Look what you made us do.”

If ethnic cleansing is the goal, why remove the “settlers” to begin with?

The number of settlers removed was considered miniscule in comparison to the opportunity to close off Gaza at will and wreak havoc (or whatever) on the Palestinians.  Don’t conflate a lack of Israeli settlements with autonomy.  With the departure of the settlers, the Gaza Strip was converted in the world’s largest open air prison.  Somewhere Joe Arpaio sheds a tear of giddy admiration.  Furthermore, once all the Arabs are driven out (or killed), then the whole Strip will be available for Jewish resettlement. 

Hell, why is 20% of the population in Israeli proper Arab?

They are a minority, which is how the right-wing Zionists want to keep it.  Don’t forget that Israel was founded as a Jewish state.  Some of the Arab Israelis are Christian, too.  But most importantly, the Arabs in the Occupied Territories likely have far less interest in becoming Israeli citizens as they do in becoming citizens of a free Palestinian state on territory their families have lived in for generations.  That’s why they cling to the land and keep fighting.  That’s also why the right-wing Israelis want to kill them or drive them out; they have no interest in ceding the God-promised land to the Untermenschen, nor do they want the demographic and political upheaval that would come from granting all the Arabs citizenship.  Or so my Palestinian friends tell me.

on’t forget that Israel was founded as a Jewish state.

Yes, well, that was the point of Zionism. The founding of a Jewish state. Do you get outraged that Poland was founded as a Polish state? Or Slovakia as a Slovak state? Or Palestine as an Arab state? I don’t.

the Arabs in the Occupied Territories likely have far less interest in becoming Israeli citizens as they do in becoming citizens of a free Palestinian state on territory their families have lived in for generations.

The majority of Palestinians prefer a two state solution* as does the majority of Israeli Jews**.

By mistaking the most extreme and fanatical Israelis for not only the majority of Israeli opinion, but for the official policy of Israel, you make the same of those who assume that Palestinians want to carry out what the charter of Hamas calls for.

*http://www.angus-reid.com/polls/view/13292

**http://www.imemc.org/article/49290

The fantasy of having the West Bank or Gaza become part of a “greater Israel” was dropped a really long time ago except among the fanatical far-right “settler” movements. Even Likud doesn’t expect that anymore.

Someday wars will be fought by having a few guys from each side come out on horseback and run at each other with really big spears.

Just like the Middle Ages, except we’ll call it ‘Extreme Politics’ and put it on TV.  The War Channel.

Church Secretary, would it kill you to make your point without throwing around the German terminology?

What we have in the current situation is not the execution of some secret Likudnik master plan, but rather the ruling party in Israel over-reacting impulsively and miscalculating terribly—just like they did in Lebanon in the Summer War. They probably realize it now but don’t know how to back out of this without losing face and handing Hamas something they will claim is a “victory”.

1.  Virtually the entire world has come out for the 2-state solution.  The main obstacle is Hamas.  I’m guessing this explains the Israeli ground action in the northern end of Gaza; Routing Hamas leadership in Gaza City.

2.  Rockets are launched most effectively from northern Gaza, but smuggled into the south end of Gaza from Egypt, so I had supposed Israeli action would be simply to block the tunnels in the south.

3.  Most likely these 2 different goals (rockets, leadership) were compressed into one operation due to time constraints; Leadership changes in the US, the PA and Israel all coming in the beginning of 2008, and Iranian changes in June.

4.  Still, I am surprised the Israeli government is trying to replace Hamas; There isn’t much to replace it with.  If that’s what they’re doing, it could get worse before it gets better.

By mistaking the most extreme and fanatical Israelis for not only the majority of Israeli opinion, but for the official policy of Israel…

The proof of the pudding is in the eating.  I think the mistake to which you refer is being made by the ones executing Israeli “official” policy, and by that elusive majority that you imply wants something other than the “extreme and fanatical” slaughter that’s being wreaked upon Gaza right now.  If the majority of Israelis have a problem with what’s being done on their behalf, then there should be millions of Israelis in the streets protesting and bringing the country to a standstill, and there should be thousands of IDF soldiers refusing to fight.  I don’t see that happening, do you?  Hm?  Didn’t think so.

The majority of Palestinians prefer a two state solution* as does the majority of Israeli Jews.

It is obvious that the majority of Palestinians want their own state; why else would they put up with the daily and never-ending depradations brought on them by the occupying power Israel?  If having their own state were no big deal, I imagine they’d all have left by now instead of staying and fighting.  As for the Israelis, I’m sure many of them might say they prefer a two-state solution, but as long as their slow motion ethnic cleansing agenda meets with no international (read: U.S.) opposition, I doubt they’ll raise a significant fuss as long as the ‘facts on the ground’ continue to slog towards the Arab-lite dream of Eretz Yisrael.  Our Senate’s recent official attaboy to the massacre doesn’t bode well for the residents of Gaza.

...would it kill you to make your point without throwing around the German terminology?

Perhaps not, but the historical irony is too appetizing to leave on the platter.  As a keen historical philosopher once said (and I paraphrase), every time history repeats itself, the price tag goes up.  As long as hundreds of helpless people (including hundreds of children) are being slaughtered needlessly by a nation that should know better, Godwin can go fuck himself.

What we have in the current situation is not the execution of some secret Likudnik master plan..

It’s not a secret to anyone who’s been paying attention (without pro-Zionist filters on, that is).  The current ‘offensive’ was on the drawing board long before Israel broke the ceasefire with an incursion into Gaza.  And if we want to talk about the urgency of stopping the rocket attacks, consider two facts:  since the slaughter began, 1) the rocket attacks have increased, and 2) more Israeli civilians have died from car accidents than from the rockets.  What was the point of this again?

Actually, Ben D., I agree with you wholeheartedly on one point: this is a tremendous miscalculation by the Israeli government if they think it will drive the Palestinians out or make Israel more secure.  If Israel doesn’t stop its heavy-handed behavior and start working toward respect for international law (i.e. ending the occupation), then it will wind up fulfilling the prediction of Ayatollah Khomeini (which was quoted once or twice by Mahmoud Ahmadinejad who was in turn cynically misquoted by every pro-Zionist pundit and reporter in the world): “the occupation regime over Jerusalem should vanish from the page of time.”  In other words, for its own sake Israel must stop acting like it can get away with murder.  And we here in the U.S. should understand that we will not get away with being Israel’s accomplices.  It will eventually come back on us, and we’ll have earned it.

Most of the heavy damage is caused by using aircraft and artillery to bombard smuggling tunnels, police stations (to encourage peace) and rocket parks connected with the long-term infrastructural development of long-range rockets, and the use of troops to root out the developed guerilla infrastructure of Hamas.  In short, it is NOT the Kassams which are the main issue, but a last-ditch attempt to prevent Hamas from becoming a lean, mean, kidnapping-soldiers-with-impunity, Zelzal missiles-on-Tel-Aviv strategic existential threat of the type Hezbollah became between 2000 and 2006.  If not for the expansion of Hamas’s capacities (to Gedera and beyond) a tried-and-true reoccupation and police action of the type carried out in 1970 by Ariel Sharon would have sufficed.  Again, a prime example of the insoluble strategic dilemma caused by the the junction of rocket, tunnel, kidnapping, guerilla and civilian.  Can’t understand why Hamas supporters aren’t happier, they’re getting what they want.

Did you ever consider that the purpose of US aid to Israel is to keep a US ally threatened by other ostensible US allies on a tight leash?

Besides, the German expression used by CS was “lebensraum”.  In the context of the Israeli occupation - with the settlements - it’s just way, way too apt *not* to use.

Piator thinks Israel=Nazis.  Am I right in thinking that Piator (“Phoenician”) is Syrian Socialist Nationalist Party, or a Lebanese Phalangist, one of the two groups in the Middle East possessing a “Phoenician” identity most drawn to such comparisons?  Your words have meaning too, to those who know the region.

As for me, I’m a Jerusalemite now of US citizenship who attended the European school.  Some of us were Jerusalemites long before the British came and were living with each other long before the State of Israel and the Kingdom of Jordan—mainly Jordan, in the case of the Orthodox Jews of the Old City—decided to come to us and make us Haganah, Arab Legion, Israelis, Palestinians, Machteret, Hamas.

If having their own state were no big deal, I imagine they’d all have left by now instead of staying and fighting.

Many have tried. Unfortunately, there isn’t a country in the world that will let them in.

Bear in mind that I think that Levantine identity began dying out out about 1913 (publication of al-Falastin) for the Arabs and 1917 (Balfour Declaration) for the Jews.  By 1938, the absolutist claims had hardened, by 1948-9 the Jerusalemites on the “wrong” side, of whichever religion, were sent into mutually-agreed-upon Exile, out of their Homeland, to their State (Israel/Jordan) on the other side of the line.  But perhaps this is a bit too nebulous, certainly, for those who regard Jews as a European people, and project onto Israel Europe’s monstrosities.

it’s just way, way too apt *not* to use.

It’s about as insightful as ranting about AmeriKKKa. But if it makes you feel clever, well, then I guess it makes you feel clever.

By mistaking the most extreme and fanatical Israelis for not only the majority of Israeli opinion, but for the official policy of Israel

Well, the far-right extremists aren’t the majority of Israelis, but they do set the official policy. Likud runs the government right now. And it wasn’t that long ago that the war criminal Ariel Sharon was in charge, a man who had personally murdered Palestinian civilians.

It’s about as insightful as ranting about AmeriKKKa.

Well, the KKK is no longer a significant political force in America. But what’s the effective difference between Lebensraum and refusal to comply with UNSCR 242?

I mean, the word bothers me too, because I know most Israelis just want to live their lives and don’t imagine that their apathy is part of the problem. They don’t feel like what they imagine Nazis must have felt like. But I can’t say the comparison is not insightful.

Eurosabra, after this comment of yours,

C’mon, people, be honest—you want a sovereign state denied its right to reply to attacks against its civilian population.

you’re never going to be taken seriously. Just wouldn’t want to see you wasting your time.

Yes, well, that was the point of Zionism. The founding of a Jewish state. Do you get outraged that Poland was founded as a Polish state? Or Slovakia as a Slovak state? Or Palestine as an Arab state? I don’t.

I have a problem with stealing land from already-settled peoples in order to found a state. Israel wasn’t already there and full of Jews when the Zionist program began.

The establishment of the United States was wrong for the same reasons. Neither the US nor Israel is going away. But let’s not whitewash the past.

The problem with the use of Nazi terminology is not its application to this situation. The problem is the way most people look at Nazi-era Germany.

As we’ve gotten farther and farther away from that period of history, it’s become easier to look at the citizens of Nazi Germany as if they were either monsters or somehow spellbound and not in control of their own thoughts or actions. We convince ourselves that it took a special set of circumstances, a defect inherent to only one group of people, an unimaginably unlikely confluence of events in order to produce such a nightmare. We feel secure in the knowledge that no one we know or care about would ever behave in such a fashion, ever embrace something so revolting. We know deep in our souls that we could never allow ourselves to support something so horrible. Our resolve is so firm that even when it’s happening, we convince ourselves that it is not.

We have narrowed the definition of fascism, of atrocity, to one period of history and one country. The end result is that most people won’t call it fascism unless it’s wearing a black uniform and goosestepping while singing the Horst Wessel Lied. Naturally, the modern fascist will take advantage of this and avoid all of the cosmetic trappings of fascism while embracing all of the policies and tactics of fascism. And, in the interest of continuing to believe that we could never be a part of it, we obligingly ignore the flimsy disguise. We pretend that the citizens of Nazi Germany were all either slavering beasts or brainwashed drones and, finding neither of these around us, believe that there’s no danger. We’ve rewritten history in a pathetic attempt to wall ourselves off from an unpleasant aspect of human society. We refuse to look the thing right in the eye and name it for what it is because looking it in the eye requires that we first look in the mirror.

Good point, Skullhunter, and one that I am always making whenever I see Disco Ball-forsaken references to Godwin whenever someone makes an apt comparison to Germany under the 3rd Reich.  The vast majority of Germans of the time weren’t committed Nazis, but they followed the program either enthusiastically or passively right to the bitter end.  They, and many of their Nazi countrymen, were otherwise ordinary people (read Hannah Arendt and Milton Mayer for more on this).  Likewise, as asdf says, the overwhelming majority of Israelis are either apathetic about the fate of Palestinians or are hostile to their very existence.  It shows not only in the continuation and solidification of the occupation, but in the behaviors exhibited both in the daily course of the occupation and in the occasional military attacks on Palestinians.

The Palestinian Arabs, on the other hand, have far fewer options from which to choose.  Their legitimate claims and grievances have been all but ignored and abandoned by the same ‘international community’ that bows to the wishes of the U.S. in giving Israel a blank check to do what would surely get other nations blacklisted and sanctioned (bombing neighbors, possessing illegal nukes, assassinations, illegal occupations, etc.) if not worse.  We can rightly condemn the homemade rocket fire and the Hamas’ blustery rhetoric of elimination, but the facts are that the Palestinians can do nothing right.  When Hamas chose the democratic route, they were rebuffed and assaulted by Israel and the U.S.  When Hamas stops shooting and agrees to talks, the Israelis find an excuse to attack them and claim that Hamas broke the truce.  Hamas is painted as a gang of savage reactionaries with whom no negotiation is possible.  But if they lay down all their weapons—ineffective as they might be—it won’t make a difference.  Israel will still find an excuse to keep humiliating and assaulting the residents of Gaza until they leave or die of exhaustion.  They want that land free of Palestinian Arabs, and no one is standing in their way but Hamas and the Palestinian Arabs.

Again, a prime example of the insoluble strategic dilemma caused by the the junction of rocket, tunnel, kidnapping, guerilla and civilian.  Can’t understand why Hamas supporters aren’t happier, they’re getting what they want.

Yeah, the Hamas supporters are getting exactly what they want. Personally, I’ve always wanted my area to be starved of fuel and food for about two years so that everyone there feels really desperate, then indiscriminantly bombed from the air, and then invaded by tanks and soldiers who want to eradicate the local government.

Oh, and if someone could order about 300 children to gather in a school for their own safety, and then destroy the school by shelling it with a tank, that would be awesome.

Am I right in thinking that Piator (“Phoenician”) is Syrian Socialist Nationalist Party, or a Lebanese Phalangist, one of the two groups in the Middle East possessing a “Phoenician” identity most drawn to such comparisons?

No.

1.  Virtually the entire world has come out for the 2-state solution. The main obstacle is Hamas.

We would love a Palestinian state. But of course, not if the Palestinians ran it. Maybe we could just throw out the Palestinians and import some Swedes. Would that work for everyone?

Asdf,

Why would I care what someone who can’t tell the difference between Likud and Kadima, and remember which party is in power, thinks?  The fact is that many, many Israelis of various religions are mobilized against the Occupation, in a highly-developed civil society, but “people power” is too diffuse and the state is centralized and Jacobin enough that it would take disobedience by the security forces or a top-down change in policy to alter the military response.  Lebanon 1982 proved that changing out of uniform to demonstrate against the war doesn’t work, while the Black Panthers proved that fighting the police in the street doesn’t work.  There IS an extra-parliamentary-opposition mainly composed of small Palestinian-Israeli-Arab parties who don’t want to sit in the parliament of a “Jewish and democratic state” and NGOs, and the Israeli Islamic Movement, which has been fairly well-behaved and DOES have a party, Ta’al, in parliament, as a shared framework with other non-Islamist Israeli-Palestinian parties, so that they can’t be called a front for terror.  Nonetheless, Ta’al did meet with Hamas, so I guess you can call that inter-governmental contacts of a sort.

What scares me is the idea that “Israel=Nazi” know-nothings like you might have power over Israelis, of any religion, culture, and language.

There was a 1000-person demo in Jaffa against the bombing the first night of the war, complete with Palestinian flags.  There was another in Tel Aviv.

Eurosabra, after this comment of yours,

“C’mon, people, be honest—you want a sovereign state denied its right to reply to attacks against its civilian population.”

you’re never going to be taken seriously. Just wouldn’t want to see you wasting your time.

I have heard tales of something called, if memory serves, “the stick rule.”  Is that applicable here, with Eurosabra?

I don’t think we’re there yet, with Eurosabra. Ze has knowledge of the situation, even if that knowledge leads hir to some really odd conclusions.

Eurosabra, can you help me ratify the internal inconsistencies with arguing that “[we] want a sovereign state denied its right to reply to attacks against its civilian population” and bragging about the fact that “[t]here was a 1000-person demo in Jaffa against the bombing the first night of the war, complete with Palestinian flags”?

But with your second point, you indeed have a point. One of the myriad reasons Israel is not like Nazi Germany is that it’s not a totalitarian state. When we talk about the complicity of German citizens, we’re forgetting what happened to those who did speak out against the government. That, as far as I know, is not the case in Israel, which leads me to the obvious response to Eurosabra’s claim about the demonstrations in Jaffa and Tel Aviv:

“Only 1000 people? That’s pretty sad. That’s, like, United States-level complicity.”

Because although we could argue for days about the relative evil of bombing Gaza versus the kinds of things America gets up to, the truth is that just because Americans can’t see it doesn’t mean that we’re not exactly as complicit as an Israeli is. I’m speaking out against Israel’s actions the way I speak out against the US’. It’s just that the crisis in Gaza is even more acute than the still-acute situation in Iraq.

None of that changes the point, Eurosabra, that you’re arguing from a disingenuous position based on your own comments.

Well, this just in: once again, the U.S. demonstrates its willingness to remain an honest, even-handed arbiter for peace in the Middle East.

Yeesh.

Well, this just in: once again, the U.S. demonstrates its willingness to remain an honest, even-handed arbiter for peace in the Middle East.

Yeesh.

Oh god….yeah, THAT’S what the problem is.  Israel isn’t well-armed enough.

Damn. Speaking of US complicity.

Auguste, the existential fear of speaking out against the Nazis in Germany didn’t develop overnight.  It took years of enthusiastic support and willful (if often apathetic) compliance on the part of the overwhelming majority of German citizens to reach a point where the Nazis and their adherents could rule Germany with an iron fist.  In other words, early on the iron fist was a popular iron fist.  It wasn’t until the Nazis had exhausted their supply of fashionable scapegoats that the German people had to face the reality that they were victims of their own making.

At this point I agree with you, sort of.  Israel is not like Nazi Germany, because though the enemy in this case is one of their own creation (on multiple levels, but most pointedly regarding Hamas), even the ‘defeat’ (i.e. extermination/eradication) of the Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank is not likely to immediately turn Israel into a police state that turns on its own a la Nazi Germany.  But though Israel is not currently a totalitarian state toward its own citizens, roughly half the people currently under Israeli control have no vote, no representation, and no enforceable human rights.  So to those people Israel is worse than a totalitarian state.  And who knows what will happen to Israel if it manages to complete its mission of eradicating the Arab infestation of Eretz Yisrael?  Maybe the Jewish Israelis will then turn on their own Arab population, then maybe they’ll have a civil war over who’s sufficiently Jewish and who isn’t.

Why would I care what someone who can’t tell the difference between Likud and Kadima, and remember which party is in power, thinks?

Hah! Kadima is Likud and everyone knows it. Too many crimes against humanity and they had to rebrand. Plus as the population has become more extremist, Kadima presents an opportunity for those who’ve drifted right to join Likud while pretending to pursue a “third way.” Why should I go along with the rebranding? Likud runs the country.

Beyond that, you’re confusing me with Church Secretary. I don’t believe that the conspicuous lack of a grassroots Israeli resistance means that everyone wants the Palestinians exterminated. I do think that it means that most just plain don’t give a shit about Palestinian lives. Just like your average red-state American isn’t writing letters to his congressman saying “kill all the Iraqis,” but wouldn’t shed a tear if we dropped nuclear bombs on every Iraqi city.

Piator thinks Israel=Nazis.

“Lebensraum” is a German word.  It refers to specific policies of the early Nazi era.

If there are comparisons between these particular policies and some of teh policies of Israel, that does not make Israelis Nazis.  It should, however, give them pause and suggest reassessment.

Or, you know, you can always scream “anti-Semetism” rather than deal with your country’s territorial expansion and ethnic cleansing.

If Israel doesn’t stop its heavy-handed behavior and start working toward respect for international law (i.e. ending the occupation), then it will wind up fulfilling the prediction of Ayatollah Khomeini (which was quoted once or twice by Mahmoud Ahmadinejad who was in turn cynically misquoted by every pro-Zionist pundit and reporter in the world): “the occupation regime over Jerusalem should vanish from the page of time.”

There won’t be any Palestinian state, either, then. If no solution is reached within the next few decades what was Israel and Palestinian will be an irradiated wasteland, because eventually it will escalate to that point. At that point, it won’t really matter who is to blame for what.

I hope it doesn’t come to that, and that at some point there are enough people on both sides that realize they’re not going to get rid of eachother and are going to have to share the land along the lines of the Arab Peace Initiative. Of course Jordan and Egypt should have set up a Palestinian state sometime between 1948 and 1967 when *they* occupied the land, but didn’t, but I digress.

And, yes, Kadima is just a re-branded Likud. The New Coke of extremist Israeli nationalism.

CS, I agree with somewhere between 80 percent and 90 percent of what you’re saying, and I don’t particularly feel like arguing about most of my points of disagreement. My appetite these days for defending anything connected with Israeli policy is about nil, and the distinctions I would make would make not one whit of difference to the people being shelled right now.

And I agree with Skullhunter that we tend to use Nazi in a way that nothing that is happening today could possibly be “as bad.”

But I don’t think talk of Untermenschen sheds any light on the situation, any more than references to Nazi ideology shed light on the U.S. involvement in Iraq or the British in Northern Ireland. One, I’m actually not a big fan of the whole “history repeats itself” thing. Which is not to say that there are not lessons to be learned from history, ones most people choose to ignore. There certainly are. But it’s really facile to transplant events from one set of historical, cultural and political circumstances onto another and declare them the same. And the point you seem to be making extends far beyond the complicity of an apathetic public in war crimes (a point on which I would agree with you). You seem to think that Israel’s existence depends on a belief in Jewish racial superiority and purity, and I disagree. And because I don’t think your comparison is accurate, I think you throwing around Nazi terminology is obnoxious. No, I’m not Godwining you and I’m not calling you an anti-Semite. I’m saying only what I’m saying, which is that I think it’s obnoxious.

Or, you know, you can always scream “anti-Semetism” rather than deal with your country’s territorial expansion and ethnic cleansing.

No one called anyone an anti-Semite. An attack on Israeli policy is not anti-Semitism. A criticism of your argument is not an accusation of anti-Semitism.

Um, I’m pretty sure Eurosabra called Piator an anti-Semite, but in coded language. Certainly the SSNP is often identified as anti-semitic.

Speaking of Israel, the U.S., and Iran, this story (http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/meast/01/11/iran.israel.nuclear/index.html) is certainly interesting!

It’s because I think that strikes against the larger weapons tunnels and stockpiles, in those videos from the first couple days, were a fairly reasonable move, given that Hamas wants to evolve like Hezbollah, and have tens of thousands of factory-made fairly-long-range rockets.  While such a response might kill tens of civilians, it would not kill hundreds, and it might have been an effective enough reply.  Israel is “going big” as a gamble to forestall a situation of permanent insecurity in the South which Hezbollah has already made a fait accompli in the North, assuming that restraint now means rockets on Tel Aviv later.

Roughly 400,000 people were mobilized in one demo against the Lebanon War, it didn’t work because Israel is a Jacobin state, which means only widespread refusal within the ranks of the security apparatus is likely to work.  The first partial withdrawal in Lebanon didn’t occur until 1985, and the war dragged on.  Obviously there is a “swing vote” phenomenon where people support the war as a default, when other options are apparent they’ll do something else.

It’s because I really thought Piator’s “Phoenician” line meant zie was a Phoenician-identified Lebanese, and such people tend to angle towards the Kata’eb, or (now) Lebanese forces, whereas the SSNP is a strange bedfellow of the Lebanese who prone the Israel=Nazi line.  It was a real mess there in the 80s.

You seem to think that Israel’s existence depends on a belief in Jewish racial superiority and purity…

Au contraire, chingona.  You raise an excellent point, though.  One of the most resilient Israel debate obstacles is when pro-Israeli hawks demand that Hamas, Hezbollah, Iran, you-name-it “recognize Israel’s right to exist.”  Let’s set aside the cherry-picking of the most extreme anti-Israeli rhetoric (real or invented) for a moment, because God knows there are a lot of those cherries lying around.  If we assume that most of the Arabs living in, say, Gaza would be willing to see Israel go right on existin’ as long as they got to have an independent state of their own, and we can assume that Hamas’ demonstrated willingness to agree to ceasefires, negotiations, etc. can be counted as a concrete (i.e. reasonable actions speaking louder than belligerent words) sort of recognition, then it begs the question of just why the recognition nugget keeps coming up.

I think the key question is what kind of Israeli existence are the Arabs in the Occupied Territories expected to accept?  Conversely, per your above-quoted statement, what are the limits of “existence” that the majority of Israelis are willing to accept?  If one looks at the ‘facts on the ground’ as the Israelis have managed to create them over the decades; and if you factor in the continuing occupation, the expansion of the settlements, and the current onslaught in the Gaza Strip, then you might easily extrapolate that the “existence” the Jewish state is trying to create is one that doesn’t recognize the equal humanity of the Palestinian Arabs.  That is the flip side of “Jewish racial superiority and purity.”  Again, we’re all supposed to accept Israel’s “right to exist,” but does that right have no limits, even respecting the Palestinian Arabs’ humanity?  Do the Palestinian Arabs have any rights worth recognizing?  According to Israel’s demonstrated policies, according to the U.S. Senate, and according to the bulk of our media coverage, apparently the answer is a resounding “NO.”

Conversely, per your above-quoted statement, what are the limits of “existence” that the majority of Israelis are willing to accept?

The 1967 borders plus West Jerusalem.

I think if Hamas removed this from the charter it would go a really long way:

The Day of Judgement will not come about until Muslems fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Muslems, O Abdulla, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him. Only the Gharqad tree would not do that because it is one of the trees of the Jews

I think if Hamas removed this from the charter it would go a really long way

A long way toward what?  Ending the occupation?  Oh, I’m sorry, you were just fucking with me, right?

Right?  Because we all know that the ‘charter’ is just words, and the willingness to sit down and negotiate means that even the most cartoonishly harsh words can be made meaningless by actions—- oh, I’m just blowing the irrelevant smoke of reason here, aren’t I?  I’ll stand quietly aside now whilst you wax on with your rationalizations for justifying the slaughter in Gaza.

A long way toward what?

Towards negotiations that would lead to peace.

Hamas so far hasn’t been willing to negotiate anything except a “truce” that they themselves was merely so they could prepare for the “final battle” with the “Zionist entity”. Surely they didn’t mean what they said, though.

If it is “just words” what so difficult about removing it from the charter? I mean if they don’t really believe it as you suggest, it shouldn’t be a problem, right?

And pray tell where I defended what is going on in Gaza, because I didn’t.

I have a feeling if Israel’s Constitution said this:

The Day of Judgement will not come about until Jews fight the Arabs (killing the Arabs), when the Arab will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Jews, O servants of the LORD, there is an Arab behind me, come and kill him. Only the Gharqad tree would not do that because it is one of the trees of the Arabs.

You wouldn’t be so quick to dismiss it as “just words”.

And just what exactly does leaving that language in the Charter help Hamas if they really don’t have the destruction of Israel as their ultimate goal, and it’s all just a big misunderstanding?

If deep down inside they want peace with Israel, I fail to see how having that kind of language in their charter (and making numerous public statements supporting that belief) helps them.

History has shown that if two peoples separated by religion, language or whatever absolutely cannot share sovereignty peaceably over the same territory, either 1) one militarily defeats the other; 2) they divide up the territory in dispute; or 3) they live in a state of low-level war, perpetually threatening to explode at any minute.

It’s looking more like partition is the answer.

The only peace Hamas wants is the one described in there charter.  I hope the Israelis crush Hamas and if an opportunity comes, Hezbollah as well.  The civilian deaths are horrendous, but given the size of Gaza and the deliberate use of civilians and civilian infrastructure (schools, hospitals, and mosques), they are inevitable and Hamas wants them.

excuse me…typo correction… their charter

The only peace Hamas wants is the one described in there charter.

Are you a Hamas leader?  If not, then why do you speak for them?

Hamas have signalled a willingness to negotiate on recognising Israel.  Whether or not that is actually the case is another matter - they seem to delight in doing stupid things - but it’s an old truism that jaw-jaw is better than war-war.

There’s a comment on the perspective from Gaza here:

“The current crisis began in November of 2008 after Ismail Haniyah, political leader of Hamas in Gaza, said that Hamas was willing to accept a Palestinian state within the 1949 armistice lines, and offered Israel “a long-term truce if Israel recognized the Palestinians’ national rights.” As there was no response from Israel, Hamas allowed a six month truce with Israel to expire and began firing crude rockets from Gaza into southern Israeli towns.”

I hope the Israelis crush Hamas and if an opportunity comes, Hezbollah as well.

Think what will happen if the Israelis do that: the Palestinians in Gaza & the West Bank will just start another group that will be even more angry and violent than Hamas. The Lebanese will just hate the Israelis that much more. I mean, don’t you think?

In my opinion, the only way that could work would be if Israel exterminated every single man, woman and child in Gaza, and/or southern Lebannon, and left those areas as waste-lands. Not only do I want to keep that from happening, I think that this would be against the long-term interest of the Israeli state as well. It could lead them to embrace “The Samson Option”

Phoenician—

They said they wanted a truce to prepare for the “final battle” against the “Zionist enemy”. That’s not peace.

Again, if they’re serious about wanting a two state solution like the rest of the world, they’d amend their charter. Until then, it’s pretty safe to say they aren’t serious about it.

The problem is that the only model for a Palestinian Islamic activist organization that isn’t exclusionary or genocidal (Hamas Charter) is the Israeli Islamic Movement and its umbrella party, Ta’al, and despite meetings with Hamas, the political culture of Israeli Islamists (who have produced only 1-2 suicide bombers since 2001) hasn’t really influenced Hamas.  The situation becomes almost hallucinatory when you consider that Israeli politicos sometimes make noises about handing over majority-Israeli-Arab areas of Israel, and Israeli Islamists lobby to remain part of an Islamist opposition within Israel rather than potentially be governed by an explicitly Islamist Hamas Palestine.  So we have 21st century claims of liberal citizenship vs. the brotherhood of believers.

The other thing that happened from the early 90s was the skyrocketing (!) level of deadliness of the war on the Israeli street—from something that soldiers did, “over there”, perhaps in campaigns of imperial overreach, it became sheet-covered corpses on the suicide-bombed streets of Haifa, Hadera, Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, farmers picked off on the northern highways by moonlighting Lebanese, bored after the “liberation” of their land from the tread of Israeli soldiers, in short, a society-wide crisis that left approximately 2000 dead and 10000 wounded over two decades but *more importantly* convinced the average Israeli, who buried friends, experienced an attack, or saw neighbors die in cafés, malls, schools, banquet halls, or offices, that an organized campaign of extermination was going on.  The Separation Fence brought a slowdown of suicide bombings, and the various organizations transitioned to using rockets to maintain the tempo of harassment, wounding, and death—thus far, relatively ineffectively, if tens of dead over two years instead of hundreds is any measure.  When long-range rockets began falling, Israel decided to act, which is why peace organizations have little traction on the Israeli street right now—this is seen as the least bad choice of a range of VERY bad alternatives.

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