What is "israel"? Somebody please....?

[Nameless]

Every years, new colonies are built on Palestinian territories with palestinians being kicked off their ancestral houses and pushed further away. Every year, the humiliation continue further with agressions done by Israel to push the Palestinians to more despair from being blockaded and stolen their lands. What do you expect of that? More hate is generated, religious groups in Gaza are getting more radical and people jump in the bandwagon because they have nowhere else to look for as great international organizations such as the UN continue to either turn a blind eye to Palestine or to simply use some vetos to block the whole process.

No, there is not enough to say to describe the misery that Palestine is thrown in because of the arrogance of a Nation that has powerful lobbies in other countries.

[Beanz]

You may wish to toe the popular line and believe that things are that simplistic but no amount of hyperbole will ever describe such a complex issue. Comparing the Palestinians situation to a concentration camp or referring to it as apartheid just lets you off the hook when it comes to analyzing the facts with an open mind.

But it is and has described as much by influential scholars; Chomsky and Finklestein would readily agree with me. It is a concentration camp minus the gas chambers and moreso now that so much infrastructure has been destroyed. It was no accident and the bombing carefully targetted to wreak as much havoc with Palestinian lives as possible.

There is nothing simplistic in the fact that Gazan's are camped in and restricted by land, air and sea, they are denied basic equipment, food, or even materials to rebuild long term damaged property. You keep a populace hungry, deprived, poor and bound and what you have is a concentration camp. It is easy to end it and Israel is in control of it. All this talk of rockets is absurd when you see how Gazan's are forced to live.

It is you who deny that we can call it a concentration camp or Israel/West Bank as apartheid. It seems it is you with the closed mind on the topic.

Time to break the taboo and say what Gaza is: a concentration camp

You have quoted Arthur Silber's article. He identifies himself openly as being part of the "9/11 truth and justice movement". He does this whilst decrying both "the delusional stupid left" and "right". He is almost as big a douche as Chomsky. People in Gaza elected Hamas an organization that revels in the death of innocent civilians and uses them as human shields. The idea of martyrdom is for them a glorious concept. If you are so open minded then can you explain how they have escaped any blame? Why have you not mentioned them killing their own people yesterday and dragging their bodies around on the back of a motorcycle? Why have you not mentioned the million ton of aid given to Gaza by Israel? Why have you not mentioned the tons of weapons smuggled into Palestine for the express purpose of murdering Israeli civilians ?

Why would you suggest that a bombing campaign quite obviously aimed at military targets is AIMED at civilians? Is it because you have already decided who the bogeyman is and can not complicate things by seeing anything else? It seems that you, Brockton and Kirkland are so intent on drawing attention to the plight of Palestinian civilians that you can not countenance the idea that Israel has any right to protect it's own civilians and that Hamas and the mis goverment of Gaza is not the fault of Hamas? In an effort to appear even handed it appears that the monopoly on suffering that people accuse Jews of exercising has been inverted to blame them for everything.

The people of Gaza are often treated in Israels hospitals, they are not lined up to have their gold teeth extracted. They are not being stripped naked and asked to leave their clothes in neat piles. Their hair is not being used to fill mattresses. They are not being experimented on and injected with diseases. They are not being sent to the gas chambers. They are not living in a concentration camp or living under a system of apartheid where the colour of their skin is enough to condemn them.

[Ghost]

You may wish to toe the popular line and believe that things are that simplistic but no amount of hyperbole will ever describe such a complex issue. Comparing the Palestinians situation to a concentration camp or referring to it as apartheid just lets you off the hook when it comes to analyzing the facts with an open mind.

But it is and has described as much by influential scholars; Chomsky and Finklestein would readily agree with me. It is a concentration camp minus the gas chambers and moreso now that so much infrastructure has been destroyed. It was no accident and the bombing carefully targetted to wreak as much havoc with Palestinian lives as possible.

There is nothing simplistic in the fact that Gazan's are camped in and restricted by land, air and sea, they are denied basic equipment, food, or even materials to rebuild long term damaged property. You keep a populace hungry, deprived, poor and bound and what you have is a concentration camp. It is easy to end it and Israel is in control of it. All this talk of rockets is absurd when you see how Gazan's are forced to live.

It is you who deny that we can call it a concentration camp or Israel/West Bank as apartheid. It seems it is you with the closed mind on the topic.

Time to break the taboo and say what Gaza is: a concentration camp

You have quoted Arthur Silber's article. He identifies himself openly as being part of the "9/11 truth and justice movement". He does this whilst decrying both "the delusional stupid left" and "right". He is almost as big a douche as Chomsky. People in Gaza elected Hamas an organization that revels in the death of innocent civilians and uses them as human shields. The idea of martyrdom is for them a glorious concept. If you are so open minded then can you explain how they have escaped any blame? Why have you not mentioned them killing their own people yesterday and dragging their bodies around on the back of a motorcycle? Why have you not mentioned the million ton of aid given to Gaza by Israel? Why have you not mentioned the tons of weapons smuggled into Palestine for the express purpose of murdering Israeli civilians ?

Why would you suggest that a bombing campaign quite obviously aimed at military targets is AIMED at civilians? Is it because you have already decided who the bogeyman is and can not complicate things by seeing anything else? It seems that you, Brockton and Kirkland are so intent on drawing attention to the plight of Palestinian civilians that you can not countenance the idea that Israel has any right to protect it's own civilians and that Hamas and the mis goverment of Gaza is not the fault of Hamas? In an effort to appear even handed it appears that the monopoly on suffering that people accuse Jews of exercising has been inverted to blame them for everything.

The people of Gaza are often treated in Israels hospitals, they are not lined up to have their gold teeth extracted. They are not being stripped naked and asked to leave their clothes in neat piles. Their hair is not being used to fill mattresses. They are not being experimented on and injected with diseases. They are not being sent to the gas chambers. They are not living in a concentration camp or living under a system of apartheid where the colour of their skin is enough to condemn them.

And they don't live in England

[Kirkland Laing]

You may wish to toe the popular line and believe that things are that simplistic but no amount of hyperbole will ever describe such a complex issue. Comparing the Palestinians situation to a concentration camp or referring to it as apartheid just lets you off the hook when it comes to analyzing the facts with an open mind.

But it is and has described as much by influential scholars; Chomsky and Finklestein would readily agree with me. It is a concentration camp minus the gas chambers and moreso now that so much infrastructure has been destroyed. It was no accident and the bombing carefully targetted to wreak as much havoc with Palestinian lives as possible.

There is nothing simplistic in the fact that Gazan's are camped in and restricted by land, air and sea, they are denied basic equipment, food, or even materials to rebuild long term damaged property. You keep a populace hungry, deprived, poor and bound and what you have is a concentration camp. It is easy to end it and Israel is in control of it. All this talk of rockets is absurd when you see how Gazan's are forced to live.

It is you who deny that we can call it a concentration camp or Israel/West Bank as apartheid. It seems it is you with the closed mind on the topic.

Time to break the taboo and say what Gaza is: a concentration camp

You have quoted Arthur Silber's article. He identifies himself openly as being part of the "9/11 truth and justice movement". He does this whilst decrying both "the delusional stupid left" and "right". He is almost as big a douche as Chomsky. People in Gaza elected Hamas an organization that revels in the death of innocent civilians and uses them as human shields. The idea of martyrdom is for them a glorious concept. If you are so open minded then can you explain how they have escaped any blame? Why have you not mentioned them killing their own people yesterday and dragging their bodies around on the back of a motorcycle? Why have you not mentioned the million ton of aid given to Gaza by Israel? Why have you not mentioned the tons of weapons smuggled into Palestine for the express purpose of murdering Israeli civilians ?

Why would you suggest that a bombing campaign quite obviously aimed at military targets is AIMED at civilians? Is it because you have already decided who the bogeyman is and can not complicate things by seeing anything else? It seems that you, Brockton and Kirkland are so intent on drawing attention to the plight of Palestinian civilians that you can not countenance the idea that Israel has any right to protect it's own civilians and that Hamas and the mis goverment of Gaza is not the fault of Hamas? In an effort to appear even handed it appears that the monopoly on suffering that people accuse Jews of exercising has been inverted to blame them for everything.

The people of Gaza are often treated in Israels hospitals, they are not lined up to have their gold teeth extracted. They are not being stripped naked and asked to leave their clothes in neat piles. Their hair is not being used to fill mattresses. They are not being experimented on and injected with diseases. They are not being sent to the gas chambers. They are not living in a concentration camp or living under a system of apartheid where the colour of their skin is enough to condemn them.

Don't the Palestinians have the right to defend themselves? Bearing in mind that the majority of them have been ethnically cleansed from their homes and land and are now living in refugee camps, the most densely polulated places on earth. And that for nearly half a century they've been living under a militaryoccupation that every other nation has declared illegal in various UN resolutions? If the aggressor have a right to defend themselves, don't the aggressee also have the same right?

The right of resistance to military occupation and ethnic cleansing is guaranteed under international law. Don't the Palestinians have the same rights as you or I would have if we were living under occupation?

[IamInuit]

The creation of the state of Israel was a terrible blunder and has only ever caused trouble in the region. Countless wars, the continued degredation of the Palestinians. It was absurd to create Israel. On that basis you should really kick out the whities in America and create a new United States of Native Americans. Then you look at Israel today and they are using the same methods that manifest destiny Americans used. We will take land by force, we will degrade you, manipulate you. There will be no peace until we have all the land. Those that live within our borders shall be denied rights and work as serfs. It is exactly the same and the world created this and though it was a good idea? It is a blot on the planet.

Sorta like your British empire or American Empire? Is any other country on earth encased in such a geographic imperative? I think not. And Britain put them there. The Jews were in the area for thousands of years and they were systematically refused entry to countless countries. Of course Britain and the allies were going to look at origin.

Israel must cease and desist in expansion and find a 2 state solution. Or the Grandkids of today's Grankids will be dealing with this a hundred years from now.

[Gandalf]

The creation of the state of Israel was a terrible blunder and has only ever caused trouble in the region. Countless wars, the continued degredation of the Palestinians. It was absurd to create Israel. On that basis you should really kick out the whities in America and create a new United States of Native Americans. Then you look at Israel today and they are using the same methods that manifest destiny Americans used. We will take land by force, we will degrade you, manipulate you. There will be no peace until we have all the land. Those that live within our borders shall be denied rights and work as serfs. It is exactly the same and the world created this and though it was a good idea? It is a blot on the planet.

Sorta like your British empire or American Empire? Is any other country on earth encased in such a geographic imperative? I think not. And Britain put them there. The Jews were in the area for thousands of years and they were systematically refused entry to countless countries. Of course Britain and the allies were going to look at origin.

Israel must cease and desist in expansion and find a 2 state solution. Or the Grandkids of today's Grankids will be dealing with this a hundred years from now.

No different to the immoral act of taking land by force commited by far too many regimes in world history. I condemn America and its poodle Britain and in turn condemn Israel which was largely created through years of pressure.

The numbers have already been shown in previous posts. Arabs were the people who lived in the region, Jews were just a tiny proportion.

The wrong has been perpetrated (outrageous state creation) and so now a 2 state solution is a must, but likewise, the settlements need to come down. The 1967 borders are agreed by practically everyone and thus they are the roadmap to peace. It is Israel and America that refuse to participate in anything just.

[Gandalf]

You may wish to toe the popular line and believe that things are that simplistic but no amount of hyperbole will ever describe such a complex issue. Comparing the Palestinians situation to a concentration camp or referring to it as apartheid just lets you off the hook when it comes to analyzing the facts with an open mind.

But it is and has described as much by influential scholars; Chomsky and Finklestein would readily agree with me. It is a concentration camp minus the gas chambers and moreso now that so much infrastructure has been destroyed. It was no accident and the bombing carefully targetted to wreak as much havoc with Palestinian lives as possible.

There is nothing simplistic in the fact that Gazan's are camped in and restricted by land, air and sea, they are denied basic equipment, food, or even materials to rebuild long term damaged property. You keep a populace hungry, deprived, poor and bound and what you have is a concentration camp. It is easy to end it and Israel is in control of it. All this talk of rockets is absurd when you see how Gazan's are forced to live.

It is you who deny that we can call it a concentration camp or Israel/West Bank as apartheid. It seems it is you with the closed mind on the topic.

Time to break the taboo and say what Gaza is: a concentration camp

You have quoted Arthur Silber's article. He identifies himself openly as being part of the "9/11 truth and justice movement". He does this whilst decrying both "the delusional stupid left" and "right". He is almost as big a douche as Chomsky. People in Gaza elected Hamas an organization that revels in the death of innocent civilians and uses them as human shields. The idea of martyrdom is for them a glorious concept. If you are so open minded then can you explain how they have escaped any blame? Why have you not mentioned them killing their own people yesterday and dragging their bodies around on the back of a motorcycle? Why have you not mentioned the million ton of aid given to Gaza by Israel? Why have you not mentioned the tons of weapons smuggled into Palestine for the express purpose of murdering Israeli civilians ?

Why would you suggest that a bombing campaign quite obviously aimed at military targets is AIMED at civilians? Is it because you have already decided who the bogeyman is and can not complicate things by seeing anything else? It seems that you, Brockton and Kirkland are so intent on drawing attention to the plight of Palestinian civilians that you can not countenance the idea that Israel has any right to protect it's own civilians and that Hamas and the mis goverment of Gaza is not the fault of Hamas? In an effort to appear even handed it appears that the monopoly on suffering that people accuse Jews of exercising has been inverted to blame them for everything.

The people of Gaza are often treated in Israels hospitals, they are not lined up to have their gold teeth extracted. They are not being stripped naked and asked to leave their clothes in neat piles. Their hair is not being used to fill mattresses. They are not being experimented on and injected with diseases. They are not being sent to the gas chambers. They are not living in a concentration camp or living under a system of apartheid where the colour of their skin is enough to condemn them.

Don't the Palestinians have the right to defend themselves? Bearing in mind that the majority of them have been ethnically cleansed from their homes and land and are now living in refugee camps, the most densely polulated places on earth. And that for nearly half a century they've been living under a militaryoccupation that every other nation has declared illegal in various UN resolutions? If the aggressor have a right to defend themselves, don't the aggressee also have the same right?

The right of resistance to military occupation and ethnic cleansing is guaranteed under international law. Don't the Palestinians have the same rights as you or I would have if we were living under occupation?

Good post.

I don't see the point in even responding to Greenbeanz post as I can only assume he is playing devil's advocate or genuinely buys into sympathetic CNN reports on the kind Israeli's who ever so caringly treated a Palestinian girl who had 3 fingers blown off. It must be the evil Hamas as Hague argues. Hamas hides behind girls of 7 and of course the good old Israeli's allow the girl to be treated. It's good to see some good old humanity. That is why America subsidises Israel, for good old regional peace. Time to take down the settlements chaps? Not today or perhaps ever, but we will blow up your kids and perhaps treat them if they survive. Lovely stuff.

[Beanz]

Miles you have not replied because you are not interested in debate. You have made your mind up and fairness and reason have little to do with it. Everybody on social networking and internet sites have taken your position with most others afraid to voice any dissent so your patronizing suggestion that I am so stupid to be informed only by mainstream news media and American ones at that is uneccesarily patronizing. The Palestinian people are victims but their leaders are culpable as much as Israel and you speak as though it would be just and fair for the Jews to be condemned forever to wander the earth as a homeless people. Your pick and choose easy targets for your vitriol.

[Gandalf]

Miles you have not replied because you are not interested in debate. You have made your mind up and fairness and reason have little to do with it. Everybody on social networking and internet sites have taken your position with most others afraid to voice any dissent so your patronizing suggestion that I am so stupid to be informed only by mainstream news media and American ones at that is uneccesarily patronizing. The Palestinian people are victims but their leaders are culpable as much as Israel and you speak as though it would be just and fair for the Jews to be condemned forever to wander the earth as a homeless people. Your pick and choose easy targets for your vitriol.

No, I don't think you are stupid in the slightest. I am just surprised that you can ignore that self defence is a right and that the Israeli's are illegal occupiers and continue to segregate the Palestinians off from their own lands. The evidence shows that this is all planned and intends to continue apace. The problem is largly America and Israel itself. I just expect better of you on an issue such as this. I know what I know on the subject and for sure, won't get extended as I have in the past as I would rather chill a little.

No religious group or race deserves their own country. People are just people and to nation build on race and religion is a slippery slope.

[therealremi]

When a race of the people, have been persecuted and exterminated you would think, they would not
do the same thing to others.

Surprise, surprise. When Soviets took over Poland after defeating Germans, they recruited lots of Jews into the new communist puppet regime. One of the first thing they did was setup concentration camps for German civilians and for local people whom the communists considered enemies. The inmates were no "nazis" or "collaborators", just innocent civilians, women and children.
American journalist John Sack wrote a book about this inglorious and unknown episode of Jewish history "Eye for an eye", only to be called antisemite... which is funny because Sack was Jewish.
Actually the title of that book is misleading, or rather complete BS because the word "revenge" implies that justice has been served. In reality, I don't think 1% of the inmates deserved to be imprisoned, starved, tortured and murdered in those camps.
BTW the commander of the most famous camp - Salomon Morel fled to Israel before the new democratic Polish authorities could sentence him. Israel successfully resisted his extradition to Poland.

[IamInuit]

The creation of the state of Israel was a terrible blunder and has only ever caused trouble in the region. Countless wars, the continued degredation of the Palestinians. It was absurd to create Israel. On that basis you should really kick out the whities in America and create a new United States of Native Americans. Then you look at Israel today and they are using the same methods that manifest destiny Americans used. We will take land by force, we will degrade you, manipulate you. There will be no peace until we have all the land. Those that live within our borders shall be denied rights and work as serfs. It is exactly the same and the world created this and though it was a good idea? It is a blot on the planet.

Sorta like your British empire or American Empire? Is any other country on earth encased in such a geographic imperative? I think not. And Britain put them there. The Jews were in the area for thousands of years and they were systematically refused entry to countless countries. Of course Britain and the allies were going to look at origin.

Israel must cease and desist in expansion and find a 2 state solution. Or the Grandkids of today's Grankids will be dealing with this a hundred years from now.

No different to the immoral act of taking land by force commited by far too many regimes in world history. I condemn America and its poodle Britain and in turn condemn Israel which was largely created through years of pressure.

The numbers have already been shown in previous posts. Arabs were the people who lived in the region, Jews were just a tiny proportion.

The wrong has been perpetrated (outrageous state creation) and so now a 2 state solution is a must, but likewise, the settlements need to come down. The 1967 borders are agreed by practically everyone and thus they are the roadmap to peace. It is Israel and America that refuse to participate in anything just.

Simplistic. When the Jews were granted territory in 1948 after their scourge in Europe since the Bolshevik revolution its because nobody post world war 2 would take them as they were deemed something other then human. The problem is eternal and will never end because of Israels expansionism. Thee expansionism is based on the conflict not ending.

[TysonBomb]

Israel is an oppressive, malignant cancerous proxy state that lays a false claim to the land of Palestine. It serves a purpose of creating disorder and constant conflict between itself and the neighboring states surrounding it.

It has been encroaching upon Palestinian land for decades under the guise of "self defense" and has been actively annexing it.

[Beanz]

Israel is an oppressive, malignant cancerous proxy state that lays a false claim to the land of Palestine. It serves a purpose of creating disorder and constant conflict between itself and the neighboring states surrounding it.

It has been encroaching upon Palestinian land for decades under the guise of "self defense" and has been actively annexing it.

The moment you referred to the holocaust as a staged farce you buried your own credibility.

[TitoFan]

A Synopsis of the Israel/Palestine Conflict


Personally, I’ve never been to the Middle East, and much less traveled about and talked to the people there, to see what their thoughts are and how they feel about the whole Israeli-Palestinian conflict. All I know is what I read in the papers and other printed media, and through news coverage, like everybody else. I figure it’s a good way to be informed, but carries the risk of being slanted one way or the other.

However, I did come across this site, which intends to explain the conflict in an objective manner, and more important… was founded by a news journalist who has been in the Middle East and walked among its people. So I figure she’s more qualified to give opinions about both sides than I am. Then of course the skeptic in me wanted to know whether her own opinion was slanted. Maybe she was born of Arab ancestry, or has something in her past that would cause her to harbor a dislike for Jews. So I looked a bit into her bio, and found nothing to suggest that. She seems a level-headed, intelligent, probing, inquisitive person… who is interested in knowing all the facts and sharing them with the rest of the American people.

Education is a good thing. I still shake my head at the National Geographic study some years ago, which found an extremely poor knowledge among today’s young people of some important subjects, but most notable geography. I remember the U.S. did very poorly when compared against other countries. This and other studies seem to have lit a bit of a fire under the U.S. consciousness, and prompted politicians to pay more attention to the educational needs of Americans.

But one needs to be careful with traditional education. Geometry and calculus books are surely the same in the U.S. as in any other country, save the language. But the principles are universal. History books are another matter. It depends who is telling the story. A lot of well-educated, very opinionated people have read the history books in their particular country. These books carry the stories that the particular culture wants to portray. The facts are all there… but the underlying factors might differ from one culture to the other.

But back to the Middle East. Ms. Weir, of not any known Arab descent or marital status, has traveled through these troubled regions, and seen things first hand. She has seen enough and learned enough to warrant founding a nonpartisan organization with the sole purpose of informing the general public of how things really are. For that she is to be commended.

The ideal thing, I think, is to be both intelligent AND open-minded. In the sense that you can say, “You know… I hadn’t thought of it that way before. Maybe… just maybe… I may have been wrong about certain things.”

All this being said, it’s heartening to read that many Palestinians are in favor of a peaceful, two-state solution… and are only too willing to sit down at the bargaining table and bring about solutions that acceptable to both.

[El Kabong]

The problem with that is, the Arabs don't want a peaceful 2 state solution, these "Palestinians" are just a jumping off point for them to get rid of Israel altogether. Do that and then they'll be on about the Persians and how they're "not real Muslims" ....the situation won't end because the Arabs don't want to let it end which is why they funnel in weapons....more weapons than food or any kind of relief, the people of Israel do that.