The Real News Network - Historical amnesia and Gaza »
Posted By jovial 5 months, 4 weeks ago in Political News
Several days into Israel's military operation in Gaza, The Real News speaks to Phyllis Bennis about the conflict. After giving a brief background on the events that led to the invasion of the Gaza Strip, Phyllis explains the various ways in which the United States facilitates Israel's activities. According to Phyllis, it is the unquestioning military and political support from Washington that makes Israel's actions possible.
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jovial
Grew up In Brooklyn. Joined the Navy in 1976 stayed in 10 years. Aircraft Electronics tech. Worked for Major Govt. contractor then settled in California ...
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jovial5 months, 4 weeks ago
Phyllis Bennis is a Senior Analyst at the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington DC. She is the author of Before and After: US Foreign Policy and the September 11 Crisis and Challenging Empire: How People, Governments, and the UN Defy US Power.
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SandmonsterComment removed: User banned.5 Replies
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AnteUp5 months, 4 weeks ago
Jovial ~
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Many thanks for this submittal. What I wouldn't give to be able to hear
an intelligent discussion by Ms. Bennis, and others, on cable news!
My PBS TV station shows squat - like old Lawrence Welk shows! - maybe
I need to pull my support and send it to the Real News? I would LOVE to
see this type of news presented on television - and available to educate more
citizens - on a daily basis.................it would be a better world if we could
stuff the "agendas" and get to the facts more often. -
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hyperbola5 months, 4 weeks ago
The place where one has to start is the late 19th century when the racist, colonial, totalitarian askenazi zionists from eatern europe began their program of ethnic cleansing in Palestine.
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Silence on Gaza is Complicity - We’re All War Criminals Now
The conflict causing this violence is not centuries old. Nor is it too complex to address. Prior to 1900, Jews and Palestinians lived together in Palestine for generations without the extreme levels of hatred and violence which now exist. With the advent of Zionism, the political movement to establish a Jewish state in all of historic Palestine, tensions began to escalate. The leaders of the Zionist movement sought to control more and more of what they considered to be land promised to them by God. In 1947-48, the violent ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from their homeland by Zionist militias and the creation of the Jewish state of Israel began the conflict in earnest.
Since then, Israel’s continued seizure of Palestinian land through the establishment of illegal settlements in the West Bank has accelerated the aggression. In addition, Israel has refused to abide by UN resolution 194 which guarantees Palestinians the right of return to or compensation for lands taken from them during the war in 1947-48. As a result of that war and the 1967 war Israel expanded well beyond the borders alloted to it by the original partition of Palestine and has been in violation of the Geneva Conventions as well as the terms of the original United Nations partition plan since its inception.
Though rarely if ever spoken about in any media source, the real reason for the conflict in Palestine is not Jews or Palestinians, it is the Zionist colonization of Palestine. Zionism, a virulent form of ethnic nationalism, fosters a culture of exclusivity and entitlement within Israeli society. Jews are “The Chosen People” living in “The Promised Land.” These inherently racist attitudes create an atmosphere which legitimizes collective punishment and human rights abuses against Palestinians simply because they are not Jews. Jewish lives are valued more than Palestinian lives. This attitude was epitomized by the statement of extreme right wing Israeli Rabbi, Eliyah, in April of 2008. “The life of one yeshiva boy is worth more than the lives of 1,000 Arabs."
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Radiofreeeuropa5 months, 4 weeks ago
For me the question addressed here "where do you start the clock?" has always been the bone of contention. I don't have an honest answer, yet regardless the violence must stop. I understand it- if your son or father were killed by a group of people how can you be expected to NOT hate them, retaliate?
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Yet no one gains anything through the violence.
Somehow, some way, it must stop.
All I can say is Ghandi and Martin Luther King won their wars.
And the reverberations are still being felt today.
Napoleon lost his.
There is more to be learned from Gandhi than from Napoleon.-
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Candida5 months, 4 weeks ago
Here is an Oxford professor, who reviews the whole history. It appears that he has no trouble to decide who the real victim is.
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"As always, mighty Israel claims to be the victim of Palestinian aggression but the sheer asymmetry of power between the two sides leaves little room for doubt as to who is the real victim."
Avi Shlaim
http://www.propeller.com/story/2009/01/06/avi-shla...
He also has some suggestions on how the problem could be solved. Unfortunately they involve some compromises on the part of Israel, so his suggestions are not likely to be followed. -
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MRCOFFEECAKE5 months, 4 weeks ago
Actually Ghandi didn't really win.
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But that aside, he certainly made for better opportunity.
This is a different world now. The battle is no longer just for religious freedom.
The battle now is for power, land and oil..
There needs to be an international; mediator.
Jews need their land and freedom and Arabs/Muslims need their sovereignty.
The two goals do not need to be conflicting if they have leadership that can be committed to honestly brokering a deal.
You need a Jew who sees the Muslim point of view and a Muslim who understands the Holocaust.
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splitrch5 months, 4 weeks ago
another way to say that is peace won't prevail until people love their children more than they hate their enemy.
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blowback5 months, 4 weeks ago
Enabling is not a priori for peace.
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Statehood, autonomy and land are.
> Hamas: Ceasefire for return to 1967 border
Top Hamas official Mahmoud al-Zahar tells CNN ‘long-term truce’ possible if Israel withdraws to pre-1967 borders, releases Palestinian prisoners; as to possibility Hamas would renounce terror, Zahar says, ‘Israel is killing people and children and removing our agricultural system - this is terrorism’
Yitzhak Benhorin Published: 01.30.06, 08:17
Until Israel says what its final borders will be, Hamas will not say whether it will ever recognize Israel, Zahar said. "If Israel is ready to tell the people what is the official border, after that we are going to answer this question."
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3207845,... -
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protoham5 months, 4 weeks ago
Or one side is eliminated. And that is the ultimate direction they are headed.
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PsychoHosebeastComment removed: User banned.4 Replies
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rightfromwrong5 months, 4 weeks ago
it is true that if the USA took a neutral stance in the middle east...Israel would have to abide by the UN resolutions.
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The USA continues to give billions in aid to Israel and carte blanche on weapons(free)and the latest technology.
Hardly a just policy on the part of the USA-
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Locky125 months, 4 weeks ago
Abide by UN resolutions?
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The UN?
If it were up to the UN, Israel would have been pushed into the sea a long time ago.
It's all a bunch of Arab Muslim shills.
It was never a big deal for Hamas to rocket Israel all it wanted.
It's all of a sudden a big deal when Israel actually uses its' power to stop it.
But knowing all of the ways that Israel is backed by the U.S., just how dumb is Hamas to hurl rockets into Israel on a regular basis anyway?
Payback's a btch.
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silvergator5 months, 4 weeks ago
According to Ms. Bennis,if mexicans started showering rockets on Texas and California,The US should refrain from attacks on mexico and understand that Texas and California used to be part of Mexico and no doubt the issue should be submitted to the UN.
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MRCOFFEECAKE5 months, 4 weeks ago
No..not at all..
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What she is saying is that if the US were to stop all food, medical supplies, water and electricity from entering Mexico and the people were starving and ill, then the mexicans would have no choice but to use whatever weapons they had to fight back AND to appeal to the UN for the right to get necessities to their starving populace..NO?? -
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AnteUp5 months, 4 weeks ago
Silly ~ they would have to be blockading all access to Mexico from the sea - from the
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air and from the border first to make your example relevant. Hamas didn't just wake up
one morning and think it would be a good day to shell Israel - there are REASONS.
Did you watch the video? Israel ratchets up the pressure, they make the continuation
of daily life intolerable and they sit back and WAIT for something to BLOW.
Who's gambling with the lives of the Israeli civilians - hmm?
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reallypsst5 months, 4 weeks ago
The Palestinians cant survive with radical militants running the country,so long as hamas keeps firing on israel.the only way is to get rid of these fanatics so peaceful Palestinians can rebuild their lives and gain respect from the world,right now they are viewed as militants themselves and are incapable of a government that represents the majority of Palestinians!
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jovial5 months, 4 weeks ago
And to use overwhelming military power against their country is the answer? To destroy their infrastructure and make their entire population suffer. To make them eat animal feed and feed it to their children. To remove access to medical supplies and electricity and water. To deny them a passport, or means to freely go from one part of Palestine to the other. To submit their women to humiliating body and cavity searches when they go through numerous Israeli checkpoints. To strip them of all human dignity until they accept peace in the terms that are given. To ignore their elected government and kill their leaders with deadly airstrikes. To have carte blanche power to attack or kill Palestinians with weapons provided by America and free use of a U.S. veto to ANY country or UN resolution that tries to question the legality of it. Something is not quite adding up here. I don't see a solution. I see "tit for tat". Except the "tat" on one side is exponentially worse than the "tit". This may be a genocide before this ends, and we American citizens through our government are accessories to the fact.
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Candida5 months, 4 weeks ago
reallypsst: "The Palestinians cant survive with radical militants running the country"
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What country? You call this a country?
http://www.sott.net/image/image/9591/israel-palest... -
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hyperbola5 months, 4 weeks ago
Rubbish psst. Hamas actually has done a great deal for development of civil society in Palestine. Why do you suppose that the zionists had to bomb a university. Here are some israelis who are not as ugly a racist as you. The most despicable behavior is racists in America cheering on death in Israel/Palestine for ugly ideology.
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Where's the Academic Outrage Over the Bombing of a University in Gaza?
Not one of the nearly 450 presidents of American colleges and universities who prominently denounced an effort by British academics to boycott Israeli universities in September 2007 have raised their voice in opposition to Israel’s bombardment of the Islamic University of Gaza earlier this week. Lee C. Bollinger, president of Columbia University, who organized the petition, has been silent, as have his co-signatories from Princeton, Northwestern, and Cornell Universities, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Most others who signed similar petitions, like the 11,000 professors from nearly 1,000 universities around the world, have also refrained from expressing their outrage at Israel’s attack on the leading university in Gaza. The artfully named Scholars for Peace in the Middle East, which organized the latter appeal, has said nothing about the assault.
While the extent of the damage to the Islamic University, which was hit in six separate airstrikes, is still unknown, recent reports indicate that at least two major buildings were targeted, a science laboratory and the Ladies’ Building, where female students attended classes. ...
..the Islamic University is the first and most important institution of higher education in Gaza, serving more than 20,000 students, 60 percent of whom are women. It comprises 10 faculties — education, religion, art, commerce, Shariah law, science, engineering, information technology, medicine, and nursing — and awards a variety of bachelor’s and master’s degrees. Taking into account that Palestinian universities have been regionalized because Palestinian students from Gaza are barred by Israel from studying either in the West Bank or abroad, the educational significance of the Islamic University becomes even more apparent.
Those restrictions became international news last summer when Israel refused to grant exit permits to seven carefully vetted students from Gaza who had been awarded Fulbright fellowships by the State Department to study in the United States. After top State Department officials intervened, the students’ scholarships were restored — though Israel allowed only four of the seven to leave, even after appeals by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
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reallypsst5 months, 4 weeks ago
The Palestinians cant survive with radical militants running the country,so long as hamas keeps firing on israel.the only way is to get rid of these fanatics so peaceful Palestinians can rebuild their lives and gain respect from the world,right now they are viewed as militants themselves and are incapable of a government that represents the majority of Palestinians!
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Spadecaller5 months, 4 weeks ago
There is one haunting reality that gnaws at me each time I read or see George Bush Jr. justifying the wars with Israel and Iraq; I know that U.S. corporations provide many of the weapons, the missiles, the mortars, the rockets, the guns, and the ammunition for all the participants involved in the fighting, which Hamas, Hezbollah, and Israel use against each other.
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The idea of long protracted wars that have no possibility of a definitive solution -- are the perfect means for generating ongoing revenue for the warmongers machinery to stay in operation. The business of war preys on the hatred of bitter rivalries. The Iraq and Vietnam wars were never wars that needed to be fought, but they were sold to the American people by lies and fear mongering.
The Israeli and Palestinian people are also being exploited; not just by their militant fundamentalist leaders,or by vengeance, bigotry, and hatred, but by the corporations that profit from their fighting.
Did Dick Cheney and George Bush Jr. ever really care about weapons of mass destruction? Of course not. They care about making money. Does Bush really want peace in the middle east?
He dosn't give a rat's ass; he is a ruthless business man.-
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hyperbola5 months, 4 weeks ago
Well Spade, it is revealing to see which people here were strongly against the Iraq war and strongly preached about the need for separation of church and state in America, but forgot all that as soon as it became a case of "if its my tribe, it can't be wrong" racism in Palestine. It is revealing to see many such people now cheering along Bush and his NeoCons. Sure seems to reflect a primary loyalty that is not to America and the principles of American democracy, but rather primary loyalty to a foreign country.
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Gaza: Obama’s Bay of Pigs
A counter-terrorist operation involving US military materiel and foreign troops is taking place before the inauguration of the next president, and there are some striking similarities between the Bay of Pigs and the Gaza War for the origins of both stem from the secret chambers of the previous administration.
Last Saturday, the Israeli Air Force launched its attack on Hamas via its aptly named Operation Cast Lead, a phrase from a popular children’s song during Chanukah to, “cast lead dreidels.” The dreidel is a four-sided spinning top, the favorite child’s toy during Chanukah. Sixty Israeli military aircraft including both F-16s and Apache helicopters are not dropping lead dreidels on the inhabitants of Gaza -- they are dropping high-tech 250-pound bombs provided by the “foreign aid” program of the Bush government courtesy of the United States of America.
Last June, President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt brokered the six-month truce agreement that began on June 18th and expired on the 19th of December. Reports in Israel confirm that military planning for the current operation began six months ago, at the beginning of the truce. Less than two months into the truce, the New York Times reported the US would speed up delivery of high-tech bombs to Israel. On the first day of the Israeli assault more than 200 Palestinians died making it the bloodiest day of the Arab-Israeli conflict since the Six Day War of 1967. Bush’s policy is now perfectly clear, Palestinians will suffer even more severe punishment than Operation Cast Lead via the IDF – the forceful re-occupation of Gaza as a last gasp of Bush’s neoconservative hubris.
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Spadecaller5 months, 4 weeks ago
Where do we start? A year ago, 25 years ago, 50, or 2000 years ago...I think it is an academic question for an historian to play with. Should we consult the American Indians for the answer?
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The question that concerns me more is: where do we end it?-
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canadianrancher575 months, 4 weeks ago
Good point, I hope this doesn't sound like a statement from a fool but it is the deaths of the children and civilians that bothers me most and those who look back in time will never find peace, it is those who look to the future and completely disregard the past that will create peace.
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In your own history in the US. I have seen periods in the not so distant past where there was the potential for a real bloodbath (racial riots in the 60's) but because people on both sides chose to look to the future things have improved . The situation may not be perfect but in many parts of your country young people and even alot of the older generation has changed. I know there is a proper way to say this but I'm just not sure how to word it, so in my own words I will say just look at what your own country has done, It has elected a man of color to be your President. Which shows to me if people wish things to become better for all, it can be accomplished. -
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hyperbola5 months, 4 weeks ago
Well Spade, that statement is commonly made by those who are apologists for askenazi zionist crimes against humanity in Palestine.
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The UN charter explicitly prohibits the gaining of land by war. This was inserted in the Charter by the US as a specific response to Hitler's claims to "living space for the Aryan master race".
Since Israel is a member of the UN, this clause applies to Israel.
It really is revealing to see which people here try to ignore that principle when it comes down to "if its my tribe, it can't be wrong" racism.
In evaluating that, we should also remember that about half of the population of Israel also feels that they are victims of askenazi racists from eastern Europe.
The Sephardi Question
A growing group of Jewish Israeli professors is challenging the legitimacy of the Israeli state from within. Many are Mizrahim, as the Sephardi Jews from the Middle East and North Africa are increasingly called, and do so from a distinctly Mizrahi outlook. In July 2004, for example, a poem appeared online entitled, "I Am an Arab Refugee":
When I hear Fayruz[1] singing,
"I shall never forget thee, Palestine,"
I swear to you with my right hand
that at once I am a Palestinian.
All of a sudden I know:
I am an Arab refugee
and, if not,
let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth.[2]
The author is not a Palestinian refugee but rather an Israeli Jew. His name is Sami Shalom Chetrit, a Mizrahi professor at Hebrew University in Jerusalem who, along with Mizrahi academics like Ella Shohat, Eli Avraham, Oren Yiftachel, Yehouda Shenhav, Pnina Motzafi-Haller and others has developed a radical critique of ethnic relations in Israel. True to post-Zionism, an intellectual movement that believes that Zionism lacks moral validity, post-Zionist Mizrahi writers believe that Israel has no right to exist as a Jewish state. According to Mizrahi post-Zionism, the Mizrahim, about half of Israel's Jewish population, are "Arab-Jews," who like the Palestinians are victims of Zionism. ...
Some of the adherents of this new Israeli school of thought now equate Mizrahi grievances with those of Palestinians. In an article, "Zionism from the Standpoint of Its Jewish Victims," a takeoff on Edward Said's famous "Zionism from the Standpoint of its [Palestinian] Victims,"[5] Ella Habiba-Shohat, an Iraqi-Israeli woman and one of the principal Mizrahi post-Zionist leaders, claims that, alongside the Palestinians, Mizrahi Jews are Zionism's "other" victims.[6] According to Shohat, Zionism is a white, Ashkenazi phenomenon, based on the denial of the Orient and the rights of both Mizrahi Jews and the Palestinians. Indeed, she argues, the conflict of East versus West, Arab versus Jew, and Palestinian versus Israeli exists not only between Israelis and Arabs but also within Israel between Ashkenazi and Mizrahi Jews.
[6] Ella Shohat, "Mizrahim in Israel: Zionism from the Standpoint of Its Jewish Victims," Social Text, Fall 1988, pp. 1-35.
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Endoscopy5 months, 4 weeks ago
This fool keeps saying go back and stops in 1967. Lets go back to the Balfour document. Britain was going to give the land west of the Jordan to the Jews and the land west of the Jordan to the Muslims. That was legalized by the League of Nations. Then WW2 came along and after that the size of the Jewish land was shrunk. The two countries were set up in 1948. Immediately as the British ships were leaving the harbor the Muslim countries surrounding Israel attacked with the avowed aim of driving the Jews into the sea and killing them there. Keep in mind that some Jews have been living there for over three thousand years. More Jews had been returning to Israel for the last two or three centuries.
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The Muslim avowed aim is to destroy Israel and put a Muslim government in place. They have been attacked many times. What the Hamas charter says is the aim of the Muslims. Destroy Israel and no other solution is acceptable. Go and read the charter. It is on line.
This person made a big deal about the IDF making plans to conquer Gaza. All military organizations make those kinds of plans. Our pentagon has plans to defend or attack all kinds of places. They routinely redo these plans as situations change. So that was a red herring.
That person ignores what the people from Gaza have done under Hamas. They send out suicide bombers and missiles. That cease fire was a cover to dig a tunnel but that was found and Israel stopped the digging. Why was the border closed? They found missiles and weapons going in under cover of medical supplies. Also some suicide bombers came out of there.
This person ignores the history of Israel being attacked from the start of the country. Why.-
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willottica5 months, 4 weeks ago
"This person ignores the history of Israel being attacked from the start of the country. Why."
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Why was Israel attacked from the start?
Because the inhabitants of the land at that time were not consulted. Were uprooted, and forcibly removed from their homes. You can trace all ill-will towards Israel to that historical moment. Rather than give away their own land for the Jewish people, the Allies decided to give away someone else's, someone else whose land they had no right to parcel out.
I have no answers, but I can certainly see why the Palestinians would be upset in the first place. I can also see why Israeli's would be upset about being attacked by Hamas rockets. -
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Candida5 months, 4 weeks ago
Endoscopy,
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I have a few questions and comments for you:
"Immediately as the British ships were leaving the harbor"
Why were the British leaving? Why did they abandon Israel in 1948?
"More Jews had been returning to Israel for the last two or three centuries."
How can you "return" to a place you've never been?
"That cease fire was a cover to dig a tunnel but that was found and Israel stopped the digging."
It did a lot more than stop the digging. It killed six people within Gaza, thereby violating the cease fire.
"Why was the border closed? They found missiles and weapons going in under cover of medical supplies. Also some suicide bombers came out of there."
Israel can inspect everything and stop any suspicious shipment. By your reasoning, they should not get any food or medicine at all. How many suicide bombers came out of Gaza under Hamas? -
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crghss5 months, 4 weeks ago
"Israel can inspect everything and stop any suspicious shipment"
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How? When things are being brought in by a tunnel. Also, where did the new and impoved rockets come from. -
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MRCOFFEECAKE5 months, 4 weeks ago
very well put..
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But being right has still not prevented them from doing some wrong things..
So, needless to say this is a no win scenario at present..
This situation cries out for a definitive international plan.
i would hope it would be led by the US , which can still occur before we lose all of our credibility.
After we lose more credibility we'll lose any control we might presently have also.
We MUST act! -
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hyperbola5 months, 4 weeks ago
Well Endo, perhaps the most despicable people of all are those who sit in America and preach death of jews, christians and moslems in Palestine for ugly, racist ideology. Perhaps you should give your silly chants and slogans a rest and begin to learn from those in the mideast.
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Jews sans frontieres: Sderot Jews Condemn Gaza Attack
Despite the ongoing rocket attacks on their town from Gaza in the last several years, some 500 Sderot residents have recently signed a petition calling to stop the IDF operation in the Strip and renew the truce with Hamas.
The tragedy of Sderot is that nobody in Israel cares about the people of Sderot beyond the lip service to their utility as sacrificial lambs for the "national cause" (i.e. the cause of ethnic cleansing and apartheid.)
Well, some Sderot residents are stepping up to the task and speaking for themselves. Their petition calls on the government to keep the peace is here in Hebrew. Unfortunately no translation, but see my translation below.
the petition continues:
On the other side of the border live a million and a half Palestinians under unbearable conditions, and most of them want, like we do, calm and the opportunity of a future for themselves and their families.
We live in the feeling that you have wasted that period of calm, instead of using it to advance understandings and begin negotiations, as well as for fortifying the houses of residents as promised.
We call on the Prime Minister and the Defense minister not to listen to the voices of incitement and do everything they can to avoid another round of escalation, to secure the continuation of the calm and to work...towards direct or indirect negotiations with the Palestinian leadership in Gaza in order to reach long term understandings.
We prefer a cold war without a single rocket to a hot war with dozens of victims and innocent fatalities on both sides.
We ask you to offer us the possibility of political arrangement and hope and not an endless cycle of blood.
This petition has been gathering signatures in Israel since the 11th of November. Needless to say, it was ignored by the murderous office holders of Israel.
http://www.propeller.com/story/2009/01/06/jews-san...
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Candida5 months, 4 weeks ago
These are excellent suggestions. The probability of anyone in authority listening? Zero.
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dissent5 months, 4 weeks ago
thanks jovial. that's one of the best articles with a practical outline for future peace that i've read on this subject. i agree with you candida, that getting the powers-that-be to act on this is not going to happen. but that's why people here, in israel and everywhere need to sit up, pay attention and be heard.
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just in case anyone wants to take a shot at these points as "jew-bashing", here are the author's credentials.
fta
"Uri Avnery is a veteran of Israel's 1948 war, a former Member of the Knesset, founder of the Gush Shalom peace movement and winner of the 2001 Right Livelihood Award, often called the "alternative Nobel Peace Prize." His book "1948: A Soldier's Tale, the Bloody Road to Jerusalem," which was published in Hebrew soon after the 1948 war and was a bestseller in Israel, has just been translated into English for the first time by Oneworld Publications." -
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rimbaud5 months, 4 weeks ago
"The number of refugees who will return to Israeli territory will be fixed by mutual agreement, it being understood that nothing will be done that materially alters the demographic composition of the Israeli population." Does this mean ...only as many Palestinians may be repatriated as maintains a majority of Jews? ...only as many Palestinians may be repatriated as are matched by Jewish immigrants to Israel?
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Many former Palestinians are now settled, and gainfully employed, in the Americas and the Gulf States: generous compensation will allow many Palestinians to stay, or move away, from Israel.
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hyperbola5 months, 4 weeks ago
Well locky, simple minded preaching of hatred again. Hamas offered Israel a long term truce in 2006, including recognition, but the Israelis (and the US) never answered. Indeed, at that point Israel began acts of war against Gaza with a blockade that amounted to starvation. When a six month truce was established, Israel NEVER complied with the conditions. Here is an israeli (former member of the Knesset) who speaks out against the ugly racists and their slogans.
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How Israel is Multiplying Hamas by a Thousand
Molten Lead in Gaza
... “ISRAEL MUST defend itself against the rockets that are terrorizing our Southern towns,” the Israeli spokesmen explained. “Palestinians must respond to the killing of their fighters inside the Gaza Strip,” the Hamas spokesmen declared.
As a matter of fact, the cease-fire did not collapse, because there was no real cease-fire to start with. The main requirement for any cease-fire in the Gaza Strip must be the opening of the border crossings. There can be no life in Gaza without a steady flow of supplies. But the crossings were not opened, except for a few hours now and again. The blockade on land, on sea and in the air against a million and a half human beings is an act of war, as much as any dropping of bombs or launching of rockets. It paralyzes life in the Gaza Strip: eliminating most sources of employment, pushing hundreds of thousands to the brink of starvation, stopping most hospitals from functioning, disrupting the supply of electricity and water.
Those who decided to close the crossings – under whatever pretext – knew that there is no real cease-fire under these conditions.
That is the main thing. Then there came the small provocations which were designed to get Hamas to react. After several months, in which hardly any Qassam rockets were launched, an army unit was sent into the Strip “in order to destroy a tunnel that came close to the border fence”. From a purely military point of view, it would have made more sense to lay an ambush on our side of the fence. But the aim was to find a pretext for the termination of the cease-fire, in a way that made it plausible to put the blame on the Palestinians. And indeed, after several such small actions, in which Hamas fighters were killed, Hamas retaliated with a massive launch of rockets, and – lo and behold – the cease-fire was at an end. Everybody blamed Hamas.
* * *
WHAT WAS THE AIM? Tzipi Livni announced it openly: to liquidate Hamas rule in Gaza. The Qassams served only as a pretext.
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crghss5 months, 4 weeks ago
People, People, people. There is only one question. The only issue is the right of return. I think if Muslim Arabs accepted Israel and not demand the destruction of Israel through violence or the right of return this whole thing would be over tomorrow. But Muslim Arabs, amongst others, know if they can get the right of return for Arabs then they could destroy Israel. That is why Israel will never allow it.
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I say all out war till one side capitulates. As in any other war in the history of man.-
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EDWARDIII5 months, 4 weeks ago
I had a dream that I went to Israel/Palestein for vacation and when I got off the plane there was nothing--nothing but corpses and rubble and a fragment of a wall. There was a message on the wall. It said "We were right!" But dreams aside, Hamas is clever. They take multiple pictures of dead babies (dead from whatever causes) and peddle them to the bloody press. You have to admire the creativeness of that.
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By the way, when a martyr gets his seventy virgins are they special heaven virgins or are they the souls of dead virgins? -
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Dionys5 months, 4 weeks ago
"The only issue is the right of return"
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Seems to me the only issue is how many deaths is acceptable to the world and the question of why Israeli deaths are somehow "worth more" than Palestinian ones in the propaganda war. -
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MRCOFFEECAKE5 months, 4 weeks ago
Your points are all correct..Your solution is abominable.
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Please, if you can so intelligently describe the situation you should realize that war has never solved any issues..
WWII created Nazi Germany..
WWII created Communism..(well, for the most part)..but the Cold War
war has never ended anything, it just breeds more festering resentment.
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KingofQueensS605 months, 4 weeks ago
heartofsword1980 , fat chance. As Bennis rightly reveals, Israel *started planning for this latest incursion weeks ago* before any rockets were fired from Gaza. These are systematic efforts by Tel Aviv to eventually appropriate that land. Plus, you don't cut off food and water to those people unless you are purposefully BAITING THEM into conflict. *Any* arguments on behalf of Israel in this latest conflict are moot.
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EDWARDIII5 months, 4 weeks ago
I wonder if Obama is looking forward to the opportunity to be the president under whom Israel ceased to exist.
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MRCOFFEECAKE5 months, 4 weeks ago
Now that argument is gonna cause a problem.
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Everyone has a God..
Rome had one.
England had one.
In japan the Emperor was God.
But your God is the best...we know!
(that's what they all say)
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shistikComment removed: User banned.
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shistikComment removed: User banned.
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HMMace5 months, 4 weeks ago
YOU CAN REST ASSURED--THIS WOMAN IS EITHER A MUSLIM--PALISTINIAN--OR BOTH,
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JUST BECAUSE SHE SAYS SOME TING--DOES NOT MAKE IT TRUE--IN FAVCT--I BELIEVE SHE IS AN OUT RIGHT LIAR...NOT WORTH LISTENING TO FOR SURE..AND--WHO EVER POSTED THIS IS NOT TO BE TRUSTED EITHER..
I AM 81 YRS OLD--AND I REMEMBER THE PALS SHOOTING AT JEWISH SCHOOL BUSES FIFTY YEARS AGO...THE PALS ARE ANIMALS..HECK--EVEN ANIMALS DO NOT SEND THIER YOUNG TO DO THIER WORK...
WHEN DID THE PALS LAST BUILD A SCHOOL??? CAN NOT EDUCATE THE PAL KIDS--THEY MAY REALIZE HOW DUMB THIER PARENTS ARE..
LONG LIVE ISREAL...-
PsychoHosebeastComment removed: User banned.2 Replies
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KingofQueensS605 months, 4 weeks ago
excellent work the "Real News" team - i have not heard anything like this from for eg. the BBC. in this matter they have forgotten the historical context - and sadly they do it (forget context) on a daily basis. - that is why you the "Real News" team are so important to us all. - many thanks and keep up the good work. tony - nottingham uk.
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mingsciansComment removed: User banned.
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