Obama deplores civilian deaths in Gaza »
Posted By tehranchik 11 months, 4 weeks ago in Political News
Breaking his silence on the conflict in Gaza, the president-elect deplored the civilian casualties, which have been overwhelmingly on the Palestinian side, after a meeting with fiscal and economic advisors today
"I’m very concerned with the conflict taking place there," Obama said. "I’m monitoring the situation on a day to day basis.
"The loss of civilian life in Gaza and in Israel is a source of deep concern to me, and after January 20th I’ll have plenty to say about the issue."
Obama said he was "not backing away at all from what I said during the campaign" and that "starting at the beginning of our administration, we’re going to engage effectively and consistently in trying to resolve the conflict in the Middle East."
Obama's emphasis on civilian casualties breaks slightly with the White House line, which has been to blame Hamas first..
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tehranchik
Well, I'm from and live in the Pacific Northwest. I did live in the middle east during the late 70's and early 80 ...
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4thchance11 months, 4 weeks ago
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"Obama deplores civilian deaths in (GAZA)", BUY says very little about the deaths caused to Israel by Hamas firing killer rockets into Israel. I think this is the first good indicator that Obama will be siding with terrorists! That's exactly what many of us have been concerned about for a long time now. I may be proven wrong, I hope I am proven wrong, but it appears the writing is on the wall.
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Why so many civilian deaths?...because the cowardly Hamas fire off their rockets from areas where civilians live. Then Israel drops bombs right where the rockets were fired off from, in an effort to kill Hamas memebers. In essence, Hamas is using innocent civilians to hide behind. So, when Israel drops bombs and kill civilians, then Hamas can say Israel is intentionally targeting civilians. Hamas are low life COWARDS!
If Hamas had even 1 ounce of courage or respect for innocent human life, they would put on military uniforms and meet Israel on the front lines and fight like real men. Hamas are PURE COWARDLY SCUM OF THE EARTH! You can try your best to make excuses for Hamas, but anyone with a working brain can see what's really going on here. So, if you want to make excuses for Hamas, then please explain why they refuse to put on military uniforms and come out of their hiding among innocent people and fight this war like true soldiers would do.-
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tadair91911 months, 4 weeks ago
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Here are words you won't hear in the media: "guerilla warfare." Instead, they've redefined meanings for the sake of catagorizing people as evil "terrorists." But the formula is simple. Any time you want to justify killing somebody, just label them a terrorist. The American colonist did this to the Native Indians. Britian did this to India. We do this to Afghanistans, Iraqis, (and now Pakistanis.) Everywhere in history, the formula is used over and over again. Divide and conquer.
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Dionys11 months, 4 weeks ago
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""Obama deplores civilian deaths in (GAZA)", BUY says very little about the deaths caused to Israel by Hamas firing killer rockets into Israel."
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Can you read?
"The loss of civilian life in Gaza and in Israel is a source of deep concern to me, and after January 20th I’ll have plenty to say about the issue." - Obama
He took NO side, acknowledging that the deaths on both sides are horrific and concerning. Maybe you should try it sometime. Being concerned for the deaths of all, rather than the deaths of whichever group you happen to support because of ideological blindness. -
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willottica11 months, 4 weeks ago
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Please 4thchance, take the time to read your own submitted stories (beyond the headlines), here's Obama's quote FROM THE ARTICLE YOU POSTED:
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"The loss of civilian life in Gaza and in Israel is a source of deep concern to me, and after January 20th I’ll have plenty to say about the issue."
Welcome to reality, it's that thing that exists when you drop your blinders and look around at the complete picture. -
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Candida11 months, 4 weeks ago
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4thchance: "If Hamas had even 1 ounce of courage or respect for innocent human life, they would put on military uniforms and meet Israel on the front lines and fight like real men."
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You must be kidding. You expect a group of people possessing a few home-made rockets, a few guns and some stones to stand up against the world's fourth strongest military machine. They are not stupid. How would they fight against bombs dropped from airplanes? It would be no fight; it would be just a massacre.
Weak people fight with the weapons and tactics they have. Just like the Israelis used terrorist tactics against the British, the Palestinians now use terrorist tactics against the Israelis. It doesn't make it right, but it's no more wrong than starving people and bombing them from the air.
I also have a suggestion for you. Try switching the names of Hamas and Israel in your post to see how it sounds. Dehumanizing others makes it easier to kill them, but it's offensive nonetheless.
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rimbaud11 months, 4 weeks ago
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Lobbing bombs into Israel is a form of lashing out blindly with violence, and not a very good strategy against a more powerful enemy. Hamas would do better to follow Hezbollah's model of building an economic infrastructure in Gaza. On the other hand, Israel has guaranteed another generation of resisters, and it is likely that Hamas will be more popular than Fatah in any future elections in Palestine.
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The Palestinians in Gaza area a modern and educated populace. They need to negotiate a truce with Israel that allows trade and travel across their borders, instead of violence. Unfortunately, almost immediately after every agreement, it is clear by their actions that neither side is ready for peace.-
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most_reasonable11 months, 4 weeks ago
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The Israelis are not ready for another Holocaust of their people. As for peace among the muslims, look at the constant butchering of the Sunnis by the Shiites and the Shiites butchering the Sunnis. The wars between Iraq and Iran (where the Iranians used their children to march across Iraqi mine fields to clear them and promising them Paradise as their reward, the wars between North and South Yemen, the wars between the Hindus and the Muslims, the murder in Darfur.
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The inhabitants of GAZA are truly in a bad position. The result years of neglect under the PLO and supplanted by the greater hate and lies of the HAMAS who have only brought more destruction and a PROMISE of another Theocracy (just what the world needs, another Muslim theocracy.)
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tadair91911 months, 4 weeks ago
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I'm surprised the media calls it "civilian deaths." They usually operate by labeling anybody that deceased as terrorists. Church or school. Doesn't matter to our reporters.
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Sometimes they even get around to calling it incidental collatoral damage. Oh sure. -
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Shankari25Comment removed: Retracted by user1 Reply
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hyperbola11 months, 4 weeks ago
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Obama should catch up with the American people - 70% of us now say the US should NOT support Israel.
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George Washington's warnings and U.S. policy towards Israel
A new WorldPublicOpinion.org poll of 18 countries finds that in 14 of them people mostly say their government should not take sides in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Just three countries favor taking the Palestinian side (Egypt, Iran, and Turkey) and one is divided (India). No country favors taking Israel's side, including the United States, where 71 percent favor taking neither side.
The degree of mandated orthodoxy on the Israel question among America's political elites is so great that if one took the statements on Gaza from George Bush, Pelosi, Hoyer, Berman, Ros-Lehtinen, and randomly chosen Bill Kristol-acolytes and redacted their names, it would be impossible to know which statements came from whom. They're all identical: what Israel does is absolutely right. The U.S. must fully and unconditionally support Israel. Israel does not merit an iota of criticism for what it is doing. It bears none of the blame for this conflict. No questioning even of the wisdom of its decisions -- let alone the justifiability -- is uttered. No deviation from that script takes place.
that America must unquestioningly stand on Israel's side and support it, not just in this conflict but in all of Israel's various wars -- is a view which 7 out of 10 Americans reject. Conversely, the view which 70% of Americans embrace -- that the U.S. should be neutral and even-handed in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict generally -- is one that no mainstream politician would dare express.
In a democracy, one could expect that politicians would be afraid to express a view that 70% of the citizens oppose. Yet here we have the exact opposite situation: no mainstream politician would dare express the view that 70% of Americans support. Isn't that fairly compelling evidence of the complete disconnect between our political elites and the people they purportedly represent?
http://www.propeller.com/story/2008/12/31/george-w...-
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Endoscopy11 months, 4 weeks ago
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More al taqiyaa hyper. You are so in bed with Hamas after your joyful visit there you just can't help lying for Islam. Way to go hyper. Your view is that our people get their marching orders from Israel. What a concept. That is what you are implying. What you always ignore is that if they are saying the same things then it just might be true. Poor Muslim hyper.
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Endoscopy11 months, 4 weeks ago
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Lets put this in perspective. In Sri Lanka there has been a group using terrorist tactics and to date there have been 73,000 people killed. In India the Muslim terrorists have killed over 4000 people. Then there is the Sudan where genocide is being carried out as we speak by the government.
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These are three different places in the world where a lot more deaths are occurring. This begs the question of why there is no real outcry about those killings and people go nuts about Israel attacking Hamas because of all the missiles and suicide bombers they keep facing on a daily basis.
Those horrible Jews and mostly ignore what Hamas, Hezbollah, and other terrorists groups in the area does. In Sri Lanka, India, and the Sudan where a lot more deaths take place the left either ignore it or when a big attack takes place in the news for a while and ignore afterward. Where is the outrage about these places where an order of magnitude greater of killings take place.
But day after day anti Israel stories abound and some of the people posting on this site are completely on the side of the TERRORISTS.-
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dissent11 months, 4 weeks ago
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the tamil tigers of sri lanka and the muslim and hindu extremists of india are all armed militant groups. they are not nation states with a seat at the un as is israel. and for this reason israel deserves all the criticism it gets and probably a great deal more
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throwing sudan into this mix alongside sri lanka and india however is disingenuous. that’s apples and oranges stuff. while the troubles of sri lanka and india are mostly internal concerns, sudan, like the palestinian crisis, is a pawn of larger geopolitical manipulations and interventions. -
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ningyo11 months, 4 weeks ago
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hamas knows that every liberal media here and worldwide will put these innocent victims on their front page--so in their bloodthirsty campaign to destroy israel they continually sacrifice women and children to get the predictable response from lib/dem american media and sites like this--listen to the phone calls from the terrorists in mumbai to their masters in pakistan if you have any doubt--its chilling--let the muslims go..kill the women..kill the children..kill them all..like they were ordering a pizza
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ningyo11 months, 4 weeks ago
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israel is pushing now partly in response to the constant rocket attacks but also because they dont know what the obama admin position will be--"i deplore the civilian deaths in gaza"..what does that mean..!!??..sounds like he sort of kind of blames israel for "overreacting" to these attacks..barry gives clintonian parsing words kind of answers to ANY quetions..israel has to question how much support they will get from an obama admin--sadly i dont think it will be much
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EDWARDIII11 months, 4 weeks ago
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Obama deplores civilian deaths. Well, of course he does. It's his particular genius to take a swipe at whoever he wants to destroy by saying something that sounds kind and loving. Oh, sure, he deplored the killing of Israeli civilians too, but look at the timing. No Israeli deaths have been in the news lately. The soft brown eyes, the gentle voice, the ardent concern in his expression as he piles on against the Jews-- what a master of media manipulation. I can hardly wait to hear what he says when he starts buying votes with tax money. I'm going to join Acorn and get ready to cash in.
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dissent11 months, 4 weeks ago
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"Oh, sure, he deplored the killing of Israeli civilians too, but look at the timing. No Israeli deaths have been in the news lately."
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huh?..... how dare he choose a time when no israelis are dying!
latest score: 700 gazans, 6 israelis (4 from "friendly fire")
i can tell you're a "ah! but the strawberries! that's where i had them" kinda guy. :|
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