Xazy

I disagree strongly with this. Their view and stance, is the total destruction of Israel. They believe Israel does not have a right to exist. Look to the yom kipper war, or the 6-day war, or any other conflict in the past 60 years there, and you will see, it is not about anything other then, the destruction of Israel. Even now as Hamas is part of the Palestenian government, they do not recognize Israel.

An example of the hardship is closing border enterancesbetween Palestine and Israel, where terrorists enter. And when they open it, the capture a suicide bomber, and have to close down the enterance. Later that day get condemned for not allowing Palestenian employees to get to work (no mention of the suicide bomber that was trying to sneak through). Safety comes sadly at a price.

They have also destroyed homes of anyone who was a suicide bomber. Sadly since Palestenians are willing to be martyrs, and do not mind dying this is a punitive punishment, since in Palestine homes tend to be for an entire family, so there could be a whole family there. Again a safety measure attempt that comes at a price.

If there is a strip of houses that are used as cover from Israel, so that they can fire rockets at Israel, they have come in and bulldozed the place flat, so that anyone firing rockets there will be seen, and can defend against. Once again safety comes at a price.

bermuDa

So neither group recognizes the other as a legitimate political entity with any right to exist, the main difference being that Israel has an institutionalized method of fighting the war (whilst violating international law to which they might not be bound, but I refer to it as a sort of "standard protocol" for armed conflict), while the Palestinian groups are a more scattered bunch, fighting their side of the conflict (also violating international law) as guerillas and suicide bombers. Both sides target civilians, and do whatever they consider necessary to accomplish their goals. Is this a more accurate description?

Also, I see what you're saying about the actions that must be taken for safety's sake, but unfortunately, it is precisely those actions that garner support for Israel's opponents. I simply cannot consider this the only acceptable course of action because it basically boils down to whether we'd rather see Israeli lives and property destroyed, or Palestinian lives and property destroyed. Allowing either only widens the rift between the two sides, as more cries for vengeance and more angry soldiers or suicide bombers are borne from the violence visited upon them on purpose or by circumstance.

What has especially shaken my view of the situation was footage I saw of a Palestinian family sitting on the curbside weeping as they watch Israeli bulldozers destroy their newly built house, not because they had any ties to terrorism, but because it was impossible for them to get through all the red tape needed to build a house sanctioned by the Israeli bureaucracy, while more Israeli families are encouraged to settle and "dig-in" to the West Bank so they might claim it as their own territory. Looking into the faces of the family, especially the young boys, I saw the kind of confusion and anger that takes anchor in the heart and fills the mind with thoughts of violence that might never be quelled. It was like watching the birth of a suicide bomber. In the parent's faces, I saw nothing but despair. I can not justify this as protection of any Israeli interests other than forcing innocent Palestinians out of the West Bank. Are they not worthy of living peacefully and working on land that they own, in a land they consider sacred? Do the actions of a few condemn the many? If so, we are all in a lot of trouble.

We can do better than this.

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Xazy

Israel has recognized the Palestenian right to exist, they have said they would work with Hamas, if they would stop acting as a terrorist organization, and recognize Israel's right to exist. So again that is inaccurate.

Never said that. Israel tries its best not to hit civilians, they do not target civilians, the terrorists use the civilians as human shields.

Yes, and Israel withdrew a year ago, and since then got a terrorist organization running their government, re-arming of the militant groups, over 500 hundred rocket attacks, continued attempts for suicide bombers to get in to Israel, tunnel dug, assaulting a military compound inside Israel, soldiers killed, soldier kidnapped. Yep it is their right to own, and work the land.. I wish someone would tell them to do that, and not continue to assault their neighbor who was attempting peace, since they do not seem to get the idea.

roachboy

xasy: do you notice any dissonance between your summary and the information bermuDa posted?

in his posts, you get an outline of ways in which the various parties involved with this long brutal degrading (for everyone) conflict determine each other---in yours, you get an image of israel as Perpetual Victim, which provides you with no options if you want to explain why this or any particular conflict might happen----except vague and outmoded narratives of israel the victim struggling to survive in a hostile environment (when the reality is that israel is by a considerable distance the most powerful military force in the region and is under no meaningful threat from any combination of others--no threat in the way you seem to prefer to think about threat, that is--there is no threat to israel's existence in 2006...) buttressed perhaps with the socially acceptable racism directed at arabs that many folk who have no idea what they are talking about use to fill in inconvenient gaps in vague narratives (so in your story there are no civilians only terrorists opposing israel--everyone is a terrorist--you cant tell who is and who is not--"they" use "human shields"--and so by extension are not themselves human--nice work....)


your narrative gives you no space to actually think about the conflicts that lay behind the present war on lebanon.
for you, all questions as to cause and motive are settled in advance. everything you adduce as evidence is simply plugged into this a priori framework.

as a way of thinking about history, your position is not viable, precisely because what looking at history would function to explain you have decided is already settled, given in advance. the same problem obtains for thinking about politics.

there are ways in which this kind of narrative indicates that this thread is not even a debate---it is simply a place for a collage of mutually exclusive stories and no meaningful dialogue between them.

you could even see this kind of talking past each other as a little petri dish in which some of the structuring features that lay behind not only the lsraeli war on lebanon but a whole series of previous conflicts sits: if these narratives reflect what is happening ideologically amongst the participants, they simply talk past each other. they are set up to talk past each other.

at bottom, the version that i have been tracking assumes that violations of the dignity of the palestinian population are problematic--and that violence will follow from systematic violations of dignity, that is of basic human rights---from this, you assume that the palestinian population is made up of a wide range of human beings--not "terrorists"--and then you attempt to see how it is that variables have come to be shaped as they are--and you can get a glimpse of how the right likud story is fundamentally an insult to that dignity. not content with shutting palestinians out of the present, a narrative like yours tries to shut them out of the past as well.

in the end, xazy, yours is not a narrative about this conflict: your is a narrative within the conflict--it is part of the conflict--it is the logic used by one of the parties to shape itself within the context of the conflict--you are not explaining the conflict, then--you are reproducing it in your narrative.

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it make you sick.

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Xazy

Yes because this thread is not about the entire history of Israel and the palestenian conflict. My viewpoint is decided honestly, not going to deny it. And in this thread I have not been posting to explain my views or opinions on the past 60 year conflict.

On a side part of my thoughts that once you signed a peace treat, and start moving to that peace, both sides are supposed to hold to their end. So far it is all one sided. So if you want to go back in history start a topic about that, but do not throw that in my face, about how I am not responding about that. This is about recent history, and going back since really the whole peace process to me more then shapes this encounter.

I have always sympothized with the innocents hurt, and that, at the same time I blame the terrorists for allowing this to continue... But look at the schools there, they are taught and bred hatred at this point.

I agree that whatever may have happened in the history may have shaped the past few years, but if both sides sign an accord and want to start a peace process then both sides have to work towards it. If the other side does not want to (which is seemingly obvious by their actions) then we can continue to talk about the acts of war that they are doing.

But to be honest, all this is a different topic and should not be continued in this thread.

roachboy

how one understands this conflict IS the center of this thread. debates about how one understands this conflict IS the thread. what else do you think is going on here? what is the interest in repeating lines that you can see on television, given at press conferences by nice men in flashy uniforms?
if there is no debate to be had, what are we doing here?
what is the point of this, or any, of the threads about this conflict?

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

host

.....indeed !!! ....and....it explains why the general discussion thread on a "political" subject, like the new escalation of violence in the M.E., racked up so many more posts than this thread has.

If some of us were not so committed to challenging the "I know what I know" mindset that perceives the politics forum to be "too frustrating", or "too intimidating", debate could then be totally eclipsed by "discussion"....chit-chat........banter........ like this:

flstf

I imagine this is the same way some of the countries and groups involved in this conflict feel about resuming past talks or starting some kind of new negotiations.

roachboy

source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Sto...823817,00.html

well this removes any ambiguity about what the bushpeople are up do, doesnt it?

what is going on here?
how does the bush administration give permission to israel to bomb lebanon?
how could the bush administration give israel the green light, then devise a plan to comdemn the attacks in a week, then send rice to set up a cease fire AND BEFORE ANY OF THIS HAPPENS TELL PEOPLE THE PLAN?
why would you do that?
what possible purpose does this serve?
why would the administration want a cease fire to be seen as a sham?

how does the bush administration give permission to israel to bomb lebanon?

what is going on?

i am so confused.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

Seaver

Isreal has recognized Palestinian rights of existance for quite some time. A big point of this is that they gave away Gaza to hold to their end of the peace agreement. The Israeli government exists to protect themselves as a result of the many wars others have declared on them in thier short history.

Hamas and the PLO (both Palestinian governmental parties) have NEVER swayed from their party platform of total destruction of Israel.

So why are you trying to paint them both with the same brush?