closed Thread

[policywank]

I was only going as far back as the Arab league, the Grand Mufti and the persecution of jews by the third reich.

And if we go even further back (way way back) we have to recognize that this is not a bad "colonizer" scenario. It is not a matter of someone who has no connection to that place just coming along and taking it over as has happened in so many parts of the world.

The Jews' claim to this land goes back as far as the Palestinians' claim. Who has the more valid claim is well beyond my knowledge but the factual reality is that different groups have been displacing each other in this part of the world for all of recorded history. There is no scholarly consensus that one group or another was there first and each religious group claims primacy based upon the fairy tale that they worship.

 

[Fuzzy1975]

That was UN resolution 181

lol glad you can figure out the resolution, which was a mistake to have been passed and implemented.

 

[SubzeroGirl]

Watching a documentary on the role the British played in the history of the land division with Palestine and Israel. Interesting to see how their actions affect us now. Those Brits back then were some callus bastards. Not like the civilized bastards we have today.

 

[policywank]

History lesson time

What was bin Laden's goal?

Answer: The destruction of the United States ideals.

Now could he do that by force? Of course not. So he knew the end result. So let's look a little deeper. How can you destroy the United States? By creating dissention within America. By planting the seed...and letting Americans do it themselves. Are we "more free" than before 9-11? Are we "safer"? Is our Government more capable of governing today? Nope. Nope. Nope. And now, other country leaders see this...like Putin...like Xi...and they follow the lead...create dissention within. Let that destroy our ideals. Bin-Laden won.

Now flash forward to today. Does Hamas think they can beat Israel by force? Nope. But how can they destroy Israel? From within. Know that "peace" agreement that was on the table? Gone. Why? Because of the actions by Israel since the attack. Not because of Hamas...everyone condemns that except Iran. So every single day people that live in enclaves...they now live the rest of their lives in fear. Hamas was one of TWELVE or so different groups...each operating independently. Someone will survive. So....basically...in the scheme of things...Hamas has already won. Not because of their actions. But because of Israeli actions.

Now here is the reality. It doesn't have to end this way. But it will...because that is deep down...what Israel wants.

This attack was purposeful. It was directed st the enclaves on purpose. Not Israel. Hamas is letting Israel attack themselves from within. But I can 100% guarantee...every Israeli living in those enclaves from this day forward...will do so in fear. There is no border safe from terrorism. And the future actions of those scared citizens will be watched by the future Arab nations.

The premise that what Bin Laden sought was the destruction of United States ideals is actually the propaganda that the west sold. To be more precise the talking point at the time was "he hates our freedom" and apparently you bought the narrative.

He may have had issues with U.S. ideals freedom, etc. but he stated quite clearly that his motivations were to push the U.S, presence out of the middle east. He may be an ideologue but his goal was geopolitical.

I happen to believe that the U.S. is (mostly) a force for good in the world. It has to make some challenging trade-offs and deal with some nasty characters to do that and sometimes Uncle Sam gets it wrong, but I like that better than the alternative. It isn't fair to rely upon American power for stability then nit-pick the messy details.

But the simple matter is that Bin Laden wanted the U.S. out of the middle east. He was a loathsome piece of shit and I am glad that he didn't get what he wanted. But this "he hates freedom" rhetoric was just a way to keep the electorate on side and detract from the messier aspects of foreign policy.

 

[policywank]

Watching a documentary on the role the British played in the history of the land division with Palestine and Israel. Interesting to see how their actions affect us now. Those Brits back then were some callus bastards. Not like the civilized bastards we have today.

Yes they were pretty callous. Pretty arrogant too, thinking they could just draw lines on a map and make it so. But much like the way we criticize American hegemony now we tend to ignore the context. Was/is any other nation more likely to be judicious or fair?

Look at the topic of this thread. People look at the conduct of Israel and can be rightly critical. But the explicitly stated policy of Hamas and the PLO has been "murder them all and throw them into the sea." The only reason we aren't seeing the far more awful consequences of that policy is because some less heavy handed policies kept them from doing it.

 

[SubzeroGirl]

Yes they were pretty callous. Pretty arrogant too, thinking they could just draw lines on a map and make it so. But much like the way we criticize American hegemony now we tend to ignore the context. Was/is any other nation more likely to be judicious or fair?

Look at the topic of this thread. People look at the conduct of Israel and can be rightly critical. But the explicitly stated policy of Hamas and the PLO has been "murder them all and throw them into the sea." The only reason we aren't seeing the far more awful consequences of that policy is because some less heavy handed policies kept them from doing it.

Far more awful than beheading babies? Speechless.

 

[Chobham]

Three choices. That is all there is.

1) Hamas got lucky. (Unlikely)

2) The entire World intelligence community failed. ( Highly unlikely)

3) Hamas has their shit together way more than people want to admit. (Highly likely)

If the third option is true...why did they choose the targets they did...and not something more personal to the Israeli nation itself? Could it be the historical significance associated with those enclaves? People need to put the emotion away and look at facts...or at least possibilities. Americans have gotten dumb because of our media and politics. God gave us a brain. This is not "just because Hamas hates Israel". They could have done far worse.

I wanted to return to this.

The media is playing this up as a huge intelligence failure and the answer to that is yes..................and no. Let's look at what actually happened.

We know that Hamas is getting almost all of it's material support from Iran. Given that fact there is no reason to believe that they were not getting intelligence and planning from Iranian sources as well, primarily the Revolutionary Guard. Among the various Islamic factions Iran is probably the most organized and disciplined. We also know that Egypt gave the Israelis a 'heads up' about a month ago. That came in the nature of, "something's going on but we don't know what, where, or when." That is cause to try, and TRY is the operative word, to dig deeper, but it is NOT actionable information by itself.

So on a Jewish holiday Hamas managed to infiltrate Israel with 1000 +/- fighters in a coordinated air, land, and sea attack. (And you have to love that phrasing, makes it sound like the Marines. ) Once Hamas breached the border they basically just ran amok killing or abducting anyone and everyone they could. All covered by a massive rocket attack. The attack had no strategic objective or value, it was a tactical and political operation.

Sequestering a 1000 or so fighters out of a population of 2 million in the warren of tunnels in the Gaza Strip would have been easily accomplished thereby maintaining operational security. Further, given that there was no real plan after the border had been breached no significant amount of 'rehearsal' would have been required. The comparison of this to 9/11 is almost laughable. 9/11 was complex, long term, and had multitudes of possible security breaches, this operation was almost laughably simplistic in it's design and execution.

Now that the Israeli's are committed to combing through the Gaza to weed out Hamas the press is going on about how many Israeli's are going to die cleaning out the warren of tunnels. <shrug> Fine, let them prattle on. The Israelis aren't stupid and could do just what we did in Vietnam, flood the tunnels with propane and then light a match. Me? Given the small size of the Gaza Strip and it's proximity to the Med. I'd just get some high volume pumps and start running hoses to every tunnel entrance I found. Plenty of water, plenty of time. Flood the bastards out.

 

[RandyRebecca]

Yes they were pretty callous. Pretty arrogant too, thinking they could just draw lines on a map and make it so. But much like the way we criticize American hegemony now we tend to ignore the context. Was/is any other nation more likely to be judicious or fair?

Look at the topic of this thread. People look at the conduct of Israel and can be rightly critical. But the explicitly stated policy of Hamas and the PLO has been "murder them all and throw them into the sea." The only reason we aren't seeing the far more awful consequences of that policy is because some less heavy handed policies kept them from doing it.

Do you have any idea of what Israel has done to Palestinians over decades? 700,000 plus Palestinians were expelled from their homes in 1948 when Israel was founded. Imagine if yourself and 700,000 people near you were expelled from their homes. And that was just the start of Israel. These days, Israel thinks nothing of bulldozing the homes of Palestinians for trivial affairs, or killing Palestinian children for throwing rocks at Israeli soldiers. Israel is monstrous.

 

[policywank]

Far more awful than beheading babies? Speechless.

Well yes, I should have back dated that comment by a week. What I meant was up until recently the legitimately heavy handed conduct of the Israelis was not as bad as beheading babies.

I think that while it is fair game to criticize the Israeli regime what we have seen recently is the evidence of why they have been heavy handed.

Many people are saying "well Hamas was driven to this by the oppressive policies of Israel." No. This is what Hamas and their ilk were planning all along (they told us that explicitly). It was only Israel's aggressive control that kept it from happening sooner.

 

[Rotadom]

He just waited to hear what President Biden said and then took the opposite position no matter how ridiculous he sounds.

Donald Trump Praises Hezbollah, Criticizes Israeli Government in Wake of Attacks

https://newrepublic.com/post/176199...ah-criticizes-israeli-government-wake-attacks

 

[SubzeroGirl]

Hamas are terrorists. No country is without blame during a war, but terrorists are not proud military simply defending their country. Even the warlord Putin has come out against Hamas. He’s certainly not a pillar of righteousness, but even he knows when the line has been crossed.

 

[policywank]

Do you have any idea of what Israel has done to Palestinians over decades? 700,000 plus Palestinians were expelled from their homes in 1948 when Israel was founded. Imagine if yourself and 700,000 people near you were expelled from their homes. And that was just the start of Israel. These days, Israel thinks nothing of bulldozing the homes of Palestinians for trivial affairs, or killing Palestinian children for throwing rocks at Israeli soldiers. Israel is monstrous.

Every square inch of that part of the world has changed hands multiple times over the decades and centuries. The Arabs who occupied that land killed Jews to throw them out of it. And the cycle has repeated itself for literally millennia.

Yes many Palestinians were disadvantaged. And all of the hostile neighbours (Syria, Iran, Egypt, etc.) kept them there and refused to take them in because it served their interest. Meanwhile any attempt to find a two state solution or live in peace with an appropriate exchange of land was rejected.

You do know that there has never been a recognized state of Palestine, right? The whole area was a British protectorate in which Jews purchased a large portion of their lands fair and square in a friendly environment until the Mufti decide they had to go at which point everything changed.

By the way, where do you live? Who owned the land you live on before you were there?

 

[RandyRebecca]

Ask yourselves the question. Is the violence of a slave against a slave owner as bad or worse than the violence of a slave owner against a slave? Liberal moralists will say yes, all violence is the same, or say that the slave owner's violence is worse in words while lamenting that there isn't "peace" between slave and slave owner.

These liberals are pathetic. The Republicans of the 1860s-1870s should have been utterly ruthless during Reconstruction, merciless.

 

[RobDownSouth]

Far more awful than beheading babies? Speechless.

Still no proof of "beheaded babies" but intrepid reporters have identified the Israeli Mossad (CIA) as the source of that particular rumor. It should be noted that the Mossad is not above propaganda to promote its cause (or in this case, deflect attention on how badly they erred assessing Hamas aggression)

 

[SubzeroGirl]

Still no proof of "beheaded babies" but intrepid reporters have identified the Israeli Mossad (CIA) as the source of that particular rumor. It should be noted that the Mossad is not above propaganda to promote its cause (or in this case, deflect attention on how badly they erred assessing Hamas aggression)

Fine, then innocent children murdered, women raped or burned alive. Is that better for you?

 

[Dribble]

And here we have it...weird...CNN can find this...but the Israeli intelligence couldn't? Or didn't want to?

https://www.cnn.com/2023/10/12/middleeast/hamas-training-site-gaza-israel-intl/index.html

 

[Sean Renaud]

Many people are saying "well Hamas was driven to this by the oppressive policies of Israel." No. This is what Hamas and their ilk were planning all along (they told us that explicitly). It was only Israel's aggressive control that kept it from happening sooner.

The only reason Hamas is in control on any level is because the Palestinians learned that playing nice was not viable plan.

 

[ChloeTzang]

Do you have any idea of what Israel has done to Palestinians over decades? 700,000 plus Palestinians were expelled from their homes in 1948 when Israel was founded. Imagine if yourself and 700,000 people near you were expelled from their homes. And that was just the start of Israel. These days, Israel thinks nothing of bulldozing the homes of Palestinians for trivial affairs, or killing Palestinian children for throwing rocks at Israeli soldiers. Israel is monstrous.

nope. Most of those 700k Pals self-expelled, expecting the Arab armies to win and wipe out the Jews and then they'd come back. They were mistaken. They sided with genocide, and the picked the wrong side. Sucks to be them, but, basically, tough shit.

Go back further, Becky. The Jews bought their land from the owners, legally and legitimately, and the Arabs consistently attacked them. The jews defended themselves, just as they did on independence. The Stern gang and others were a Jewish response to violence directed against them. All the wars were attacks on Israel, and Israel won.

Bulldozing homes? Justified. Killing children? Mostly the Pals doing this and blaming Israeli's. I'm consistently amazed by Israel's forbearance. The Palestinians have an amazing ability to pull defeat and death from the jaws of peace. That said, this whole mess is on Biden anyhow, just as Ukraine is. That fucker is the most dangerous president in US history. We'll be lucky if the senile old fool doesn't drag us into WW3.

 

[ChloeTzang]

Israel are the occupiers, the oppressors. That's what the media don't want you to know.

Yeah well. You tell yourself that. Last I saw, Gaza hadn't been occupied since 2005 or something. Back in 2005, the borders were open and many Gazans worked in Israel and returned home after a day at the office or whatever. They could actually move fairly freely in Israel and the two state solution with free movement of people internally was looking viable. Hamas suicide bombers put paid to that one and led to the walls and the border being closed. Self-inflicted. If Gaza is a prison, Hamas has only themselves to blame.

And at 360 square kilometres with a a population of 1.5 million people, it's actually no prison. It could be an extremely viable city-state. Tourism too - it has lovely beaches. And all the UN aid to develop that you could ask for. So many opportunities that the dumbfucks wasted.

Singapore, by way of contrast, is far more crowded with 734.3 km and a population of 5.6 million. A very successful city state. So many opportunities that Chinese took advantage of. We Chinese are smart. We make any system and any state work. Including the ones like Thailand and Indoneasia that Chinese with local surnames run. My family was from Vietnam, and guess who made the Vietnamese economy work. Yeah, Chinese.

Give us Chinese Gaza and you'd see a Mediterranean Singapore in 20 years time.

 

[ll74]

https://www.cnn.com/2023/10/12/us/hamas-funding-crypto-invs/index.html

And what social media were they using? Twitter and Facebook

Crypto

It's comical how all these self appointed intellectuals always have to blur the lines with whataboutism or watering down the facts to play the ole two sided coin. Violence begets violence is the intellectual argument. That's true until someone wins. If you kick the big guy in the shins he'll turn around and knock your block off. Everyone posting here is very well aware that the Israeli/Palestinian issue is a complex issue that dates back to 1932, the Arab league and a Grand Mufti that aligned with Hitler's Third reich with a mission to exterminate Jews. God forbid they had the temerity to fight back. UN resolution 181 took into consideration that Arabs and Jews didn't get along therefore 181 attempted a two state solution Palestine/Israel.
To heap all the blame on Israel for all the animosity that exist in the region is pure revisionist history.

War of independence 1947-1949, Israel vs Egypt, Iraq, Syria, SA ( HOLY WAR )

Sinai War UK, Israel vs Egypt

Six day War, Israel vs Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Syria

These conflicts were started by the Arabs who were defeated and embarrassed. Some territory was grabbed by the Israelis but much was given back.

To confuse this Hamas issue with past history is blurring the facts. You cannot be the devil's advocate here. There are no two sides to this conflict. Hamas committed pure murder, heavily armed terrorist invaded a sovereign state and arbitrarily killed innocent men women and children. Anyone trying to blur the lines as to who is guilty here is just being plain argumentative. The appropriate response IMHO is to invade and disarm Hamas. Palestine has been since 2005 a independent state without the attachment (State) The Palestinians had an opportunity for self governance and surrendered that opportunity to Hamas. Now if anyone wants to point the finger at what state is more oppressive to palestinians look no further that Hamas then move on to Hezbollah, then Iran.

The problem you have is that all humans are human beings and you don't like that , because you see certain humans as animals,..it's difficult to see other perspectives.

 

[IrezumiKiss]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1712541855223787581

 

[ll74]

Yeah well. You tell yourself that. Last I saw, Gaza hadn't been occupied since 2005 or something. Back in 2005, the borders were open and many Gazans worked in Israel and returned home after a day at the office or whatever. They could actually move fairly freely in Israel and the two state solution with free movement of people internally was looking viable. Hamas suicide bombers put paid to that one and led to the walls and the border being closed. Self-inflicted. If Gaza is a prison, Hamas has only themselves to blame.

And at 360 square kilometres with a a population of 1.5 million people, it's actually no prison. It could be an extremely viable city-state. Tourism too - it has lovely beaches. And all the UN aid to develop that you could ask for. So many opportunities that the dumbfucks wasted.

Singapore, by way of contrast, is far more crowded with 734.3 km and a population of 5.6 million. A very successful city state. So many opportunities that Chinese took advantage of. We Chinese are smart. We make any system and any state work. Including the ones like Thailand and Indoneasia that Chinese with local surnames run. My family was from Vietnam, and guess who made the Vietnamese economy work. Yeah, Chinese.

Give us Chinese Gaza and you'd see a Mediterranean Singapore in 20 years time.

I appreciate your interest in Singapore, though I'd like if you created a different thread for it


Thanks.

 

[RobDownSouth]

Fine, then innocent children murdered, women raped or burned alive. Is that better for you?

Much better. I have a thing for truthiness. In any event, war is hell, right?

 

[ChloeTzang]

Crypto

The problem you have is that all humans are human beings and you don't like that , because you see certain humans as animals,..it's difficult to see other perspectives.

LOL. For myself, I see all humans as humans. Just, there are some humans where we'd be better off if they were dead, and that doesn't upset me in the slightest. It is what it is, and I'd far rather all of them died rather than one of me.

 

[ChloeTzang]

I appreciate your interest in Singapore, though I'd like if you created a different thread for it


Thanks.

Get over yourself. You know very well what I mean. You're not a dumb fuck like Becky