Facts
Arabs (Muslims) can vote in Israeli
Arabs (Muslims) have MPs in the Israeli parliament
Arabs (Muslims) serve in the Israeli Army
Arabs (Muslims) have access to medical services
The Hamas leadership have family living the good life in Israel
Hamas workers, families and the Red Crescent can visit those in prison
The Red Crescent has not managed to visit the Israeli soldiers captured.
Both Hamas and Syria have NOT confirmed any information about those captured in current or past battles
Israeli soldiers captured (in PLO custody) have in the past have been ripped apart by the mob!
Israel hand over the bodies of the dead to Red Crescent
Palestinians seek to trade the dead for prisoners
Israel tries to limit civilian causalities, Muslim often fire from among the civilian population. This has happened in many Muslim conflicts around the world.
Palestinians captured are given medical treatment and a reasonable comfortable jail
The ONLY site holy to Jews (Temple mount) is controlled by Muslims
Muslims deny that Temple Mount was EVER Jewish
Mecca can ONLY be visited by Muslims, they claim the JEW Abraham built it!
Saudi Arabia wants to build a fence on its border with IRAQ
Saudi Arabia wants to build a fence on its border with YEMEN
Saudi Arabia does not all citizenship to anyone not even to Palestinians
Sudan is killing 100,000 because they are BLACK
No on is killed for the colour of their skin in Israel
Israel is the ONLY country in the Middle East that does NOT require to identity your religion when visiting
Few Jews are allowed to live in Muslims lands, while many Jew are assaulted and murdered even in Europe.
Christians are being cleansed from Gaza and West Bank
The Muslims of the Middle East have hated the West since before the Crusades
The Muslims have hated the USA since it was a British Colony
(I suggest reading White Gold – white slaves in North Africa)
The Palestinians have and continues to receive more foreign aid than ANY other humanitarian activity.
NEVER in the history of modern humanitarian aid has more money be wasted or stolen than has been provided to Palestinians. (Arafat took more than his fair share)
ONLY the Western Countries like the USA, UK, France, Italy, Spain, Germany and the like over migration and citizen rights to Palestinians.
Local Muslim countries like Lebanon, IRAQ, Kuwait and Jordan have all fought wars, battles or expelled Palestinians from their countries!
NO Middle East country offers Permanent Citizenship to Palestinians
The only West style Government in the Middle East is Israel
There is NOT one Muslim Middle East country has a government that is for the people or by the people. Their Governments see their people as cannon fodder, just as Mohammed did. Their Governments are Tribal, Religious or Fascist.
The Israel government is NOT racist, Fascist or Religious.
Islamic Muslims radicals are instigating and perpetuating terrorist campaigns, insurgencies, civil wars, minority suppression, ethnic cleansing and/or genocide in Afghanistan, Algeria, Bangladesh, Belgium, Chad, Chechnya, Dagestan, Denmark, Egypt, Ethiopia, France, Gambia, Great Britain, India, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Kashmir, Kenya, Kosovo, Lebanon, Macedonia, Mali, Mauritania, Morocco, Netherlands, Niger, Nigeria, Pakistan, territories administered by the “Palestinian Authority,” Philippines, Qatar, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Somalia, Spain, Sudan, Syria, Tanzania, Thailand, Tunisia, Turkey, The United States of America, Yemen, and Zanzibar.  The rest of the world is held hostage to fear.
Arabs and Muslims have nearly a third of the planet, much of it won by war and forced conversions.
The Jews are defending the only land that is remotely Jewish in the World, they are not fighting in any other country.
Fact - Jimmy Carter is a great disappointment; I hope it’s more to do with old age senility rather than understood and committed belief. If he believes it then he is an idiot.

Perhaps the Gazans should ask Suha Arafat to return some of the $3.5 Billion stolen from international funding sent to the Palestinian Authority during the time of Yassir Arafat’s rule.  Or look into the mirror and ask why they consider killing Jews and electing Hamas to be the answer to their personal problems.  They have no more excuse to blame the Jews for their miserable condition than did a citizen of Koln, Berlin, Tokyo or Hiroshima in 1943, for what lay ahead. Happy enough to commit mass-murder themselves, for their “God-Kings”, happy to engage in slavery and raw conquest of others, bringing mass-misery to so many, happy to be participants in hysterical mass-psychological movements which put themselves up as Supreme Beings, with all others as inferiors, the Palestinian populations of Gaza and the West Bank are little different in this respect.  They daily drink in litres of Jew-hatred propaganda and revisionist history from government TV and radio, procliaming themselves as the only legitimate ones, describing the Jews and Americans as Satan’s Spawn who drinks the blood of Muslims, their social construct so sex-repressive and inherently violent they descend into the historical dark ages even to the point of strapping bombs on their own children. And then celebrating their obliteration, much as they also celebrated wildly in the streets, with hysterical cheering and uulating when news of 9-11 reached “Palestine”.  The only errors the West has made, is to give these people anything in the way of relief or assistance, and to not recognize how Muslim governments and the mullah-mosque systems are major organizers of this dark emotional plague which leads them towards Jihad violence against the unbelievers—whether Jew in Israel, Hindu in India, Christian in Lebanon, Animist in Darfur, it does not matter, they are all inferiors who should be wiped away to make room for Muslims.  1400 years of this lie, about the “religion of peace”, which the Western Leftists also promote if only to gain more votes for their candidates, who bend over to kiss the Muslim foot, no matter what barbaric atrocities they commit.  And Gaza is not unique—just go to any Muslim-dominated nation and you will see similar poverty conditions, resultant from similar crooked leaders, including massive butchery even of Muslims killing fellow Muslims, as in Algeria, Syria, Sudan, and now Iraq.

It is refreshing to read such raw assessments of life in Gaza from a senior American journalist. As someone who follows the US press and opinion online and through internet radio it always amazes me what a taboo subject Israels policies in the occupied territories are. For example I listened to a Bill Maher podcast last week and after all the withering and extremely funny attacks on Bush et al came an interview with Benjamin Netanyahu!  I thought it was a joke at first, but no and there followed an extremely soft cosy chat with the extreme right wing former Israeli PM.  If him who is next - why not Cheney or Rumsfeld as well?  They are part of the same problem. Democrats seems to be the most terrified of all to address these issues so I admire Jimmy Carter all the more for his timely book. 

The “anti-semitism” comment expressed above is cheap lazy and absurd.  For some people I wonder if there is anything that Israel can ever do that could ever be wrong.  As Jimmy Carter himself has pointed out these issues are lively debates within Israel itself.

Since Day One of Israel’s existence, its leadership has tirelessly worked with two major foreign policy goals. The first goal is to break Arab states into smaller and smaller pieces and promote sectarian violence in these states. The famous plan for a Christian state in Lebanon and its successful instigation of the 1975-90 war is part of this. The other has been to draw the US and the Arab world into war and promote mutual hatred between the two.

The second goal has been a smashing success. At first, they were caught doing such things as bombing US targets in Egypt in 1954 to sabotage talks between the two countries, though Israel was never punished for this and this has never been publicised in the US, much like the 1967 attack of the USS Liberty and its lifeboats. Then, with the help of AIPAC and the rise of the neocon movement, Israeli agents penetrated the US government.

A huge victory for them was the rise of Ronald Reagan, bringing neocons into power for the first time. With it came the green light for the 1982 invasion of Lebanon and the sending of US Marines into Lebanon to relieve the Israeli occupation forces. Palestinians subject to an American security guarantee were slaughtered under Israeli supervision. The Marines then waged war on behalf of a Lebanese government installed by Israel. This led to the bombing of the Marine barracks in Beirut, which of course led to cries of revenge against all Arabs from the United States.

Later, on April 1 1990, Saddam Hussein said “If they attack us, fire will eat half of Israel”. As a result, US media speculated on a war on Iraq to disarm it of what became to be known as WMDs, to preserve Israel’s regional monopoly.

Conveniently, a dispute between Iraq and Kuwait led to the events of August 1990, which was used as an excuse by the US to destroy that country through bombing and to maintain a draconian sanctions regime in the name of preserving Israel’s regional WMD monopoly. 500,000 children dead later, and Madeleine Albright said “It was worth it”. For Israel, it certainly is for US government officials.

With these crimes committed with Israel and for Israel, including the Qana massacre which Albright responded to by firing the UN Secretary General who dared allow a report blaming Israel be published (So Annan knows why he got his job), the Arab world saw this and there was lots of anger. Repressive regimes were bribed by the US into collaborating with Israel. The Oslo process was a cruel, cruel exercise in US-Israeli sadism. Clinton staffed his Israel-Palestine team with Israel lobbyists.

Then there was the betrayal of Yasser Arafat; promised he would not be blamed for any failure at Camp David, he was stabbed in the back, supposedly because Bill wanted to help Hillary for her Senate bid.

After the failure of Camp David, over 300 unarmed Palestinians were massacred and the media justified this on the grounds that the “generous offer” had been turned down and that a “lynching” of suspected death squad operatives happened. These 300 were murdered by the Israelis before the first suicide bomber crossed into Israel during the Al-Aqsa Intefada. Clinton responded to the murders by sending weapons to help commit more murders. These murders were advertised in May 2000 before the Camp David meetings by the Israelis, they announced their plans to use helicopter gunships, tanks and live ammunition against expected protests.

So all these crimes later, something happened on September 11 2001. What did Benjamin Netanyahu say? “It’s very good”. It sure was for him. It was the culmination of his country’s policy for the past fifty years.

Well, since the palestinian arabs (Hamas) do not recognize Israel, openly claim their goal is destruction of Israel, since they conduct terrorist war against Israel - the result is obvious: Israel is forced to defend herself.

Anyway, so far all arab parties in Judea, Samaria and Gaza openly claim that they need Jew-free territories. Are they closer related to the KKK than the Israel government? Moreover, would the author be satisfied if Israel treated the arab israelis in the same exact manner as jews are treated in Judea, Samaria and Gaza? And if not, why not?

Chris Hedges themes, views and voice should be shared with a much larger audience than merely this site. Since his work, “War is a Force....” was published, Hedges has been a most distinctive and insightful voice, counter balancing the bravado and hubris offered by many that trumpet war as a main means of moral victory.

For generations, many segments of the Israeli community have offered themselves as offshoots of an oppressed society.  But quickly - in this past decade - and in a ramped up manner in the past couple of years, the Israeli military muscle in a paradoxical twist have made themselves into onery oppressors - in so many circumstances.

While many in the Palestinian community are likewise complicit in in the deadly havoc that continues to wrack this country, there must be many that dream of peace and a moral society where folk embrace rather than engage in reckless depravity.

Innocence betrayed as woman and children are blown assunder. Israeli society - in all corners - should pay greater attention and American political leaders balance views before this conflict grows into a greater ominous storm.

Ironic that it was a Elie Weisel, a Jew, who said: ‘The opposite of love is not hate, it is indifference.’

Israel has become that which they hated.

Torture, kidnappings, targeted assassinations, gulags, walls along our borders in the name of “national security”—have we been taking lessons from the Israelis?  I’m ashamed to be an American we’ve strayed so very far from our ideals.

Chris Hedges’ brutally honest appraisal of the Palestinians’ humanitarian crisis sounds a powerful alarm bell that desperately needs to be heard. I agree with every word he says, except for his criticisms of Jimmy Carter and his book. The story of Israel’s destructive intentions and the misery wrought on the Palestinians has been known for a very long time. If Carter had titled his book, “Palestine Humanitarian Crisis”, it probable raised as many yawns as one called “Darfur Humanitarian Crisis”. We can see that he must have done something right in deliberately using the word “apartheid” by the way he’s being roasted. By invoking the comparison with South Africa, and the sub-text of our own tortured racial history, he has scorched a lot of raw nerves (some of the reviews are vicious and ugly), exactly what was needed. Meanwhile, those who are provoked into reading the book will find one of the most convoluted and intricate conflicts in human history laid out calmly and succinctly in plain English.

My revered Zionist grandmother led me to believe in the Israeli cause. In the 1940s, we went to the theater and stood and cheered and wept as the curtain came down on “A Star is Born” as Paul Muni raised the new flag and somberly led the Jewish people into the nascent State of Israel. We watched the newsreels of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians snaking their way through the desert as they were forced out of the country. “They’re dirty, ignorant nomads who had no right to be there in the first place,” she would tell me.

But in 1971 I spent six months in Israel. The history, I learned, was far more more complicated and a lot less favorable to the Israelis than my grandmother let on. The origins and practices of Colonial Zionism were not pretty. I met ordinary Palestinians who were quite intelligent and decent, just as I met of lot of dovish Israelis who also were kindly and well-intentioned. But I also saw that the Labor Party was in decline, the right was on the rise, and their supporters were arrogant, truculent, militaristic, and intensely antagonistic toward the Palestinians. The future looked grim—in 1971!

Many Likud followers told me that Israel could get whatever they wanted from the U.S. because they had us a over barrel, a barrel of oil: amidst the Cold War, they were our bastion against Russian expansionism in the Middle East. It was hard not to laugh in their faces. But who would ever have imagined that 35 years later, for different reasons, that Israel, through AIPAC, other lobbies and agencies, and sheer political clout could have the lock grip that it does on American-Israeli policies. This to the point that anyone who dares to challenge their policies is immediately attacked as an anti-Semite, a coddler of terrorists, and worse—the way Jimmy Carter is now under assault.

The former president and Chris Hedges make excellent cases. Both of their perspectives are needed. I for one welcome both.

Don

If possible, worse than Israeli government policy has been U.S. policy, as OUR government has aided and abetted (with the consent of the governed--fed the “facts” by grossly biased media that grants seemingly infinite time to AIPAC spokespersons, while merely pretending to fairness in giving a few brief moments to Ereket or Ashwari, both of whom are invariably interrogated as to suicide bombers, noticeably, by the way, absent since Hamas won elections)--to the tune of billions of dollars per annum, along with supplying of advanced weapons systems.

Obscenity that Israeli government policy has been and remains, U.S. policy has been and remains yet more loathe-some. I agree re reaction to Carter’s (fairly tepid) new book. I’ve been wondering where, exactly, was he when he held the reins of power? No doubt, same place he was when the issues were Salvadoran and Nicaraguan revolutions.

Seems the more things change, the more they remain the same: European settlers lately arrived in the “New World” pursued the same policy toward indigenous peoples, deemed so much “shrubbery” to be mowed down or banished--naturally, in the name of security, or “taming” the savage beast--bringing religion and democracy to the uncivilized. “Land grab” was never mentioned in officialdom. My own opinion, as white, male, European descendent, is that the “uncivilized” had a good deal to teach Europeans about civilized behavior.

I suppose that if the Palestinians get “lucky,” they’ll wind up no “worse off” than Navajo, Cherokee, Seminole, Sioux--every tribe, every nation--at least those yet extent.

Even the U.S. government didn’t construct a wall, but then, so thorough was genocide no wall was even contemplated, far as I know. Perhaps one day, Israel will be able to tear theirs down, once Palestinians have been so reduced in number and/or banished to nether regions (places where there is no water, no arable land, etc.), they will attain the status of a people to be pitied, to be granted charity, not least by the oh-so-very “decent” people who destroyed them--in the name of some goddamn ideology or other, that is, in the interests of power and wealth.

Thanks to Hedges for NON-fiction, the very best piece I’ve read at Truthdig.

One of the more graphic illustrations of the capitalist system’s growing irrationality is now being painted by one of its forward outposts—Israel. As Chris Hedges so richly describes, the state that Zionism created now clearly senses it’s mortality and is thrashing around accordingly. The guardians of the state are clearly in the grip of fear and uncertainty. The recent indiscriminate bombings in Lebanon and Gaza and the resultant killing of civilians and destruction of infrastructure, the kidnapping of Hamas legislators, the targeting of a U.N. observer post, and the outrage on Qana were desperate acts. Each farther outside the bounds of common sense than the one before.

Completely out of the blue on repeated occasions and in leaflets dropped on the Lebanese, Israeli leaders have felt compelled to mention their power to erase Lebanon from the planet. The Israelis are blustering past the graveyard and their bully’s trepidation is bound to grow now that their adventure has gone badly. Prime Minister Olmert and his security cabinet moved in fits and starts. When the Israeli military’s nose was bloodied at Bint Jbail, they gave up on the idea of driving to the Litani River to establish their so-called buffer zone. Then the security cabinet realized the electrifying effect of this turn on the Arab people and they poured troops across the border. Even as they veered back to their original plan, deep down they knew that militarily speaking, only a Pyrrhic victory was available against Hizbollah.

One thing the Israeli assault on the Gaza and Lebanon has made clearer is the alignment of forces in the Arab and Muslim world. Ironically, in different fashions both Hamas and Hizbollah were creations of Israel. Hamas was supposed to act as a counterweight to the Palestine Liberation Organization when Israel considered the PLO the most immediate threat to their domination of the Arab majority. Hizbollah filled the gapping chasm Israel created with the 1982 invasion and years long occupation of southern Lebanon. Both Hamas and Hizbollah have, through years of disciplined work and organizing, woven themselves into the lives of the respective peoples they seek to liberate. What a stark contrast with the rich Arab boys who have created the cult they call al-Qaeda. The clownish Ayman al-Zawahiri rushed to his camcorder after Hizbollah faced down the Israeli military to spout some silly rhetoric about a caliphate from Spain to Iraq in front of a poster that screams, “Please remember us, we did 9/11!”

Under normal circumstances the impending death of a form of racism like Zionism (see the picture of young Israeli girls writing messages and drawing on missile warheads soon to rain down on Lebanon) and the establishment of a secular state on the territory Israel now occupies where Palestinian Arabs of various religious persuasions and Jews could peacefully co-exist as equals would be cause for human celebration. Unfortunately, the panic that clearly grips Israel means they will likely join in U.S. attacks on Damascus and Tehran and resort to the use of their nuclear arsenal when all else fails. And that, on a larger scale, is the dilemma that the whole world faces as the capitalist system spearheaded by the United States begins experiencing it’s last gasps.

What does anyone expect. The Palestinians vote for Hamas, who’s prime purpose is the destruction of Israel, the killing of Jewish people, and it’s expected that the Palestinians will be handled with kid gloves?

Maybe the Palestinians are fighting amongst themselves because they realized they screwed up in their last election and would like new leadership that is willing to recognize the right of Israel to exist so that the poor Palestinians (you know, the ones that institutionally learn from grade school on to hate Jews) can have some hope of a prospect of peace and survival.

I do feel sad for the Palestinians as I’m sure that a good percentage are victims of their own institutionalized hatred towards their neighbors. Reading Chris Hedges makes me feel sad for the people caught in this vice. But, the Jewish people are sick of suicide attacks and so built their wall to restrict movement of the AK47/rochet launcher/suicide vest toting demagogues. They’re sick of being attacked and so are using a heavy hand to deal with those who would be their enemy. Who can blame them?

If it’s causing upheaval within the Palestinian governemnt, maybe it is sound strategy. I would never have guesed it was a sound strategy, but apparently Israel is leaning more towards Clausewitz and Machiavelli since Bush went preemptive and the strides of US presidents towards Middle East peace over the last 24 years were thrown in the dumppster.

It’s a bad situation, but what do you expect? Kid gloves?

As I understand it, Israel was created primarily as a refuge for homeless Holocaust survivors following the attempted genocide in Europe.  Israel has been under attack - for its survival - ever since then.  I can’t understand why Israel should not be able to defend itself.  It seems obvious to me that when the Palestinians stop firing rockets into Israel, and stop sending suicide bombers into Israel, both targeting unarmed civilians, Israel will no longer have to defend itself against them.

Having been to Gaza myself and witnessed the horrors that result from the Israeli and American policies, I thank you for having the guts to say it like it is.

I appreciate everything Chris Hedges said in his article, “Worse Than Apartheid.” It appears that finally a bit of reality is seeping into the American consciousness.  What is going on in occupied Palestine is barbaric, cruel, and with malice aforethought.  But in my mind what makes the unrelenting Israeli assault on the Palestinians even more cruel is its deliberate intentionality.  Everything done by the Israeli occupiers is carefully thought out and carefully implemented for maximum effect.  In fact, the Israeli Supreme Court last week ruled that assassinations of Palestinian political leaders is “legal,” and that is has no problem with Israeli death squads, which freely roam Gaza and the West Bank looking for those on their lists or just targets of opportunity.  Everything, the checkpoints, the home demolitions, the routine atrocities, the land confiscations, the theft of water, and theft of even more Palestinian land by the Hate Wall, the theft of Jerusalem, all of it is so methodical, so well constructed, so merciless.  Yes, it’s worse than apartheid by a long-shot, that’s why a more accurate term would be slow-moving genocide.

What Carter and Hedges are voicing is the truth.  I applaud them both for having the courage to state what the rest of the world knows to be a fact.

Human beings cannot live in peace with ferocious animals with human masks.

President Carter and Mr. Gibson were absolutely right when denouncing these animals.

King George only knows how to bow and knee down in front those wild beasts.

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“Smuggling began at the very moment that residence was established; its inhabitants were forced to live on 180 grams of bread a day, 220 grams of sugar a month, 1 kg. of jam and 1 kg. of honey, etc. It was calculated that the officially supplied rations did not cover even 10 percent of the normal requirements. If one had wanted really to restrict oneself to the official rations then the entire population of the ghetto would have had to die of hunger in a very short time....

The authorities did everything to seal off the ghetto hermetically and not to allow in a single gram of food. A wall was put up around the ghetto on all sides that did not leave a single millimeter of open space....

They fixed barbed wire and broken glass to the top of the wall. When that failed to help, they were ordered to make the wall higher, at their own expense, of course....

Several kinds of guards were appointed for the walls and the passages through them; the categories of guards were constantly being changed and their numbers increased. The walls were guarded by the military together with the police; at the ghetto wall there were police ..They employed sharply repressive measures to stop the smuggling. Several times smugglers were shot at the central lock-up. Once there was a veritable slaughter (100 persons were shot). Among the victims of the smuggling there were tens of children between 5 and 6 years old, whom the killers shot in great numbers near the passages and at the walls....

And despite that, without paying attention to the victims, the smuggling never stopped for a moment. When the street was still SLIPPERY WITH BLOOD that had been spilled, other smugglers already set out, as soon as the “candles” had signaled that the way was clear, to carry on with the work....”

How sad, the above was entitled “Life in the Warsaw Ghetto, by Emanuel Ringelblum—-is it too trite to say that history continually repeats itself again and again—-have we learned no lessons from the past.  How did we become the Enemy we so intensely reviled?

They used to teach us in political science that nothing’s worse than apartheid.

I don’t see Europe, China, Russia, or any Asian nations intervening on behalf of the Palestinians. Why are the Israelis given free reign to do what they will? BECAUSE THEY CAN!

This situation should be handled by the UN and yet, all we get out of the UN is a bunch of empty rhetoric. Just what exactly are these UN employees doing for their over inflated salaries? I bet the average lunch tab for a UN delegate would feed a family in Darfur for a week. 

Get with it people. No one gives a damn! We live in a sad, sad world.

In many ways, the creation of Israel was a mistake. As a Jew, I don’t believe the state of Israel has made my being a Jew any easier or made me feel any safer. In the United States, APAC has exerted a level of influence equivalent to the oil, gas and insurance lobbies. I agree with Carter. There is no dialogue about the plight of the Palestinian people in this country. Politicians automatically and uniequivocally throw their support behind Israel and don’t even question it. Makes sense since they receive so much monetary support from Jewish lobby groups. You don’t hear about American/Palestinian lobby groups in the United States. I haven’t anyway. The media sure doesn’t talk about them. And they sure has hell don’t command the level of influence that AIPAC does. The United States will never broker a peace in the Middle East between Israel and the Palestinians because it is a sole supporter of Israel.  Its up to some other country to broker that peace. The U.S. wallows in Israeli blood money. The Arabs are no saints to be sure. But the Palestinians are suffering badly and since the Arabs themselves don’t want to stop it other than by annhilating Israel, its up to another country to broker a peace so we can have a two state solution materialize. But the United States is one of the worst perpetuators of the Palestinian tragedy. My tax dollars go to Israel to support this state of apartheid and it hurts me deeply.

Israeli leadership is racist.  A large portion of Israeli’s are racisct and in addition, they covet the entire West Bank and Gaza.  They simply want the land and they want all Palestinians cleared out.

One can make scores of arguments on either side, but this is the bottom line.  Israel wants the land and they are intent on getting it.  They have several justifications for every argument, all obfuscations that they do not even believe.  But they have to hide their true intent.  And that is that they are gong to steal the land and expel the palestinians.  Robbery in broad daylight!

And they have the termidity to say to the world that it is the fault of the Palestinins!  They, the Israelis, the ceaselessly tell us, are the victims.

In his book The Seat of the Soul, Gary Zukav states that nations have their own karma. It must be difficult for nations in the Middle East to transcend their karmic burdens, rooted in tribe, religion and culture. Revenge-culture, the suppression of women, etc.—how can individuals buffeted by these powerful currents make loving, spirit-filled decisions?

I just read Jimmy Carter’s book, which I bought after seeing the attacks upon his person, his character, and his leadership. The taunting challenge to debate Alan Dershewitz was particularly offensive considering the desparity in the character between the two men.

On one side of the proposed debate is a man who selflessly dedicates his life to humanitarian purpose, such as Habitat for Humanity, while the other is a man who has prostituted his profession in the defense of the super rich, without regard for conscience: OJ Simpson and Claus Von Bulow.

Jimmy Carter possesses a quality unknown to his attackers: character. There could be no debate because while both men might mouth the same words, they speak a different language.

what Israel is doing to the Palestinians . . . is called “genocide.” Not apartheid. Not ethnic cleansing.

The truths Hedges expresses are painfully accurate and extremely important.  Although difficult to do, let us try to spread these seeds of enlightenment.

I have read of this tragedy and have commented when relevant realizing that a torrent of anti-semitic slurs against me will follow.  Seldom, if ever have I been mistaken.

It’s rather like the invectives thrown at those who criticize the Bush Administration’s policies.  We’re fascistic, terrorist-loving, America-hating traitors. 

As we long as name-calling is seen as a productive reply to criticism, the wrong-headed policies of either government will not be addressed.

Thank you fir the blunt but true assessment of the situation in Palestine.  Everything I have read on the situation in Palestine leads me to concur with this assessment. 
Add to our implicit support of Israeli policies in Gaza and the West Bank our open support of recent Israeli aggrerssion and destruction in Lebanonve, and we indeed would be incredibly naive to think that we can ever avoid years of active hostility from the Middle East and elsewhere.  It is almost as if the U.S. leadership is intentionally creating an enemy that will justify a continuation of a war on terror for generations to come!  I refuse to believe that, but our policies in the Middle East are so blatantly destructive and stupid that I can think of no better explanation.
It is time to charge Israeli and U.S. leaders with war crimes and bring them to trial.  That is the only way to minimize the damage that is being done in the names of all Americans.  When will we, and our media, wake up?