The way some here simply harden their hearts and turn from the truth in order to support one side or the other makes rather evident the reasons there has been no solution to this thorny issue and why there will be none in the immediate future.

No one is right when everyone is wrong
Each side has its truths and each side has its wrongs. Violence, whatever the cause, whatever the provocation is wrong, period. Whether Israel has a right to bomb occupied apartment buildings to assassinate an Hamas leader (fact),killing in the process his wife, two daughters and multiple residents of that complex is undeniably indefensible.

Likewise when Hamas fires Kytusha rockets into settlements, regardless of provocation, harms their cause before the world. When suicide bombers explode themselves in a marketplace killing indiscriminately they forfeit the sympathies of public opinion and deny the merit of their ultimate cause.

Those who defend Israel, and those who defend the rights of Palestinians to a homeland are both blinded by loyalties to the real solution; stop killing and start talking. Only through discussion, and never through force of arms, will we see a solution to this 60 year nightmare. Those who villify the other side thoughtlessly and stupidly only lengthen the time it takes to end this absurdity. Ony when violence ceases will both sides begin to note how they have been brutally used by the West.

#82868 by Robert on 7/01 at 5:45 am

Robert, Thanks for posting this.

Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, May-June 2007,

Christianity and the Middle East
Open Bethlehem Exposes Israel’s Systematic Strangulation of the Holy City
By Pat McDonnell Twair

I haven’t linked to the site yet, which means that I haven’t seen the photos. But, I will.

I’m thinking the most significant part of this is that it is NOW. This is an on-going thing, NOW. Hard to keep these realities undercover any longer.

Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, May-June 2007,

Christianity and the Middle East
Open Bethlehem Exposes Israel’s Systematic Strangulation of the Holy City
By Pat McDonnell Twair  

“Bethlehem surrounded by barbed wire and Israel’s annexation wall (Photo courtesy Sari Khour).   

DESPITE MANY reports on how Israel’s apartheid wall is subdividing Bethlehem, the magnitude of Israel’s systematic takeover of the ancient city’s holy relics, as documented in an Open Bethlehem power point presentation, was shocking.

Since the brother and sister team of Maxim and Leila Sansour launched Open Bethlehem in November 2005 (see Jan./Feb. 2006 Washington Report, p. 69), they’ve been bringing the plight of the endangered cradle of Christianity to the attention of church leaders the world over.

During a Jan. 22 presentation in All Saints Church in Pasadena, CA, Maxim Sansour explained that when the second Muslim Caliph, Omar Ibn al-Khattab, set eyes on Bethlehem in the mid-7th century, he realized it was an extraordinarily important Christian shrine, and decreed that Muslims were not to disturb a single stone of the holy site.

“A pledge was made between Christians and Muslims to live in peaceful coexistence,” Sansour emphasized, “and this has been the model Bethlehemites have emulated for centuries.”

Now Israel’s illegal wall has turned Bethlehem into a prison for its inhabitants. The formidable barrier has cut off 70 percent of Bethlehem’s agricultural lands from the urban center. His grandfather owns five acres of farmland, Sansour noted, but has been notified that Israel is confiscating it for “security purposes.”

“Contemporary Bethlehem is a multi-faith society with a population of 170,000 Palestinians in the district and 75,000 in the city of Bethlehem,” he told his audience. “We have 22 churches and 14 mosques, but the Christians are rapidly emigrating, so the population is about 30 percent Christian and 70 percent Muslim.”
 
Claire Anastus (inset) stands by a windowin her Bethlehem home, located near Rachel’s Tomb and surrounded by Israel’s annexation wall (above) (Photos courtesy open Bethlehem).
   

Sansour, who holds an MBA from the City University of New York, recalled that in June 2006 two congressmen tried to pass a resolution condemning Palestinian Muslims for driving Christians out of Bethlehem.

“Open Bethlehem immediately notified the congressmen that it was Israeli practices that are forcing Christians out of Bethlehem, not Muslims,” Sansour said. “As far as we know, the resolution was shelved.”

More than 170,000 Israelis are living in 27 settlements that encircle and encroach upon Bethlehem, Sansour noted. “These are not natural expansion, but deliberate measures to block the growth of Palestinian Bethlehem. The really scary settlement is Har Homa,” he said, “which is intended to be an alternative Bethlehem tourist center. Har Homa doesn’t have Manger Square, but it will bus Christian pilgrims to the Church of the Nativity and after they’ve had their photo-ops with the holy monuments, they will be bused back to the settlement without talking to a Palestinian or buying mementos or eating in restaurants.

“Bethlehem is in a state of emergency,” Sansour warned. “Closures have all but dried up the tourist industry many Palestinian inhabitants relied on. The wall separates Bethlehem from neighboring villages. There are just two exits out of Bethlehem that can be closed on any Israeli pretext. One gate leads to Jerusalem, the other to nearby villages.

“Checkpoints separate the Christian communities of Jerusalem and Bethlehem just as the wall has severed the Basilica of the Nativity from Jerusalem’s Church of the Holy Sepulcher,” he pointed out.   

Palestinians are particularly alarmed by a new settlement being built in the heart of Bethlehem, Sansour said. It surrounds Rachel’s Tomb and its residents are militant fundamentalist Jews.”

http://www.wrmea.com/archives/May-June_2007/0705056.html

Friday, June 29, 2007
PEACE LOVING ISRAELI OCCUPATION

(Ben Heine)

Presented here are six videos that will not be screened on American or British televisions. Nor will they be shown in the Cinema Houses there. Six videos that documentthe horrors of the Israeli Occupation.

They were produced and published by B’tselem (The Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories) This thread was originally posted on Sabbah’s Blog…‘borrowed’ with thanks.

“Daddy will come at night, like a butter fly”
Author : Haitham

Here is a new sample of the “peace loving Israeli occupation“.

The following video testimonies produced and published by B’tselem (The Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories) shows a sample of Palestinian daily misery life under the Israeli occupation:

———————— ———————— 212;———————

I got this link/website from another thread’s post.

Take a good look at the “SIX (6) VIDEOS” that we will NOT see on our American TVS:

http://desertpeace.blogspot.com/2007/06/peace-lovin g-israeli-occupation.html

82509 by nahida on 6/29 at 4:26 pm

Thanks for the piece by Bernard Josephs, on the boycotts. This sort of perks me up, seeing as how this technique has been an effective (non-violent) weapon in other similar struggles over the decades and centuries.

Gandhi used it in India, it was the only thing that actually brought about any change in the Apartheid structure of South Africa, and the leaders of the Civil Rights Movement here at home, relied heavily on it as well.

I remember reading a while back, that when Martin Luther King was finally able to meet with Ghandhi’s son for the first time, he talked with him about the whole theory of non-violent resistance, and the practical effectiveness of many of the strategies. He wondered really, (as did other leaders of the movement) if such a thing could even WORK in the struggle of oppressed people here, because of the “nature” or “character” of the problem here…meaning the hate based on racism, as opposed to say a difference in religious ideology, or even the “class” separation, but simply based on a hate for a group of people who were different from themselves, if only in the color of their skin, or the texture of their hair. In other words, this deep hatred for an entire group of people, based primarily on their racial/ethnic identity, cannot always be combated with the standard tools that apply in other conflicts of the weak against the powerful.

But, it did in fact work….not without some violence, and not without a long time of suffering on both sides, (which for the black folks of course, was not new). But, it worked. When the black populations of those places in the South started boycotting the buses, and the white merchants, etc, etc, it brought about some realistic negotiations.

So, this is a positive thing. Idealistically, this is what we have a United Nations for. But, having lost it’s legitimacy under the corrupting influence of this Mob in power in the US, the UN has simply dropped the ball on enforcing any sort of measures against Israel’s multiple violations of all the Geneva Conventions, and any other International Law.

The only drawback I see to this, is that the US will continue to fill in the gap, for whatever funds Israel would need to survive such a boycott, and we know where those funds would ultimately come from, just as they always have. US, as in the U.S. Treasury, already trillions in the red.

Still, nothing beats a “try” but a “failure”, and they we can always try again.

T&G urges a ban on Israeli goods

http://www.thejc.com/home.aspx?ParentId=m11s18& SecId=18&AId=53530&ATypeId=1

29/06/2007
By Bernard Josephs
The campaign to boycott Israel was widened this week as members of the Transport and General Workers Union prepared to vote on a motion calling for a ban against all Israeli products.

The move, to be considered by delegates representing the TGWU’s 800,000 members at their annual meeting next week, could result in millions of trades unionists coming under instructions to impose an embargo.

Such actions have already been approved by the 1.3 million strong Unison and by the National Union of Journalists. Meanwhile UCU, the academics’ union, may ballot its members over sanctions.

The TGWU’s boycott motion has been proposed by car-industry workers at its Birmingham branch. It “deplores the actions” of Israel towards the Palestinians and accuses it of failing to recognise the “legitimate aspiration of a Palestinian state”.

The motion specifically calls upon the conference to “support a boycott of Israeli products and goods” and calls on the government to take a “stronger stance in support of the Palestinian people”.

Members of the Trade Union Friends of Israel said they were hoping to persuade the union to drop its boycott move, and would be seeking talks not only with TGWU leaders but also with the proposers of the motion.

However, Eric McDonald, the union’s Birmingham branch secretary — who said he had never been to Israel or the Palestinian Authority areas — pledged that there would be no backtracking. “Boycotting worked against South Africa and the motion was approved unanimously by the 30 members of the district committee,” representing 16,000 members.

“Israel is very intolerant and sometimes its behaviour is not dissimilar to that of the Nazis,” he told the JC. “Israel, like any other fundamentalist religious state, abuses groups that are different.” This also applied to Hamas, he accepted.

Re #82061 by Frank Goodman, Sr. on 6/28 at 5:30 am

Thanks for your support, Frank. I think it is so interesting that he did not answer my question, “Is Jewish nationalism compatible with universal principles of democracy and human rights?” either yes or no. I dare say everybody on this thread, including me, would say either yes or no, in the strongest terms. I for one have been saying the answer is clearly no, and that this is the essence of the conflict. Zionism puts Jewish nationalism above human rights and has therefore justified and led to the violation of the human rights of non-Jewish people. Jewish nationalists, such as Lefty and lilmamzer and even very liberal and humanitarian ones such as ITW obviously disagree in the strongest terms.

So was Kucinich, supposedly a man of principle, just being a politician when he answered my question by saying neither yes nor no but “it should be”? Maybe he was, but still, it could be a good answer. He followed by saying “that’s what we have to figure out”. At least that means he’s going to think about it and try to come up with an answer. Who knows, maybe there is some answer other than just plain no. What I would say is that a gradual process of reunification, of converting Israel from a Jewish state to a state of all persons residing in it, of integration of the occupied territories, of resettlement of Palestinians living in refugee camps and crowded in the prison of Gaza to good locations in the greater Israel/Palestine area, could result in a democracy where Jews, even if they were not a majority, would remain a very powerful minority in no danger of losing their civil rights, and such an Israel, a state of all its citizens, would continue to be a world center of Jewish culture and religion. If this would satisfy Jewish nationalists, then as far as I am concerned we would have a deal.

Re: #82023 by Tony Wicher on 6/27

Tony,

Twenty seconds is better than most of us get. That is a hole-in-one. To get a 20 second sound bite on national TV would cost you a bundle of money or a scandal of major proportions. Of course Paris Hilton can get it free on Larry King Live in a string of 20 second comments with no chance what-so-ever for any substantial nationally significant intelligence.

I suggest that we provide in our constitution a counter-Senator elected in the national election process who would be given considerable time to ask the elected senator questions. A public surrogate, as it were. That office could go to the opponent who is first runner up in the election. Even though second place is first loser, he could perform a vital service by asking embarrassing questions for the public record for the next six years. I would be willing to help fund his salary and office expenses from my taxes.

lilmamzer, what a name,,,
We must admit, atleast for once he hasnt lied.

A few days ago I spoke with Dennis Kucinich, who was making an appearance at a symposium sponsored by the IPC, the Isreali-Palestinian Confederation, a Los Angeles area group. He was preparing to make his speech and I interrupted him for 20 seconds, which was all he would allow. I told him I wanted him to go on record with an answer to the following question: Is Jewish nationalism consistent with universal principles of democracy and human rights? He thought for about 1 second and said, “It should be.” I think to myself, “What kind of answer is that?” He sees I’m not satisfied and elaborates, “That’s what we have to figure out”. That was the best I could do in 20 seconds. If I could tie him down for 20 minutes I might be able to get somewhere.

•    81971 by Fadel Abdallah on 6/27 at 7:36 pm

Fadel, you just made a “connection” for me, with this post for lilmamzer:

•  But I have a revelation and a question to ask “lilmamzer” about his own chosen identity as implied by his fake name. The word “mamzer” in Hebrew means “bastard, illegitimate child”, I could not decipher the meaning of the “lil” part, except that it might be an intended corruption of one of the several names of God in Hebrew

Here’s what’s weird…a couple of days ago, another poster, (and I think it was Tom Doff, but I won’t swear to it) responded to a lilmamzer post by calling him/her The Little Bastard. Now, since I don’t know Hebrew, and since I don’t know Arabic, (that one is simply too difficult for a middle aged person to learn) I made absolutely NO connection to the title of “The Little Bastard”, other than to (I admit it), giggle quite a bit. I thought the poster was calling him/her that just because they were so frustrated by the total lopsidedness of the faux arguments, and just really needed to blow off the steam.

NOW, I’m hearing from you how this name breaks down linguistically, and it all clicks. (well, I should say that it’s certainly worth pondering.) This is a person with a lot of hate, the type and depth of which is usually nurtured and maintained by self hate. And, he or she worries a lot about ‘Israel’s Legitimacy”.

Anyway, lilmamzer has pretty much worn me out. And, just when I thought I’d escaped the wrath, I came across another post by a different name, and damned if it didn’t sound suspiciously like lilmamzer reincarnated into a raving name/ID that includes a bunch of accusations that Amy Goodman is a bigot. Gave me goosebumps when I read it.

So, I might have to take a break from any more responses on this thread. But, it will be interesting to see if you get a response. It’s curious about that bastard thing.

Reference: lilmamzer(the master of ranting on this thread)

It’s obvious that this full-time Zionist propagandist is against the whole world and the whole world is against him. Even his notoriously devilish brother “Lefty” seems to have abandoned him after he was exposed as viciously promoting nuclear war against Arabs and Muslims.

But I have a revelation and a question to ask “lilmamzer” about his own chosen identity as implied by his fake name. The word “mamzer” in Hebrew means “bastard, illegitimate child”, I could not decipher the meaning of the “lil” part, except that it might be an intended corruption of one of the several names of God in Hebrew. As a linguist who is always intrigued by languages, I could not help restraining myself from commenting on my findings! And the question is now directed to “lilmamzer: “Why in the world you chose for yourself such a name? Is “bastard” how you see yourself? I am deadly curious, and I hope you can give us a straight answer, as a break from the ranting you’ve been posting.

#81735 by Frank Goodman, Sr. on 6/27 at 7:01 am
(13 comments total)

Re: 81584 by ardee on 6/26
And: 81451 by Howard Berg on 6/26

Mr.Goodman, I would appreciate a clarification of exactly what in my post,81584, deserves the epithet “fiction”.

I believe in a single state solution to the problems between Palestinian and Israeli, I have noted that “Of course there were arabs and jews living side by side 3000 years ago, of course BOTH have legitimate claims to that territory, they are, after all cousins. ” I have placed the blame equally between the two sides and believe I am being logical, rational and fair.

To lump me with Mr. Berg who, blinded by his religious affiliation to the jewish homeland, refuses to see the horrific treatment the JDL doles out to the palestinian. Is it perhaps because I dare take the middle ground and fail to excoriate ONLY Israel that you give me such short shrift and inaccurate criticism?

non credo, the marriage you refer to was a shotgun wedding that went off very methodically. A well executed, 360 degree, 3-dimensional clusterf-k. This isnt a relationship at all, its a bribe w/teeth of extortion.

Israel today is a trojan horse w/excellent media coverage. All very carefully presented and packaged w/the fraudulent and phony energy of a Hollywood production. Very lovely.

Israel’s arrogance is only exceeded by their remarkable capacity for deceit.
While this is really part of their pathology, its infected us now too and that is tragic.

Re: 81584 by ardee on 6/26
And: 81451 by Howard Berg on 6/26

Sorry you do not wish to be accurate in your communication attempt. Of course, if you stuck to accurate terminology and fact, you would invalidate the anti-human rights nature of Zionism. Re: 81691 by nahida on 6/27.

My discussion is somewhat academic as I am, indeed, an educated man. It is education that makes the difference. Ordinary people who could not care less about anything more important than their next paycheck, God bless their ignorant souls, would not care for the difference between vitamin deficiency and a full stomach.

Of course, history will eventually correct these mistakes. I will not live to see it, but surely truth will triumph. Jews did not own the land of Palestine (Actually the precursor of Palestine, that you may, if you want, call it the ‘Holy Land’, a misnomer for a Jewish mythology’.

All religious mythology is passe. We have moved on to better processors of fact and fiction. BTW: I read in the Bible, Genesis, that Abraham found people there when he got there. Don’t you ever wonder who those people were? The Bible identifies them rather clearly as Canaanites and others. They did not get there by following Abraham. They were already there. And what about the fights Abraham and his followers had with the indigenous people he found there. And what about the associates of Moses after they escaped slavery in Egypt? They found the original people very much in the ‘Holy Land’. They were much like the Palestinians the Jews found on their ‘return’ from the Diaspora. Occupied with tending the land and their flocks. Not prepared for armed conflict with the encroachment of Jews long gone to work as ‘guest’ workers in Egypt.

Sorry, Jews were, indeed, present in that land a couple of millennia ago, but the did not hold clear title to the land. They held it by the right of conquest, which humans now reject in the United Nations charter. If you move into a place with enough armed force and kill enough of the locals, you can take over. That is what happened in Biblical times. Read Genesis in its entirety. Note how many times ‘God’ favored Abraham, and told his followers to kill the locals, man, woman, child, and their farm animals.

It is a myth that ‘God’ told Abraham to go and take over the ‘land flowing with milk and honey’ from the locals. Who do you think were tending the cows and the bees? Not Abrahamites.

You better get up to date on your facts and fiction.

The Founding Fathers

http://johnmccarthy90066.tripod.com/id315.html

David Ben Gurion
Prime Minister of Israel
1949 - 1954,
1955 – 1963

“We must expel Arabs and take their places.”
—David Ben Gurion, 1937, Ben Gurion and the Palestine Arabs, Oxford University Press, 1985.

“We must use terror, assassination, intimidation, land confiscation, and the cutting of all social services to rid the Galilee of its Arab population.”
—David Ben-Gurion, May 1948, to the General Staff. From Ben-Gurion, A Biography, by Michael Ben-Zohar, Delacorte, New York 1978.

“There has been Anti-Semitism, the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault? They see but one thing: we have come and we have stolen their country. Why would they accept that?”
—Quoted by Nahum Goldmann in Le Paraddoxe Juif (The Jewish Paradox), pp. 121-122

“Jewish villages were built in the place of Arab villages. You do not even know the names of these Arab villages, and I do not blame you because geography books no longer exist. Not only do the books not exist, the Arab villages are not there either. Nahlal arose in the place of Mahlul; Kibbutz Gvat in the place of Jibta; Kibbutz Sarid in the place of Huneifis; and Kefar Yehushua in the place of Tal al-Shuman. There is not a single place built in this country that did not have a former Arab population.”
—David Ben Gurion, quoted in The Jewish Paradox, by Nahum Goldmann, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1978, p. 99.

“Let us not ignore the truth among ourselves ... politically we are the aggressors and they defend themselves… The country is theirs, because they inhabit it, whereas we want to come here and settle down, and in their view we want to take away from them their country.”
—David Ben Gurion, quoted on pp 91-2 of Chomsky’s Fateful Triangle, which appears in Simha Flapan’s “Zionism and the Palestinians pp 141-2 citing a 1938 speech.

“If I knew that it was possible to save all the children of Germany by transporting them to England, and only half by transferring them to the Land of Israel, I would choose the latter, for before us lies not only the numbers of these children but the historical reckoning of the people of Israel.”
—David Ben-Gurion 1938 (Quoted on pp 855-56 in Shabtai Teveth’s Ben-Gurion in a slightly different translation).

The Founding Fathers-1

Golda Meir
Prime Minister of Israel
1969 - 1974

“There is no such thing as a Palestinian people… It is not as if we came and threw them out and took their country. They didn’t exist.”
—Golda Meir, statement to The Sunday Times, 15 June, 1969.

“How can we return the occupied territories? There is nobody to return them to.”
—Golda Meir, March 8, 1969

“Any one who speaks in favor of bringing the Arab refugees back must also say how he expects to take the responsibility for it, if he is interested in the state of Israel. It is better that things are stated clearly and plainly: We shall not let this happen.”
—Golda Meir, 1961, in a speech to the Knesset, reported in Ner, October 1961

“This country exists as the fulfillment of a promise made by God Himself. It would be ridiculous to ask it to account for its legitimacy.”
—Golda Meir, Le Monde, 15 October 1971

Yitzhak Rabin
Prime Minister of Israel
1974 - 1977,
1992 - 1995

“We walked outside, Ben-Gurion accompanying us. Allon repeated his question, What is to be done with the Palestinian population?’ Ben-Gurion waved his hand in a gesture which said ‘Drive them out!”
—Yitzhak Rabin, leaked censored version of Rabin memoirs, published in the New York Times, 23 October 1979.

”[Israel will] create in the course of the next 10 or 20 years conditions which would attract natural and voluntary migration of the refugees from the Gaza Strip and the west Bank to Jordan. To achieve this we have to come to agreement with King Hussein and not with Yasser Arafat.”
—Yitzhak Rabin (a “Prince of Peace” by Clinton’s standards), explaining his method of ethnically cleansing the occupied land without stirring a world outcry. (Quoted in David Shipler in the New York Times, 04/04/1983 citing Meir Cohen’s remarks to the Knesset’s foreign affairs and defense committee on March 16.)

Menachem Begin
Prime Minister of Israel
1977 - 1983

”[The Palestinians] are beasts walking on two legs.”
—Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin, speech to the Knesset, quoted in Amnon Kapeliouk, “Begin and the ‘Beasts,”’ New Statesman, June 25, 1982.

“The Partition of Palestine is illegal. It will never be recognized .... Jerusalem was and will for ever be our capital. Eretz Israel will be restored to the people of Israel. All of it. And for Ever.”
—Menachem Begin, the day after the U.N. vote to partition Palestine.

The founding fathers:2

Yizhak Shamir
Prime Minister of Israel
1983 - 1984,
1986 – 1992

“The past leaders of our movement left us a clear message to keep Eretz Israel from the Sea to the River Jordan for future generations, for the mass aliya (=Jewish immigration), and for the Jewish people, all of whom will be gathered into this country.”
—Former Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir declares at a Tel Aviv memorial service for former Likud leaders, November 1990. Jerusalem Domestic Radio Service.

“The settlement of the Land of Israel is the essence of Zionism. Without settlement, we will not fulfill Zionism. It’s that simple.”
—Yitzhak Shamir, Maariv, 02/21/1997.

”(The Palestinians) would be crushed like grasshoppers ... heads smashed against the boulders and walls.”
—Israeli Prime Minister (at the time) Yitzhak Shamir in a speech to Jewish settlers New York Times April 1, 1988

Benjamin Netanyahu
Prime Minister of Israel
1996 - 1999

“Israel should have exploited the repression of the demonstrations in China, when world attention focused on that country, to carry out mass expulsions among the Arabs of the territories.”
-Benyamin Netanyahu, then Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister, former Prime Minister of Israel, speaking to students at Bar Ilan University, from the Israeli journal Hotam, November 24, 1989.

Ehud Barak
Prime Minister of Israel
1999 – 2001

“The Palestinians are like crocodiles, the more you give them meat, they want more”....
—Ehud Barak, Prime Minister of Israel at the time - August 28, 2000. Reported in the Jerusalem Post August 30, 2000

“If we thought that instead of 200 Palestinian fatalities, 2,000 dead would put an end to the fighting at a stroke, we would use much more force….”
—Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, quoted in Associated Press, November 16, 2000.

“I would have joined a terrorist organization.”
—Ehud Barak’s response to Gideon Levy, a columnist for the Ha’aretz newspaper, when Barak was asked what he would have done if he had been born a Palestinian.

Ariel Sharon
Prime Minister of Israel
2001 - 2006

“It is the duty of Israeli leaders to explain to public opinion, clearly and courageously, a certain number of facts that are forgotten with time. The first of these is that there is no Zionism, colonialization, or Jewish State without the eviction of the Arabs and the expropriation of their lands.”
—Ariel Sharon, Israeli Foreign Minister, addressing a meeting of militants from the extreme right-wing Tsomet Party, Agence France Presse, November 15, 1998

“Everybody has to move, run and grab as many (Palestinian) hilltops as they can to enlarge the (Jewish) settlements because everything we take now will stay ours…Everything we don’t grab will go to them.”
—Ariel Sharon, Israeli Foreign Minister, addressing a meeting of the Tsomet Party, Agence France Presse, Nov. 15, 1998.

“Israel may have the right to put others on trial, but certainly no one has the right to put the Jewish people and the State of Israel on trial.”
—Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, 25 March, 2001 quoted in BBC News Online.

Sources:

http://johnmccarthy90066.tripod.com/id315.html
Video : http://www.thedossier.ukonline.co.uk
Quotes: monabaker.com/

Mr.Goodman

Is it simply nitpicking to quibble over my misuse of legal instead of legitimate? I hate to think so as this is not a disertation or thesis leading to a degree but a converstaion.

Israels founding, as noted here:
http://www.palestinefacts.org/pf_independence_un_role.php

was done with a mind to all the players in that region and was, I believe, administered fairly. The newly birthed State of Israel (your continuing to call it Palestine is an agendised ploy it would appear) after defeating the armed insurrection against it did indeed oust the resident Arab populace, in some large part. As my original post on the subject stated plainly it was wrong of them to do this, yet, having sailed over from a war torn Europe, escaping from the ravages of Nazi Germany only to come under fire from Arabs fomented by the Brits, one may understand if not condone.

Ever wonder, Mr. Goodman, what the history of that nation might have been like had the Arab population welcomed the refugees? I have. I continue to argue that both sides are refusing to even attempt a solution, thus both sides share the blame.

Re: #81349 by ardee on 6/25

“Israel, as a legally constituted nation is wrong for its actions against a poor, desperate and landless people. The Palestinians are wrong for abetting the violence that prevents some solution, any solution.”

Two wrongs do not make it right. But one wrong should be rectified. That is the wrong of the statement that Israel is a “...legally constituted nation…”

There are two terms that are confusing to most people. The relationship between the term, legal, and the term, legitimate. Legitimate simply means that it is accepted by the operating authority and that the operating authority is accepted by the majority by act or by fact.

Legal means accepted as lawful. It is legitimate that the majority of people act responsibly or in accordance with the acceptance of the majority. It is not legitimate when an outside power acts to endanger the people of one land when confronted with a takeover by another people. To make an illegitimate act legal after the fact is to cave in to aggressors and hand the fruits of the aggression over to the aggressors in perpetuity. The United Nations had no authority in law or legitimacy to hand over any part of Palestine to the Zionists by an act of ‘recognition’.

Compare the revolt of the colonists in America with the taking of the lands of the Native Americans by the American states. Now compare the revolt of the Palestinians against the takeover of their homes and lands by Zionists with the handover of Palestine to the Zionists by the British with the blessing of the United Nations and now the acquiescence of the world.

If it was wrong for Hitler to confiscate the properties and lives of Jews in Germany, it is wrong for Zionists to confiscate the properties and lives of Arabs in Palestine. The majority of Germans approved of the confiscation from Jews, and the majority of Jews approved of the confiscation from the Arabs. Take it to the next question. Did Jews approve of the confiscation of their properties? And do the Palestinians approve of the confiscation of their properties?

Did the American Natives approve of the confiscation of their properties and homes by force? Was it legitimate in the Native Lands? Was it legal for the European colonists to do so? If the European colonists passed laws to make it legal, it is a legal fiction. Not legitimate. When American Natives ceased “...to fight forever…”, did it become legitimate? Was it right or wrong?

Israel is legal, but not legitimate, because the Palestinian people never voted to give up their rights or to assign them to Zionists. They have a right to resist that process in a violent reaction just as America had a right to resist the violence of Japan and Germany. However, had the American natives succeeded to prevent the taking of their lands by the Europeans, the decision would have fallen on them to resist Japan and Germany for invading American Native lands.

Human rights are not codified, but determined by the common sense of justice and morality. Laws codify justice and morality according to legitimacy of the acts. My real estate property rights are protected by my state, and nation and announced by my deed of ownership. I can convey ownership to others for a consideration. The state can take my property for reasons legal to the state, and someone else can cause the state to take the property from me and give it to someone else in accordance with laws properly enacted and enforced.

Is Israel legal? Is Israel legitimate? Is Israel moral? Is Israel right?

Is Palestine legal? Is Palestine legitimate? Is Palestione moral? Is Palestine right?

Dear Truthdig reader.
While some may sincerly covet the spirtual geography that is Israel, the political state of Israel is a hand grenade of bad karma.
No friends, just resentments, acrimony, distrust and hate - w/no one to thank but themselves.

Non Credo posits:
Ardee - your even-handed dismissal of both sides of the fatimah/ilmamzer divide ignores the fact that there is no underlying equivalence of the two sides in this dispute. Fundamentally, the Palestinians are right, and the Israelis are wrong. The only counterargument the Israelis can offer is, “There’s nothing you can do about it, so give up,” which is not an argument on principle, of course, but more like saying, “I have a gun, and you don’t.”

..I did not assay to be dismissive and I believe my words do not lend themselves to such interpretation. I stated that both sides are at fault here. And they are.
Palestinians gave up the ‘rightness’ of their cause when the first act of terrorism was perpetrated upon the Israelis. Israel, in its infancy, was maneuvered into hostility against the indigenous arab population by the British who sought a bloodbath (by arab against jew) in order to regain their colony deeded to the refugee jews by the Balfour Declaration. Israel has long since passed the point of redemption for the necesary struggle to establish a state in what was given to them, and with the full agreement of the world.

This thread is filled with venom and so is the struggle between the two peoples. The world must share the blame though Jordan has taken in and granted citizenship to thousands of palestinian refugees. To blanket indict one side or the other is to continue the false stance and aides a continuation of the violence.

Israel, as a legally constituted nation is wrong for its actions against a poor, desperate and landless people. The palestinians are wrong for abetting the violence that prevents some solution, any solution. One might sympathise with them but one must, in the name of reason, condemn them as well. We condemn Bush for the torture and murder of Iraqis, as we should. We condemn the US for an illegal invasion of that nation, as we should. We condemn the state of Israel for its armed aggressions against refugee camps as we should. We condemn AlQaeda for its violence and we should also condemn Hamas for its, and the peoples who allow it to be done in their name as well.

Israel’s most effective lie?

The one they tell themselves.

Israel ups the stakes in the propaganda war

Following its invasion of Lebanon this summer, Israel was said to have largely lost the PR battle to Hizbullah, but armed with a major web offensive, it’s fighting back

11.20.2006 | The Guardian
by Stewart Purvis

“Amir Gissin runs what he calls ‘“Israel’s Explanation Department”. Which is why it is surprising to hear him admit that many Israelis think “the whole problem is that we don’t explain ourselves correctly”.

But Gissin was not down-hearted. He declared there to be a “war on the web” in which Israel had a new weapon, a piece of computer software called the “internet megaphone”.

To check out the power of the megaphone, I logged onto a website called GIYUS (Give Israel Your United Support) last Wednesday afternoon. More than 25,000 registered users of http://www.giyus.org have downloaded the megaphone software, which enables them to receive alerts asking them to get active online.

It did not take long for an alertto come through. A Foreign Office minister, Kim Howells, had issued a press statement condemning that day’s Palestinian rocket attack which killed an elderly Israeli and wounded other civilians. GIYUS wanted site users to “show your appreciation of the UK’s response”.

One click took me to a pre-prepared email addressed to Dr Howells, and a slot for me to personalise my comment. A test confirmed that the email would arrive at his office, as if I had spotted his comments on a news website, in this case Yahoo, and sent it to him with a supporting message. In the emails, there would be no indication of the involvement of GIYUS, although Howells may have been suspicious that so many people around the world had read the same Yahoo story about him and decided to email him. The Foreign Office confirms that emails were received last Wednesday but will not go into any more detail.

The most popular target of the online activists is the foreign media, especially the BBC, the news organisation which they love to hate. Earlier this year I was a member of the independent panel set up by the BBC governors to review the BBC’s coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. We reported on the high number of emails we had received from abroad, mostly from North America, and the evidence of pressure group involvement. A majority of email correspondents thought that the BBC was anti-Israel, however if the emails that could be identified as coming from abroad were excluded, the opposite was true - more people thought the BBC anti-Palestinian or pro-Israel.

The BBC has already had one encounter with GIYUS - an attempt to influence the outcome of an online poll. BBC History magazine noticed an upsurge in voting on whether holocaust denial should be a criminal offence in Britain. But the closing date had already passed and the result had already been published, so the votes were invalid anyway. GIYUS supporters claim success elsewhere in “balancing” an opinion poll on an Arabic website by turning a vote condemning Israel’s attack in the Lebanon into an endorsement.

One particular target has been the respected French TV correspondent, Charles Enderlin, whose Palestinian cameraman filmed 12-year-old Mohammed al-Dura being shot and killed, as his father tried to shield him at the start of the second intifada. Enderlin accused Israeli troops of shooting and killing the boy. French supporters of Israel went online to claim the report was a distortion based on faked footage. His network, France 2, responded with legal action and, last month, in the first of four individual cases, a French court found the organiser of a self-styled media watchdog website guilty of libel.

It is clear that the government of Israel wants to fight back against the impact of foreign media pictures like these.”
————————& #8212;———————R 12;

Beware of “GIYUS” Israe’ls Internet Mega-Phone.

Read All About IT:

http://www.normanfinkelstein.com/article.php?pg=11& ar=695

The little bastard, AKA lilmamzer, is not what he appears, he is a joke, a parody, an impossibility, for it can be mathematically proven that it is not possible to cram that much sh*t into even the most obese, fat-headed, zionist jew.

#81249 by Non Credo:

Lilmamzer, just so you know: I no longer read your ridiculous posts.

As if it was evident in any of your posts that you
ever did?

Your loss, of course. We will survive, somehow…......... 

#81226 by Non Credo:

“The presumption challenged is that it is morally acceptable to have a state whose legal structures assign preferential stake to all those who pass some test of Jewishness. It is not surprising that the Israeli right wing rejects this challenge. But why is the message also rejected by those Israelis, and their Western supporters, who claim to be concerned about human rights?”

Ben-Dor’s critical failure is his inability to recognize that without allowing for Jewish self-determination (i.e. the founding and maintaining of the State of Israel) human rights will be denied the Jews, and there can be no justice in that. He also fails to explore the reality that Zionism is not mutually exclusive with self-determination for Arabs, either. That is the key element that both core constituencies of the Israeli right and left understand, but Ben-or does not. In this regard he is no different than Fatah, Hamas, and any other rejectionist and absolutist ideology.

#81210 by Non Credo:

I was thinking, “Please, God - tell me I’m not the only one who finds talking with these arrogant, dishonest, and stubborn people so maddeningly futile!”

I certainly hope you are referring to me.

<u>arrogant</u> - sometimes, sure (it’s not a crime)

<u>dishonest</u> - never

<u>stubborn</u> - proudly so

<u>You forgot to mention:</u> impassioned, articulate, well-informed, thoughtful, refreshingly original, pertinent, loyal, and proud.

There is a logical solution to the Israeli/Palestinian/Middle East problem, but it may not please everyone.

We need to find some more of that amber that has trapped mosquitos which have bitten velociraptors.

I don’t think either the jews or the arabs can claim to have pre-dated the dinosaurs in their occupancy of the West Bank, or Gaza, or any other part of the ‘Holy Lands’. So let’s put that