At this moment, Israeli tanks are moving into Gaza. This is after they destroyed three bridges and a Gaza City power plant earlier this evening (or this morning in Palestine). Israel says it is doing this to rescue a soldier captured in a Palestinian attack on Sunday and that the time for restraint is over. However, when one looks at the reality of the situation, Israel's actions make no sense - unless their goal is to inflame the situation and kill lots of civilians.
First of all, where did this notion of restraint come from? If 6,000 shells and dozens of dead Palestinian civilians in the past three months is Israeli "restraint," then the world should be preparing to send loads of medical supplies to Gaza - already devastated due to the boycott of the Palestinian Authority.
Second, there was a way to solve this problem with no one getting hurt. Those holding the Israeli soldier said they would release him if Israel freed all the Palestinian women and children it was holding in Israeli jails. That amounts to about 100 women and 388 minors, many only a few months to a few years old. A prisoner exchange is not an absurd suggestion, as Israel has done it many times before.
Not only was a prisoner exchange on the table, but major diplomatic efforts were underway to free the soldier. Egypt, France, the U.S., Israel, the PA, everyone was working on it. If given more time, it is almost certain that the soldier would have been freed and no blood would have had to be shed.
Some will undoubtedly say Israel has the right to respond in this manner. Yet remember the Palestinian attack was a military action against a military target. It was not a terrorist attack against civilians. While the raid was in Israel proper, Israel has raided "unoccupied" Gaza before, and the soldiers were active duty members of the occupation army, even if not stationed in the Occupied Territories. It may seem callous, but it's a necessary distinction. While Israeli retribution was never in doubt, there were other ways to respond in a productive fashion, both in the short and long term.
Instead, it appears that much of Gaza will be flattened and many civilians will be killed - not to mention the soldier Israel is supposedly trying to rescue. As a result, Palestinian groups will increase their attacks (puny by comparison) and Israel will then respond with even more devastating force - perhaps even assassinating the elected Hamas leadership. All because Olmert feels the need to prove he can be just as brutal and bloodthirsty as Sharon and all because the world stands by and does nothing.
How could one so young as you have become such a racist?
Posted by: Warner Todd Huston | June 27, 2006 at 09:45 PM
Huh?
Posted by: scott | June 27, 2006 at 10:47 PM
CNN reported that an Israeli soldier was "kidnapped" and taken "hostage". That is typical of the biased American reporting.
The guy is a soldier, so he was captured and now he is a prisoner.
The real kidnap victims and hostages are the Palestinians held in Israeli jails.
Posted by: bernarda | June 28, 2006 at 05:28 AM
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060628/wl_mideast_afp/mideastunrestgaza
"Family members were playing with a grenade in the town of Khan Yunis when it exploded, killing 23-year-old Qassem Massud and his one-year-old niece, medical and security sources said Wednesday."
Incidents like this make me both sad and angry.
Did you even know that last year the number of Palestinians killed by their terrorists was greater than the number of Palestinians killed by Israelis?
http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/spages/634612.html
Instead of playing with granades, they should be reading books.
They should be writing peace declarations.
They should dispose of the terrorists who supply those means of destruction.
I doubt that living with such a family would have left the 1 year old baby much chance of growing up as a peaceful person.
But it's still sad. There's one who would like to see the casualties on both sides come to an end more than me, but the truth is, I'm losing my fate in civilization. Yes, I have a lot of critisizm for my country too, but much more so for the Palestinians. Either way, the end of civilization is looking more and more likely to occure.
Posted by: Opeth | June 28, 2006 at 01:06 PM
You got something wrong in your post. The terrorists didn't say they would release Shalit if Israel freed women and kids under 18. Rather, it just said that they would release information about Shalit's health. There's a big difference.
Posted by: Dave | June 28, 2006 at 02:29 PM
Yes, Scott, I think you hit the nail on the head - the Palestinian raid was an attack on a military target. Israel rolls into Palestinian towns all the time and captures military and political personel, and it doesn't cause an international incident.
If Shalit's capture provokes what I fear will be the widespread harm of Palestinian civilians in a major ground operation, how is this morally different from Palestinian retaliation against Israeli civilians when Al Aqsa or Hamas leaders are captured?
Posted by: Andrew Schamess | June 28, 2006 at 10:07 PM
"how is this morally different from Palestinian retaliation against Israeli civilians when Al Aqsa or Hamas leaders are captured?"
How about because the IDF doesn't threaten to kill the terrorists captured if X people aren't released by X days.
And you have talked only about Shalit, how about Eliyahu Asheri who's death has been confirmed yesterday?
He was no soldier.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1150885858552&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
"The youth appeared to have been shot to death, and initial findings indicated that he may have been killed as early as Sunday."
What do you mean? killed before the IDF storming on gaza? why, I'm shocked.
Posted by: Opeth | June 29, 2006 at 04:37 AM
From the AP:
So, Israel is a bit smoother about it. We don't say, we're taking hostages but rather, "The arrests of these Hamas officials ... is part of a campaign against a terrorist organization that has escalated its war of terror against Israeli civilians."
Are we fooling anyone?
We don't usually murder our detainees, which is in our favor; but we torture them.
Both the insurgency and the counter-insurgency are committing war crimes. Both sides use anti-civlian (basically, terrorist) tactics to achieve their ends. Furthermore, Israel, which can muster massively more force, kills and injures proportionately more civilians.
Posted by: Andrew Schamess | June 29, 2006 at 09:44 AM
Soldier or settler, it is the same thing. He is major, 18, and "According to current information, Asheri, who studies in a pre-military mechina (preparatory program), left his friend's house in Beitar Ilit, south of Jerusalem, on Sunday and has not made contact with his family since.
Arieh Goldman, from the settlement secretariat in Itamar, told Ynet: "On 9:00 p.m. Sunday night, one of Asheri's classmates saw him for the last time hitchhiking near the French Hill (in Jerusalem). No one has seen him since then…He was on the way to a fieldtrip""
Soon to be a soldier of the occupying force. If the settlers are targets, it is because they are asking for it. They have only to leave.
Posted by: bernarda | June 29, 2006 at 11:09 AM
bernarda, you can't justify killing someone based on what they might be when they are older. There is a difference between an active duty soldier operating at an outpost that has been shelling Gaza and a kid hitchhiking.
I have no love for the settlers and they should all most certainly leave, but condoning the death of a kid whose crime was living where his parents raised him is unacceptable.
As for Israel not murdering detainees - which it has in the past - the fact is when Israel wants someone dead, Israel doesn't bother itself with the legal process - it just goes ahead and extrajudicially assassinates them. As for the abducted Hamas officials, there is talk they are to be used as bargaining chips, though the gov't denies this. So would it be cool for Hamas to roll into Tel Aviv with all their tanks and APCs, seal it off, bomb power plants, bridges, a university, drop 400 shells in one day, then arrest 64 Israel Knesset members? Or is only Israel allowed to do that?
Posted by: scott | June 29, 2006 at 04:41 PM
... and then the palestinian cold-blooded kidnappers were brought to justice. Boo-ya!
Scott, last time I checked, rather than arresting 64 knesset members, Hamas gets to blow them up and then listen to international cries of sympathy for their fragile emotional state.
By the way, I LOVE your version of evidence - linking to a autocratic propaganda site - that toddlers are being held by the big bad Israeli government. BRILLIANT!
Posted by: Fritz | June 29, 2006 at 08:45 PM
I don't understand why people are trying to compare Israel's treatment of prisoners to Palestinian terrorist group's treatment of prisoners. Firstly, it is a completely unfair comparison because Israel is a state, and one that considers itself civilised at that, and Palestinian terorist groups are, well, terrorist groups.
But more importantly, that is SO not the issue.
Collective punishment, that is; that deliberate targeting of a civilian population, is a war crime under international law. If blowing up bridges and damaging a power station is not collective punishment, nothing is. Israel can't get out of it by saying it was "terrorist infrastructure" - a bridge is a bridge: yes, terrorists who have legs *can* cross it, but so can everyone else. Same with the power station - it provides power to 40% of Gaza, and 130 wells rely on its electricity to provide water. Yes, it is likely that in that 40% of Gaza, there will be a terrorist tat drinks from a well. That doesn't make the power station "terrorist infrastructure".
If the international community wasn't so blinded by self-interest, Israel would be facing punitive action and international isolation. Instead we get the Bush administration urging that "all sides exercise restraint". It's disgusting.
Posted by: Jamie Stern-Weiner | June 30, 2006 at 09:06 AM
Israel is a free society that protects the rights of its citizen's; not only does
Israel show restraint in its just retailiation to Palestian Muslim fanatics, it shows too much. The majority of Palestinians have chosen to elect HAMAS, an evil organization that wantonly and jubilantly butchers children with delight.
It is quite clear that there will NEVER be peace until one side has been utterly defeated. For the sake of life and liberty, let's pray that the victorious party will be Israel.
Posted by: senatortombstone | June 30, 2006 at 06:46 PM
Angry White Kid. It is a cute concept.
Posted by: durante vita | June 30, 2006 at 08:55 PM
It is almost rather amusing to see people like senatordumbstone continue to spout zionist myths and lies. It would be if it weren't for the fact that the Israeli ubermenschen didn't regularly go on unrestrained killing expeditions.
Israel is a racist apartheid state. It is as simple as that. As an atheist, I of course don't pray, but the disappearance of Israel would be a good thing for humanity. The western world, especially the U.S., has shown far too great a tolerance for zionist crimes against humanity.
Posted by: bernarda | July 01, 2006 at 04:59 PM
BERNARDA WROTE: It is almost rather amusing to see people like senatordumbstone continue to spout zionist myths and lies.END QUOTE
Are you lazy or just incapable of forming a coherent arugment?
BERNARDA WROTE: It would be if it weren't for the fact that the Israeli ubermenschen didn't regularly go on unrestrained killing expeditions.END QUOTE
Israel does restrain itself and it shouldn't. Palestinian terrorists deliberately target innocent, unarmed civilians and the majority of Palestinians ,who don't actually partake in the murder, support the terrorists; there are very few innocent Palestinians. Palestinians and the usefull-idiot Western liberals who defend them claim that all Israelis are legitimate targets because they all directly or indirectly take part in so-called occupation. If one is to be consistent, the same standard must apply to the Palestinians-the majority of whom support terrorism and celebrate the deaths of Jews-and therefore, there should be no condemnation of Israel when unarmed, non-combatant Palestinians are killed in Israeli attacks whose primary targets are terrorists. If every Israeli is an occupier, then every Palestinian is a terrorist.
BERNARDA WROTE: Israel is a racist apartheid state. It is as simple as that. As an atheist, I of course don't pray, but the disappearance of Israel would be a good thing for humanity.END QUOTE
18.5% of Israel's population is Arab; Arabic is one of the two official languages of Israel. The only people they are keeping separate are the savages on the other side who delight in slaughtering unarmed and defenseless children.
BERNARDA WROTE: The western world, especially the U.S., has shown far too great a tolerance for zionist crimes against humanity.END QUOTE
You've got to be kidding me! Muslim Palestine and the whole Muslim world in general is the greatest threat to Western civilization. The Hamas "leadership" in Palestine seeks to create a therrocracy in which Sharia law reigns supreme and all dhimmis (i.e. non-muslims) are treated as second-class citizens and forced to pay the jizya.
How can anyone who claims to uphold such values as tolerance, peace, liberty, diversity, etc. support the Palestinian cause? Very few Palestinians share those values.
Islam and its fanatical followers who delight in death are the second greatest threat to the free world. The greatest threat are liberals like you, Bernarda; because you are trying to hand us over to them on a silver platter.
Posted by: senatortombstone | July 02, 2006 at 01:04 AM
Senatorshithead the greatest threat to any civilization, western or otherwise are dick hairs like yourself and the nazis who run Israel. Fuck them and fuck you.
Posted by: Anti-LGF | July 02, 2006 at 05:12 AM
Anti-LGF: Senatorshithead the greatest threat to any civilization, western or otherwise are dick hairs like yourself and the nazis who run Israel. Fuck them and fuck you.END QUOTE
Oh boy, it looks like we've got another genious. Move over, Bernarda.
LOL!
Posted by: senatortombstone | July 02, 2006 at 06:43 AM
Zionism is an international criminal organization. It was created on racism and terrorism and its purpose is theft. It must be combatted just as one combats the mafia.
It steals land from the Palestinians and extorts money from the U.S.
There is a typical double-standard in the press about Israel and zionism. It talks about people who are anti-Israel, or anti-zionist. But in fact, we are first of all pro-Palestinian.
The Israelis and other zionists should be called what they really are: anti-Palestinians. With that terminology, you can easily see what racists the Israelis and other zionists are.
Posted by: bernarda | July 02, 2006 at 09:05 AM
Bernarda, The Israelis are a decent, law abiding people who simply wish to live in peace. The Muslim Palestinians and most Muslims in general seek to conquer the free world, impose Sharia on EVERYONE, force conversion (or levy the jizya), and kill anyone who denies allah and his prophet. Muslim fanatics are deceitful liars who cannot be appeased for long. Their demands may seem reasonable at first, but they are quick to become tryants when they can muster enough force to back it up.
Israel has done remarkably well when you consider how few they are in the desert sands amongst hundreds of millions of Muslim who pray daily for their destruction.
The so-called evil and racist zionist agenda is confined to the 8,019 square miles that comprises Israel. Muslims have set their sites on all 57,268,900 square miles of the Earth's land surface. Tell me then how Israel is the real threat to world peace.
I have never been able to understand why leftists are so intent on destroying their free so society and so eager to embrace tyranny. Perhaps you think that despots that you so desire to hand the world over to will smile upon your efforts. But as history has demonstrated, usefull idiots are the first to go.
Posted by: senatortombstone | July 02, 2006 at 01:08 PM
Senator dude, whoever you are, props for being the only guy in the history of this board who knows what he's talking about.
Posted by: Fritz | July 02, 2006 at 05:29 PM
"most Muslims in general seek to conquer the free world"??????
What kind of shit are you smoking?
Please share,
that must be some kind of trip!
Posted by: sappho | July 02, 2006 at 06:48 PM
I take my hat off, Senator.
You might be a tiny bit extreme, but you're the most clear minded poster in this place.
Posted by: Opeth | July 02, 2006 at 07:06 PM
Math time: worldwide, the Muslim population is 1.4 billion, if we assume the vast majority occupying the western world are peaceful, and that Uzhbek and Bangladesh muslims are outside the fold of mainstream radicalism, that leaves us with at least 1.3 billion living within autocratic regimes such as Pakistan, Egypt, Syria, Somalia etc. Polls show that with small variation, support for Al Qaida's rhetoric and lifestyle is >50% in Saudi Arabia(http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/meast/06/08/poll.binladen). Considering the Saudi economy is largely dependent upon the west economically, we can expect this percentage to vary up to 60% in such countries where this is not true. We would then consider 55% a conservative estimate for that portion of the autocratic muslim population that supports Al Qaida's pro-let's-bring'em-all-back-to-the-stone-age initiative. This is reasonable since this is what they're state-run media prints in their newspapers everyday. 55% x 1.3/1.4 = 51%.
Posted by: Fritz | July 02, 2006 at 07:25 PM
senatorstonedumb, "Israel has done remarkably well when you consider how few they are in the desert sands amongst hundreds of millions of Muslim who pray daily for their destruction."
Israel has done well because of theft. First, zionists stole Palestinian land. Second, they are welfare bums that rely on 5 to 6 billion dollars per year that they extort from the American taxpayer. Israel is a criminal enterprise or as they say, the zionist enterprise.
Israel is the number one threat to world peace. It is the only fanatic religious state that has WMD's: nuclear, chemical, and biological. And it has the will to use them.
Yet for some reason the press or the government never speak about Israel's WMD's when they condemn, for example, Iran's nuclear program. What is needed is a pre-emptive strike against Israel to eliminate its WMD's.
Posted by: bernarda | July 03, 2006 at 03:35 AM