Gaza Strip?

[.Ein.]

I say we drench them in my heathen seed and be done with it.

And then drench me with someone's heathen seed, too.

That sounds great. =D

 

[ceacar99]

Oversimplification. One, you win a war by making the other side give up its ideals--and when one of your biggest reasons for fighting is that the other person will wipe you out even if you don't fight back...
Two, we didn't win the American Revolution singlehandedly. The only really "good" war we won singlehandedly was our Civil War. Though I'm sure you'd have opposed that, given your earlier posts...

in the first two years of the war we had two major supply problems. 1: we had FAR too many rifles and far too few muskets in the general army's mind and 2: we didnt have the powder needed to function in war. despite the fact that the american business of rifle making was booming at the time there were no real production centers of powder. most of it was "downright primitive".

the united states marine corps' first amphibious landing assaulting british forces in the bahamas with the single goal of capturing enough ammunition for washington's planned battle at trenton. such was the scarcity of the stuff. the munitions captured allowed the american forces(whom were FAR more accurate then europeans but still not their betters in shock action) to beat the hessian garrison, while washington could have even attempted at forcing the british to withdraw from the americas by pressing on in the gap formed and capturing the british army's pay he did recognize that his meager force was far too exhausted to continue and ended the campaign season.

the fact was, that britian had a CHANCE of winning the war by breaking the will of the highest echelon of leaders. there were enough "torries" around to evidence that support for the war was not so overwhelming that britain initially did not have to actually control all the ground to force a peace. however as the war wore on that changed and victory became an impossibility, especially since the continental army did indeed manage to get arms for its men.

simple fact. there are only three or four ways to control a nation with a hostile population. 1: force to space ratio, 2: scorched earth, 3: a century long fortress strategy(how the english conquered the welsh) and 4: using the leadership of the country to enslave itself for you thus giving the illusion of legitimacy in the system and preventing hostilities from boiling over.

most failed occupations in history were based on one simple truth. lack of force to space ratio. once again thats why napoleon was unable to actually keep control of spain, and actually why france was not chopped up into little pieces when napoleon was defeated....

You love war. There's more to history than that.

you have to study it all to really start understanding. like how the english spoke french in court in the early years, or the intricities of monarchial germany with its class system and inner racism. some of the former german city states retained ability to deal independently with the outside world till the 30's for example.

however, war is such a dominating factor in history that its very difficult NOT to bring it into everything else. man kind is constantly at war with itself and the repercussions are everywhere. european culture was dramatically changed by a bunch of seaborn raiders for example. how can you study the other things and ignore that?

No, you're one of the far-too-many ignorant enough to dismiss anything that didn't happen on the battlefield. Congratulations! Your parents must be proud.

alright my boy lets discuss one thing that americans recognize as what universally made us so successful at the start of the 1900s. mass production, specificly of things like cars, refrigerators and so on.

now all of that relied on a single piece of rather difficult complex technology. completely universal replaceable parts. before then every last machine was unique in some way or another and had to be hand fitted, ESPECIALLY firearms.

well it turned out that a man named hall became fascinated with firearms. he wasnt a gunsmith or nothing, he just recognized the superiority of the rifle and decided to improve on it. he realized that he couldn't improve on the actual accuracy of a weapon already renowned for it but he could improve its rate of fire. with that hall invented one of the first reliable safe breach loading black powder rifles. the original was flintlock but then when percussion caps became popular it was upgraded.

well, the thing was that hall's "factory" could only produce 20 a month. even when he finally did get the government's ear to adopt the new weapon he couldnt meet the demands of the government so no contract. so two years later he proposed a new plan, he wasn't selling his rifle so much as selling the idea of a completely universal firearm. each with identical parts that would work in all firearms of the same model or "pattern". now hall was not the original thinker of this idea, a man in france achieved limited sucess with this and boosted arms output tremendously for france.

long story short the government liked the idea, gave hall a factory and money. there hall developed the fundamentals of american mass production. he didnt really invent more firearms but invented machines like a screw lathe and so on. production soared and the government was pleased.

so army engineers in the ordinance department worked in hall's facilities. they gained the knowledge of how he made the universal parts, and how he ran the factory. this knowledge soon began to spread across the country not just in arms industries. the founder of the crystler company for example was a former army engineer educated in hall's systems. my friend, america was made by the rifle. it brought us much needed wealth from abroad after the civil war, it tought the world mass production, and it created a nation of imagination and innovation.

im sorry to say but to a very large degree our nation was made by the rifle.

Does Hamas have those now too? You know, your description makes 'em sound pretty high-tech--kinda like something we'd be more likely to have the technology for than a group that has to suicide-bomb if it wants to kill Israelis because it doesn't have any proper guns...

air bursters high tech? please..... and btw i was talkin about what israel could have been using. hamas likes rockets and mortars because launchers are lighter and easy to move. a howister however is heavy and not so mobile. hamas also likes mortars because they are so simple that a monkey could make one.......

"Objective" used here to mean "self-righteously ignorant apathetic toward anything that focuses on human lives rather than religion and/or money."

religion? money? bah. im talking about a battle of culture here. israel is like us, hamas is not. israel values freedom and human rights similar to ours amongst its own, hamas does not. you dont support those with opposing world views as your own, it just is not done my friend.

That's because you watch Fox News. Try getting some of the coverage LinkTV shows for a couple days. Either you'll walk away knowing something, or you'll die of an aneurysm from trying to find rationalizations around everything.

Here's something funny, though--Israeli media actually gives dissenters on the subject more airtime than American media. They get better coverage on the killings and whatnot, too.

i wasn't quoting anything from fox news exept body counts which a double check on google shows that fox news isnt saying anything different there then the rest of the world.

Hamas wouldn't need to exist if Palestine had Israel's resources. The people would already have schools, and roads, and hospitals, and they wouldn't need Hamas to build them.

from what i've read online all those schools and hospitals while hamas supported(why wouldnt they? improvements like that only empower themselves) are primarily funded by the un. "un hospital", "un school". sounds like the un actually was trying for once. unfortunately for their efforts hamas got violent with a power much stronger then themselves.

So?
And Israel cramming the Palestinians into a smaller and smaller territory every year is nothing like Germany's actions?

and israel giving up gaza years ago is pushing them into smaller and smaller territory?

Remember kids, killing is only bad when it's people you have personal grievances with. If it's somebody overseas who has a family and has never done anything against you or yours in your life, it's A-OK to kill him; after all, it's just business.

ya and i suppose people everywhere should lead foreign nations attack them all the time as they please. we should have done what the japanese wanted at pearl harbor, gave up and went to the peace table talking out of fear of re opening trade so japan could get the oil and steel it needed. we REALLY should have done that..... and israel should cower in fear and give hamas everything it wants.

WAR IS NOT AN ATROCITY. often people will use violence, the supreme authority to try to get what they want. there honestly is nothing to do except kill them. otherwise they will kill you, rape your wife in front of your children and then chop up your pathetic spawn into little pieces. what are you supposed to do then? let him do it? or are you going to pick up a gun and shoot the asshole in the face?

Violence in itself? As in, violence for its own sake?
It doesn't. How is that an unreasonable sta--
Wait, you just called the Israeli invasion violence for violence's sake.
And still endorse it.
You know, people like you are why I support eugenics and sterilizing mental patients. It may not be 100% effective in reducing the number of amoral war-hawks, but even basic preventive measures are better than none.

nope i meant that the modern bleeding heart movement views any violence what so ever as bad, even if its in self defense. "no you cant kill that guy its wrong.....", "but the fucker just shot 3 people and still has the pistol!". same case in israel, as i said there is no super ninja "a team" in the world that can charge into gaza, disarm hamas and get out. the only way israel can ensure the health of its people is disarm hamas by force of arms.

That's only a valid argument if the US is incontrovertibly right 100% of the time.
Kill it with fire.

no, its a valid argument if you believe our cultural views of human rights and economics(generally shared by western europe) are right or not. either way, as i said you support people who support your crusade, not the other way around.

Did you know the Qu'ran prohibits people from collecting interest on loans?

and without that we wouldn't have a financial industry. now its your own fault for accepting a loan with a ridiculous interest rate, but saying that all interest rates should be abolished?

Why is it that this argument never fails to remind me of the nuns from Chrono Trigger?
"All we want is world peace...
Or a peace of the world, tee hee."

read up on how many times israel has defeated its neighbors, then read up exactly how much land they have taken from them. then read up on how much land they have given back. honestly their actions demonstrate that they dont want any more land then what they have now.

Then it clearly has insufficient might, and thereby no right to exist by your reasoning.
Thank you, fail again.

wtf?/???? now your even getting more over the top then me!!!!! wow! amazing .

i didnt say any such thing..... jesus..... i said that if israel ceased to have such a functioning army all those arab states would descend on it and devour it whole, like they tried so many times. and outright war has not broken out against israel in a while because they recognize that they dont have the strength to defeat it so overtly. its a war thats been going on since 1948, just because the palistinians sometimes have been the only ones keeping the pressure on doesnt mean the other players aren't watching and biding their time.

Never mind that the Palestinians' rockets have barely the explosive power of a half-soaked firecracker and most don't go more than 300 yards when fired. Never mind that they don't have any proper armies and that nobody sells them shiny new American weapons.

um bud, a light mortar can go 2k.... a rocket, well too variable but regular artillery and many cheep rocket artillery can go 20, 30k. but either way it demonstrates that israel and egypt's embargo did indeed have the desired effect. hamas doesnt have substantial arms to do much against israel. though those rockets ARE very powerful, its just like regular artillery in the fact that one honestly isnt gonna do much however......

Sadly, you're 100% right here--America's foreign policy's been "might makes right" ever since we formed a navy.

edit: original content removed because it would likely result in more diarrhea flung in my direction.

back that statement up. honestly, do it. so far i havent seen a single sign that you know what the hell your talking about. so give us a history lesson about how the united states has been the biggest bunch of arms toting war mongering evil doers, do that all the way through present and that includes covering our isolationist era after the imperialist era. good fucking luck. god, i had a flame fest here for ya first but i decided that it would decend this "argument" into even more of a stink fest. man inflamed into a modern moron by the anti bush retoric vs (a non bush supporter) a man who avidly studies. GO!

 

[Wolf-Bone]

ceacar, no one has ever agreed with you on a single thing you've ever said for as long as I've been on these forums. It's unlikely they ever will. I don't even really bother reading your posts anymore, because it's always the same God damned shit, and I doubt I'm the only one.

 

[ceacar99]

ceacar, no one has ever agreed with you on a single thing you've ever said for as long as I've been on these forums. It's unlikely they ever will. I don't even really bother reading your posts anymore, because it's always the same God damned shit, and I doubt I'm the only one.

ya, i was trying to be chill this time and try not to let things get into a major hate fest. but yknow this time that guy just basically spewed filth at me.... and ya normally its a 95% disagreement against me in terms of politics, lol. ESPECIALLY when it comes to "capitalism vs socialism" but im not about to bring that up again.

 

[Wolf-Bone]

"capitalism vs socialism" but im not about to bring that up again.

Yeah, seeing as how this is the second time in less than a century capitalism has needed to employ a bit of socialism to save its ass, the ones both asking for and supporting it are the same people who'd tell a homeless person they don't have a house and a job because of "personal responsibility", and you're on a forum where a lot of people can't even afford health insurance you'd be pretty fucking wise not to open your mouth about that.

 

[Adrimor]

Yeah, seeing as how this is the second time in less than a century capitalism has needed to employ a bit of socialism to save its ass, the ones both asking for and supporting it are the same people who'd tell a homeless person they don't have a house and a job because of "personal responsibility", and you're on a forum where a lot of people can't even afford health insurance you'd be pretty fucking wise not to open your mouth about that.

He'd be wiser still if he realized America wasn't immaculate and that, despite all his arguments to the contrary where Israel's concerned, might alone doesn't make right.

Tell me, ceacar--since you cling to your argument that being similar to hte US makes a country worth supporting, it hardly seems unreasonable to assume that you would agree with this:
"If you criticize America, you hate America and are automatically wrong."
Since there remains, however, a chance that you aren't a complete waste of life, it would be bad form of me to deny you it...
Do you agree with the above position?

but yknow this time that guy just basically spewed filth at me....

Who are you to judge things filth when excrement's the only thing I've seen in your posts?

See, I'm one of those neo-hippies you hate so much:
Realistic. Humanist. Skeptical.
Happy to offend you.

 

[Aq Bars]

lol, i do with it like i do with history. study objectively, compile facts then let emotion get involved. simply put i support israel because its one of the few nations that supports our viewpoints. they got a lot of their own but israel is a nation that expresses similar ideals on the western viewpoint of human rights and economic theory for example. many of its neighbors do not. would i support those against us or those with us?

I don't think you quite grasp what you're talking about here. I had you in mind when I made that post, by the way.

 

[Tycho]

Dear sweet sanity that post was way too fucking long @_@

ceacar99, DIAF plz k thx bye

 

[Aq Bars]

Dear sweet sanity that post was way too fucking long @_@

It's like Bill O'Reilly made an FAF account.

 

[Mayfurr]

ya, i was trying to be chill this time and try not to let things get into a major hate fest. but yknow this time that guy just basically spewed filth at me....

Pot. Kettle. Black.

 

[ceacar99]

Who are you to judge things filth when excrement's the only thing I've seen in your posts?

""

lol, i do with it like i do with history. watch fox news, drink mercury, spout bullshit.

Fix'd.
""

i dont remember making ANY statements like that. maybe ripping on a few unnamed "hippies" but thats about it..... where as your post wore on you increasingly relied on insulting me directly instead of really arguing. THATS what i'm talking about.

"If you criticize America, you hate America and are automatically wrong."
Since there remains, however, a chance that you aren't a complete waste of life, it would be bad form of me to deny you it...
Do you agree with the above position?

nope dont agree with it. lol, you keep reading things into me. thinking im a normal "pro bush republican, yee hah!"' when im on a completely differing team. suppose im reading too much into you as well. i see a modern liberalist person who is so full with hate over the current administration that he cant even admit that his own country has done some good once in a while, that the general american ideals of life and liberty are good and so on. generally a person so jaded towards politicians that he doesnt believe any of them are true and honest anymore.

let me explain something to you. i say i support isreal because they are like us i dont mean that they go around blowing shit up. i mean that they believe in concepts like free speach. almost completely free markets(nobody has a truly free market), and so on. but nope, you gotta tie it in with the modern liberal bush hate retoric.....

lets summerise, my point is:

-israel isnt this evil monster that the modern left is making it out to be. its essentially doing all it can to defend itself. its had acedents and a few stupid leaders in the military but the nation itself isnt "evil".

the general opossing point is

-israel is evil because its attacking gaza with extreeme force. they are bad because with egypt they had a major embargo against gaza(similar to that commited against many nations like north korea) and essentially israel brought this on themselves with their own evil and should admit that they are wrong and seek a completely peaceful solution to the situation.

my stance on israel isnt so extreeme, its kinda funny seeing that so few people even are willing to concede that israel has some right to invade gaza.....

 

[Adrimor]

i dont remember making ANY statements like that. maybe ripping on a few unnamed "hippies" but thats about it..... where as your post wore on you increasingly relied on insulting me directly instead of really arguing. THATS what i'm talking about.

Argument ad hominem isn't so great when people use it on you, is it?
Calling people who believe a human life has some intrinsic value regardless of their viewpoint "hippie morons" isn't any better.
Particularly when you refuse to even use reasonably correct spelling or grammar. It's one thing if you're discussing games or something, but once you whip out the insults to somebody else's intelligence, at least try to look smarter >_>

nope dont agree with it. lol, you keep reading things into me.

It's the nature of people to analyze things, and the nature of sheeple to accept things at face value. I'm not one of the latter.

thinking im a normal "pro bush republican, yee hah!"'

Who said anything about Bush? We were blindly pro-Israel here in the US before anybody even heard of W. Doesn't matter what party's in power--though every president who refuses to even try correcting his predecessor's mistakes is a fair target for blame.

i see a modern liberalist person who (...) cant even admit that his own country has done some good once in a while

We've done many good things--that goes without saying.
However, acting like the world's police force is not one of them, and we do that more than anything else lately.

that the general american ideals of life and liberty are good

See, you say you're not a Republican, but then you spout their same partyline bullshit. "Ideals of life and liberty"? Pshaw! Talk about life and liberty to the innocent Americans who'd been imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay. Talk about life and liberty to the Iraqis we ground into the desert sands just so W. could show off. Talk about life and liberty

and so on. generally a person so jaded towards politicians that he doesnt believe any of them are true and honest anymore.

Some are. They don't make it past the local level of government, though--maybe county, tops.

let me explain something to you.

You're going to explain things? Finally! I was wondering when you'd get tired of people pointing out all your fallacies.

i say i support isreal because they are like us i dont mean that they go around blowing shit up.

I didn't say you supported them because they blow shit up, I said you supported their blowing up of shit in the first place--which you have not denied yet, though I'd love to see you try now.

i mean that they believe in concepts like free speach

Irrelevant; besides which they believe in free speech in practice, whereas we only believe in it on paper, ultimately. As I mentioned, their news channels allow people to speak against Israeli actions on-air, whereas ours do not.

almost completely free markets

Shut the fuck up about economics. Have you even heard about the bank bailout? That's what happens when you clamor for free markets.

Here's some real economics for you:

For capitalism to be possible, there must be two things firmly in place beforehand:
(1) An established rule of law.
(2) A consistent application of the law.

Meaning that there have to be laws preventing companies and people alike from fucking each other over, and they have to be enforced routinely. Doesn't mean the law has to be entirely reasonable--it could be utterly draconian--but it has to be there, and consistently so. "Free market" is another term for "deregulation"--which is actually anti-capitalism.

but nope, you gotta tie it in with the modern liberal bush hate retoric.....

I don't believe I've made more than one, maybe two rebuttals that mentioned Bush. How about you save some face and try playing some other card? "I'm the misunderstood victim of anti-Bush liberals" is a bullshit claim here.

the nation itself isnt "evil".

The government of it is. The ordinary people might just be doing the best they can with what they have--but so are the ordinary Palestinians, so what makes them deserve death more than the Israelis?

israel is evil because its attacking gaza with extreeme force (...) israel brought this on themselves with their own evil and should admit that they are wrong and seek a completely peaceful solution to the situation.

You really don't seem to get the question, but I'll ask again: How is that an unreasonable opinion compared to "killing people whose weapons aren't anywhere near the level of the killers' is awwwright"?

my stance on israel isnt so extreeme

"We have guns, they have sticks. It's okay for us to kill them though."
That's not extreme at all, no sir e.e

its kinda funny seeing that so few people even are willing to concede that israel has some right to invade gaza.....

When they had said before that they weren't going back in? There's nothing for us to concede, you're just wrong.

 

[ceacar99]

Particularly when you refuse to even use reasonably correct spelling or grammar. It's one thing if you're discussing games or something, but once you whip out the insults to somebody else's intelligence, at least try to look smarter >_>

spell check(save for capitalization issues) is almost 100% clear when i post. though i concede on the grammar issue, you think as abstract as me and you have trouble talking normal, or maybe its just that i never put much stock in it as long as the idea got across.

I didn't say you supported them because they blow shit up, I said you supported their blowing up of shit in the first place--which you have not denied yet, though I'd love to see you try now.

didnt even try at a half ass attempt to deny it. rather its best to say that i support blowing the RIGHT shit up, however that doesnt always happen does it?

Irrelevant; besides which they believe in free speech in practice, whereas we only believe in it on paper, ultimately. As I mentioned, their news channels allow people to speak against Israeli actions on-air, whereas ours do not.

dont? wow, i didnt notice that our news channels weren't able to criticize israel after watching all the coverage about the death tolls, the humanitarian issues, israel ignoring the un and so on. other then that there is absolutely no criticism of israel what so ever!

Shut the fuck up about economics. Have you even heard about the bank bailout? That's what happens when you clamor for free markets.

the bailouts.... yes some of the greatest failures in our system in a long time(referring to the bailouts, not necessarily the bank collapse). just so you know economies far more regulated then ours were poisoned too by the issues of a combination of adjustable interest rates and loaning to ever increasingly poor people. as i said before, its STUPID and MORONIC to criticize a system based on one singular event. every single damn machine in the world breaks down once in a while, the same goes for the economy. everyone has ups and downs and there are always crashes.

further blaming the economic crash on the lack of enforcement on the regulation of banks is as well not covering the real full story. everyone was riding the edge here and as the economy started to slump it reached a point that there were a few dramatic collapses. look at it, things were already sinking before the modern banking crisis.

Here's some real economics for you:

For capitalism to be possible, there must be two things firmly in place beforehand:
(1) An established rule of law.
(2) A consistent application of the law.

Meaning that there have to be laws preventing companies and people alike from fucking each other over, and they have to be enforced routinely. Doesn't mean the law has to be entirely reasonable--it could be utterly draconian--but it has to be there, and consistently so. "Free market" is another term for "deregulation"--which is actually anti-capitalism.

hrmm... first i think i used the term semi free economics. second, free economics refers to the system of reducing regulatory systems down to the bare minimum required to keep stability.

further, the "capitalist" road is about reducing the role of the central government and increasing independent action and individualism. the "socialist" road is the opposing view. obviously free market mechanics belong in the capitalist end, but do not necessarily refer to the end of laws, but rather the reduction of the number of people who want to take money out of your pocket and time away from your day.

The government of it is. The ordinary people might just be doing the best they can with what they have--but so are the ordinary Palestinians, so what makes them deserve death more than the Israelis?

isnt that the story of every war? since hamas was the legitimate governing party of gaza and hamas committed an act of war against israel gaza is now at war with israel, end of story. if one nation attacks another its considered an act of war, simple fact. some nations tolerate it and sweep small incidents under the rug hoping they'll dissipate over time, others dont.

How is that an unreasonable opinion compared to "killing people whose weapons aren't anywhere near the level of the killers' is awwwright"?

ah now we are getting to the real issue. something i've seen now and again.

you object to israel invading gaza on the grounds that hamas cant really fight back? so its better if we give them all rocks instead of guns and let them have at it? or would it be better if china backed hamas and gave them billions of dollars of equipment to match?

fact: the looser of a war is often based on lack of ability to fight back. lack of equipment, munitions, or simply men to fight the war. gaza is such a case. saying that its wrong for israel to press gaza in a war that gaza started based solely on the grounds that hamas doesnt have the resources to fight back is well..... pretty childish.....

"We have guns, they have sticks. It's okay for us to kill them though."
That's not extreme at all, no sir e.e

well again, gaza started the war.

honestly, i dont know how i can make it any more clear. no gaza cant really fight back. they got a few rifles, some rocket sites, mortars that if properly directed could be lethal(but normally aren't guided well) and rpgs that wont do anything against a modern tank. thats about it....

BUT, they decided to threaten and attack israel anyway. its like a moron faced off against an entire swat team with a m9 berrata vs their 15 mp5's. he waves the gun crazily demanding things and when he doesnt get what he wants he shoots one of the cops in the leg. so the cops gun his ass down. perfectly legal, especially because the police officers are entitled to their lives and should never be expected to give up 2 or 3 of their own lives to capture a criminal that just shot them.

apply that same situation to israel. gaza is the crazy lunatic with the pistol. things are not going well for him so he uses a weapon to threaten to get what he wants(an end to the embargo), when he doesnt get it he shoots to show he is serious. now is israel expected to just run through the streets of gaza with handcuffs trying to capture alive all those that just attacked them? pretty silly.....

When they had said before that they weren't going back in? There's nothing for us to concede, you're just wrong.

when they said before that they werent going back in believing that it would result in a peaceful situation in which they would never have to point arms at gaza again. but they were wrong.... now they gotta go gun down another criminal.

 

[Mikael Grizzly]

I find it funny how people automatically assume the weaker side is "good". Hamas and it's supporters have been asking to be invaded with rockets and other explosives.

It is unfortunate that lives were lost. But if Hamas kept the peace and, you know, actually did something to get the Palestinians off the ground, this'd never have happened.

It's quite sad.

 

[Mayfurr]

NEARLY SEVENTY YEARS ago, in the course of World War II, a heinous crime was committed in the city of Leningrad. For more than a thousand days, a gang of extremists called "the Red Army" held the millions of the town's inhabitants hostage and provoked retaliation from the German Wehrmacht from inside the population centers. The Germans had no alternative but to bomb and shell the population and to impose a total blockade, which caused the death of hundreds of thousands.

Some time before that, a similar crime was committed in England. The Churchill gang hid among the population of London, misusing the millions of citizens as a human shield. The Germans were compelled to send their Luftwaffe and reluctantly reduce the city to ruins. They called it the Blitz.

This is the description that would now appear in the history books - if the Germans had won the war.

Absurd? No more than the daily descriptions in our media, which are being repeated ad nauseam: the Hamas terrorists use the inhabitants of Gaza as "hostages" and exploit the women and children as "human shields", they leave us no alternative but to carry out massive bombardments, in which, to our deep sorrow, thousands of women, children and unarmed men are killed and injured.
<...>
The Hamas movement won the majority of the votes in the eminently democratic elections that took place in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip. It won because the Palestinians had come to the conclusion that Fatah's peaceful approach had gained precisely nothing from Israel - neither a freeze of the settlements, nor release of the prisoners, nor any significant steps toward ending the occupation and creating the Palestinian state. Hamas is deeply rooted in the population - not only as a resistance movement fighting the foreign occupier, like the Irgun and the Stern Group in the past - but also as a political and religious body that provides social, educational and medical services.

From the point of view of the population, the Hamas fighters are not a foreign body, but the sons of every family in the Strip and the other Palestinian regions. They do not "hide behind the population", the population views them as their only defenders.

Therefore, the whole operation is based on erroneous assumptions. Turning life into living hell does not cause the population to rise up against Hamas, but on the contrary, it unites behind Hamas and reinforces its determination not to surrender. The population of Leningrad did not rise up against Stalin, any more than the Londoners rose up against Churchill.

- "Israel Is Losing This War" (Uri Avnery, Israeli journalist) (emphasis added)

 

[Tycho]

- "Israel Is Losing This War" (Uri Avnery, Israeli journalist) (emphasis added)

Cover story on my latest TIME Magazine is "Why Israel Can't Win This War".

Haven't gotten around to reading it yet, though.

 

[Adrimor]

- "Israel Is Losing This War" (Uri Avnery, Israeli journalist) (emphasis added)

On the other side of the coin, anybody else find it a little peculiar that most of Israel's most vocal supporters don't even live there?

I find it funny how people automatically assume the weaker side is "good".

The weaker side in any conflict, when it knows it's weaker and still fights back, usually is "good".
Just because the Jews rolled over for the Nazis doesn't mean everybody who came since should have to--after all, a holocaust must never happen again, right?

Hamas and it's supporters have been asking to be invaded with rockets and other explosives.

That's like saying me TPing your house gives you justification for bulldozing mine while my entire family and I are in it.

I don't see how the hell you think your opinion's unpopular, ceacar--maybe you need to start talking to people IRL, because most US citizens watch mainly (or only) Fox News themselves. Then again, I suppose it's the same reasoning that the rabid Jesus Christers use to call themselves an oppressed minority here: "Fuck the numbers, I'm a victim!"

Sadly, when that's your only trump card in a discussion...

 

[ceacar99]

The weaker side in any conflict, when it knows it's weaker and still fights back, usually is "good".

lol its a silly childish thought though. with that justification a midget could run up to 1980's arnold punch him in the nuts for no real reason and be on the "good side". the midget started the fist fight but he's so little and weak! its wrong for arnold to do anything to defend himself!

That's like saying me TPing your house gives you justification for bulldozing mine while my entire family and I are in it.

I don't see how the hell you think your opinion's unpopular, ceacar--maybe you need to start talking to people IRL, because most US citizens watch mainly (or only) Fox News themselves. Then again, I suppose it's the same reasoning that the rabid Jesus Christers use to call themselves an oppressed minority here: "Fuck the numbers, I'm a victim!"

80 fucking rockets a day and countless mortar rounds is NOT tping your neighbors house. scaled down to that its rather more like your neighbor sneaking into your house and attempting murder on your daughter with a .22 cal pistol he made himself and failing because the barrel didnt fit the round and the velocity was not enough to pierce your daughter's skull.

once again, just because hamas is the "midget" in the fight doesnt make it right. a man who attempted murder is a man who attempted murder, no matter the resources at his disposal. its just fucking fact.

now i can understand saying that israel shouldn't use so many artillery shells and air strikes and instead rely on line of sight ground based equipment but saying israel is unjustified in the war that hamas started? thats more over the top then ANYTHING ive said on these forums and believe me ive said some pretty bad shit....

 

[Wolf-Bone]

as i said before, its STUPID and MORONIC to criticize a system based on one singular event.

As you already pointed out, a single event can drastically change circumstances, but what you go on to say sorta defeats your own argument there anyway.

every single damn machine in the world breaks down once in a while, the same goes for the economy.

Then obviously we're not critical of it based on a single event. We're fed up with the same damn thing happening repeatedly. Furthermore, the comparisons guys like you make to machines (or even better, living entities that somehow exist outside of their creator) when talking about something like the economy is fucking retarded in the first place. You can't always see the signs of a machine breaking down, and when you do, generally you try to prevent the problem. The people in charge of this "machine" know full well what goes on inside of it and see the writing on the wall long before us regular joes. They have no excuse, try as you do to make ones for them.

 

[Mikael Grizzly]

OThe weaker side in any conflict, when it knows it's weaker and still fights back, usually is "good".

I see what you did there. Though, going with your definition, Al-Quaeda (or any other terrorist organisation/cell) might be considered good.

Just because the Jews rolled over for the Nazis doesn't mean everybody who came since should have to--after all, a holocaust must never happen again, right?

Overdramatizing much? It's shameful that civilians died, but to compare Israel's body count (somewhere around a thousand, give or take 500) with that of Nazi Germany (going in the milions) requires a rather large logic leap.

That's like saying me TPing your house gives you justification for bulldozing mine while my entire family and I are in it.

Um, no. A more accurate comparison would be you throwing bricks at my house and killing my dog. Then I'd promptly break your face across the nearest car.

Which is what Israel is doing right now. They can change the Gaza strip into a smoking crater, but they don't.

Then obviously we're not critical of it based on a single event. We're fed up with the same damn thing happening repeatedly. Furthermore, the comparisons guys like you make to machines (or even better, living entities that somehow exist outside of their creator) when talking about something like the economy is fucking retarded in the first place. You can't always see the signs of a machine breaking down, and when you do, generally you try to prevent the problem. The people in charge of this "machine" know full well what goes on inside of it and see the writing on the wall long before us regular joes. They have no excuse, try as you do to make ones for them.

You forgot that machines also need regular maintenance, regardless of their performance. Heh, I love to see someone's comparison turn out to be the direct opposite of the intended meaning.

 

[ironwolf85]

huh lots of rage here...
I agree with grizzly here though

Um, no. A more accurate comparison would be you throwing bricks at my house and killing my dog. Then I'd promptly break your face across the nearest car.

Which is what Israel is doing right now. They can change the Gaza strip into a smoking crater, but they don't.

The Gaza strip is so small it could be carpet bombed into oblivion in a single night, yet Israel is going in and fighting a grinding ground war to protect it's people.
when they hit a UN hospital or school or any other UN thing, it's because almost all decent facilities were built by the UN, so anything hit will be UN.
Hamas hides behind civilians to deter their foes, Launching rockets from a schoolyard so no rockets come back at them is one of their best known tricks.
the BBC is a little steamed that they cut off access to the Gaza strip.

Between two sides where one warns civilians 24 hours beforehand to get the hell out of town then rolls in and lays siege, and the other that tells them to stay where they are because the first dare not attack if the women and children stay, then goes out and kills men, women, and children themselves.
I know which side I support.

"I have two middle fingers one for conservatives and one for liberals"

 

[Mayfurr]

The Gaza strip is so small it could be carpet bombed into oblivion in a single night, yet Israel is going in and fighting a grinding ground war to protect it's people.

... AFTER they bombed the shit out of Gaza from the air, killing over 400 people in the process.

when they hit a UN hospital or school or any other UN thing, it's because almost all decent facilities were built by the UN, so anything hit will be UN.

And that makes it all right, does it?
By Israel's logic, they've just committed acts of war against the UN.

Between two sides where one warns civilians 24 hours beforehand to get the hell out of town then rolls in and lays siege...

... you forget that said civilians have nowhere to run TO given the small size of Gaza and the fact Israel aren't letting anybody out. All the "kind" warnings are doing is stirring up fear and panic among the population.

There's a word for that: Terrorism.

 

[Aq Bars]

By Israel's logic, they've just committed acts of war against the UN.

Pretty much. But of course the US will see that there are absolutely no repurcussions for Israel.

There's a word for that: Terrorism.

osnap

 

[ironwolf85]

heh these were my personal opinions and observations, I don't care if you flame me.
Israel's no saint either I thought that went without saying but I guess not, they've done shit I don't support, but they and most of Gaza have already accepted a two state solution (they just have to figure out what those states are going to be *wink*) but hamas is refusing because they want to whipe Israel of the face of the map.

oooo 400 people, scary, yet many other places with much much more people dying are being ignored. Small wars used to have body counts in the MILLIONS, and while I sound heartless I hate that so many people bemoan a couple hundred like it was the death of their entire society and civilization.
death is tragic, but natural, treat the dead with respect, not pity.
so long as people are willing to pick up a pipe and crack another human being over the head for any reason there will be war, it is always tragic, it is always terrible, but you do no good by pretending it isn't.
World Peace is a long way off and no modern philosophy will bring about an end to war but if war must happen I hope it is quick and civil, I'm just not holding my breath on it.

oh and nobody attacks the UN, not on purpose, unless they want to be squashed like bugs.

 

[Sulfide]

nah I think Russia wants back the respect it lost during the cold war.
they are actually a lot like other western nations now, they have gone hardcore capitalist now.
so europe's be screwed over by russian capatalists... ain't it grand 8)

still Hamas is being stupid "the heathen lion sleeps on our land, let us poke him with a stick to drive him off... oh he's mad now quickly get me the bigger stick Iran us sent last week." then it goes somthing like "holy #$%#@ my arm my @#$!$ arm, I told you it was evil, ahhgh peace, peace, we want peace aggh"

Dude, Russia is just an Empty fist
proffesional russia disser> http://youtube.com/russiaisprimitiv