Israel

Hmm! Well I guess it comes down to personal opinions(for what they're worth!) The Semites have been picked on for centuries. My personal beliefs are to support the underdog if they're being treated unfairly. The Semites have been persecuted since the year dot. They've managed to found a State that anyone of their beliefs can go and live in without fear of persecution. They did it by force and they think that is the only way to survive. They are a very young country. If all your neighbours are telling you that they are going to obliterate you, you might, just, react violently. Think of a 19yrs old reaction to someone who says they're going to kill them.

P.G. As regards the EU. Where do we go? We're a silly little island off of the Continent. We need to Ally ourselves to someone. I don't like the Americans any more than you. I'm not struck on the Europeans eithier. The Russians have their hands on our throats as regards our power supplies.
Maggie destroyed our chances of being independent as regards power supplies (right wing!)
Where do we go?

 

Claire, i don't defend hamas. My Issue is also not with Israels right to defend itself but how they are going about it.

 

Tell me, is what the Israeli's are doing any different to what the Nazi's were doing in Warsaw in 1943/4?

 

They aren`t transporting millions upon millions to death camps-but I see your point, especially after I watched the news last night.

Another difference is that they aren`t at war with Britain-maybe we`d do more if they were.

 

Larkshall. I don't think the inhabitants of the Warsaw Ghetto were denying Germany's right to exist or threatening to wipe them off of the planet. Although I accept your sentiments about innocents being killed. This system proved "Man's inhumanity to man"
Without being sarcastic or patronising, if you're under 40yrs, try "Googling" "Holocaust". Sussex, hope my spelling's O.K.:D

P.G. Err! you didn't answer, mate. Where do we go?
Feel free to P.M. me. I'll never whinge to the mods about anything:gnthb:

 

I did a bit of research on Hamas. Their objectives and beliefs make for interesting, if scary reading. Did you know they are listed as a terrorist organisation in several countries around the world and even more interesting, are BANNED in Jordan.

 

Aaron, it is quite unnerving isn`t it.

Hamas is playing a dangerous game. They (in my very humble and probably erroneous opinion) are attempting to martyr an entire state in the vain hope that the Arab states will rise up against Israel (the west?).

 

Yes, the rise of fundamentalism is a worrying and potentially catastrophic movement. I don't just mean Islamic fundamentalists either, the Christian far right in the USA with their Creationist beliefs are just as scary.
Hamas have the support of Iran and Syria, not exactly know for their love of Israel either.

Something else to consider, whatever Israel are doing now (and I don't totally support them) it has the only democratically elected government in that part of the world.

 

It isn`t wise of me to develop the argument that it has become a Zionist versus Islamic Fundalmentalist situation. I know so little you see, but I do get the sense that Israel is seeming to talk to the most sense.

I can`t claim to understand it very well, I can only discuss my impressions.


Palestine must be freed-that`s a moral necessity, but I`m not sure who from anymore. It seemed so black and white at first. Israel are firing thus it`s Israels fault. I have had reason to question that of late. And now feel that Hamas must be brought to an end.


In war we must accept some crime, because to do nothing is a greater crime. It`s a trite and rather easy comment for me to make safe here tapping away on my laptop, but I know my freedom was paid for by my ancestors-they killed and were killed, and I only pray that should the time come for me to stand up and be counted I can show the same level of bravery.

 

And here lies the crux of the whole problem - at least from my point of view.

Who should palastine be freed FROM?

If it's Hamas, then it will be interesting finding out what a "moral" course of action is to free them. You could give them a nice cup of tea, and explain that their course of action isn't good form. But that won't make much difference. You *could* shoot them all, but there's a lot of people to shoot, and you'll make a lot of orphans and widows in the process and so that probably isn't the best course of action either. And if you do get rid of Hamas, hezbollah and a load of other splinter groups are waiting in the wings to carry on the fight. You could get rid of them as well, but then you've left a power vacuam, which history shows leads to a civil war, or Isreal cracking on and taking advantage of the situation.


On the flip side, you could give every Isreali a slapped wrist and tell them to play nicely. Or take all their guns off them. But then you'll get the Six Day War Mk II and this time Israel will be leveled, and many thousands die. Then the US will get involved, and all of a sudden the whole of the middle east is in a war against the US. The UK, as part of NATO, will need to get involved for mutual support, at which point our troops will be in a far nastier situation than ever before as places like Saudi Arabia and Kuwait have British and US weaponry - far more than Israel, and have been well trained.


There is NO easy answer to what to do with that situation. Nature always tries to take the easiest route, and in this case, the easiest route is for the poor sods in Palastine to have to take a beating from the Israeli's. There doesn't seem - currently - an easier solution to the problem than that.

Probably the best solution, at least in the short term, is for the West Bank and the Gaza strip to be linked through a land corridor somehow, and then an enormous wall built around the entire thing. No one goes in or out and the border is controlled by a nuetral state.

It'll never happen.

The quote is a good example of my point about the British and the US meddling as well.
My father used to wake up screaming with nightmares from the terrible things he had seen, and done, in the army. My grandfather used to sleep with a pistol under his pillow to try to keep the nightmares at bay.

Perhaps I'm a coward. Perhaps I'm a moral weakling. But the first thing that I think when I see the whole mess that is Gaza on the TV is
"Thank God that's not me it's happening to".
The second I think is
"In 3 weeks time I'll be a father. I hope my son never gets caught up in anything to do with that"
And the third thing I think is
"My best friend doesn't get out of the marines for another 6 years. I hope no wretched politician comes up with some cunning plan that gets him killed in that awful place"


I think it is absolutely fine to express opinions on a forum. There is nothing wrong with wanting something done about it - "brining Hamas/Israel/faction of your choice to an end".
But that sort of stuff always involves some poor woman's kid being killed. It involves a children not seeing parents any more, and it involves phone calls like I had last year with a lunatic mancunian who used to be the most fearless man I ever met, and got me into trouble far to many times, ringing me from Afgahnistan in tears, weeping like a 5 year old, becuase his sergants head had exploded all over him, and he had to clear bone fragments and a lump of brain out of the trigger guard before he could return fire.

Britain has lost too many men - and women - over the last 300 years. So maybe it's the turn of someone else to get involved?


Side note - in the last 40 years, a grand total of three MP's who had at that time children serving in the armed forces have voted for military action in any vote put to the house.

Steve

 

Hamas were democratically elected by the Palestinian people, in free and fair elections that were independently monitored. However Israel and the rest of the western world chose to ignore this as they didn't like the outcome They stated that the Palestinian people had chosen the 'wrong' leadership and decided that the Fatah leader should be installed instead. There lies the crux of the problem.

Democracy will throw up undesirable results occasionally, it is the nature of the beast, but for Israel and it's allies to undertake to wipe out another country's elected government undermines the whole institution of democracy itself. If Israel had recognized Hamas at that point, and negotiated with them, things might have turned out very different. Nothing will be achieved by force in this situation, apart from recruiting more support for Hamas.

 

I'm very ambivalent about recognising a terrorist organisation as a government.

I do think Britain needs to stop pretending its a world power anymore and concentrate on internal affairs. I know its not glamourous for a politician to forgo jetting around the world hobnobbing with his fellow world leaders, but frankly Britain can't afford to send troops here, there and everywhere and it only breeds discord amongst the ethnic minorities we have living here.

 

Aaron, The British forighn policy, should be changed to one of negotiation, not sending in troops, this is something the British goverment have forgotten and one that has cost many soldiers lives and tax payers money.

 

Claire, How can Hamas be brought down when they have a massive recruiting tool ie the slaughter of civilians by Israel.

The only time Hamas will be weakened is when there is comparative peace in the region, Any attempt to wipe out hamas will make them stronger, the Hamas fighters see themselves as martyrs and will be constantly replaced.

 

The definition of a terrorist organisation is a group of people who use violence to induce fear and terror in another community to further their own ends. This is exactly the method being employed by Israel against the Palestinians in Gaza.
It is using force to terrorise the people into rising up against Hamas. It is also using the Palestinian missiles as an excuse to hit Hamas hard as there are Israeli elections coming up, so Israel is using terrorism to further it's political aims.

It is also the method used by the US when they illegally Invaded iraq; why else was the mission called 'Shock and Awe' if not to make the population afraid of US forces?
As for our own role in this, we should never have become involved and have to stop supporting the US in it's military conflicts, and this includes Afghanistan - another unwinnable war.

The western democracies will never impose their will on the Middle East by force, but maybe democracy in that part of the world is not the ultimate aim. After all, a friendly dictator serves the interests of the west much better than a harder to contol democracy, it is only when our pet dictator rebels, like Saddam Hussain, is he deposed. Saudi Arabia's tyrants are supported in power by the US because they are western compliant. They were even guests of the US president at the time of September 11 2001, and yet most of the hijackers were from Saudi Arabia. It is this western support of the Saudi Royal family that has created Osama Bin Laden and Al Qaida.

The CIA were instrumental in organising the coup in Iran against the newly elected Dr. Mohammad Mossadegh because he nationalised the oil industry (which was definitely against western interests) and imposed the dictator Shah of iran, who did as he was told.

Iran is accused of attempting to aquire nuclear weapons, and yet Israel already possesses such weapons against international law and refuses to sign up to the non-proliferation treaty or even admit publicly that it has them.
Israel is also in breach of something like 85 UN security council resolutions, including human rights violations, illegal land grabs, occupation, abductions, aggression and failures to abide by the Geneva Convention. It has also been imposing sanctions, witholding vital supplies, refusing to open the borders, witholding millions of dollars of Palestinian tax money, and causing untold misery and suffering of the whole population of Gaza for years.

It is this ongoing hypocrisy and double standards from western countries, including ourselves, that has to be addressed if we really want to have peace in the middle east.

On a personal note - I am neither pro nor anti Israel, or Hamas for that matter. I am, however, on the side of justice and human rights and condemn both sides for the pointless loss of life and misery that this latest conflict is causing.