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Dr Pie
Dr Pie
Joined: 08 Nov 2007
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I don't want to defend Israel's actions in Gaza but you have the sequence wrong David.
After the three biblical students were kidnapped Israel took about 500 Palestinians into custody. Many of these were Hamas members. Israel claimed that the arrests were part of the search for the kidnapped teenagers but this has been challenged. Most of the detainees were not released after the bodies of the teenagers were found.
Hamas then demanded the release of the prisoners and began firing rockets into Israel. Israel retaliated by bombing and shelling Gaza. Israel destroyed almost all of the weapons fired at it so only about one Israeli has been killed. Hamas lacks the technology to defend itself against Israeli bombing so a couple of hundred Palestinians, many of them civilians, have been killed.
There is no path to peace in the Middle East that involves Israeli bombs or Palestinian rockets.
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Born and raised in Black and White |
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Member 7167 
"What Good Fortune For Governments That The People Do Not Think" - Adolf Hitler.
Joined: 18 Dec 2008
Location: The Collibran Hideout
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| Dr Pie wrote: |
There is no path to peace in the Middle East that involves Israeli bombs or Palestinian rockets. |
The highlighted area is a little closer to the mark unfortunately. |
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ronrat
Joined: 22 May 2006
Location: Thailand
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They have been fighting for 2000 odd years. It is in the DNA. Put a wall around them and tell them they are on their own. There is nothing good that ever came out of religious wars.
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Annoying opposition supporters since 1967. |
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pietillidie
Joined: 07 Jan 2005
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Here is another take on the matter to add to the mix:
| Nathan Thrall of the International Crisis Group wrote: | Gaza and Israel: The Road to War, Paved by the West
JERUSALEM AS Hamas fires rockets at Israeli cities and Israel follows up its extensive airstrikes with a ground operation in the Gaza Strip, the most immediate cause of this latest war has been ignored: Israel and much of the international community placed a prohibitive set of obstacles in the way of the Palestinian national consensus government that was formed in early June.
That government was created largely because of Hamass desperation and isolation. The groups alliance with Syria and Iran was in shambles. Its affiliation with the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt became a liability after a July 2013 coup replaced an ally, President Mohamed Morsi, with a bitter adversary, Gen. Abdel Fattah el-Sisi. Hamass coffers dried up as General Sisi closed the tunnels that had brought to Gaza the goods and tax revenues on which it depended.
Seeing a region swept by popular protests against leaders who couldnt provide for their citizens basic needs, Hamas opted to give up official control of Gaza rather than risk being overthrown. Despite having won the last elections, in 2006, Hamas decided to transfer formal authority to the Palestinian leadership in Ramallah. That decision led to a reconciliation agreement between Hamas and the Palestine Liberation Organization, on terms set almost entirely by the P.L.O. chairman and Palestinian Authority president, Mahmoud Abbas.
Israel immediately sought to undermine the reconciliation agreement by preventing Hamas leaders and Gaza residents from obtaining the two most essential benefits of the deal: the payment of salaries to 43,000 civil servants who worked for the Hamas government and continue to administer Gaza under the new one, and the easing of the suffocating border closures imposed by Israel and Egypt that bar most Gazans passage to the outside world.
Yet, in many ways, the reconciliation government could have served Israels interests. It offered Hamass political adversaries a foothold in Gaza; it was formed without a single Hamas member; it retained the same Ramallah-based prime minister, deputy prime ministers, finance minister and foreign minister; and, most important, it pledged to comply with the three conditions for Western aid long demanded by America and its European allies: nonviolence, adherence to past agreements and recognition of Israel.
Israel strongly opposed American recognition of the new government, however, and sought to isolate it internationally, seeing any small step toward Palestinian unity as a threat. Israels security establishment objects to the strengthening of West Bank-Gaza ties, lest Hamas raise its head in the West Bank. And Israelis who oppose a two-state solution understand that a unified Palestinian leadership is a prerequisite for any lasting peace.
Still, despite its opposition to the reconciliation agreement, Israel continued to transfer the tax revenues it collects on the Palestinian Authoritys behalf, and to work closely with the new government, especially on security cooperation.
But the key issues of paying Gazas civil servants and opening the border with Egypt were left to fester. The new governments ostensible supporters, especially the United States and Europe, could have pushed Egypt to ease border restrictions, thereby demonstrating to Gazans that Hamas rule had been the cause of their isolation and impoverishment. But they did not.
Instead, after Hamas transferred authority to a government of pro-Western technocrats, life in Gaza became worse.
Qatar had offered to pay Gazas 43,000 civil servants, and America and Europe could have helped facilitate that. But Washington warned that American law prohibited any entity delivering payment to even one of those employees many thousands of whom are not members of Hamas but all of whom are considered by American law to have received material support from a terrorist organization.
When a United Nations envoy offered to resolve this crisis by delivering the salaries through the United Nations, so as to exclude all parties from legal liability, the Obama administration did not assist. Instead, it stood by as Israels foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, called for the envoys expulsion on the grounds that he was trying to funnel money to Hamas.
Hamas is now seeking through violence what it couldnt obtain through a peaceful handover of responsibilities. Israel is pursuing a return to the status quo ante, when Gaza had electricity for barely eight hours a day, water was undrinkable, sewage was dumped in the sea, fuel shortages caused sanitation plants to shut down and waste sometimes floated in the streets. Patients needing medical care couldnt reach Egyptian hospitals, and Gazans paid $3,000 bribes for a chance to exit when Egypt chose to open the border crossing.
For many Gazans, and not just Hamas supporters, its worth risking more bombardment and now the ground incursion, for a chance to change that unacceptable status quo. A cease-fire that fails to resolve the salary crisis and open Gazas border with Egypt will not last. It is unsustainable for Gaza to remain cut off from the world and administered by employees working without pay. A more generous cease-fire, though politically difficult for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, would be more durable.
The current escalation in Gaza is a direct result of the choice by Israel and the West to obstruct the implementation of the April 2014 Palestinian reconciliation agreement. The road out of the crisis is a reversal of that policy.
Nathan Thrall is a senior analyst at the International Crisis Group covering Gaza, Israel, Jordan and the West Bank.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/18/opinion/gaza-and-israel-the-road-to-war-paved-by-the-west.html
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watt price tully 
Joined: 15 May 2007
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^ A surprisingly shallow observation.
Hamas throughout never relinquished it's objective to kill Jews. It buys them time to plan more tunnels & more infrastructure.
Israel was warned years ago by one of it's own ( a Geologist) to watch for the sophisticated tunnelling being developed down along the Lebanese border by Hezbollah & by Hamas in Gaza. Israel just after the brief ceasefire yesterday discovered 13 Hamas fighters 250 meters inside Israeli territory very close to a Kibbutz. They killed one & bombed the others but the others got away. The tunnels found are concrete reinforced - moreso inside Gaza.
Hamas is armed with quite sophisticated weapons in 2014 than it was 6 years ago. These weapons can now hit Northern Israel. They now have manufacturing capabilities.
Qatar are no altruistic innocents in this (an impression that was given by the author & have been funding the transfer of weapons). While a state of non conflict might have occurred it is not in Israeli security interests to allow this build up to continue through the notion of a unity government or not.
I do not support the killing of any civilians in any way shape or form: Be they Gazans, Israeli's, or whoever.
But to allow that situation to continue as the author was suggesting would be national suicide for Israel - a consequence of allowing that process to continue
Hamas is a disgrace as well as the current Israeli government.
I thought the piece was again simplistic but adds a layer albeit a minor one.
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“I even went as far as becoming a Southern Baptist until I realised they didn’t keep ‘em under long enough” Kinky Friedman |
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What'sinaname 
Joined: 29 May 2010
Location: Living rent free
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Let em go to war, winner takes all.
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Fighting against the objectification of woman. |
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pietillidie
Joined: 07 Jan 2005
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| watt price tully wrote: | | I thought the piece was again simplistic but adds a layer albeit a minor one. |
I am definitely more interested in Hamas' bread-and-water politics than its bellicose rhetoric, but I haven't been following it close enough in recent times to assess his claims. Was the aspect concerning salaries correct?
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In the end the rain comes down, washes clean the streets of a blue sky town.
Help Nick's: http://www.magpies.net/nick/bb/fundraising.htm |
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David
I dare you to try
Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda
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| ronrat wrote: | | They have been fighting for 2000 odd years. It is in the DNA. Put a wall around them and tell them they are on their own. There is nothing good that ever came out of religious wars. |
Um, no they haven't. Read your history booksminor clashes aside, Jews and Muslims in the Middle East lived in harmony until at the very earliest the 1800s, and serious hostilities only really kicked off when the construction of the Israeli state got underway. There are probably posters here who are older than the IsraeliPalestinian conflict.
http://tinyurl.com/qdmblyc
DNA has nothing to do with it.
As for the "put a wall around them and let them blow each other to pieces" rhetoric, I'm amazed that such callous disregard can be shown to the many ordinary people like you and me in both Israel and the Palestinian territories whose lives are in jeopardy whenever these conflicts escalate. The endless cycle makes us feel helpless, but that's no excuse for embracing apathy.
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All watched over by machines of loving grace
Last edited by David on Sat Jul 19, 2014 10:39 am; edited 4 times in total |
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HAL
Please don't shout at me - I can't help it.
Joined: 17 Mar 2003
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| Are there any other ones someplace else? |
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1061
Joined: 06 Sep 2013
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| David wrote: | | ronrat wrote: | | They have been fighting for 2000 odd years. It is in the DNA. Put a wall around them and tell them they are on their own. There is nothing good that ever came out of religious wars. |
Um, no they haven't. Read your history booksminor clashes aside, Jews and Muslims in the Middle East lived in harmony until at the very earliest the 1800s, and serious hostilities only really kicked off when the construction of the Israeli state got underway. There are probably posters here who are older than the IsraeliPalestinian conflict.
DNA has nothing to do with it.
As for the "put a wall around them and let them blow each other to pieces" rhetoric, I'm amazed that such callous disregard can be shown to the many ordinary people like you and me in both Israel and the Palestinian territories whose lives are in jeopardy whenever these conflicts escalate. The endless cycle makes us feel helpless, but that's no excuse for embracing apathy. |
I think that attitude is similar to the line
"Never argue with a fool they'll drag you down to their level and beat you with experience"
People of the world are sick and tired of the BS from both sides. |
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David
I dare you to try
Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda
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If they think they're sick and tired of having to occasionally listen to an ABC news report read in a neutral tone or see a few explosions on TV, imagine how sick and tired of it all the average citizen of Israel, Gaza or the West Bank must be. I think that sentiment can be directed in a more positive manner; if not towards the (at times) seemingly unattainable peace process, then at least towards mitigation of violence and unnecessary deaths.
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All watched over by machines of loving grace |
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watt price tully
Joined: 15 May 2007
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| pietillidie wrote: | | watt price tully wrote: | | I thought the piece was again simplistic but adds a layer albeit a minor one. |
I am definitely more interested in Hamas' bread-and-water politics than its bellicose rhetoric, but I haven't been following it close enough in recent times to assess his claims. Was the aspect concerning salaries correct? |
As I understand it yes. If I recall it was due to retribution over .....
My concerns primarily relate to: The rise & power of dangerous religious extremism (is there any other type?) of both Jews & Arabs / Arabs & Israelis / Jews & Muslims sidelining reason & rationality & thereby promoting hate.
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“I even went as far as becoming a Southern Baptist until I realised they didn’t keep ‘em under long enough” Kinky Friedman |
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Wokko 
Come and take it.
Joined: 04 Oct 2005
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The problem seems to be that each side has a faction that wants to maintain the horrendous status quo. Even when one of those factions wanes, the other side's war hawks then up the ante. I remember the Northern Ireland conflict, even went there as a kid in '87 and saw tanks rolling down the street. If the IRA and UK loyalists managed peace then it should be doable in Palestine.
Apart from ineffective rocket fire there doesn't appear to be any capacity of the Palestinians to hit Israeli territory anymore, either with direct fire or even suicide bombing. While Israel certainly has the right to defend their territory, what they seem to be doing is performing retributive strikes against a civilian population, while keeping a particular ethnic group locked up inside a ghetto. The fact the Israelis don't seem appreciate that irony is astounding. |
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Member 7167
"What Good Fortune For Governments That The People Do Not Think" - Adolf Hitler.
Joined: 18 Dec 2008
Location: The Collibran Hideout
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| What'sinaname wrote: | | Let em go to war, winner takes all. |
The trouble with wars of this nature is that there are no long term winners. At best they win a couple of skirmishes. Any victory is short lived. In the end it results in generation upon generation of individuals with revenge and hate in their hearts. If you look at he Middle East as a whole at this point in time it is very chaotic with war and rebellion on just about every front.
Even if you turned the whole region into glass there will always be others in other parts of the world who will take up the cause. |
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Dr Pie
Dr Pie
Joined: 08 Nov 2007
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| What'sinaname wrote: | | Let em go to war, winner takes all. |
I've always had my doubts about people who advertise their religion in inappropriate places but you must be a world class moron. To post a comment which amounts to encouraging people to murder each other above a quote about an alleged God so loving the world that he sacrificed his alleged son shows exactly how little your religious beliefs are worth.
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Born and raised in Black and White |
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