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Thursday, 20 Jul 2006
This is what this feels like: A never-ending war. The Battle that will never end, mainly because the Israelis are willing to Kill to stay alive, and because the arabs are willing to die to kill them. I don't think Peace is possible, mainly because you need a common ground for peace, and a level of acceptable losses. The Israelis will always reach a point where their losses become unacceptable, and they will push for Peace. Not for our side. Our acceptable losses are limitless, as long as we win. When your acceptable loss is your own death, what is there to compromise on?
The Israelis want to destroy Hezbollah, but they can't, because it's a culture and a nation. You want to destroy Hezbollah? You have to kill every single person who supports Hezbollah and its Ideology. You have to eleiminate almost all of the Shia in Lebanon. You have to engage in ethnic cleansing, and you can't do that! Now, since YOU CAN'T DO THAT, you will lose. It is inevitable. In order for the gun to kill the idea, it has to kill everyone who holds the idea. Since you can't do that, the idea will always win. The cause will always survive. The Israelis maybe willing to kill for Israel, but the arabs are willing to die for the cause. There is no winning for the israelis. Only degrees of losing!
But let the folly continue anyway…
Moving on, let's see what the people have to say today:
Subzero Blue is quoting the always idiotic Uri Avenry, who believes that the aim of the current conflict is to install a government that is Israel and US friendly. Dude, the government is not the problem. This government was already US and Israel friendly. It's Hezbollah that isn't.
Lisa is writing a more detailed version of the explanation for those pictures . It's worth a read!
Doha is asking the same question I asked earlier about Lebanon. She now believes that Lebanon got sold out.
Paretz confirms that Israel has no intention of occupying Lebanon, but has no problem going inside the borders and doing things when he feels like it deems necessary!
PM Seniora says that Hezbollah must be disarmed, and that Israel can defuse its power and prupose if they withdraw from Shaaba farms and release the prisoners. BP agrees with that solution!
Haartez is giving a realist/defeatist (It really depends on which side you are on) view on Hezbollah after 9 days of bombing. Their conclusion? It didn't affect Hezbollah at all!
Mubarak says he tried again to negotiate the release of Shilat, but those pesky "external forces" (wink wink Syria nudge nudge) keep interfeering. Dude, of course they will interfeere; this crisis has been great for their economy so far.
Abu Kais writes another post that breaks my heart.
And last but not least, make sure to check Itoot's roundup of this current crisis!
Have a nice day!
July 20th, 2006 at 12:17 pm
“You have to kill every single person who supports Hezbollah and its Ideology. You have to eleiminate almost all of the Shia in Lebanon. You have to engage in ethnic cleansing, and you can’t do that! ”
The Allies killed 3 million Japanese and 4 million Germans and millions more non-combatants in WWII. I think it is going to require a comparable amount of carnage in World War III (or IV).
July 20th, 2006 at 12:36 pm
Either way you look at it, millions will die.
If they wish for death, they will get it. But at a time or place of our choosing until their concept of ‘honor’ is destroyed and they feel sthemselves subdued. It’s about time we give the Muslims their own choice.
July 20th, 2006 at 12:43 pm
SM, I believe Israels intention is to attempt to crush Hezbollah’s offensive infrastructure and if possible kill the current leadership. This will cripple them, at least for a while. They have also crippled ( temporarily ) their supply routes. It is obvious that Israel had not been clarifying trade between Iran and Lebanon but once HEz, has been crippled and much of their arsenal destroyed, Isael will, watch with an eagle eye and possibly even extinguish incoming vessels from Iran attempting to re-supply Hezbollah. While the suicide bomber etc. will always be a threat, without range missiles, Israel knows that it doesn’t matter how many Hezbollah sympathisers there are in Lebanon, because without these type weapons, they can do Israel no harm.
Does your change of heart on this issue not also condemn Hezbollah for it’s obvious hidding behind the Lebanese civilian population ? Why do Hezbollah not fight like men. I am not naive to the possibility that Israel might be fucking up and bombing area in Southern Beirut that are innocent, but it is not a revelation that any of these terror organizations use innocent mass population to take cover. This is the height of cowardess !
I wish none of this were happening but I have to ask the anti-Israeli members, if they have ever thought to question why it is that Jordan and, for the most part, Egypt manage to maintain peacefull relationships with Israel. That Israel does not antagonize, once peace agreements are reached and Israel truly believes that it’s Arab neighbors are not our for the death of Israel ? One has to wonder who is truly at fault here. My firm belief is that if all of these terrorist organizations would just shut the fuck up and now legitimized, start the work of real govt etc. and in time I guarantee that prisoner exchanges would happen with Israel ( Once they believed that ” death to Israel was not the prevailing sentiment ). Land would be returned through peaceful but possibly heated debate etc etc.
The only fuck ups here are Hamas and Hezbollah, the former being a group I gingerly supported after it’s election. They failed to rise to the occassion as obviously has Hezbollah in Lebanon.
My heart aches for the innocent who have and will continue to die on both sides, but I blame Iran, Syria, Hezbolla and Hamas for all of this shit. Imagine being surrounded by constant shouts of hate. If you as a person had to listen to your neighbors scream hate and death at you every single day, one day you would lash out and this is what Israel is doing now. They have shown amazing restraint for the last few years.
Sorry I have been clear that I love Middle Eastern culture and have many Arab / Muslim friends and wish to God that the Middle East would allow the neighsayers to bathe in the beauty of the Middle East, but terrorist organizations are the scurge of the ME and until it is eradicated and replaced with reasonable intelligent leaders, who while not appeasing Israel will sit down at the table, the ME will continue to be chastized but the rest of the world that only wants peace.
July 20th, 2006 at 12:46 pm
dude, that’s intense
July 20th, 2006 at 1:09 pm
Frenchman,
what change of heart?
July 20th, 2006 at 1:09 pm
I have to say that i agree with the diatribe of the ’sandmonkey’. What the west and its minions tend to forget is that it is not ‘madness’ that creates what the west self-servingly terms, ‘terrorists’, but the death and destruction rained on the transnational Nation of Islam. Thus, many Muslims who perceive themselves as part of this non UN-recognised nation will inevitably be led closer to the path of militaristic action, as any other ‘citizen’ of a UN-recognised nation that suffers attack from without, the more this nation suffers under the onslaughts of the colonial overlords and their remote outpost, Israel.
July 20th, 2006 at 1:18 pm
You were right the first time. It’s a never-ending war. Keeping an ideology alive doesn’t mean the Nazis “won.”
Root for giant space rocks!
July 20th, 2006 at 1:21 pm
Sand monkey:
I have to disagree with you. I do not believe Israel’s goal is to wipe out Hezbollah. Their goal is to elliminate the military capacity of Hezbollah, and to flex Israeli muscle, and show they are not to be fucked with.
The truth is that there is no cycle of violence. All there is is Israel showing force when the costs of not showing force get to be too much. When Israel shows the appropriate level of force, there’s a temporary detante, because the terror groups start getting scared of Israel. After all, the only thing the terror groups understand is force. Appeasement works to their advantage.
There will always be billions of people in the world who hate Israel, and Israel always will need to have the best military in the world in order maintain its very existence. I doubt anyone within Israel actually thinks this war will change any of that. All anyone is hoping for is a return of the soldiers and a temporary detante.
I want to add that the reason there’s so much hatred is in part tied to the media. I have seen Hezbollah TV programs calling all Jews cockroaches, and TV programs about the Protocols of Zion. Thankfully, Israel hit the Lebanese TV station. I view that as equivalent to Rwanda’s Hate Radio, and the broadcasters to be war criminals. Until action is taken to change the Arab media, then hatred will only foment and perhaps increase in the next generation.
Are there innocent Lebanese who are caught in a crossfire they did not ask for? Yes. My belief, which I have said many times in many different places, is that war is hell. But sometimes it is necessary.
Sand Monkey, I have seen a shift in your attitudes lately about Israel. I have an honest challege for you, posed by Alan Dershowitz: what would you do differently?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alan-dershowitz/a-challenge_b_25378.html
July 20th, 2006 at 1:38 pm
One more thing…
Hezbollah is not a nation. It is an illegal terrorist group that is fomenting the hatred within Shias. Destroy the infrastructure of Hezbollah, and be willing to help pay for the rebuilding of Lebanon into a stronger nation than it was before…
…And then maybe some of the next generation of Shia, not raised on Hate TV/Hate radio…will hate a little less.
Maybe.
July 20th, 2006 at 1:44 pm
The Frenchman is absolutely correct.
July 20th, 2006 at 1:45 pm
“The Israelis want to destroy Hezbollah”
I would have to agree with Frenchman and Miss R above.
Israel is not attempting to “destroy” Hezbollah any more than it is trying to “destroy” the Arabs called Palestinians.
Israel is attempting to remove their offensive capacity and keep these de facto Iranian and Syrian surrogates off of the borders with Israel.
That is a huge problem in of itself, but it is not the attempt to “destroy an ideology.”
Israel may fail in its attempt, but that is what Israel is trying to do.
And yes, this will go on until the ideology changes or, more likely, until such time as a Arab or Muslim strongman is able to take power and commit the kind of genocide on the death cultists that you are writing about, to which the world will indeed, turn a blind eye….
Sigh…
However, in the immortal words of Sancho Panza in the musical “The Man of La Mancha,” regarding Israel, “Whether the rock hits the pitcher, or the pitcher hits the rock, it’s going to be bad for the pitcher…”
Sigh…
July 20th, 2006 at 1:51 pm
“Sand Monkey, I have seen a shift in your attitudes lately about Israel”
killing of 300 civlinas in one week will infleuence any normal human being.
July 20th, 2006 at 2:33 pm
I find the links very accurate
if Becca, the gentle beyrouthan girl could read theses lines, I invite her to come to my safe home in France
July 20th, 2006 at 2:36 pm
¿Quién tiene razón en Oriente Medio?
Han contestado 1176186 personas
1-37.2%
2-62.5%
3-3.3%
Leyenda
1 - Israel
2 - Los palestinos
3 - Ns
July 20th, 2006 at 2:46 pm
http://fromisraeltolebanon.info
July 20th, 2006 at 2:59 pm
If the “civilian” is working in a Hezbollah stronghold, I don’t care if he’s cleaning weapons or passing out figs — he’s not a civilian.
That was one of my favorite lines from the Afghanistan conflict (I love it when people are brave enough to say the actual truth and not “spin” it). People were upset that so much destruction was rained down on a single villiage, just because it was chock full of Taliban and al Qaida fighters, tunnels and weapons stores. The Pentagon said “we know precisely what we hit. Those people are dead because we wanted them dead.”
It is because war is so utterly, contemptably horrible, that make Hamas and Hezbollah terrorist and rocket attacks so contemptable and horrible. That is ASKING for a war, and now they have one.
If the people in Lebanon didn’t see the horror in allowing Hezbollah to live among them and kill Jews — then they can’t bitch about the horror now that it’s switched sides.
July 20th, 2006 at 3:05 pm
SM, I usually agree with your analysis, but I think that this time you might be a bit off. This whole “Arabs are willing to die for their cause” lionizes the Jihad while gravely underestimating the West.
There is a difference between pulling out from foreign territory because guerillas kill your soldiers and the original threat of why you were there in the first place is gone (as was the case with the original pullout) and guerillas attacking your territory and thus, the integrity of your border and country. The stakes are different this time. I was in Israel before the pullout from Lebanon, and most Israelis had no idea why they were still there. This is NOT the case now. Israelis know precisely why they are there, so their will to complete the mission is more forceful.
The idea that the bombing just creates more terrorists/emnity/Nasrallahs may indeed be true in practice, if Israel is shown to be hamstrung by the International Community or by it’s own self-image as a peaceful nation, giving terorists hope that Israel can be defeated. But in theory, as insensitive as this might sound while Lebanese civilians are being killed, history has borne out that complete miltary victory crushes these things. Today there are still Neo-Nazis and people calling for the restoration of Japanese Imperialism, but their total obliteration was the main factor in “dismantling” the ideology. The Japanese Kamikazes were also willing to die for their cause, but in the end, they found that their technological superiors were only too happy to accomadate them. So by the end, the Japanese made the calculation that they would not survive their ideology, so they were forced to change it.
At this juncture things may look in favour of the Jihadists, as their sympathizers apparently grow from Israeli attacks and American condoning. They have the demographic edge (which they’ve had for the last 50 years and hasn’t seemed to be a factor), and the West is weak when it comes to civilian losses due to urban terrorism. And they can withstand a “long war” because of their faith. What people forget is that the longer the war goes on, the better the West’s technology gets. Even nuclear weapons are worthless if your enemy can shoot down your delivery capabilities and you can’t shoot down his. The rise of terrorism is a logical step for the Jihadist. His enemy is constrained by Geneva, “International World Opinion” and a whole bunch of other things he isn’t. Terrorists can’t be held accountable the way a soveriegn state can, and thus that’s why soveriegn states don’t attack Western targets, they get their unanswerable proxies to do it for them, so we get into tricky situations like Lebanon. But while World Bodies may not be adapting to this new kind of warfare, technology is. From tank construction to missle defense to robotic controlled war machines (which is where military technology is going), Western nations are making it harder and harder for the enemy to kill their soldiers. If you look at the death rates of modern wars, the disparity between deaths on the technologically advanced society and its less-advanced enemies are growing almost exponentially. This trend will continue, until it becomes a numbers game Islamists can’t win. That breaks the ideology.The question is will. The occupation of South Lebanon was not viewed as an existential struggle for Israel. This conflict is. Therefore, the will is stronger (though Israel could make blunders, which would certainly change my analysis).
I should note that on a global scale, I don’t think the West will win this war until they can pull off what the Islamists did in Somalia, which is to use the native population to fight for your ideology. But the actual survival of Western countries (Israel included) won’t hinge upon the will of the Arab/Islamic world, which in the scheme of things, is largely irrelevant.
July 20th, 2006 at 3:08 pm
SM, I jumped the gun a little. Upone first reading your commentary, I felt a little changen in the nuance of your commentary but after a second read, I see your comments as equal sacrasm as it pertains to both sides. I apologize for being a little fast on the light trigger. One thing for sure, you are play your deck very even handedly. If only the world was comprised exclusively of people like you and I who evaluate events based on reason rather than bullshit, we will all be screwing each other the good way, instead of the bad. Peace to my brother in Egypt
July 20th, 2006 at 3:16 pm
I have a subscription to Ha’aretz. They’re defeatists, not realists.
Of course, even a blind chicken sometimes finds a grain of corn…
July 20th, 2006 at 3:38 pm
Inquisitor how can you say this ? : ” that creates what the west self-servingly terms, ‘terrorists’, but the death and destruction rained on the transnational Nation of Islam ”
There are Islamic nations worldwide, Indonesia ( the world most populace Muslim state ), Malaysia, do I need to list all of the others ? who live in relative harmony with the rest of the world. Muslims who practice peacefull Islam are given just as much respect as any other group. There are Muslims living worldwide, Mosques erected throughout. Even radical Islamic groups are allowed to congragate and spew hatred so long as they don’t act, by way of freedom of speech. Even in the US, which has been the greatest target of Islamic fundamentalism has welcomed Muslim and is in fact evacuating thousands of Muslim American citizens out of Lebanon as we speak. There are thousands of Muslims living in Israel !!!!!!!!!!!!!! Find me a single Jew in any Muslim nation !! I grew up in Singapore and 20 years ago, I had many Israeli friends and none could visit Malaysia or Indonesia. Why because of the Palestinian issue. Don’t you get it ? The Israeli issue with the Palestinians is territorial not religious !
I believe the opposite is true and that Islam has the been the greater force of intolerance in the last decades.
Yes the history between Israel and Islam has been harsh but holly fucking shit, isn’t it time to let baygons be baygons in the interest of friggin peace. I have heard countless people define how many of Palestines neighbours don’t really give a flying shit about the Palestinians, so what is it ? I just don’t get.
Everyone has had their share of persecution in history, Arabs included. The difference is that all of these conflicts suffered by the rest of the world have been relegated to the history books because in the end humanity is exponentially more important than bloody religion. Yes there were periods of adjustment, unraveling hate takes time and patience. Hamas and Hezbollah are obviously of the belief that suddenly because they have been put into govt that they should reap immediate rewards, which only indicate their immaturity in the real of real governance.
With all due respect, please do not fall back on the poor Islam argument. There are far too many martyrs in fundamentalist Islam as it is. What the ME now are people of true strength, who are willing to say enough is enough, the past is the past, let’s pave a new future for our people, instead of continuing to dig deeper and deeper holes for them. We need world quality leaders in the ME. The very best example being King Abdullah II and his father. You don’t hear him crying about Muslim persecution.
Until those in Islam who still feel persecuted get over themselfes and dust off their shoes and say I am going to be positive rather than negative, there will be no change, which as I have said given all that the Middle East has to offer, is horribly saddening.
July 20th, 2006 at 3:40 pm
Jonathan wrote :
” Of course, even a blind chicken sometimes finds a grain of corn… ”
What a fantastic line. LOL
July 20th, 2006 at 3:44 pm
Ideas can be changed, but you have to be able to accept the truth. Therefore, let’s discuss the Golden Age of Islam, because that is what all these groups like Hamas and Hezbollah want to return to. The Golden Age was the period of expansion by conquest in Islam. Why would that produce a Golden Age? Because you were usurping other cultures’ accomplishment, once Islam establish itself as the only viable culture with no further expansion and subjugation of other peoples, it suffocated over a very short period of time, all development and advancement.
Were Hamas and Hezbollah successful in regaining the land of Palestine and annihilating all Jews, they would still not regain the Islamic Golden Age. They would not have the standard of living which the Israelis at present enjoy nor their level of development, because they would be “killing off the goose that lays the golden egg.” It is a people and ideas that make a country great, not the land where it is located. Where people are free they have an incentive to produce.
When Israel was first created in the 1940’s, it was given desert and the least productive land, yet they used their minds and bodies to turn the land productive in an environment encouraged by individual freedom. I, as a non-jew, with no ancestral claim to any land in Israel, could go to Israel, bring some ideas with me, establish a productive business and seek to become a citizen, knowing full well that my rights to practice my Christian faith along with other personal freedoms would be protected.
July 20th, 2006 at 3:45 pm
That’s a long standing thing over here. But here it’s : “even a blind pig will find an acorn now and then.”
But that one didn’t go over so well in the ME ;o)
July 20th, 2006 at 3:50 pm
Very well put Iris !
July 20th, 2006 at 3:54 pm
My irony detector is redlining.
Israel is hardening the hearts of the Shia by bombing the crap out of them? No doubt. But if bombs harden the heart, perhaps one can understand why Israelis can be a little hard-hearted, no?
The Lebanese bemoan that they are the battlefield for someone else’s war? They are, of course, right to be upset. But wait, the sunis and the christians don’t want to risk civil war by taking out Hezbollah (in compliance with the UN), and WHO gets bombed? Israel. Hamas and Fatah are struggling for power in Gaza, and WHO gets bombed? Israel. Iraq invades Kuwait, and the world kicks them out, and WHO gets bombed? Israel.
Lebanese are upset that civilians are being killed accidentally. Keep in mind that some of these civilians are also storing missiles in their basement, and otherwise aiding and abeting Hezbollah. Still, they’re civilians, so it’s at least sorta kinda wrong, granted. But where, exactly, is Hezbollah aiming their missiles. At civilians, of course. Ditto the Palestinians. A stray shell, fired at combatants firing missiles, accidentally kills their willing human shields. Oh, the horror! Oh, the missiles they fired hit a school? What joy!
The irony detector is redlining.
Or is it the bullshit detector? I can’t tell.
July 20th, 2006 at 4:13 pm
#23 Gadfly “That’s a long standing thing over here. But here it’s : “even a blind pig will find an acorn now and then.””
I learned it as “Even a blind squirrel finds an acorn in the woods once in a while.” But frankly, I believe them all to be inferior to “Even a stopped clock is right twice a day.”
If I may be so bold, may I suggest that one of the biggest problems facing Muslims today is the greater emphasis that seems to be placed on honor, as opposed to pursuing their own best interest.
An example.
I live and work among a cosmopolitan group of people, which includes a number of Muslims. A Muslim friend of mine owned an apartment with a very leaky roof. He sued the owner of the building. A year and a half after he bought it, someone came along and wanted to buy the building to knock it down. They offered him three times what he had paid for the apartment, but as a condition, he would have to drop the lawsuit. He had a choice between pursuing his honor (staying in the leaky apartment and persisting in his lawsuit) or his self-interest (making $1.2 million on a $400,000 investment over 18 months, and getting out from under the leaky ceiling). The Christians, Jews, and Hindus thought this a no-brainer. All the Muslims agreed with him that he had to continue with the lawsuit for the sake of his honor. Incredible.
I realized that this represented a big part of the problem in the ME.
After the Holocaust (which, incidentally, really did happen, no matter what Ahmadinejad says), we Jews could have held out for a return to our houses and property, retained our bitterness, tought our children to trust no one, and strapped bombs on them to blow up discoes and pizzerias in Germany. Instead, we did the best we could, raised families, found new homes, integrated into the surrounding cultures, and sent our children off to college. As a child of that generation, I’m glad, because holding the real keys to a real house in New York beats the crap out of holding the keys to a non-existant house in Warsaw while living in a hut in a refugee camp and demanding handouts from the UN. Is there more honor in the refugee camp? Maybe, but I’m glad all the same.
July 20th, 2006 at 4:24 pm
http://india_resource.tripod.com/mathematics.htm
The Indian Numeral System
Although the Chinese were also using a decimal based counting system, the Chinese lacked a formal notational system that had the abstraction and elegance of the Indian notational system, and it was the Indian notational system that reached the Western world through the Arabs and has now been accepted as universal. Several factors contributed to this development whose significance is perhaps best stated by French mathematician, Laplace: “The ingenious method of expressing every possible number using a set of ten symbols (each symbol having a place value and an absolute value) emerged in India. The idea seems so simple nowadays that its significance and profound importance is no longer appreciated. It’s simplicity lies in the way it facilitated calculation and placed arithmetic foremost amongst useful inventions.”
July 20th, 2006 at 4:28 pm
Excellent point Brooklyn. In fact I lost a very dear person as a friend because for this very reason. We had a fight, no side was right but I stepped up to the plate many times and he refused to succomb and I know it was because if his honor. In Asia like probably the middle east it is called ” loss of face ” and it is a crippling affliction.
July 20th, 2006 at 4:31 pm
http://www.shaka.mistral.co.uk/coffee.htm
Coffee plants are originally from Ethiopia although it was always thought they originated from the Republic of Yemen. It is easy to get confused about the origin since many of the old legends that talk about the farming of coffee plants and drinking of coffee take place in the Arab countries.
July 20th, 2006 at 4:36 pm
http://www.sciam.com/askexpert_question.cfm?articleID=000A41D6-B959-1C71-9EB7809EC588F2D7&catID=3&topicID=11
The first evidence we have of zero is from the Sumerian culture in Mesopotamia, some 5,000 years ago. There a slanted double wedge was inserted between cuneiform symbols for numbers, written positionally, to indicate the absence of a number in a place (as we would write 102, the ‘0′ indicating no digit in the tens column).
The symbol changed over time as positional notation, for which zero was crucial, made its way to the Babylonian empire and from there to India, via the Greeks (in whose own culture zero made a late and only occasional appearance; the Romans had no trace of it at all). Arab merchants brought the zero they found in India to the West, and after many adventures and much opposition, the symbol we use took hold and the concept flourished, as zero took on much more than a positional meaning and has played a crucial role in our mathematizing of the world.
July 20th, 2006 at 4:51 pm
ok with history, where do you want to go Iris ?
July 20th, 2006 at 4:53 pm
Brooklyn Jon - great analogy & IMHO so so correct. Greatest hypocracy todate - we hear absolutely no Islamic outrage regarding Moslems killing Moslems (Sunni vs. Shia in Iraq). Your own people are blowing each other up in Iraq yet there are no protests, no shouts of Death to Sunnis or Shia from the Arab world. Agmed - 300 dead is an indication of Israeli restraint. If the Israelis did not go to great lengths to not target civilian population & just wanted to carpet bomb the south, many, many, many more would require quick funerals. Sad reality is the Lebanese people now reap what they have sowed by tacitly supporting an organization whose goal is the obliteration of a sovereign state.
July 20th, 2006 at 5:23 pm
Our acceptable losses are limitless, as long as we win.
I don’t agree, Sandmonkey. Iran and Iraq both reached a point where their losses became unacceptable in the 80s. That level wasn’t even partuclarly high by historical standards.
I think it’s only this constant attack/ceasefire/attack cycle that keeps the losses so low that every can accept them in perpetuity.
July 20th, 2006 at 5:37 pm
Peoples and cultures interact and exchange when they come together. That is the way it is; that is the way it has always been. But, when a Master-slave structure is set-up that interaction and exchange is stifled and may eventually lead to it being totally cut-off.
July 20th, 2006 at 6:05 pm
“The Battle that will never end, mainly because the Israelis are willing to Kill to stay alive, and because the arabs are willing to die to kill them.”
BANG ON!
July 20th, 2006 at 6:29 pm
I would like to pose a question. If Israel is bombing everything that moves in Lebanon and if they are heavily bombing Hezbollah bunkers and they dont know where there kidnapped soldiers are, then what are the chances they could bomb their own soldiers?
Maybe there arent any soldiers to hit *WINK* Not trying to stir things up, im just wondering if anyone else has thought about that.
July 20th, 2006 at 6:37 pm
D.B.
Because it’s better to have them die a quick death than to live whatever tortured life they will have left if they are not found.
July 20th, 2006 at 6:41 pm
“The Israelis want to destroy Hezbollah, but they can’t, because it’s a culture and a nation. You want to destroy Hezbollah? You have to kill every single person who supports Hezbollah and its Ideology. You have to eleiminate almost all of the Shia in Lebanon. You have to engage in ethnic cleansing, and you can’t do that! Now, since YOU CAN’T DO THAT, you will lose”
Not true.. its happened before and it can happen now. What do you propose? Having Israel sit on its ass & have rockets rain down on them? Enough if enough of this bullshit. It’s time to end it.
July 20th, 2006 at 6:42 pm
Peoples and cultures interact and exchange when they come together. That is the way it is; that is the way it has always been. But, when a Master-slave structure is set-up that interaction and exchange is stifled and may eventually lead to it being totally cut-off.
you call it so, I would say civilisations are mortal, and I see our wertern one is ending as the roman empire did
July 20th, 2006 at 6:46 pm
Has anyone heard from Nasrallah in the last 24 hours?
July 20th, 2006 at 7:31 pm
Nomad,
you call it so, I would say civilisations are mortal, and I see our wertern one is ending as the roman empire did
Yours is. Your culture ended in WW II. Europe itself is falling, but France was the first to fall. Luckily, The United States is not Europe. Maybe it’s time to stop calling the US a western country. We aren’t much like you guys, anymore. If we ever were. And we certainly don’t intend to fall just because Europe is stuck in a downward spiral. The US has been rising all these years, as you were falling.
Glad to see you finally admitting that Europe is becoming Eurabia. The rest of us have believed it to be so since the riots, at the least.
Honestly… Europe is not an ideological ally of the United States anymore. I’d be very happy if we stopped pretending that we were. We need to make new allies, and leave the past (which is western europe) behind us. Most Americans are not even descended from Western Europeans.
July 20th, 2006 at 7:44 pm
In my opinion people are born with a basic understanding of right and wrong. I think it is going to come down to: either you are with us or your against us. The israeli people should not have to continue living with nations that believe they should be wiped off the map. I think the world needs to call upon the people in the middle east to root out the terrorists and bring them to justice. Essentially a war is about to ensue that IS going to change the state of the middle east. You are right about our humanity, but remember the people the israelis are fighting are firing rockets into civilian neighborhoods. Yes the israelis are killing civilians as well, but that is because those civilians have chosen to allow terrorists to live in their neighborhoods. Our world humanity hinges on stopping the insanity that the extremists in islam are pushing for. Unfortunatly I agree witht Israel that war is the only option at this point. As much as I hate war I think a full scale invasion by the US, Isreal, and Brittian and others on Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon is likely to be the only way this is resolved. It will likely require a couple million people to die. It scares the shit out of me…but I’m more scared of a world that supports hate groups. I suspect we are going to see some of this in our lifetime…perhaps soon
July 20th, 2006 at 8:52 pm
> The Israelis will always reach a point where their losses become
> unacceptable, and they will push for Peace.
My gawd, an invasion of slime.
> Not for our side. Our acceptable losses are limitless, as long as
> we win. When your acceptable loss is your own death, what is
> there to compromise on?
We all know this slime, this kind of apologies from american and
hebrew masmurderers already. So what makes you more interesting?
You’re neither the first, nor the last sandnigger that wants to be on
the side of the master race. A pinocchio that eats their shit and
claims that it smells and tastes like roses.
Booooooooooooooring.
July 20th, 2006 at 8:55 pm
> I think the world needs to call upon the people in the middle
> east to root out the terrorists and bring them to justice.
Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes and yes!
Lynch’em all: ben Gurion, Meir, Begin, Shamir, Sharon and rest
of the gang that came to palestine to create their gangster state
by terror and ethnic cleansing.
Israel - the only “jewish only” democracy needs to be wiped from
the map - a good reason for all arabs to unite.
Thanx so much.
July 20th, 2006 at 8:56 pm
that Israel can defuse its power and prupose if they withdraw from Shaaba farms and release the prisoners.
So, let me get this straight:
After the last attempt at appeasement (withdrawing from south Lebanon) by Israel, Lebanon agreed to secure the southern border, exert its authority over the entire nation, and disarm Hezbollah. Furthermore, Israel engaged in multiple prisoner exchanges previously.
Israel withdrew from southern Lebanon and the Lebanese government failed to live up to its promises. Previous prisoner exchanges have now resulted in 8 dead and 2 kidnapped soldiers. Hezbollah is more of a threat to Israel than ever and the same-old problems have reared their ugly head in a new and more dangerous form.
But now Siniora says “if Israel will just appease us once again and withdraw from the Shaaba Farms and release more prisoners, this time we promise…..yes, we promise….we really, really promise…that it will be different this time around.”
I will promise Olmert that if he trusts the Siniora on this, history will repeat itself.
I’d tell Siniora to go fuck himself if I was Olmert….
….but that is just me.
News:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060720/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iran_hezbollah_s_patron
I love the opening:
Iranian officials often say that places with the greatest troubles offer their country the best opportunities.
Of course they talk like that. It isn’t Iranians that are dying, it is the Lebanese. The Iranians are always happy to sacrifice Arabs for their own purposes.
Still, I’m glad they feel that way. Maybe the West should give Iran some serious troubles then. Let us open up new opportunities for them.
July 20th, 2006 at 9:28 pm
“Europe is not an ideological ally of the United States anymore”
Correct me if I’m wrong here Craig, but you seem to be saying that Europe, in its entirety, is now an ideological enemy of the US. I can see your point to an extent; Inasmuch as our collective governments seem to be blinded to the realities of “Multiculturalism”, effectively empowering the Muslim minorities to dictate policy to the indigenous majority.
I couldn’t speak with experience of other European nations, but I can tell you that British society is starting to stir with a nasty undercurrent and teeth are starting to be bared. In short….We’re getting pretty fucked off with being told how to be British and sooner or later something’s going to give.
Tony Blair and his whimpering cronies I feel are going to find out just how fucked off as soon as a decent opposition comes along. An opposition that can be trusted to clamp down our borders and basically say “Be British or piss off”, or better still; “Don’t bother coming here”. Remember, our present government may not be much good at upholding the values of our traditional society, but governments change.
What I don’t understand is your proposal that you basically wash your hands of your allies. Is it a case of “Do what the US expects you to or we’ll leave you to the dogs”?. Now here’s a thought….Wouldn’t “Screw multiculturalism, the Brits et al have stood by us while we defended our way of life, we’re with them all the way while they defend theirs”…….As I believe the US is for the most part doing now with the Israel / Lebanon situation.
I couldn’t speak for other Europeans on the subject, but as a Brit I find your notion of cutting and running on us a little unsupportive. As I said, I may have gotten you all wrong here mate, but if not I’m sure the spirits of many British and American servicemen would wonder if they fought and died together so we may simply leave eachother to the jackals when our governments ideologies didn’t seem to agree.
July 20th, 2006 at 9:46 pm
Wishbone,
Correct me if I’m wrong here Craig, but you seem to be saying that Europe, in its entirety, is now an ideological enemy of the US.
No, I said it wasn’t an ally, not that it’s an enemy. The two things are not the same, I do have a concept of neutrality or even of overt hostilty, which I don’t consider to be the same thing as enmity
I couldn’t speak for other Europeans on the subject, but as a Brit I find your notion of cutting and running on us a little unsupportive.
Well, Britain has been one of the few western european countries that has expressed any support at all for America the last 5 years. I admit that. But it hasn’t come without a cost. We get beat up in the British press every single day. If I loaded the BBC news site right now, what percentage of the articles that I found that spoke of the US would be outright America bashing? I’m guessing, almost all of them. I’d be happy to check it if you wish to challenge me on that.
Now, you can say that’s just a media campaign and doesn’t reflect public opinion, but did you see that poll that was published on our Independence day that showed over 80% of Brits think of Americans as being uncouth, ignorant, uncultured, arrogant, selfish, etc, etc, etc?
Do you really feel you’ve been a steadfast ally of the United States? Maybe I’m missing something here. If so, I’m willing to take another look. I don’t mean to offend the Brits (or any other european nation) I just honestly do not see that we have that much common cause with EUropeans anymore.
July 20th, 2006 at 9:58 pm
Nomad,
Yours is. Your culture ended in WW II. Europe itself is falling, but France was the first to fall. Luckily, The United States is not Europe. Maybe it’s time to stop calling the US a western country. We aren’t much like you guys, anymore. If we ever were. And we certainly don’t intend to fall just because Europe is stuck in a downward spiral. The US has been rising all these years, as you were falling.
Glad to see you finally admitting that Europe is becoming Eurabia. The rest of us have believed it to be so since the riots, at the least.
Honestly… Europe is not an ideological ally of the United States anymore. I’d be very happy if we stopped pretending that we were. We need to make new allies, and leave the past (which is western europe) behind us. Most Americans are not even descended from Western Europeans.
I did not ment specially your country, but the global western civilisation, thus our both continents, like it or not, you are an european product , do what ever you want, fight more, bomb anyone who try to provoque, the facts are here, the world wants his part of the cake, and soon or later he will have it
(see, latins are going progressively to overwhem your country)
you think Europe is no more your alliee, not in the way you think you are the winners, we don’t stand to changes as you may think it would be the only good way : go and make war in far back posts, we keep our energy to absorb changes, we may change too, but we ‘ll keep the memory
thank you for remind me your old song of WWII, that was a real good job your contry fellows did that time : it was a clear enemy with clear purposes,
eurabia seems an upseting idee for you, but we don’t live too bad wit it, we have to make our brain work for apeasement and progess, that the way life is !
July 20th, 2006 at 10:32 pm
The Joooz will looz!
July 20th, 2006 at 10:43 pm
I heard an interesting thought the other day.
If the Arab terrorists took all their weapons and threw them in the sea, there’d be peace tomorrow.
If Israel took all their weapons and threw them in the sea, there’d be another Holocaust.
July 20th, 2006 at 11:00 pm
Europe’s problem is that they depend on the USA for security, if they held the power to protect themselves there wouldn’t be such animosity towards the USA.
What idea does the Shia hold exactly? If it is to rid the world of Israel and the western influence on their socialities, I believe 10’s of millions are going to have to die. I don’t think it’s possible for the world not to be a global community.
July 20th, 2006 at 11:13 pm
Europe’s problem is that they depend on the USA for security, if they held the power to protect themselves there wouldn’t be such animosity towards the USA
England and France have their own nuclear power, no nead an us umbrella !
we just don’t want to follow US in all their crusades, and saying so Bush administration argue : you are with us or against us without nuances !
It is much the lack of confidence with that administration which drive people criticising us politics
July 20th, 2006 at 11:24 pm
Craig-
With reference to Ideological alliance/enmity…..Conceded mate….I was thinking in black and white terms without considering all the various shades of grey……My bad
Also I’m far too happy to bash the British Bullshit Corporation for that very same reason, so no argument from me there. Same goes for the rest of the lefty/liberal media also. Since WWII we seem to have developed an elitist middle class, the Tabithas and Tarquins all, who seem to like their ignorant views reiterated in the media regardless of the fact that they’re heads have never been out of their arses long enough to get a world view and it’s easy to pander to the general readership when that readership mainly consists of ignorant idiots that open their eyes every morning to find they’re staring at the back of their own teeth
. It helps them feel safe, the poor little things.
I’ve got a copy of that poll result here Craig. There doesn’t seem to be any any distinction as to which exact cross section of society it was pulled from other than the sample size was 1962. Out of a population of 60 million!. Not exactly a difinitive view, the results of which can safely be filed under B for bin, as they say. Of the funnier results these two stuck out: Preoccupied with money 84% and Dominated by big business 90%. It would amaze me if the poll subjects could even pronounce “capitalist ideal”.
As for the rest of it, regarding Americans’ general decorum, I’d be more inclined to point those questioned in the direction of this little gem…
http://www.expedia.co.uk/daily/press/releases/Best%20Tourist.doc
I’d say it put things into a little more perspective for the more introspective Brit and from my own point of view it’s more than a little shameful.
There are British politicians right now that want our borders and immigration clamped down on, a full withdrawal from the Europian Union, and all human rights acts repealed because they’re hampering us in what we know may need to be done one day. They are also advocating telling the rest of the EU to go screw itself AND its’ multiculturalism and bolstering the trade and mutual alliances we have with the US. The parties proposing these strategies are growing in popularity too. So as I said, change could be in the wind and common sense restored.
I know you don’t mean to offend Mate as neither do I. We each have our opinions and the right to express them and debate the differences. Of course, have a go at the French all you like…….Aside from Football, it’s our national pastime…….They’re still pissed that we were at war with ‘em for almost a thousand years and they never won a single decent scrap. It’s why they’ll never agree anything with us on principle
July 20th, 2006 at 11:25 pm
Sandmonkey: “In order for the gun to kill the idea, it has to kill everyone who holds the idea.”
You don’t see many Japanese kamikaze pilots these days.
July 21st, 2006 at 12:08 am
if i may quote a line from the movie “aliens”.
there is only one sure way, nuke it from space.
July 21st, 2006 at 12:15 am
They’re still pissed that we were at war with ‘em for almost a thousand years and they never won a single decent scrap. It’s why they’ll never agree anything with us
yeah, forgot any Guillaume who teached you good manners ? and we kick your ass out of here in century war !
your lovely foot-ball clubs have mainly french players
and your retirees seems to like better over her !
July 21st, 2006 at 12:30 am
Wishbone - You are a damn good man!
I typically agree with a lot of Craig’s political views. I think he’s a solid American patriot. As I was reading his post about “old Europe” I could’t help but think that the Brits have done a pretty good job of standing side by side with America. You, mate, simply reaffirmed that view
BTW, that poll you cited is interesting because I just saw another similar poll that had Americans as the worst tourists…the poll you have has Americans as some of the best tourists. Who knows?
Every where I’ve traveled I’ve bumped into Brits. I’ve had nothing but great experiences where I’ve met them.
July 21st, 2006 at 12:52 am
Wishbone–
I have been astounded by some of the multi-cultural stuff I’ve seen coming out of the UK. I’m a Victorian Era historian and just can’t believe things like a proposal to avoid displaying the British Flag during the World Cup because it has a cross in its design, or banning Piglet from the workplace least it offend a Muslim.
Of course, I am astounded by my own country’s kowtow to Latin Americans. How did we get into our respective messes?
July 21st, 2006 at 1:17 am
Nomad,
we kick your ass out of here in century war !
That is right, nomad! It took the French well over a century to expel the British from French territory during the 100 Years War. LoL! It took a tough French female (Joan of Arc) to rally the troops to do it, too!
Oh well, at least French women are attractive. The wine is good and the culinary arts are highly developed too. I can honestly say I enjoy some of the literature also: Voltaire, Zola, Proust, etc.
You have a few things going for you, I suppose. War isn’t one of them.
News on the Palestinian front:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060720/ap_on_re_mi_ea/israel_palestinians;_ylt=AmQIHvhDUZBu_uYeKCgsiTln.3QA;_ylu=X3oDMTA3b3JuZGZhBHNlYwM3MjE-
Also, I heard on CNN the following:
Apparently the Lebanese government is stating that the army will join the side of Hezbollah if Israel launches a ground invasion.
OK. More stuff to get straight. Let us see here….
….the Lebanese Army cannot possibly defeat Hezbollah they have claimed….
….OK they cannot defeat Hezbollah….
…but they think they can defeat the IDF (WTF?)…..
….hmmmmm…..
….hmmmmmmmmmmmm……
July 21st, 2006 at 3:25 am
This is one time an Arab aggressor must be allowed to be beaten so badly that every civilized nation will stand in horror, wanting desperately to step in and stop the carnage… but knowing that the fight will only truly be over when one side gives up and finally admits defeat.
Just as every person who had ever rescued that bully from admitting defeat helped create the cowardly brute I saw that evening in the bar, every well-intentioned power that has ever stepped in and negotiated a ceasefire for an Arab aggressor has helped create the monsters we see around us today.
President Lahoud of Lebanon, a big Hezbollah supporter and a close ally of Syria, has been shrieking non-stop to the UN Security Council for the past two days to get them to force Israel into a cease fire.
Clearly he has been reading his autographed copy of ‘Military Success for Dummies Arab Despots’ by the late Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt. Ever since Nasser accidentally discovered the trick in ‘56, every subsequent Arab leader has stuck to his tried and true formula for military success:
1. Instigate a war.
2. Once the war is well underway and you are in the process of having your ass handed to you… get a few world powers to force your western opponent into a cease fire.
3. Whatever you do, don’t surrender or submit to any terms dictated by your enemy. That would ruin everything! All you have to do is wait it out and eventually the world will become sickened at what is being done to your soldiers and civilian population… and will force a truce.
4. Once a truce has been called you can resume your intransigence (which probably caused the conflict in the first place), and even declare victory as your opponent leaves the field of battle.
This tactic has never failed. Not once.
http://bogieworks.blogs.com/treppenwitz/2006/07/thanks_i_needed.html
July 21st, 2006 at 3:27 am
I think you are right, the war between jews and arabs will last as long as Israel exist and it will exist as long as it can fight of its enemies. Israel will have to kill all arabs to achive peace and I do not think they are capable to do that.
If Israel is not able to stop violence from Gaza and Westbank after 40 years of occupation how should Israel be able to stop violence from Hizbollah in Lebanon, it is impossible.
To save a lot pain and suffering Israel better pack up and leave for Utah or some place were they are welcome, the arabs will hate and kill jews for ever for what they have done to them. But Israel will not pack up and leave so the war will continue for ever. Sorry.
July 21st, 2006 at 3:33 am
>>>But Israel will not pack up and leave so the war will continue for ever. Sorry.
Arabs have not yet died in great enough numbers. They have fought many wars with Israel and they die by the thousands, but not by the hundreds of thousands. Sadly, that is what it will take.
July 21st, 2006 at 3:49 am
I can’t wait to hear what eastern equine encephalitis will have to say about that.
July 21st, 2006 at 5:18 am
I’m SURE it won’t be anything new and creative! Same shit, different day!!
July 21st, 2006 at 6:12 am
David 62,
True. Sad, but true.
July 21st, 2006 at 6:18 am
Nothing lasts forever.
Here is a story, that if true, may change the entire dynamics of the region.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060720/sc_nm/energy_spain_plankton_dc
The highlight:
“Our system of bioconversion is about 400 times more productive than any other plant-based system producing oil or ethanol,” it said, referring to currently available biofuels made from plants like maize or oilseeds.
Ethanol has been slowly but surely creeping up as a potential alternative to petroleum that is within the range of economic feasibility. If they have found something that would be substantially cheaper than ethanol (I’m sure it isn’t anywhere near 400x cheaper, I think they are speaking in biological terms here not economic ones, of course - but still, this sounds very promising), they may be on to something huge.
I wonder what would happen to the Mideast if oil were no longer a source of income? Would the entire region just implode?
July 21st, 2006 at 6:24 am
Hezbollah’s prestige is based upon its prowess in battle. It is the rare government or political movement that can withstand a massive and humiliating defeat and survive. (That’s the main reason why so many Arab despots claim victory when it is obvious to everyone they were defeated.) I think Israel’s principal target in this war is Hezbollah’s military prestige.
If Israel comes out of this war with a stalemate, it loses. If Hezbollah comes out of this war with an unequivocal defeat, Israel wins. The key is to either kill or humiliate the leadership of Hezbollah. Saying that Lebanese Shi’ites will fight to the end for Hezbollah is like saying that Germans would fight to the end for the Nazi Party in WWII. Some will, but many others will refuse to fight a war they feel they will not win.
It may sound hard to believe in retrospect, but many Lebanese Shi’ites actually welcomed Israel’s invasion of Lebanon in 1982, for it meant the end to the PLO’s occupation of their towns. Sadly, Israel overstayed its welcome. Hopefully, Israel will not repeat the blunders of its previous occupation.
If Israel had started this war, it would deserve much of the criticism it is getting. However, Lebanon started this war. Passive aggression is still aggression, and the Lebanese government’s unwillingness to disarm Hezbollah effectively made it an accomplice in Hezbollah’s brazen aggression against Israel. Either the Lebanese government is able to disarm Hezbollah or its status as Lebanon’s government is a polite fiction.
There is an inherent difference between vendetta and war. In war, a state seeks to establish a monopoly of violence over its enemy. Proportionality of violence is a necessary aspect of vendetta, but it is a ludicrous concept in war. Sadly, most Muslim nations appear to be far more adept at vendetta than they are at war. In the mean time, so long as Israel can document each airstrike’s relationship its military target and warns civilians to stay away from military targets, Israel is abiding by the requirements of the Geneva Conventions.
July 21st, 2006 at 6:39 am
That is right, nomad! It took the French well over a century to expel the British from French territory during the 100 Years War.
too complicated for an us brain, royal families heritages contests, agreement between brotherhoods, desagreements….
You have a few things going for you, I suppose. War isn’t one of them.
you can say that, though we had a few suucces in naval battles too, not mantioned in anglo-saxon collective memory !
July 21st, 2006 at 7:42 am
You are so wrong Sandmonkey. Don’t you read history? Japan? Germany? If you kill enough of em they give up stupid ideas. Then you can reprogram them. Islam will come to the end of their rope soon enough. They just haven’t pissed us off enough yet. Do you really think the West will just lay down and die? As soon as Iran nukes us … ANYWHERE … we will respond 1,000 000 fold. It’s inevitable. We’re just waiting for the excuse … and we know it will come.
July 21st, 2006 at 7:48 am
You had better pray that that is wrong - because if you are right then the same goes for the rest of the West. And all that the future holds then is, after this brief and brilliant flower of light, the endless stagnation under Islamic totalitarianism.
July 21st, 2006 at 9:56 am
Nomad-
Hehe…..Just so you don’t misunderstand me mate……I was just winding you up
I don’t have anything against the French at all, but I like to think our nations have been at it for long enough that we’ve come to the point we can rib eachother over it.
Times move on don’t they?. I mean……. let’s face it……these days my crowd (Liverpool FC) would be HAPPY to have David Trezeguet in the team…..And we wouldn’t even throw any cheeseburgers at him either
July 21st, 2006 at 10:03 am
Wishbone,
that was OK for me, but other nations don’t get all of it , nead some clearishment which doen’t come from one side of view
July 21st, 2006 at 10:22 am
There’s more than one idea Sam. It’s pretty presposterous to say the Jihadis will inevitably win because they have the idea and everyone else just has the gun. It was violence in the first place that spread the idea you speak of - violence that crushed other ideas in it’s path. The same will happen again and new ideas will emerge.
What a depressing concept to imagine that jihadis are forever. I still have hope that one day the human race will grow up.
July 21st, 2006 at 1:02 pm
Actually it’s quite possible for Israel to win.
WWII was a total war. The allies were perfectly willing to slaughter as many civilians as it took to break them and make them beg for peace. Consider the brutal fire bombings toward the end of the war.
Israel has not been willing to act that way, it’s true. But the rest of the world isn’t so scrupulous.
I think Arabs are in for a very nasty surprise if they come to the conclusion that they can have an eternal war against any other country.
If they try it on Russia or China they’ll be nuked before fhey know it. And as one comedian said, America has a long fuse, but at the end of that fuse is a big fricking bomb.
July 21st, 2006 at 1:04 pm
As far as I read it (from AP), the French are the only “civilized” western nation to take action on the humanitarian crisis in Beirut:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060721/ap_on_re_mi_ea/lebanon_israel;_ylt=AtD2_x1_WET0ZBdEr3JSl.Ss0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTA2Z2szazkxBHNlYwN0bQ–
Why is no one else insisting on delivery the of humanitarian aid to those afflicted (like Katrina?) by this violence?
July 21st, 2006 at 1:27 pm
“French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy, meanwhile, said his country was dispatching urgent aid to Lebanon by air and sea and he called for safe passage.”
How many humaitarian aid orginisations could be gauranteed “safe passage”? . Would you believe American or British aid workers would be safe in Hezbollah territory?.
July 21st, 2006 at 1:57 pm
I keep reading what I can about the situation in the Middle East and have formed some definite opinions about what to do with the insanity.
BUT, the question that keeps going through my mind is that since I am a memeber of a peacefull, dissinterested third party counry is this.
Do I have a right, let alone an obligation, to comment on or make suggestions about the what I see and read!
Everyone pretty well agrees that the vast majority of wars and conflicts in the world today are betweeen radical Islam and whoever gets in their way.
Without pointing the finger here I will only state what Islam’s position is on certain matters!
Islam prohibits surprise attacks and invasions.
Muslim scholars note that a verse from the Quran expressly gives the enemies of Muhammad the time period of four months to reconsider their position and negotiate. Muslims are prohibited from opening hostilities without exhausting possibilites for peace.
Islam expressly prohibits the killing of non-combatants, civilian women, children and the eldery, during war. The Quran states “make (them) prisoners, and afterwards either set them free as a favor or let them ransom (themselves) until the war terminates”
Muslim scholars have traditionally held that women and children prisoners of war cannot be killed under any circumstances, but that they may be freed, ransomed, or enslaved.
Muslims have been instructed by the Prophet not to pillage or plunder or destroy residential areas, nor harm the property of anyone not fighting. It has been narrated in the Hadith: “The Prophet has prohibited the Believers from loot and plunder”
I will only make one comment myself and that is best exemplified by a quote from my book;
“The Plain Truth bout God-101.com” (what the church doesn’t want you to know!) http://www.god-101.com
The problems in the Middle East are not only religious, insofar as the clergy is all to glad to foster discontent to further their own ends, but is also cultural and political. It is what might be described as a:
“Political agenda seeking justification in religion!”
Your far away scribe;
Allan W Janssen
July 21st, 2006 at 2:07 pm
Wishbone may I suggest white flags with your train for change
July 21st, 2006 at 2:24 pm
66 Tommy. An interesting article. Thank you.
Meanwhile, the Japanese recently few a manned aircraft, using nothing but AA batteries as the power source.
In the end, the economic giants in the world will turn to alternative sources of energy, making Middle Eastern oil almost worthless. You can’t build a nuclear arsenal in Iran if you have no money. You can’t finance terrorism if you have no money. And you can’t effectively fight strong nations if you have to ride a donkey to the battlefield.
The power of ideas? Ideas are a dime a dozen. Ideas are meaningless if you have no way to implement them.
July 21st, 2006 at 3:49 pm
Anybody remember Napoleon? As in, conquered most of Europe and north Africa.
France has an interesting dichotomy that works well for them. Everybody thinks of them as peace-loving neutralists. But in recent years they’ve detonated nukes, blown up a Greenpeace ship, and basically used force to protect their own interests just like any other of the world’s major economies. I don’t know how the hell they do it. My country gets blamed for every bad thing that’s happened since the Punic Wars. Chirac could take a dump on a table at The Hague, and somehow it would be our fault. France has a certain furtive subtlety in their international presence that allows them to get away with things without recrimination. I’m impressed, truth be told, and I hate the damned French
July 21st, 2006 at 3:59 pm
Allan W Janssen - “Do I have a right, let alone an obligation, to comment on or make suggestions about the what I see and read!”
For my part I’d say you very much do have a right to an opinion mate. You’d be obliged by your beliefs to either agree or disagree with the opinions of others, so long as you understand that people won’t always agree with you.
Insofar as your country may be a peaceful and disinterested third party nation now then if, for example, this latest rash of organised unfriendliness escalated to the point where somebody starts lobbing nuclear weapons about, then I’d say the whole world is in the crapper. I think the whole world should have an opinion about the possibility of that.
It’s heard from a lot of directions that Islam is the religion of peace. It’s just a bit hard to reconcile that with the actions of radical Islamists and even a lot of Muslims that would describe themselves as “Moderate”. Of course it would be nice if the peoples of the world could all get along, but I fear that’s a long time coming.
There’s always hope though.
July 21st, 2006 at 4:38 pm
Per you are wrong on so many levels. Israel hasn’t done it in 40 years because we all keep stopping the war. Also they don’t have to kill all Muslims…that’s complete crap. All muslims (in fact most) are not bad. Israel needs to be allowed (and they will this time) to utterly and completely defeat it’s enemies. With the US and British troops in the region no other country will dare jump in. Israel is going to completely destroy Lebanon and it’s army if they get involved. The best thing lebeanon could do is offer to help the Israelis. In fact since they are refusing to help them I place the blame squarly on them. A larger middle east war is very likely looming as I pointed out earlier. I assure you that the western world can hand a sweeping defeat to all opposing countries in the Middle East…..far far more severe than anything the Japanese would remember.
I hope it doesn’t come to this, but I think the world as a collective is getting very sick of the Arabian BS. To the people in the Arab region I say this. Clean your house. Remove the terrorist cells. Educate your people and stop this insanity. If you continue to allow this then more people than you can imagine will end up dead…10’s to 100’s of millions. You want the war to end then stop your terrorists and embrace human rights. Expel you right wing leaders (yes we should do the same).
July 21st, 2006 at 5:18 pm
Lebanon shouldn’t have allowed Hezbollah to exist in the first place, now Israel has forced the issue of Lebanon having to do something about it. If a country harbors a terrorist organization, which commits acts of war against another, well then, you get war - plain and simple.
July 21st, 2006 at 5:47 pm
Joe: “I assure you that the western world can hand a sweeping defeat to all opposing countries in the Middle East.”
Absolutely right. According to a recent estimate, the U.S. still has more than 10,000 nuclear warheads. Think about that number. The U.S. can drop one nuclear bomb on somebody each and every day for the next 28 years without having to build another one.
Americans lived with the possibility of a nuclear war with the Soviet Union for decades. The Americans coped quite well with the threat.
Muslim riots inside France? The French made the streets of Paris wide to give troops a good field of fire in the event of revolts. Outsiders should read the story of the Paris Commune in 1879. The French government killed more than 25,000 rebellious French citizens during that little skirmish.
July 21st, 2006 at 6:27 pm
Correction: The Paris Commune was in 1871, not 1879. Sorry for the typo.
July 21st, 2006 at 6:47 pm
Sandmonkey, I agree with Josh Scholar (#74), and as much as I like your blog, I have to disagree with you. I do not believe that since “the arabs are willing to die for the cause, there is no winning for the Israelis.” Western countries have a long fuse, but when the bomb connected to the fuse finally goes off, watch out.
Just recall WW2 in the Pacific: a true war without mercy. Every Japanese soldier was more than willing to die for their cause, and die they did at the hands of the Americans and Aussies and British, because when western countries finally get enraged, they are indeed willing and capable of killing “everyone with the idea.”
Look around the world now: imperial Japan and the cult of Bushido no longer exists. Japan is now a fully westernized secular democracy, and as much as the arabs bluster about honor and their willingness to die, I doubt that they are any braver or more dedicated than the Japanese were in WW2 (and they sure as hell aren’t nearly as well organized or united!). Yet even the Japanese were utterly defeated, and their culture ended up being completely transformed under the crushing weight of an enraged western military.
Please don’t think that in the West will always hold back and restrain itself no matter how hard it is attacked or provoked. Remember Carthage?
You might want to read Victor Davis Hanson’s “Carnage and Culture” for a thorough discussion of the west’s approach to wars of survival.
A final homily from my time with the USMC: never get into a pissing match with a guy who has a bigger bladder than you do.
July 21st, 2006 at 7:24 pm
http://rareerotica.blogspot.com/
only for Gadfly
this kind of dichtomy works well in good relations
July 21st, 2006 at 8:24 pm
SM says “The Israelis maybe willing to kill for Israel, but the arabs are willing to die for the cause.” Its funny: I keep hearing this: The degenerate west loves life too much, while Islam loves death, and therefore Islam will win. Somebody should read a little 20th century history, like WW1 and WW2 for example. People who “love death” should be a little careful of whos western door they knock on. They’re liable to get what they love on a scale they didnt count on.
I think this refrain is essentially a primitive tribal one-on-one-with-a-knife mindset. It aint like that any more.
July 21st, 2006 at 8:47 pm
Howard,
You’re wrong. They don’t “love death”, at least not the ones in power. After all, Omar Bakri just asked the Royal Navy to get him out of Beirut. Yes, ladies and gents, the man who praised suicide bombers, is himself quite the little puss.
And that’s the deal. The people in power don’t care, as long as they can manipulate those around them. The really sad thing here is that I bet the people who become suicide bombers are just frustrated with their situation, and someone comes along and tells them that they can be something amazing! So they join what they think is a real cause, while the leaders grab the cash and run.
Nice.
July 21st, 2006 at 8:55 pm
> The really sad thing here is that I bet the people who
> become suicide bombers are just frustrated with their situation
In Palestine: Getting robbed, humiliated and murdered by the
master race.
> while the leaders grab the cash and run.
Not “their” leader but the greedy muster race grabs everything -
especially land - and pathetically cries about the resistance then.
July 21st, 2006 at 9:22 pm
Sandmonkey: “The Israelis maybe willing to kill for Israel, but the Arabs are willing to die for the cause.”
American World War II General George S. Patton: “Nobody ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor dumb bastard die for his country.”
July 21st, 2006 at 9:24 pm
*chuckle @ Nomad*
Maybe you’re right. We’re too busy doing that to people the metaphorical way. Maybe we should switch tactics
Hannah: That is hilarious about Bakri. Mister jihadi death preacher is just a big Nancy boy. “Uh oh. The mean old Jooooze are coming for you.” *chuckle*
July 21st, 2006 at 9:29 pm
Wishbone, thanks for the reply. You made me feel a little bit better about things, whether you represent a majority in Britain or not
News today looks pretty grim. If Israel cannot issue a solid ass-kicking to Hezbollah, then Lebanon is going to be an Iranian colony. If only we had invaded Iran in 2003, instead of Iraq, none of this would be happening. Lebanon would be free, and truly sovereign, Syria would be on it’s best behavior, HAMAS would have started all the shit with Israel, there wouldn’t be a nuclear crisis that has yet to be resolved… damn. Well, it may all still work out. I have a feeling the whole region is going to be getting pretty ugly for the next few years though. Or more.
July 21st, 2006 at 9:39 pm
eee—give us all a break. World history teaches us that land ultimately belongs only to those who can both hold it and keep it.
The Palestinians are being played for suckers by the radical Islamofascists.
The leaders of Hamas, Hizbollah, Iran and Syria are more than willing to fight until the last Palestinian drops in battle. But are they willing to actually hit the ground themselves in Southern Lebanon or Gaza to take on the IDF across the firing line? Naaaaaaaaaaah! That might hurt those precious leaders and their palaces and luxurious personal lifestyles!
July 21st, 2006 at 9:55 pm
time for regrets Craig ? with if you can built castels in Spain !
if we had not leave Lebanon, it would have been such a nice holidays country
July 21st, 2006 at 10:15 pm
“The really sad thing here is that I bet the people who become suicide bombers are just frustrated with their situation, and someone comes along and tells them that they can be something amazing! So they join what they think is a real cause, while the leaders grab the cash and run.”
I completly agree with this. The leaders of these groups could care less about the people whom they direct and “lead” into battle. The deaths of these militants are always justified, and the leaders are always the first to call them martyrs and freedom fighters. The low levels of education, combined with poor living conditions are, in my opinion, what drive these people to follow “leaders” like Nasrallah.
July 21st, 2006 at 10:15 pm
“In the end, the economic giants in the world will turn to alternative sources of energy, making Middle Eastern oil almost worthless.”
A wonderful sentiment, but wishful thinking. Even with an alternate fuel source for transport and power generation, petroleum is an intergal part of a whole slew of industrial applications, and a prime ingredient in plastics, fertilizers…
Weaning transport/power off of the oil teat would put a dent in oil production profits, but there would still be a huge market for them elsewhere.
Still it WOULD be fun to tell Exxon, Mobil and etcetera where they could stick their pump nozzle.
July 21st, 2006 at 10:33 pm
Still it WOULD be fun to tell Exxon, Mobil and etcetera where they could stick their pump nozzle
they ll’change their business, arms providers for exemple , which they already do trhough their multinational societies, I don’t mean only Exxon, Mobil ut also Elf
July 21st, 2006 at 10:34 pm
For the past while it’s been customary for me to check into this page and see what “Egyptianists” have to say, how the next generation of my fellow countrymen think. It’s the first time for me to post any comments here though, but I really needed to ask this.
Its says on your About Me section that you’re pro-US. Don’t you think that the only thing that a person can be for is religion and that everything else is subject to question? I mean even with religion, if a piece of info was not included in the Holy Book then that info is deemed questionable. So when it comes to the US I think they’re still human. They do make mistakes… and I don’t really know about you, but if they wanna question arab and islamic intentions then maybe its about time we start questioning theirs. Why are backing up Israel in this war on Lebanon? I know that Arab leaders are the ones who should be in question here for waiting until France and Russia opposed the first air strike and a day later join in with their very low oppositions, but don’t you think it’s time the US get removed from your list of things to stand for?
Well, this is probably none of my business, but I figured if all these people over here find you interesting enough to have 97 comments on a blog posted two days ago then you ought to take the responsibility of setting things straight… at least on your URL.
in the end.. cheers..
July 21st, 2006 at 10:40 pm
Craig-
You’re welcome mate
57 Egypeter -
Cheers mate. I appreciate that. I sometimes feel that we Brits are sometimes too reserved in showing our patriotism, but I hold no such reservations where my love of my country is concerned. I love every rock and stone of these blessed shores and I’m not ashamed to shed a tear when it’s time to give my thanks and remember all those that gave their lives that I may do so in freedom and pray for those that may yet, countrymen and allies all.
58 Uchuck the Tuchuck-
You’re entirely correct about the bizarre happenings in Britain mate. To repeat a phrase I’m hearing more and more often these days; “You just can’t make this stuff up”. Here’s a good one for you. This was back in 1998, I believe. A woman had a collection of porcelain pigs (17 of them) on her front window cill. Not unusual. That is, not until she got a knock on her door from the local constabulary. It seems that her poor little piggies “Offended” the local Muslims from the mosque at the end of the street. She was ordered to remove them or face prosecution!. As the lady herself said “I just couldn’t believe it, I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry,”. As I said……you just can’t make this stuff up.
I will say one thing…..If Muslims are offended by and the British flag, then pretty soon they’re going to love seeing me in the summer with my shirt off. An artist friend has almost completed the design for my tattoo, a beautiful Union Flag, poppies wreathed around the staff and the words “We Must Never Forget” below. A tattoo is something I always said I’d never go for unless it was something important enough to me to wear it for life. And this is.
As I said……..They’re gonna LOVE me if that offends them
.
July 21st, 2006 at 11:10 pm
hey, wht happened, 2 lost messages !
unchuck , i try to remember
Chirac did actually spoke about an energy and nuclear independance in last january, proposition to Europe, i am no longer extrapolate on proportional response, you have your own idea, and I don’t expect you are changing it
my explication, he said that, and not only him, all europeen countries, because Lebanese people are one of our closest friends, and it is painful to watch them in such a situation, so in regards with our other arabs friends , we could not expect him to say go Israel ; Just a n appeasement wish !
if that doesn’t plese you what can i do
July 22nd, 2006 at 12:56 am
For the militarily illiterate, here is an explanation of the differences between rockets and missles:
http://www.slate.com/id/2146304/fr/rss/
Kofi’s ceasefire proposal rejected by Hezbollah. Surprise!
http://www.adnki.com/index_2Level_English.php?cat=Security&loid=8.0.323581758&par=0
News for eee. Did you know that Pepsi stands for “Pay Each Penny to Save Israel.” Coke is part of the Zionist conspiracy also. I hope you aren’t enjoying any soft drinks down there in Florida, eee:
http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/012311.php
July 22nd, 2006 at 2:29 am
I think this refrain is essentially a primitive tribal one-on-one-with-a-knife mindset. It aint like that any more.
Exactly, this is idiotic stuff. How does being willing to die help your country survive a MIRV attack?
These tribal hatreds are so STUPID, not to mention evil. So you’re willing to die to kill the infidel…
July 22nd, 2006 at 2:32 am
Oops, this page is wierd, did you know that you can tab to “submit comment” by mistake, hit the space bar and it will post? Yuck.
Anyway, those who believe in Jihad should consider that the rest of the world has weapons like MIRVs that have up to 12 H-Bombs in a single missile.
They should learn what an H-Bomb can to do a city. Then they should sit down, shut up and become Quakers.
July 22nd, 2006 at 3:29 am
“we just don’t want to follow US in all their crusades”
No. We sell weapons to the other side.
When Saddam used French weapons to kill Iranians, we remained quiet, because we hadn’t done anything wrong.
When Saddam used German poison gas against the Kurds, we remained quiet, because we hadn’t done anything wrong.
When Saddam invaded Kuwait, we protested against the Americans, and we kept Saddam in power.
When Saddam killed several hundred thousand Shi’ites, we remained quiet, because we hadn’t done anything wrong.
But when America attacked Saddam, we spoke up!
We couldn’t believe how little respect for human life the Americans have.
Couldn’t believe it.
July 22nd, 2006 at 7:52 am
Thomas Sowell, a great intellectual, has some words about the actual accomplishments of the “Peace Movement” that are worth considering:
http://www.theatlasphere.com/columns/060721-sowell-peace.php
Speaking of peace:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060722/wl_mideast_afp/mideastconflictun_060722020845;_ylt=AoVseuCR7_BlPN2KT61rli8UvioA;_ylu=X3oDMTBiMW04NW9mBHNlYwMlJVRPUCUl
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060722/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/us_mideast
July 22nd, 2006 at 9:15 am
When Saddam invaded Kuwait, we protested against the Americans, and we kept Saddam in power
were you born yet jack ? Mitterand send the legionnaires , and we could hear americain soldiers wonder how they were quick well organized etc…
for the rest it is the same old shit you like to thow out !
and the americans were the gentle chorists in that case , buh uh uh
you (you seems to like that) sold also arms to saddam and a lot more the french or germans or english did
not even heard of americans protests as well when saddam killed sh’iits
it was Bush father who stop the war so far
and when americans reach any of their objectif, it was like in a play station for them
July 22nd, 2006 at 3:11 pm
Arithmetic of Pain
By ALAN M. DERSHOWITZ
July 19, 2006; Page A12
There is no democracy in the world that should tolerate missiles being fired at its cities without taking every reasonable step to stop the attacks. The big question raised by Israel’s military actions in Lebanon is what is “reasonable.” The answer, according to the laws of war, is that it is reasonable to attack military targets, so long as every effort is made to reduce civilian casualties. If the objectives cannot be achieved without some civilian casualties, these must be “proportional” to the civilian casualties that would be prevented by the military action.
This is all well and good for democratic nations that deliberately locate their military bases away from civilian population centers. Israel has its air force, nuclear facilities and large army bases in locations as remote as anything can be in that country. It is possible for an enemy to attack Israeli military targets without inflicting “collateral damage” on its civilian population. Hezbollah and Hamas, by contrast, deliberately operate military wings out of densely populated areas. They launch antipersonnel missiles with ball-bearing shrapnel, designed by Syria and Iran to maximize civilian casualties, and then hide from retaliation by living among civilians. If Israel decides not to go after them for fear of harming civilians, the terrorists win by continuing to have free rein in attacking civilians with rockets. If Israel does attack, and causes civilian casualties, the terrorists win a propaganda victory: The international community pounces on Israel for its “disproportionate” response. This chorus of condemnation actually encourages the terrorists to operate from civilian areas.
While Israel does everything reasonable to minimize civilian casualties — not always with success — Hezbollah and Hamas want to maximize civilian casualties on both sides. Islamic terrorists, a diplomat commented years ago, “have mastered the harsh arithmetic of pain. . . . Palestinian casualties play in their favor and Israeli casualties play in their favor.” These are groups that send children to die as suicide bombers, sometimes without the child knowing that he is being sacrificed. Two years ago, an 11-year-old was paid to take a parcel through Israeli security. Unbeknownst to him, it contained a bomb that was to be detonated remotely. (Fortunately the plot was foiled.)
This misuse of civilians as shields and swords requires a reassessment of the laws of war. The distinction between combatants and civilians — easy when combatants were uniformed members of armies that fought on battlefields distant from civilian centers — is more difficult in the present context. Now, there is a continuum of “civilianality”: Near the most civilian end of this continuum are the pure innocents — babies, hostages and others completely uninvolved; at the more combatant end are civilians who willingly harbor terrorists, provide material resources and serve as human shields; in the middle are those who support the terrorists politically, or spiritually.
The laws of war and the rules of morality must adapt to these realities. An analogy to domestic criminal law is instructive: A bank robber who takes a teller hostage and fires at police from behind his human shield is guilty of murder if they, in an effort to stop the robber from shooting, accidentally kill the hostage. The same should be true of terrorists who use civilians as shields from behind whom they fire their rockets. The terrorists must be held legally and morally responsible for the deaths of the civilians, even if the direct physical cause was an Israeli rocket aimed at those targeting Israeli citizens.
Israel must be allowed to finish the fight that Hamas and Hezbollah started, even if that means civilian casualties in Gaza and Lebanon. A democracy is entitled to prefer the lives of its own innocents over the lives of the civilians of an aggressor, especially if the latter group contains many who are complicit in terrorism. Israel will — and should — take every precaution to minimize civilian casualties on the other side. On July 16, Hasan Nasrallah, the head of Hezbollah, announced there will be new “surprises,” and the Aska Martyrs Brigade said that it had developed chemical and biological weapons that could be added to its rockets. Should Israel not be allowed to pre-empt their use?
Israel left Lebanon in 2000 and Gaza in 2005. These are not “occupied” territories. Yet they serve as launching pads for attacks on Israeli civilians. Occupation does not cause terrorism, then, but terrorism seems to cause occupation. If Israel is not to reoccupy to prevent terrorism, the Lebanese government and the Palestinian Authority must ensure that these regions cease to be terrorist safe havens.
Mr. Dershowitz is a professor of law at Harvard.
July 22nd, 2006 at 3:41 pm
“were you born yet jack”?
Yes. I even participated in the anti-American game. It was the thing to do. I was 13 years old. “No blood for oil” was our chorus and we didn’t care about the Kuwaitis.
“for the rest it is the same old shit you like to thow out!”
It’s all true, I’m afraid.
“you (you seems to like that) sold also arms to saddam”
Yes. That’s what I said. We provided the chemicals.
“and a lot more the french or germans or english did”
That’s partly true. We sold more to Iraq than the English. But we sold less than the French. Only the Soviet Union and China topped the French.
We Europeans are so peaceful. We can really be proud of ourselves.
German chemical weapons kill Kurds. But we did have the chutzpah to demonstrate against the liberation of Kuwait! If we really wanted peace in the world, why do we equip people like Saddam?
July 22nd, 2006 at 3:43 pm
Nomad, I went and looked up the specifics. From the Washington Post of 19 January 2006:
PARIS, Jan. 19 — President Jacques Chirac said Thursday that France was prepared to launch a nuclear strike against any country that sponsors a terrorist attack against French interests. He said his country’s nuclear arsenal had been reconfigured to include the ability to make a tactical strike in retaliation for terrorism.
“The leaders of states who would use terrorist means against us, as well as those who would envision using . . . weapons of mass destruction, must understand that they would lay themselves open to a firm and fitting response on our part,” Chirac said during a visit to a nuclear submarine base in Brittany. “This response could be a conventional one. It could also be of a different kind.”
It does seem a bit odd to me that the same man who threatened nuclear destruction as a response “against any country that sponsors a terrorist attack against French interests” is now bitching about disproportionate response on the part of Israel in the current situation. Or are we misinterpreting his statement? Maybe he thinks Israel should be using nukes?
July 22nd, 2006 at 3:47 pm
““and a lot more the french or germans or english did””
Are you assuming that I’m American? I thought it was established where I am from?
Anyway, do you even know what the Americans sold Saddam, and what the French sold him? I doubt it. If you knew you would hardly claim that the Americans sold them more; unless you are VERY bad at maths, or a liar.
Please quote the numbers in millions of US dollars and explain, in reasonable detail, how whatever number you find for the Americans is “a lot more” than the number you find for the French.
July 22nd, 2006 at 4:23 pm
Or are we misinterpreting his statement? ?
I suppose he was so proud of his nuclear achievment that he emphasized it in context of last subur riots ; anyways, he make a scandal , Mm Merkel was shocked !
Maybe he thinks Israel should be using nukes?
at that time Iran hat not yet actived Hezbollah in ultimate provocation for iran uranium issue
and if Israel must use her nukes, why not directly on Iran ,
July 22nd, 2006 at 4:36 pm
Are you assuming that I’m American? I thought it was established where I am from?
Entschuldigung bitte mein Herr, but you are looking so pro-neocon policy and I don’t read all the stuff over this blog, except when someone quote France for any bizarre intention
Anyway, do you even know what the Americans sold Saddam, and what the French sold him? I doubt it. If you knew you would hardly claim that the Americans sold them more; unless you are VERY bad at maths, or a liar.
Please quote the numbers in millions of US dollars and explain, in reasonable detail, how whatever number you find for the Americans is “a lot more” than the number you find for the French.
I am not an expert, I just read it reported in Mossad an CIA history books
by the ways :
http://img142.imageshack.us/img142/7986/rumsfeldhussein2sn.jpg
July 22nd, 2006 at 7:04 pm
“I am not an expert, I just read it reported in Mossad an CIA history books”
You are not an expert, but you claimed to know. So please, give me your numbers.
Maybe you read it reported, maybe you make stuff up as you go along.
“rumsfeldhussein2sn.jpg”
That’s all the proof you need, is it?
One picture of two politicians and you knew that the US sold Iraq more than the French?
You don’t disappoint me, and that’s the problem.
Better pro-neocon than uninformed. If you actually knew who sold weapons to Iraq, what Iraq did with the weapons, and who tried to save the regime, you might be more neo-con too.
July 22nd, 2006 at 7:12 pm
I don’t read all the stuff over this blog, except when someone quote France for any bizarre intention
Do you intend to comment on what somebody named “Cadavre” said about wonderful France and it’s intention to see genocide doen on the Israelis in the other thread, then?
July 22nd, 2006 at 7:34 pm
your reasonment ist deductiv but for so not much sensitiv too
a little biasiness does not empech me to apprehend the world, sorry
July 22nd, 2006 at 7:41 pm
Do you intend to comment on what somebody named “Cadavre” said about wonderful France and it’s intention to see genocide doen on the Israelis in the other thread, then?
no Craig
corpse or dead body (litteral traduction of cadavre)don’t please me
this gui is taking his dreams too seriously, and I don’t see through him a french indigenous
July 22nd, 2006 at 7:41 pm
“Do you intend to comment on what somebody named “Cadavre” said about wonderful France and it’s intention to see genocide doen on the Israelis in the other thread, then?”
If he felt comfortable with what his country does, he would not feel the need to claim that America sold more weapons to Saddam than France.
The truth is that we Europeans are really quite ashamed of what our governments did and do. Or at least we would be if we knew. But it’s easier to ignore it, make up some stuff like “the Americans did it” and then play the peaceful sophisticated country when America goes to war against the bastard.
Notice that there have been no calls for a cease-fire BEFORE Israel shot back. Notice that we didn’t sell help to JEWISH civilian victims of Arab attacks. It’s us Europeans again, ignoring the world, until the Americans or Jews are a part of it. Or it could be worse. Perhaps we knew about the Jewish victims and just didn’t care. Or we enjoyed it. I don’t know.
We will happily sell chemicals to fascists dictators and weapons to countries that attack their neighbours; we will even condemn the Jews for defending themselves; but we will NEVER give up our principles of pacifism and a proportionate response!
July 22nd, 2006 at 7:49 pm
don’t cry they know how to defend themselves
for having sold arms I agree with you, does that help ? if our countries refused the deal arms, others would jump on the occasion
July 22nd, 2006 at 8:39 pm
I believe groups like Hezbollah can be destroyed. First, by killing their leadership - then second by having the host country, Lebanon break off the Syrian shackles.
Sure there could still be members, just like there are Nazi’s even today - but they are toothless and powerless. More of a nusance than a threat.
But it will take world support - to help Lebanon. http://www.what-a-world.com
July 22nd, 2006 at 9:37 pm
> I believe groups like
the chosen people colonial state have to be destroyed, yes.
And there will be no peace in the region, until the native arab
population of Palestine manages to get rid of its zionazi shac-
kels forcing them to eat sand, while lunatic jewish fasists are
transplanted into their land - sponsored by their puppets in
Amnesia.
July 22nd, 2006 at 9:41 pm
You are so wrong Sandmonkey. Don’t you read history? Japan? Germany? If you kill enough of em they give up stupid ideas. Then you can reprogram them
Germany in which World War? Kill lots of Germans in WWI, rub their noses in their defeat, utterly humiliate them and dismember German terrority - that didn’t work out well. After WWII though there was a huge amount of US aid for reconstruction in Germany (under the Marshal Plan) and Japan, and yes, also occupation until new constitutions were set up. I’d argue that those are the factors that made the difference rather than killing lots of people. So why then are similar policies in Afghanistan and Iraq failing? The difference is probably that there is an international anti-US jihadi movement whereas after WWII there was no-one interested in travelling to Germany or Japan to fight to expel US troops from those countries.
I don’t have an answer, I just don’t think you’ll find one by looking at the history of WWII.
July 22nd, 2006 at 9:51 pm
Following up my last comment very quickly I know but it just occurred to me that on the analysis above, the threat from jihadi ideology is very similar to that from international communism during the Cold War. Communist states like Cuba, North Korea and North Vietnam could always count on support from allies abroad against the US. That ideology ultimately destroyed itself from within*, when it was shown that it was not able to compete with free-market liberal democracy, rather than in any military conflict.
*Yes, I know that a billion Chinese are still ruled by a party calling itself a Communist party, but it is clearly nothing of the kind
July 22nd, 2006 at 9:54 pm
And there will be no peace in the region, until the native arab
population of Palestine manages to get rid of its zionazi shac-
kels
If that did ever happen then Iran would quickly become the new Israel, so there would still be no peace in the region.
July 22nd, 2006 at 10:46 pm
Societies that think like Neanderthals end up like Neanderthals–extinct.
July 23rd, 2006 at 2:18 am
“*Yes, I know that a billion Chinese are still ruled by a party calling itself a Communist party, but it is clearly nothing of the kind.”
The current regime reminds me of the old Legalist dynasties like the Ch’in and T’ang (I think it was the T’ang, anyhow).
“Societies that think like Neanderthals end up like Neanderthals–extinct.”
Sir, I’ll have you know that I am one-quarter Neaderthal on my mother’s side. (by the way, we want Europe back, you Cro-Magnon Bastards!)
July 23rd, 2006 at 2:21 am
Dear Muslims: What is It that You Don’t Understand?
Will survival mean vicotry for Hezbollah?
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060723/ap_on_re_mi_ea/mideast_fighting_nasrallah
I guess that shows you the difference between the West and the Arabs. In the West, losing substantial turf and vast amounts of arms would not be taken as a victory. Among Arabs, it is a great victory. Maybe Israel should give them a total victory by permanently reoccupying all of Hezbollah’s stomping ground.
July 23rd, 2006 at 2:30 am
# 126
LOL.
July 23rd, 2006 at 7:52 am
“Dear Muslims: What is It that You Don’t Understand?”
Why are you addressing all Muslims?
“I guess that shows you the difference between the West and the Arabs. In the West, losing substantial turf and vast amounts of arms would not be taken as a victory. Among Arabs, it is a great victory. Maybe Israel should give them a total victory by permanently reoccupying all of Hezbollah’s stomping ground.”
Hezbollah claims to be a resistance force. Whether or not people in the West agree, this is they way they describe themselves to the Lebanese and Arabs. If they manage to “resist” Israeli attacks, and we all know that could mean anything, they could spin it and say that they won, and technically they’d be correct. As long as, at the end of this conflict, Israel is not in Lebanon, and they have sustained some losses, it will be considered a victory for these militants.
July 23rd, 2006 at 7:58 am
Not defending Hezbollah in the previous comment, just wanted to point out that they do not claim to be an army that can attack and win wars in the way the West would. They’re militants who resist “Israeli agression”, and therefore it’s much easier for them to claim victory as long as the Israelis have casualties and they do not occupy Lebanon.
July 23rd, 2006 at 8:21 am
http://wcbstv.com/topstories/local_story_202003024.html
to make a change
kidding my american friends, hey, those are not french !
July 23rd, 2006 at 10:42 am
PRINT WINDOW CLOSE WINDOW
AT WAR
Hostage to Hezbollah
Lesson for Nasrallah: “The violence done to Lebanon shall overwhelm you.”
http://www.opinionjournal.com/forms/printThis.html?id=110008681
BY FOUAD AJAMI
Friday, July 21, 2006 12:01 a.m.
Pity Lebanon: In a world of states, it has not had a state of its own. A garden without fences, was the way Beirut, its capital city, was once described.
A cleric by the name of Hassan Nasrallah, at the helm of the Hezbollah movement, handed Lebanon a calamity right as the summer tourist season had begun. Beirut had dug its way out of the rubble of a long war: Nasrallah plunged it into a new season of loss and ruin. He presented the country with a fait accompli: the “gift” of two Israeli soldiers kidnapped across an international frontier.
Nasrallah never let the Lebanese government in on his venture. He was giddy with triumphalism and defiance when this crisis began. And men and women cooped up in the destitution of the Shiite districts of Beirut were sent out into the streets to celebrate Hezbollah’s latest deed.
It did not seem to matter to Nasrallah that the ground that would burn in Lebanon would in the main be Shiite land in the south. Nor was it of great concern to he who lives on the subsidies of the Iranian theocrats that the ordinary Lebanese would pay for his adventure. The cruel and cynical hope was that Nasrallah’s rivals would be bullied into submission and false solidarity, and that the man himself would emerge as the master of the game of Lebanon’s politics.
The hotels are full in Damascus,” read a dispatch in Beirut, as though to underline the swindle of this crisis, its bitter harvest for the Lebanese. History repeats here, endlessly it seems.
There was something to Nasrallah’s conduct that recalled the performance of Gamal Abdel Nasser in the Six Day War of 1967. That leader, it should be recalled, closed the Straits of Tiran to Israeli shipping, asked for the evacuation of U.N. forces from the Sinai Peninsula– clear acts of war–but never expected the onset of war. He had only wanted the gains of war.
Nasrallah’s brazen deed was, in the man’s calculus, an invitation to an exchange of prisoners. Now, the man who triggered this crisis stands exposed as an Iranian proxy, doing the bidding of Tehran and Damascus.
He had confidently asserted that “sources” in Israel had confided to Hezbollah that Israel’s government would not strike into Lebanon because Hezbollah held northern Israel hostage to its rockets, and that the demand within Israel for an exchange of prisoners would force Ehud Olmert’s hand.
The time of the “warrior class” in Israel had passed, Nasrallah believed, and this new Israeli government, without decorated soldiers and former generals, was likely to capitulate. Now this knowingness has been exposed for the delusion it was.
There was steel in Israel and determination to be done with Hezbollah’s presence on the border.
States can’t–and don’t–share borders with militias.
That abnormality on the Lebanese-Israeli border is sure not to survive this crisis. One way or other, the Lebanese army will have to take up its duty on the Lebanon-Israel border. By the time the dust settles, this terrible summer storm will have done what the Lebanese government had been unable to do on its own.
In his cocoon, Nasrallah did not accurately judge the temper of his own country to begin with.
No less a figure than the hereditary leader of the Druze community, Walid Jumblatt, was quick to break with Hezbollah, and to read this crisis as it really is.
“We had been trying for months,” he said, “to spring our country out of the Syrian-Iranian trap, and here we are forcibly pushed into that trap again.”
In this two-front war–Hamas’s in the Palestinian territories and Hezbollah’s in Lebanon–Mr. Jumblatt saw the fine hand of the Syrian regime attempting to retrieve its dominion in Lebanon, and to forestall the international investigations of its reign of terror in that country.
In the same vein, a broad coalition of anti-Syrian Lebanese political parties and associations that had come together in the aftermath of the assassination last year of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, called into question the very rationale of this operation, and its timing: “Is it Lebanon’s fate to endure the killing of its citizens and the destruction of its economy and its tourist season in order to serve the interests of empty nationalist slogans?”
In retrospect, Ehud Barak’s withdrawal from Israel’s “security zone” in southern Lebanon in the summer of 2000 had robbed Hezbollah of its raison d’être. It was said that the “resistance movement” would need a “soft landing” and a transition to a normal political world. But the imperative of disarming Hezbollah and pulling it back from the international border with Israel was never put into effect.
Hezbollah found its way into Parliament, was given two cabinet posts in the most recent government, and branched out into real estate ventures; but the heavy military infrastructure survived and, indeed, was to be augmented in the years that followed Israel’s withdrawal from southern Lebanon.
Syria gave Hezbollah cover, for that movement did much of Syria’s bidding in Lebanon. A pretext was found to justify the odd spectacle of an armed militia in a time of peace: Hezbollah now claimed that the battle had not ended, and that a barren piece of ground, the Shebaa Farms, was still in Israel’s possession. By a twist of fate, that land had been in Syrian hands when they fell to Israel in the Six Day War.
No great emotions stirred in Lebanon about the Shebaa Farms. It was easy to see through the pretense of Hezbollah. The state within a state was an end in itself.
For Hezbollah, the moment of truth would come when Syria made a sudden, unexpected retreat out of Lebanon in the spring of 2005.
An edifice that had the look of permanence was undone with stunning speed as the Syrians raced to the border, convinced that the Pax Americana might topple the regime in Damascus, as it had Saddam Hussein’s tyranny. For Hezbollah’s leaders, this would be a time of great uncertainty.
The “Cedar Revolution” that had helped bring an end to Syrian occupation appeared to be a genuine middle-class phenomenon, hip and stylish, made up in the main of Sunni Muslims, Druze and Christians.
Great numbers of propertied and worldly Shiites found their way to that Cedar Revolution, but Hezbollah’s ranks were filled with the excluded, newly urbanized people from villages in the south and the Bekaa Valley.
Hassan Nasrallah had found a measure of respectability in the Lebanese political system; he was a good orator and, in the way of Levantine politics, a skilled tactician. A seam was stitched between the jihadist origins of Hezbollah and the pursuit of political power in a country as subtle and complex and pluralistic as Lebanon. There would be no Islamic republic in Lebanon, and the theory of Hezbollah appeared to bend to Lebanon’s realities.
But Nasrallah was in the end just the Lebanese face of Hezbollah. Those who know the workings of the movement with intimacy believe that operational control is in the hands of Iranian agents, that Hezbollah is fully subservient to the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.
The hope that Hezbollah would “go Lebanese,” and “go local,” was thus set aside. At any rate, Nasrallah and his lieutenants did not trust the new Lebanon to make the ample room that a country at war–and within the orbit of Syria–had hitherto made for them in the time of disorder. Though the Shiites had risen in Lebanon, there remains in them a great deal of brittleness, a sense of social inadequacy relative to the more privileged communities in the country.
That raid into Israel, the capture of the two Israeli soldiers, was a deliberate attack against the new Lebanon.
That the crisis would play out when the mighty of the G-8 were assembled in Russia was a good indication of Iran’s role in this turn of events. Hassan Nasrallah had waded beyond his depth: The moment of his glory would mark what is destined to be a setback of consequence for him and for his foot soldiers. Iran’s needs had trumped Hezbollah’s more strictly Lebanese agenda.
In the normal course of things, Hezbollah’s operatives expected at least the appearance of Arab solidarity and brotherhood. And here, too, Hezbollah was to be denied.
A great diplomatic setback was handed it when Saudi Arabia shed its customary silence and reticence to condemn what it described as the “uncalculated adventures” of those in Hezbollah and Hamas who brought about this crisis. The custodians of power in Arabia noted that they had stood with the “Lebanese resistance” until the end of Israel’s occupation of southern Lebanon.
But that was then, and there is a world of difference between “legitimate resistance” and “uncalculated adventures undertaken by elements within the state, and behind its back, exposing the region and its accomplishments to danger and destruction.” Gone was the standard deference to Arab solidarity.
This had little to do with the Shiism of Hezbollah, but with the Saudi dread of instability. The Saudis are heavily invested in the reconstruction and stability of Lebanon: This had been the achievement of Rafik Hariri, and it was to continue under Fouad Siniora, the incumbent prime minister, a decent Sunni technocrat who came into politics as an aide of Hariri.
Untold thousands of Saudis have their summer homes and vacations in Lebanon. A memory of old Beirut in its days of glitter tugs at older Saudis. On less sentimental grounds, the Saudis have been keen to shore up Lebanon’s mercantile Sunni population against the demographic and political weight of the Shiites. Hezbollah’s unilateral decision to push Lebanon over the brink was anathema to the Saudi way.
In due course, the Saudis were joined by the Jordanians and the Egyptians. The Arab order of power would not give Nasrallah control over the great issues of regional war and peace. Nor would it give sustenance to Syria’s desire to find its way back into Lebanon’s politics. The axes of the region were laid bare: The trail runs from the southern slums of Beirut through Damascus to Tehran–with Hezbollah and its Palestinian allies in the Hamas on one side, and the conservative order of power on the other.
This isn’t exactly the split between the Sunni Arab order and its Shiite challengers. (Hamas, it should be noted, is zealously Sunni.) The wellsprings of this impasse are to be found in the more prosaic impasse between order and its radical enemies.
In time, we are sure to hear from Nasrallah’s own Shiite community: There had been unease among growing numbers of educated Shiites about the political monopoly over their affairs of Hezbollah and its local allies, an unease with the zealotry and the military parades–and with the subservience to Iran. The defection will be easier now as the downtrodden of southern Lebanon take stock of the misery triggered by Nasrallah’s venture. He will need enormous Iranian treasure to repair the damage of this ill-starred endeavor.
The Shiites are Lebanon’s single largest community.
There lie before them two ways: Lebanonism, an attachment to their own land, assimilation into the wider currents of their country, an acceptance of it as a place of services and trade and pluralism; or a path of belligerence, a journey on road to Damascus–and to the Iranian theocracy.
By the time the guns fall silent and the Lebanese begin to dig out of the rubble, we should get an intimation of which Shiite future beckons. The Shiites can make Lebanon or they can break it. Their deliverance lies in a recognition of the truths and limitations of their country. The “holy war” they can leave to others.
There could have been another way: There could have been a sovereign state in Lebanon, and the Syrians would have let it be, and the distant Iranian state would have been a world apart. There needn’t have been a Lebanese parody of the Iranian Revolution, a “sister republic” by the Mediterranean sustained with Iranian wealth. The border between Israel and Lebanon would have been a “normal” border.
(The Lebanese would settle for a border as quiet and tranquil as the one Syria has maintained with Israel for well over three decades now, with the Syrians waging proxy battles on Lebanese soil and through Lebanese satraps.)
But the Lebanese have been given to feuds among themselves, and larger players have found it easy to insert themselves into that small, fragile republic. Now the Lebanese have been given yet again a cautionary tale about what befalls lands without sovereign, responsible states of their own.
In an earlier time, three decades ago, Lebanon was made to pay for the legends of Arabism, and for the false glamour of the Palestinian “revolutionary” experiment. The country lost well over a quarter-century of its history–its best people quit it, and its modernist inheritance was brutally and steadily undermined.
Now comes this new push by Damascus and Tehran. It promises nothing save sterility and ruin. It will throw the Lebanese back onto a history whose terrible harvest is well known to them. The military performance of Hezbollah, it should be apparent by now, is not a performance of a militia; nor are unmanned drones and missiles of long range the weapons of boys of the alleyways.
A formidable military structure has been put together by the Iranians in Lebanon. In a small, densely populated country that keeps and knows no secrets, Hezbollah and its Iranian handlers have been at work on this military undertaking for quite some time, under the gaze of Lebanese authorities too frightened to raise questions.
The Mediterranean vocation of Lebanon as a land of enlightenment and commerce may have had its exaggerations and pretense. But set it against the future offered Lebanon by Syria, and by Tehran’s theocrats seeking a diplomatic reprieve for themselves by setting Lebanon on fire, and Lebanon’s choice should be easy to see.
The Lebanese, though, are not masters of their own domain. They will need protection and political support; they will need to see the will and the designs of the radical axis contested by resolute American power, and by an Arab constellation of states that can convince the Shiites of Lebanon that there is a place for them in the Arab scheme of things.
For a long time, the Arab states have worked through and favored the Sunni middle classes of Beirut, Sidon and Tripoli. This has made it easy for Iran–overcoming barriers of language and distance–to make its inroads into a large Shiite community awakening to a sense of power and violation. To truly turn Iran back from the Mediterranean, to check its reach into Beirut, the Arab world needs to rethink the basic compact of its communities, and those Shiite stepchildren of the Arab world will have to be brought into the fold.
Lebanon’s strength lies in its weakness, went an old maxim. And the Arab states themselves were for decades egregious in the way they treated Lebanon, shifting onto it the burden of the Palestinian fight with Israel, acquiescing in the encroachments on its sovereignty by the Palestinians and the Syrians–encroachments often subsidized with Arab money. Iran then picked up where the Arab states left off. Now that weakness of the Lebanese state has become a source of great menace to the Lebanese, and to their neighbors as well.
No one can say with confidence how this crisis will play out. There are limits on what Israel can do in Lebanon. The Israelis will not be pulled deeper into Lebanon and its villages and urban alleyways, and Israel can’t be expected to disarm Hezbollah or to find its missiles in Lebanon’s crannies. Finding the political way out, and working out a decent security arrangement on the border, will require a serious international effort and active American diplomacy. International peacekeeping forces have had a bad name, and they often deserve it. But they may be inevitable on Lebanon’s border with Israel; they may be needed to buy time for the Lebanese government to come into full sovereignty over its soil.
The Europeans claim a special affinity for Lebanon, a country of the eastern Mediterranean.
This is their chance to help redeem that land, and to come to its rescue by strengthening its national army and its bureaucratic institutions.
We have already seen order’s enemies play their hand. We now await the forces of order and rescue, and by all appearances a long, big struggle is playing out in Lebanon. This is from the Book of Habakkuk: “The violence done to Lebanon shall overwhelm you” (2:17). The struggles of the mighty forces of the region yet again converge on a small country that has seen more than its share of history’s heartbreak and history’s follies.
Mr. Ajami, a 2006 Bradley Prize recipient, is the Majid Khadduri Professor and director of the Middle East Studies Program at the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University. His most recent book, “The Foreigner’s Gift: The Americans, the Arabs and the Iraqis in Iraq,” has just been published by the Free Press. He is the author of, among others, “The Dream Palace of the Arabs: A Generation’s Odyssey” (Pantheon, 1998), and “Beirut: City of Regrets” (Norton, 1988).
July 21, 2006 Edition > Section: Foreign > Printer-Friendly Version
The Hyenas and Maggots Who Feed Off Our World
BY YOUSSEF IBRAHIM
July 21, 2006
URL: http://www.nysun.com/article/36457
Beneath the anguished sounds of destruction in the Levant, a new Lebanon is being born.
This Lebanon will be freed from the savage hordes of Hezbollah jihadists, snatched from the jaws of Syrian and Iranian hyenas, and liberated at last from Palestinian Arab maggots who for 50 years masqueraded as freedom fighters and poisoned everything they touched.
As we watch this magnificent tragedy unfold amid so much blood, tears, guts, rockets, and smoke, we, the long silenced Arab majority, must insist that it bring down the curtain on the barbarians in our midst.
Given the enormous stakes, it is imperative that the collective will of Israel, America, France — indeed, all of Europe — and the many Arab nations quietly backing the fight does not weaken before the job is done.
It was Lebanon’s misfortune to be the experimental theater where jihadists first spread mayhem back in the 1980s, killing American and French soldiers, initiating the long, dark nightmares of hostages and terror, and placing Lebanon under Syria’s boot for 30 years.
It is only fair, then, that in the past week Lebanon has witnessed the return of American Marines, 22 years after their flight, and of the Israeli army, back this time to liberate, not occupy. By all indications, these troops are laboring hand in hand with Arabs who want to roll back the march of Islamic fundamentalism and its kingdom of darkness.
We should view the events now unfolding not as a local battle for Lebanon but as a larger fight for the future of the entire Arab nation.
For two decades, this nation of 350 million has been hijacked by a bizarre collection of Neanderthals, pseudo-revolutionaries, illiterate imams, and “Mad Max”-style Palestinian Arab terrorists of every hue, all united only in their desire to pillage in the name of a religion they expropriated.
Their manifest failure, which we hope will be delivered in resounding military terms, should come as a hard knock on the head of any Arab drifters. Cynics and cowards are already shouting “Enough!” but we know it will only be enough when the madman of Hezbollah, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, and all the other turbaned, bearded bats of the night are found, nailed down, and killed, and the whole Hezbollah movement in Lebanon — as well as Hamas and the other freelance Palestinian Arab factions — is convincingly discredited.
These groups are already running on empty. A glance at any Arab paper or news network other than the fundamentalist Al-Jazeera is enough to gauge the torrent of abuse on both Hamas and Hezbollah by Arab pundits, raining on the jihadists’ parade in commentary as stinging as a cobra’s bite.They have been accused of juvenile behavior, corruption, and incompetence, and blamed for dragging Arabs into pirate wars and bringing pain and misery to their people.
The first phase of their path to disgrace is complete: Sheik Nasrallah and various Hamas leaders have joined the growing club of Arab terrorist fugitives in hiding, sneaking their videotapes to Al-Jazeera like Osama bin Laden.
Gone are the days when they could find hideouts among their patrons. Unless the Israeli campaign in Lebanon collapses, Sheik Nasrallah will have to be smuggled into Iran, where he will be kept under wraps.
By far the biggest surprise in this debacle has been Saudi Arabia and other oil-rich Gulf Arab states’ unstinting denunciation of their would-be fundamentalist minions.
One after another, senior Saudi princes — as well as Egyptian, Jordanian, Kuwaiti, Bahraini, and other Arab decision-makers — have made it clear they will not support Hezbollah. Many of them have described it openly as Iran’s Shiite agent in a Muslim Sunni Arab world.
While they have been critical of Israel’s destruction of Lebanon, none have championed Hezbollah’s unilateral rush to war. Nor have they objected to Israel’s determination to rout Hezbollah — or, for that matter, Israel’s hounding of Hamas.
Indeed, both jihadist groups have been described repeatedly as an embarrassment to Muslim governance. Behind it all is the Arab world’s growing impatience with the concept of “eternal struggle” and the heavy price paid after September 11, 2001. Today’s Arab world is a much younger and more prosperous place, one that is eager for modernization and globalization. This Arab world has graduated from juvenile pursuits of Palestinian Arab causes, dreams of Arab nationalism, and hopes for a Muslim super-nation.
And guess who these Arabs are now following into liberation from their ghosts? Israel.
July 21, 2006 Edition > Section: Foreign >
July 23rd, 2006 at 11:44 am
Why are you posting the entire article here? Just post the link next time.
July 23rd, 2006 at 11:52 am
[...] I do believe i have a right to exist, and i do have a right to defend myself. I think that taking israel as a fact and not as an image may help reach peace quicker. But if there’s no room for peace, and israel has to by annihilated in order to the Hizbullah to be satisfied I have no one to talk to. Technorati hizbullahpeacelebanonwarisraelmediababiesinnocent”warcrimes” [...]
July 23rd, 2006 at 1:11 pm
> After WWII though there was a huge amount of US aid for reconstruction
> in Germany (under the Marshal Plan) and Japan, and yes, also occupa-
> tion until new constitutions were set up. I’d argue that those are the
> factors that made the difference rather than killing lots of people. So why
> then are similar policies in Afghanistan and Iraq failing?
Because there is no need for them amnesian vampires to do so.
First: the reason why they did not transform germany or japan into a ba-
nana republic - somehing between Nicaragua or the Philippines - was the
existence of the USSR.
Second: The US was not attacking germany - things are different for ja-
pan - and they didn’t plan to rob germanies or japanese natural resources
- the only one reason - from the US-perspective - for the mess in Iraq.
Today - having no potent rival - it’s no problem for the US to ignore and
violate international law on any scale - from torture to illegal wars under
false pretenses - and there’s no reason for them not to scrap Iraq - except
of course for stealing it’s oil.
July 23rd, 2006 at 1:29 pm
“if our countries refused the deal arms, others would jump on the occasion”
Better they kill Shi’ites and Kurds with our weapons?
July 23rd, 2006 at 1:56 pm
and what dou think of what happen to them right now ? will you put that again on our back ? oh yes you might, you seem havind accumulated an unexpressed anger toward us, any preussen disapointment ?
July 23rd, 2006 at 3:12 pm
M. Brehm,
I might have been too direct, sorry about my lack of diplomay
though in the sixties, i have been living for 2 years in Deutschland and I enjoyed it
I found the people very friendly toward me, of course, it was in federal Deutscland : Lübeck-Travemünde, Dusseldorf
then when my son got his degrees he went to Hamburg for 3 years in late nineties
his best friend was a Rostock gui who worked in the same business, therefore he was a previous east german boy
and at that time, eastern germans found they were a little segregationed in west Germany,
except for the girls
I used to meet this Rostock gui, very clever and skillful, but very proud too
I thought he was disapointed not having a place which he deserved, and was always arguing how Germany was a great and superior nation as the french one
but he had a kind of brother tenderness for my son, and my son liked him very much too
so I can understand what you may feel
July 23rd, 2006 at 6:41 pm
Vince,
“Hezbollah claims to be a resistance force. Whether or not people in the West agree, this is they way they describe themselves to the Lebanese and Arabs. If they manage to “resist” Israeli attacks, and we all know that could mean anything, they could spin it and say that they won, and technically they’d be correct.”
Yeah, I think that was kind of what I’m getting at. They can indeed spin it any way they want to say that they won. I just think that their definition of victory is a little odd considering they claimed it as a victory when the Israelis withdrew from Lebanon previously and they would probably claim it as a victory if the Israelis were to reoccupy Lebanon again because of their actions.
They really can’t lose, can they?
July 24th, 2006 at 11:30 am
“and what dou think of what happen to them right now ? will you put that again on our back ? oh yes you might, you seem havind accumulated an unexpressed anger toward us, any preussen disapointment ?”
What happens to them right now?
Kurds are rebuilding. Shi’ites are still the targets of Sunni extremists, although less so than under Saddam. I assume these things take time.
(Sunnis are also targeted by Shia extremists. But even then the numbers are nowhere near the numbers before the invasion.)
“I used to meet this Rostock gui, very clever and skillful, but very proud too
I thought he was disapointed not having a place which he deserved, and was always arguing how Germany was a great and superior nation as the french one”
I don’t think anybody can say with a straight face that I believe in Germany’s superiority over many other western countries. Perhaps Germany is superior to France, when superiority is measured in burning synagogues and dead Jews.
“so I can understand what you may feel”
Can you? You actually believe that my disgust with French arms deals and German chemicals being sold to Iraq is because of some feeling of Prussian superiority over the French nation? That IS odd.
You should really, really give up your arrogance. It agrees with you, but it shouldn’t.
The fact that you make-believe that the Americans sold more arms to Iraq than France tells me that you are not happy with these arms deals either. But you have not reached the point where you can blame your own country for its faults.
July 24th, 2006 at 2:09 pm
when superiority is measured in burning synagogues and dead Jews.
easy !
should I point actualität in Germany too ?
You should really, really give up your arrogance. It agrees with you, but it shouldn’t
yeah, old odd refrain, I supposed deserved, I wont argue that , and I really don’t care
But you have not reached the point where you can blame your own country for its faults.
yeah blaming me for not having known at the right time,ok , i’ll give you the point, but for your assertion the US didn’t have the privilege of being one of Saddam best arms providers, I would not be so sure if I were you, unless you are a detectiv, and know how to reconnect all anonym societies, transport sociaties and bank acompts in the world
an example :
Saisie de matières nucléaires de contrebande destinés à l’Iran
21.07.2006
Un camion transportant des matériaux radioactifs destinés à l’Iran a été arrêté mercredi à la frontière bulgaro-roumaine, a annoncé le directeur de l’agence de contrôle nucléaire bulgare, Serguei Tstatchev.
Le contenu du camion immatriculé en Turquie et affrété par une entreprise britannique « était destiné à Istanbul et à Téhéran », selon Tstatchev qui s’exprimait à la radio nationale. Le camion transportait des matériaux radioactifs, notamment du césium, sans disposer des autorisations nécessaires, a précisé le directeur de l’agence.
Le taux de radioactivité mesuré près de la cabine du camion était 200 fois supérieur aux taux normal.
http://WWW.IRAN-RESIST.ORG
July 24th, 2006 at 3:00 pm
“should I point actualität in Germany too?”
What does that mean?
“yeah blaming me for not having known at the right time,ok , i’ll give you the point,”
Not having known is different from claiming otherwise. You did not know who provided arms to Saddam; that is fine. But then just say it and don’t claim that the Americans had done it.
“but for your assertion the US didn’t have the privilege of being one of Saddam best arms providers, I would not be so sure if I were you, unless you are a detectiv, and know how to reconnect all anonym societies, transport sociaties and bank acompts in the world”
You still insist that the US must have something to do with it? Could it not be possible that the neo-cons are right and you are wrong and the US is not to blame?
“an example:”
Surely that was a truck coming from Britain?
July 24th, 2006 at 3:53 pm
you are arguing for an arguing pleasure
I did know who were arms providers, except percentage of each,
apparently in the official polls we have at great curse, nevertheless, the non official rents don’t appear in such quotations, and some informed people knew their existence too
as for last example , ment only that illegal trades exist, it doesnt imply UK is the provider, but the freighter
“The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 and the crisis of East and Central European countries also resulted in large and loosely controlled stockpiles of conventional weapons being offered for sale on the international market.(9) Smaller but more determined arms traders and brokers with access to cheap transport networks challenged the export markets of West European and North American arms manufacturers by exploiting these massive surplus stockpiles and aggressively targeting the most promising markets, often located in conflict-ridden ‘developing regions’…”
http://web.amnesty.org/library/index/ENGACT300082006
good boy, defend US morality !
July 24th, 2006 at 4:33 pm
“good boy, defend US morality!”
The collapse of the Soviet Union happened AFTER the arms sales to Iraq.
I can hardly agree with your theory that perhaps the Americans sold weapons from the former Soviet Union to Iraq after 1991.
It seems to me like you are convinced that the Americans are to blame for this and you are now trying to find a way for this to have happened.
And that, my friend, is prejudice.
You have decided that the Americans are the bad guys and facts don’t come into it.
You see to argue that the Americans are bad since they sold weapons to Saddam and that they must have sold weapons to Saddam since they are so bad.
But it doesn’t work like that.
You better confront your prejudices before it is too late for France. Your entire country seems to be on a slippery slope towards anti-Americanism and anti-Semitism. You are already were Germany was in the late 20s.
Don’t let it happen again. Not to France.
July 24th, 2006 at 4:34 pm
s/You see/You seem/
s/were Germany/where Germany/
July 24th, 2006 at 4:55 pm
“Operative psychologie” is still operationnelle I believe
you are twisting sentences and quotes for your aventage
but I won’t be your cobaye anymore, go fuck with your kindergarten stasi guis
July 24th, 2006 at 4:58 pm
You better confront your prejudices before it is too late for France. Your entire country seems to be on a slippery slope towards anti-Americanism and anti-Semitism. You are already were Germany was in the late 20s.
Don’t let it happen again. Not to France.
read better sources
July 24th, 2006 at 5:27 pm
Secret 2001 Pentagon Plan to Attack Lebanon
Bush’s Plan for “Serial War” revealed by General Wesley Clark
by A Concerned Citizen
July 23, 2006
GlobalResearch.ca
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“Five-year campaign plan, he said, and there were a total of seven countries, beginning with Iraq, then Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Iran, Somalia and Sudan”
According to General Wesley Clark–the Pentagon, by late 2001, was Planning to Attack Lebanon
“Winning Modern Wars” (page 130) General Clark states the following:
“As I went back through the Pentagon in November 2001, one of the senior military staff officers had time for a chat. Yes, we were still on track for going against Iraq, he said. But there was more. This was being discussed as part of a five-year campaign plan, he said, and there were a total of seven countries, beginning with Iraq, then Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Iran, Somalia and Sudan.
…He said it with reproach–with disbelief, almost–at the breadth of the vision. I moved the conversation away, for this was not something I wanted to hear. And it was not something I wanted to see moving forward, either. …I left the Pentagon that afternoon deeply concerned.”
Of course, this wholly consistent with the US Neocons’ master plan, “Rebuilding America’s Defenses,” published in August 2000 by the Project for the New American Century (PNAC)
And, as PNAC’s website ( http://www.newamericancentury.org ) notes, that the lead author of that plan, Thomas Donnelly, was a top official of Lockheed Martin–a company well acquainted with war and its profit potential.
It’s no surprise that Republicans are starting to talk about withdrawing troops from Iraq; the troops will be needed in Lebanon. And maybe Sudan and Syria?
Note:
More on General Clark–and his failure to mention all this in his pre-Iraq war commentary on CNN–is in Sydney Schanberg’s 9/29/03 article “The Secrets Clark Kept: What the General Never Told Us About the Bush Plan for Serial War” at http://www.villagevoice.com/news/0340,schanberg,47436,1.html
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=A%20C20060723&articleId=2797
July 24th, 2006 at 7:24 pm
Very eloquent, Nomad: “but I won’t be your cobaye anymore, go fuck with your kindergarten stasi guis.”
With French citizens like you backing France’s recent foreign policy, oil for food corruption, and arm sales to despots throughout the world, it’s no wonder that France is falling away from the west, surrendering its native culture to slip into becoming an Islamic state consumed by anti-americanism and anti-semitism.
Not a surprise: after all, the collaborationist French are the ones who invented Vichyism and Drancy in response to WW2. The americans were just the ones who, with the Brits and Russians, won the war.
(Drancy: http://fcit.usf.edu/holocaust/RESOURCE/GALLERY/DRAN.HTM)
Keep in mind that next time France falls into the hands of dictators the US won’t be providing a Pershing or Patton to bail you out.
BTW, how’s that vaunted French economy doing in an era of globalization?
How ’bout that Tour de France? Oops–won by an american (again!)
July 24th, 2006 at 7:34 pm
Did I call you doggy ?
your gettig lost,
here is your trip prank
http://www.fuckfrance.com/hot.html
July 24th, 2006 at 8:07 pm
one more thing doggy, if your a jew or even a german,
be aware of your ass , they ‘ll tare care of it !
July 27th, 2006 at 4:35 pm
Tour De France Winner Flunks Drug Test
By STEPHEN WILSON
AP Sports Writer
LONDON (AP) — Floyd Landis’ stunning Tour de France victory just four days earlier was thrown into question Thursday when his team, Phonak, said he tested positive for high levels of testosterone during the race.
Are americans able to win anything without cheat