Israel

[Zeuter]

[Herosbane]

wat

[Dr.Mellifluous]

I think it's supposed to contrast the experiences of victims on both sides, which is great in that it totally doesn't take into account when the reverse situation is true. Suicide bombing of nurseries and such. Both sides have done fucking terrible things. It's sad that it once again comes to this, but peace in the Middle East is years away, barring some world-altering event.

[Zeuter]

Journalism is always neutral.

[Gorbadoc]

some world-altering event.

Like if energy prices were no longer lowered by instability in the region.

[Kaz]

Oh no, not rocket warnings. Why those things occasionally but rarely kill a person! Maybe! Better bomb the fuck out of a city at the time of the day children are returning from school and kill a few dozen civilians just to send the message home

[GraveI]

Kaz, I remain fascinated by your viewpoints. Sometimes you surprise me.

[Kaz]

There's nothing defensible about Israel's constant use of disproportionate force and complete disregard for civilian casualties. They're basically waging the neocons' war on brown people by proxy.

[Half + Seven]

Sure the Israelis are overacting to it, but shooting rockets blindly isn't exactly situation appropriate either. How many rockets have to be fired, how many civilians killed before an Israeli response is justifiable? It's not like the rockets were just going to magically stop one day. It's really no different than the suicide bomber that blew up that school bus a while back. Don't pretend the "disregard for civilian casualties" is a one sided thing.

It's foolish and shortsighted to take sides in this fight. Both sides are equally culpable and pretending they aren't is ridiculous. The phrase "war is natural, peace is an accident" seems to apply to these people, they seem perfectly natural in a state of war. Short of one side disappearing I doubt there will ever be peace in the region.

Just for fun:
There's nothing defensible about Palestinian's constant use of rockets, suicide bombers and complete disregard for civilian casualties. They're basically waging the jihad's war on white people by proxy.

[Jester]

There's nothing defensible about Israel's constant use of disproportionate force and complete disregard for civilian casualties. They're basically waging the neocons' war on brown people by proxy.

What the fuck do you want from the Kaz? Hamas hides among the civilians and the civilians support them. If palenstinians REALLY wanted to stop the violence they would seek a better voice then through a splintered organization that violted the cease fire months ago. Israel is using a disproportional amount of force, but the western media is portraying them as goddamn devils for defending their sovereignty. If your neighbor everyday tossed grenades into your yard without any kind of repurcussion you would get a gun and go kill him. Its how the world works, the 8 year olds dont run over to the 12 year olds and kick them in the shin without expecting an asswhipping in return.

Both sides of this point are fucked, Hamas will keep abusing the situation to make things more complicated because they can, and Israel is going to use heavy force as an intimidation tatic to keep the neighboring countries from getting involved AGAIN. There is no win-win solution, one side has to loose, and Israel is holding better cards at the moment.

[Kaz]

Yes jester, you would get a gun and go kill him. Not bomb the entire city block because they "support him" since they did nothing to stop him for you. Also nevermind you've been aggressively "colonizing" his yard and bulldozing his shed. You get it.

As long as Israel keeps sabre-rattling and making no effort to use appropriate amounts of retaliatory force, I'll make no effort giving them the benefit of the doubt. The reason they get away with it is they have unlimited and unconditional support from the US. If they actually had to, you know, pay for their toys and face consequences for their warmongering other than bad press, they could very well behave more reasonably!

shit

Your entire fucking post is one huge equivalency fallacy. Oh no!! Some palestinians hiding among the populace also did some bad things, this makes completely annihilating infrastructure and entire city blocks justifiable to my uncritical mind!! Get out.

[Half + Seven]

Answer this question. How much is enough? When are they allowed to take action? How many rockets? Or how many civilians? You must realize the rockets weren't going to stop. Follow that train of thought to it's logical end. When can they take action according to you? And when is a reaction of the current magnitude justifiable in your mind?

There are two possibilities, you either pick never or some point. If you pick never, you're just as insane as the Israelis or Palestinians which is the root cause of the problem to being with. Thinking one side is right or justified in it's action just perpetuates the violence. Instead of thinking they're both right, they need to realize they're both wrong. This is unlikely to happen, as powerful people don't like to admit fault, and thus the conflict is likely to continue.

If your answer is an actual point, realize it was just a matter of time until it got there, so the result is inevitable. This just speed things along. And again the conflict continues on.

There's a common theme here. Even an "uncritical mind" like mine can figure it out.

[Dr.Willy]

Answer this question. How much is enough? When are they allowed to take action? How many rockets? Or how many civilians? You must realize the rockets weren't going to stop. Follow that train of thought to it's logical end.

Yes, please follow that train of thought to it's logical end.
Are the rockets going to stop now?
No.

Israel has two possible ways to solve this conflict. Either eradicate the palestinians or precisely assassinate radical leaders and come to a diplomatic solution.
However they seem a bit undecided about the way they want to take - which is why they will ultimately gain nothing other than maybe some practical training for their military.

Edit: Oooo, evil posting #666

[Dr.Mellifluous]

You people seem to be ignoring some of the fundamentals of the conflict. One is that for the Jews, the Holocaust was practically fucking yesterday. And like a traumatized child, disproportionate reactions to certain stimuli are to be expected. All brown people across the world have experienced much the same thing in relation to white-people thanks to colonialism. Add in some poverty, stir up some religious resentment, factor in limited fertile land and add weapons supplied by the two major Cold War players and presto-chango, you have our current middle east problem. Neither side is completely morally justified, but just as carpet bombing neighborhoods, hospitals and mosques is bad, so is targeting nurseries, dance clubs and or religious ceremonies with suicide bombers.

Of course I'm Jewish so my natural inclination is to say "fuck the Palestinians." But I've also been to Israel a couple times, and most people just want the fighting to stop, no matter who they are.

[Kaz]

You're misrepresenting the sides here. The *state of Israel* is bombing the fuck out of neighborhoods in retaliation to what a select few individuals are doing.

Tell Israelis who want the fighting to stop not to elect neocons every fucking election.

[Dr.Mellifluous]

I don't know how legitimate they are, but haven't studies shown that people with more conservative beliefs are simply more frightened by things? Everyone over there exists in a state of fear or suspended fear, so of course they're going to react in fear, and elect leaders who will protect them. Just like the Palestinians will continue to be led by Hamas, because both of these reactionary elements offer protection from fear.

So no, I don't believe I'm misrepresenting anyone. There are elements on both sides who are fully committed to eradicating the enemy, because that is a platform that offers relief from fear, and in Israel, they vote it in, in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, they subscribe to it.

[Jester]

Yes jester, you would get a gun and go kill him. Not bomb the entire city block because they "support him" since they did nothing to stop him for you. Also nevermind you've been aggressively "colonizing" his yard and bulldozing his shed. You get it.

As long as Israel keeps sabre-rattling and making no effort to use appropriate amounts of retaliatory force, I'll make no effort giving them the benefit of the doubt. The reason they get away with it is they have unlimited and unconditional support from the US. If they actually had to, you know, pay for their toys and face consequences for their warmongering other than bad press, they could very well behave more reasonably!

Your entire fucking post is one huge equivalency fallacy. Oh no!! Some palestinians hiding among the populace also did some bad things, this makes completely annihilating infrastructure and entire city blocks justifiable to my uncritical mind!! Get out.

No I dont get it, dont assume I get it because you repeat what nobody gives a shit about. Yes the palenstinians used to live there, but they havent in 40 years. Using that anymore is long moot, SINCE NO CARES. What exactly is appropriate amounts of retaliatory force when hamas attacks your civilians directly? If hamas wanted true peace they wouldnt have broken the CEASE FIRE. I dont give a fuck what one country does to another in time of war, because its goddamn war. Hamas acts like they are fighting a guerilla war and hide within the civilian population that supports it. Dont use civilians as meat shields if you dont want to toss them to grinder. Its dirty and it happens, crying about it on the forums when hamas provoked these latest attacks makes me want to drive up to canada and fucking falcon punch you in the uterus because of how ignorant you sound. And thats rare, you usually have a sound mind.

I regret saying this, but i agree with seven.

[Half + Seven]

I wouldn't go that far, but kindly enlighten me on what these options you think Israel had and passed on, and please be specific. I don't want an "anything but what they did" or "I don't know, but certainly not this". What should they have done? And more importantly, do you think it would have worked in ensuring lasting peace.

Yes, please follow that train of thought to it's logical end.
Are the rockets going to stop now?
No.

You seem to misinterpret my point, maybe I wasn't clear. The point isn't to stop the rockets, I've already stated what I think would do that and why I think it's highly unlikely to happen anytime soon. The point is to have Kaz find his own personal breaking point at which retaliation of this magnitude is justified. And then to realize that this point would be reached eventually and the outcome would happen anyway.

[Dr.Willy]

I dont give a fuck what one country does to another in time of war, because its goddamn war. Hamas acts like they are fighting a guerilla war and hide within the civilian population that supports it.

Yes, the Hamas is trying to (:roll:) fight a guerillia war.
...when exactly has long range bombardment ever defeated a guerillia?

If Israel wanted to assassinate the the responsible terrorists they could have done so mostly without casualties.
However they decided to randomly kill some civilians while they were at it.
That is not only pretty bad from a humanitarian point of view, but it also fails to solve the actual problem while at the same time it makes a peaceful solution impossible.

You seem to misinterpret my point, maybe I wasn't clear. The point isn't to stop the rockets, I've already stated what I think would do that and why I think it's highly unlikely to happen anytime soon.

Honestly, now that I understand your point i'm even more irritated.

Short of one side disappearing I doubt there will ever be peace in the region.

I'm quite certain people dont disappear magically. So since that isnt going to happen, someone would have to help.
Seriously, is that your preferred way to solve the situation?

[Jester]

If Israel wanted to assassinate the the responsible terrorists they could have done so mostly without casualties.
However they decided to randomly kill some civilians while they were at it.
That is not only pretty bad from a humanitarian point of view, but it also fails to solve the actual problem while at the same time it makes a peaceful solution impossible.

I'm quite certain people dont disappear magically. So since that isnt going to happen, someone would have to help.
Seriously, is that your preferred way to solve the situation?

You are still thinking in terms of conventional warfare.

They dont have the manpower or ability to go door to door and give every person they see a polygraph test while asking them if they are "terrorists". Thats how the "war" they are fighting works, you hide inside the population so that to eliminate them you have to wipe out the people. Its highly effective because war warriness tends to override any countries drive to get shit done. But it doesnt stop the war, it stagnates it while they take pot shots at their opponent and try to wear them down over time. You seem to forget that the same organization that is launching rockets is the ELECTED GOVERNMENT of those people, wiping out the leader doesnt accomplish anything because someone will just step up to take his place. There is to much bad blood right now for both sides to join hands together in peace, and both sides have pushed it to this point.

There is no end to this until one side leaves or a dramatic event happens that forces them to rely on each other. No outside force is going to be able to negotiate a peace treaty while both sides constantly work against each other. Ive never said that Israel wasnt going overboard, its just you guys love to ignore the other sides indiscretion and focus entirely on Israel.

[Half + Seven]

Seriously, is that your preferred way to solve the situation?

Who said anything about solving it? Maybe I'm just not being very clear. I see peace as essentially impossible for them. There is no way to solve the situation. I'm not going to take sides or be tricked into thinking one side is the victim. I don't blame Palestine for attacking and I don't blame Israel for reacting. These people seem perfectly natural in a state of constant strife, I have no problem letting them continue on.

[Kaz]

This isn't a guerrilla war. A guerrilla war involves an occupying force and a hostile civilian populace. You're pretty ignorant on the topic jester so you should probably stop now.

Anyway, the solution is obvious. Stop banging your cock around.

When you flatten a neighborhood and destroy necessary infrastructure like the power grid (first thing that went down), you send its people right back into worse poverty than they already were in and you make it even easier for vermin like hamas to take root.

What should be used instead are more reasonable, measured usages of force and a lot more diplomacy. Of course they won't do it because, in the tiny reptilian brains of conservatives, that would be "weakness".

I still can't fucking believe anyone thinks bombing cities for days is adequate retaliation for rockets. All they do is property damage. When someone actually dies it's almost a statistical anomaly. It's a puny, desperate effort to make some israelis feel a tiny bit of palestians' daily fear of the idf bombing the shit out of them or colonist bulldozers coming to raze an entire town

[Dr.Mellifluous]

And there's the fact that Israel holds all the bargaining chips. The Palestinians have only one, their behavior. So it's a bit of a catch-22 for them, either misbehave and get attention, or behave and be marginalized. The rest of the Arab world only cares about the Palestinians when they're being bombed so they can justify their continued hate of Israel.

Killing over 350 people is obscene, but this is a war with roots going back hundreds of years. Expecting either side to behave without someone telling them to is stupid.

And launching rockets into Israel isn't a puny desperate effort to create some measure of fear, it's a direct attack designed to maim and kill Israelis. The only reason it's puny is because the people are fucking poor, because Israel can smash their infrastructure into oblivion with ease. Sure it generates hate and is from a humanitarian view disgusting, but it's effective in preventing a solid power-base from evolving. And lots of other reasons but I'm sure you can come up with them on your own.

And I wasn't aware guerrilla warfare was defined by anything other than a smaller more agile force using the size of a much larger army against it.

[Kaz]

Well I suppose I made it too specific, but it definitely involves an invading or occupying force inside hostile territory which is the "home" of the smaller, more mobile one. Lobbing bombs over a border isn't quite the same

[Half + Seven]

What should be used instead are more reasonable, measured usages of force and a lot more diplomacy. Of course they won't do it because, in the tiny reptilian brains of conservatives, that would be "weakness".

That's your solution? Even you must see your own double standard. You expect the Israelis to act like god damn saints. The Palestinians can't do something as simple as honoring a ceasefire. Some how you deem that worthy of more diplomacy.

The attacks on Palestine allow "vermin like hamas" to take root, who in turn attack Israel, who in turn become more hostile and attack Palestine. Which came first the chicken or the egg?