Flotilla Update: Israel Attacks Convoy, Deaths Reported (2)

[crikkett]

I dont speak Arabic and never claimed to, please show me the post where I said I did, I am Jewish not arabic nor muslim, I speak Hebrew.

It's on Page 8.

My experience is having lived in Jerusalem and other areas of Israel for 27 years of my life including all of my youth and young adult and having worked my way through university working as a field reporter for several different Israeli media publications, some assignments which included actually living IN Gaza for a period of time AFTER 2007 when Hamas took control of the area and speaking personally with Hamas leadership and militant soldiers who admitted to me that ultimately they want every Jew gone from the region and that if given the opportunity to make good on that they would do it. I speak the language also, Alice is on the other side of this issue and so her and I wont see eye to eye on anything but I do have equal experience to hers when it comes to the Gaza and Israel specifically

I'll grant benefit of the doubt by assuming that English is not your first language. But you surely see how this leads people to think that you spoke the same language as Hamas leaders. If it's not deliberately misleading, what you wrote is certainly confusing.

I had an interpreter when I spoke with the Hamas subjects that were part of my assignment, I think that would be obvious to anyone paying attention since I have said countless times I am an Israeli and a Jew, therefore I would have no real reason to speak arabic.

Those of us who are neither Israeli nor Jew would not assume so since you said that 'you spoke the language' in a paragraph about working in Gaza.

I am not here to "Pwnd" anyone whatever the hell that means

That means you lost the debate to Alice. Pwnd is a slang term used by gamers, adopted from a common typo of the word 'owned'.

There's one last issue I'm still hoping you'll give us details on: you claimed more than once that Israel sends weekly shipments of humanitarian aid to Hamas amounting to 10,000 tons of material, and that you've personally witnessed Hamas agents turn away deliveries of humanitarian aid from Israel. I've not found any corroborating information in my internet searches. Can you help? Can you find an outside report? Can you give a detailed account of what you witnessed?

[JackRiddler]

I wonder if the pro-Israeli posters here would say whether they agree or disagree with the following four theses defined as central to the hardline Israeli mindset by Gary Leupp in an article today on counterpunch.org.

http://counterpunch.org/leupp06082010.html

But there are some who demand that we all accept a certain understanding of Israel. Everyone must, to avoid charges of anti-Semitism, agree on these points:

1. The establishment of the state of Israel was absolutely necessary, to prevent the annihilation of the Jewish people in a future holocaust. (This is of course an unproveable assertion. The global Jewish population today is about what it was in the 1910s---about 16 million---and if it is declining it’s mostly because of birth control and intermarriage. The prospect for future Auschwitzes seems minimal.)

2. The Jewish state must be within the boundaries of the ancient state of Israel, as it existed during the (legendary) reign of King David, as described in the Bible. It is the right of Jews to reconstitute that state, from which they were wrongly driven. It has always been theirs, no matter where they roamed. It is their “birthright” to live in Israel. (Tens of millions of Christian Zionists embrace this notion, noting that God, in the Bible, made the Jews his Chosen People and gave them that land. Enough said!)

3. The establishment of the modern state of Israel was the result of a just and humane struggle. The displacement of hundreds of thousands of Palestinian Arabs was their own fault, or a consequence of propaganda from Arab regimes urging them to flee. (Israeli historians like the estimable Ilan Pappe have effectively disproven this.)

4. The occupation of the lands invaded in 1967 is necessary as a security measure against Arab anti-Semitism, irrational anti-Jewish hate. (You can maybe advocate withdrawal from the territories, and even promote a two-state solution, without being called anti-Semitic. But if you note matter-of-factly that the occupation is against international law, is cruelly implemented, and produces enormous suffering, expect charges of anti-Semitism.)

It seems to me this is a fair description of what the ADL, AIPAC, Likud and hasbara brigades expect everyone else to accept, if they do not want to be branded as "anti-Semites." Comments?

[nathan28]

"nathan28"


my point exactly

the word holocaust was invented in the 13th century

it does not belong exclusively to one race

I do not deny your holocaust

but do not act like it's your word alone

To be clear what I mean to say is that there is nothing special, either in scope or method, about the Holocaust that makes it stand out when compared to numerous other ethnically-centered mass-murder campaigns that have not led to reparations in the same vein.

[17breezes]

I wonder if the pro-Israeli posters here would say whether they agree or disagree with the following four theses defined as central to the hardline Israeli mindset by Gary Leupp in an article today on counterpunch.org.

http://counterpunch.org/leupp06082010.html

But there are some who demand that we all accept a certain understanding of Israel. Everyone must, to avoid charges of anti-Semitism, agree on these points:

1. The establishment of the state of Israel was absolutely necessary, to prevent the annihilation of the Jewish people in a future holocaust. (This is of course an unproveable assertion. The global Jewish population today is about what it was in the 1910s---about 16 million---and if it is declining it’s mostly because of birth control and intermarriage. The prospect for future Auschwitzes seems minimal.)

2. The Jewish state must be within the boundaries of the ancient state of Israel, as it existed during the (legendary) reign of King David, as described in the Bible. It is the right of Jews to reconstitute that state, from which they were wrongly driven. It has always been theirs, no matter where they roamed. It is their “birthright” to live in Israel. (Tens of millions of Christian Zionists embrace this notion, noting that God, in the Bible, made the Jews his Chosen People and gave them that land. Enough said!)

3. The establishment of the modern state of Israel was the result of a just and humane struggle. The displacement of hundreds of thousands of Palestinian Arabs was their own fault, or a consequence of propaganda from Arab regimes urging them to flee. (Israeli historians like the estimable Ilan Pappe have effectively disproven this.)

4. The occupation of the lands invaded in 1967 is necessary as a security measure against Arab anti-Semitism, irrational anti-Jewish hate. (You can maybe advocate withdrawal from the territories, and even promote a two-state solution, without being called anti-Semitic. But if you note matter-of-factly that the occupation is against international law, is cruelly implemented, and produces enormous suffering, expect charges of anti-Semitism.)

It seems to me this is a fair description of what the ADL, AIPAC, Likud and hasbara brigades expect everyone else to accept, if they do not want to be branded as "anti-Semites." Comments?

Guy's a moron. What is and isn't antisemitism is not rocket science even if this guy is a space cadet.

[JackRiddler]

Guy's a moron. What is and isn't antisemitism is not rocket science even if this guy is a space cadet.

You seem to think simplistic zero-effort hit and run repetition of the same shit over and over wins for you. All you ever do is announce this is foolish, that's a moron, that over there is "anti-Semitic," Hamas wants "extermination" only, without bothering with definition of an own stance. This is why so many smell the troll on you.

[Simulist]

Guy's a moron. What is and isn't antisemitism is not rocket science even if this guy is a space cadet.

If "what is and isn't antisemitism is not rocket science," then it should be extremely easy for you to define — exactly — what it is and isn't.

[operator kos]

"Palestine belongs to the Arabs in the same sense that England belongs to the English or France to the French. It is wrong and in-human to impose the Jews on the Arabs....But if they must look to the Palestine of geography as their national home, it is wrong to enter it under the shadow of the British gun. A religious act cannot be performed with the aid of the bayonet or the bomb. They can settle in Palestine only by the goodwill of the Arabs. They should seek to convert the Arab heart."

[compared2what?]

PLEASE READ THIS.

IT CAN'T COMPETE WITH THOSE PICTURES I JUST GOT MY FIRST GLIMPSE OF IN IMMEDIATE TERMS.

BUT I WROTE IT TO BE READ, IN THE INTERESTS OF THE FORCES OF GOOD. AND IT'S MY SINCERE AND PROFOUND HOPE/BELIEF THAT IN MAY POSSIBLY, MAYBE, COULD-BE INCREASE THEIR SUM BY, POSSIBLY, PART OF ONE PERSON'S MIND.

IF HE OR SHE READS IT.

THANKS IN ADVANCE FOR INCREASING THE LONG ODDS OF THAT TO MORE THAN "ZERO."

Percival et al, re: Hamas & "terrorism" and Israel as victim

This may come as a shock to you, but propaganda on behalf of a state that is objectively based on armed robbery and murder and terrorism should not be trusted as a credible source of information about the causes of the bloodshed, or the 'true' motivations of its victims.

(1) No doubt wrt credibility part of it. I don't fully trust what any official spokesperson from either side of the dispute or any of the assorted interested third-party powers says beyond what I can confirm to a preponderance of evidence standard, personally.

I mean, there are some honest people of good faith on all sides, and some of them speak for the official record once in a blue moon. But since 99.9999 percent of the media almost always yawns whenever they do, that's pretty much a non-factor for practical purposes.

And....I'm speaking of roughly the last 45 years taken together, btw. So I could drag out some books and trawl through them for cites if you really wanted me to. But it would take a long time and a lot of who-what-when-where-why explanation wrt what the hell they were talking about, so I'm kind of hoping you won't really want me to do it. Because among other things, I wouldn't be able to until next week.

(2) To say that Israel as "a state objectively based on armed robbery and terrorism" is to speak a simple and unelaborated truth. So again, no doubt. It's also a truth that needs to be spoken by some and heeded by others if you have any hope of at all of achieving even a rudimentary form of the conditions in which the basic human dignity of the Palestinians and assorted other Arab peoples might plausibly be restored to them.

For that and other reasons, it's also a very politically and historically powerful truth. And that's no doubt thrice to the thousandth power.

Nevertheless, with nothing but love, sympathy, and support, I would and do assert that all by itself, simply and without elaboration, it's neither a very politically and historically substantive truth, nor a very politically and historically constructive truth, nor a very politically and historically informative truth.

And that's true even though it needs to be said. And also even though Israel is a state that's never had any very active Palestinian policy that wasn't exclusively based on armed robbery and terrorism and supplemented (or maybe compounded) by a whole slew of economic and other crimes committed in order to consolidate its hold on its illegal gains and conceal its guilt. (By which I mean: Even though it's justified.)

I'll try to explain the objective basis for that subjective distinction at least a little bit in the next installment of this reply.

On the one hand, there are the well-documented facts published by qualified historians (including prominent Israeli historians), international law and legions of eyewitnesses, all of which leave no question that the zionist enterprise was a crime against the people of Palestine from its earliest beginnings, one that is based on the denial of their humanity and all their basic rights, even their very existence.

And here we go. That's also politically and historically true.

Furthermore, it's also politically and historically substantively/constructively/informatively true. If and only if it can be taken for granted that everyone understands that:

(a) the secular agenda that led to the earliest beginnings of the zionist enterprise originated in the 1830s as an adjunct to British and/or American and/or German imperialist aspirations. Both mutual and competitive;

(b) the religious agenda that led to the earliest beginnings of the zionist enterprise also originated in the 1830s -- actually between the 1830s and 1860s, IIRC, but whatever -- as the primary goal of the Christian restorationist movement. Which was then popular in Britain, proto-German Austria, and the United States, although it's only popular and powerful in its current form in the United States;

(c) since the aforementioned secular and religious powers that invested their time, money and energy in realizing the zionist enterprise in its earliest beginnings back in the 1830s haven't yet realized the return on investment they're aiming for, they haven't yet cashed out of that enterprise. In fact, they've continued to invest in it, although (no doubt) those investments have changed imperial western hands at various points; and

(d) the contemporary shareholders who ended up inheriting enough of them to have an influential seat on the board of directors -- which emphatically includes the government of the state of Israel, especially the current fucking government of the state of Israel -- have very different and sometimes fiercely opposed and irreconcilable ideas about what kind of outcome would constitute a return on investment.

It's a clusterfuck, in short. And also a criminal confederacy that has many more crime families than the ones visibly holding the reins or manning the heavy artillery of the state of Israel.

And that's not just background trivia, for the obvious reason: Because if (or when) someone does get around to wiping the state of Israel as its currently constituted off the face of the map -- irrespective of who does it and for what reason -- the forces presently oppressing and destroying the lives of the Palestinian people would still be alive, kicking, oppressive, and homicidal.

From their point of view -- to again quote the Arab Nationalist you may or may not remember my having mentioned chatting with before, from whom I swiped the phrase:

"Jews, Arabs, they're all Arabs."

That's an exact and direct quote. But one might equally say:

"Arabs, Jews, they're all Jews"

If one preferred it that way. It would mean exactly the same thing over the very long haul.

Fuck. As so often, I'm now pathologically late. Forgive me for wiki-ing my way out the door by way of illustrating the above, but it's all I've got time for.

So for a little more sketchy detail on the earliest-beginning tangent that hooked up with and influenced Theodore Herzl, the very flighty and mentally unstable man popularly known as the father of the zionist enterprise, please see:

HERE;

HERE;

HERE; and***

HERE.
____________________

*** As a placeholder. I'll try to find something better and more comprehensible and switch it in if I do later. Hold on a second, I'll try to....Well. Never mind. I'll be back either soon enough or momentarily. But who really cares?

[compared2what?]

Powerful Jewish zionists -- both secular and religious -- entered the picture a little later. And are still in it as major players, of course. They (or....really, their successors, for the most part) are a major and primary constituent group in the criminal confederacy.

So I do not and am not disputing that.

I'm just interested in seeing justice done wrt the restoration of basic human rights and dignities to the people from whom they were stolen. And focusing solely on Israel or on the Jewish zionist agenda is never going to achieve that. Because Israel wasn't and isn't the sole perpetrator of the crimes whereby they were stolen. And the Jewish zionist agenda wasn't and isn't the sole motivation for the theft.

Justifying a plan to set up a violent, expansionist Judeo-supremacist state on Palestinian land would strain the resources of even the most sophisticated propaganda apparatus, even one that commands a bully-pulpit comprising most of the world's media conglomerates.

I'd say that the word "commands" had overly inclusive connotations in one sense. And overly narrow ones in another. Personally. But that's just what I'd say. So in honor of Delta Dawn, I'm just sayin' it.

Also, those British casualty statistics don't by any means demonstrate that Britain was so crippled by the conflict that it ceded the territory to the ferocious might of Israel, for which it was simply no match. And there are decades of subsequent events that make that not only perfectly clear but much, much too obvious to overlook.

It's certainly true that Israeli leadership of that time went out of its way on a number of occasions before, after and during that time that they had no interest in being a state that was, roughly speaking, the functional equivalent and adjunct of Turkey wrt complying with then-British-imperial interests in exchange for the semblance of autonomy.

And that says nothing at all about the respective naturally occurring national inclinations of Israelis and Turks, btw. Israel was just in a position to do what it did in 1948 that Turkey wasn't in 1918. Because regional proximity to oil and gas reserves didn't mean all that much in 1918. But by 1948, they not only meant a whole hell of a lot, they meant more than all the tea and opium in India and China put together. The latter being what Britain was interested in protecting when it had the upper hand in the process that dealt what's now (with a few adjustments) Turkey to the representatives of the former Ottoman Empire.

In addition to which, by 1948, Britain's upper hand was a lot less dominant than it had been in 1918. And however poorly reconciled the British then were to the fact that they were no longer the only interested nor the highest bidders, they weren't. They did try to bluff their way around that. And they did get bitch-slapped back to reality.

But they didn't get vanquished entirely, come on. It serves no one's interests to pretend otherwise.

Ben-Gurion, the spiritual leader: “As Ben-Gurion told Nahum Goldmann, president of the World Jewish Congress, in 1956, ‘If I was an Arab leader I would never make terms with Israel. That is natural: we have taken their country. Sure, God promised it to us, but what does that matter to them? Our God is not theirs. We come from Israel, it’s true, but two thousand years ago, and what is that to them? There has been anti-semitism, the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault? They only see one thing: we have come here and stolen their country. Why should they accept that?’”

Nahum Goldman was a despicable man in every way. He's all but unknown in the United States, though. I have no idea why.

Subsequently, the same methods were used to terrorize and expel the Palestinians from their homes and to strip them of all their belongings, which were then handed over to Jewish colonists. The process continues today. But Percival and 17breezes and barracuda are preoccupied with the safety of the zionist terrorists from their victims, and they demand that the rest of humanity to share their delusions. Black is white and 2+2=5. Palestine "belongs" to "the Jews" and it is the Palestinians who use terrorism in order to take what is not theirs.

I haven't seen barracuda say anything remotely resembling that.

He's pragmatic enough to think it's worth mentioning that the state of Israel is a country that comprehends not just the generals who run the show but also large numbers of the same kind of stupid, easily beguiled and feckless civilians who comprise most of the population of (for example) the United States.

They're not admirable, certainly. And it's my opinion, already stated wrt the U.S., that they're not innocent either. But they're not terrorists either. Or victims. Or victors. Their safety isn't a total non-concern to me either, and I wouldn't support any plan of action that didn't consider and protect it to the greatest extent possible. Plus, they're potentially educable and recruitable, which would be a huge asset to the Palestinians if they could pull it off.

Anyway. If barracuda merits inclusion on that list on the basis of the posts by him that I've read, you can add my name to it too.

I haven't read all posts by Percival or 17breezes, and given how high feelings are running with respect to the latter in particular, I'd really have to go back and review the entire record before I could responsibly remark on them.

So neither support nor opposition should be inferred from my silence wrt their positions or motivations, either by them or by anyone else.

Because in both cases, it's due to nothing more than my not yet having any idea if I know what I'm talking about or not.

[compared2what?]

...Alice is on the other side of this issue and so her and I wont see eye to eye on anything but I do have equal experience to hers when it comes to the Gaza and Israel specifically, I dont know what her experience is beyond Egypt, which strangely, itself supports Israel over Hamas in this matter, so even her own people, Arabs and Muslims are they are, recognize the menace that Hamas represents not only to Jews and Israel but to the entire region itself.

Alice may have not ever heard anyone express the above sentiment but I am also sure Alice isnt living in the heart of the Gaza, like I did on assignment for a period of 30 days, working directly and side by side, spending all of my days and nights with Hamas leadership and their militant soldiers/follwers.

Mine trumps yours, I bet. I lived for many years in Gaza during which I had torrid affairs with a number of Hamas' top leaders, and we spent intimate hours in the rubble of their bombed-out home whispering our deepest secrets into each other's ears in the afterglow of love against the backdrop of Israeli missile-fire and the screams of the dying and wounded. We hid breathlessly together from the occupation army and giggled like small children when they missed us. I participated in top secret strategy planning sessions with Hamas commanders and trained in guerrilla warfare in the refugee camps of Gaza and learned what nobody else knows about the men of Hamas. Their mothers taught me how to make maqlooba and nabulsi konafa as I cuddled their baby cousins in my lap and their uncles sang songs about Palestine and played the 'oud. So there. Hah!

_______________________

You're a remarkable writer, I note.

And not for the first time, either.

[17breezes]

Guy's a moron. What is and isn't antisemitism is not rocket science even if this guy is a space cadet.

You seem to think simplistic zero-effort hit and run repetition of the same shit over and over wins for you. All you ever do is announce this is foolish, that's a moron, that over there is "anti-Semitic," Hamas wants "extermination" only, without bothering with definition of an own stance. This is why so many smell the troll on you.

Pffft. You asked I answered. It's not my job to edumacate you all. You are a one stater; you want the end of a Jewish state. This is an antisemitic double standard since you only ever apply this shit to Israel. Whether YOU think it's antisemitic or not.

The troll accusation is just a convenient label to de-legitimize things you don't wanna hear and it's manifested itself here by creating crybabies who demand ME OR HIM.

[compared2what?]

Apologies if I missed your responses in the long thread(s).

I really think the troubles are as basic as two people seeing the same scrap of dirt as their holy birthright.

I really, really wish that actually was the basic nature of the troubles. Or even an irreplaceable key factor contributing to them.

But it's not, honey. Practically nothing geopolitical is ever that simple.

I guess I really don't see any solution other than both sides saying, "Fuck it! It's just a bunch of fucking dirt!" ... and both sides walk away. Or learn to share.

Despite which, I agree with you that one of those things -- preferably the latter, afaic -- is a key factor to the only thing remotely like a solution that I can imagine. Jews and Arabs got a common enemy in the west. Very roughly speaking.

I wish there were some way of making that immediate and compelling enough to Israeli Jews and Arabs that they'd stop fighting as enemies and start fighting as comrades. When they had to fight. Which I hope would be "Never." And marginally more realistically hope would be "Neither constantly nor continuously, at least."

[17breezes]

Apologies if I missed your responses in the long thread(s).

I really think the troubles are as basic as two people seeing the same scrap of dirt as their holy birthright.

I really, really wish that actually was the basic nature of the troubles. Or even an irreplaceable key factor contributing to them.

But it's not, honey. Practically nothing geopolitical is ever that simple.

I guess I really don't see any solution other than both sides saying, "Fuck it! It's just a bunch of fucking dirt!" ... and both sides walk away. Or learn to share.

Despite which, I agree with you that one of those things -- preferably the latter, afaic -- is a key factor to the only thing remotely like a solution that I can imagine. Jews and Arabs got a common enemy in the west. Very roughly speaking.

I wish there were some way of making that immediate and compelling enough to Israeli Jews and Arabs that they'd stop fighting as enemies and start fighting as comrades. When they had to fight. Which I hope would be "Never." And marginally more realistically hope would be "Neither constantly nor continuously, at least."

Never happen. Whether anyone admits it or not this is and has always been in large part a religious war. Too much hate on both sides.

[Simulist]

Guy's a moron. What is and isn't antisemitism is not rocket science even if this guy is a space cadet.

As I said earlier, if "what is and isn't antisemitism is not rocket science," then it should be extremely easy for you to define — exactly — what it is and isn't.

Whether it's your "job" to, or not.

[17breezes]

Guy's a moron. What is and isn't antisemitism is not rocket science even if this guy is a space cadet.

As I said earlier, if "what is and isn't antisemitism is not rocket science," then it should be extremely easy for you to define — exactly — what it is and isn't.

Whether it's your "job" to, or not.

You won't like it.