response 102 of 197:

Oct 12 17:45 UTC 2003

Richard once again shows his utter cluelessness:

>russ your problem is you classify all palestinians as murderers,

Wrong.  Read it again until you get it right.

>when only comparatively few have committed such acts.

It only took one crooked cop, one slimy district attorney and a
few credulous juries to send 10% of the black population of Tulia
to prison for crimes they did not commit.  I think we all agree
that this was an outrage and besmirches the whole state of Texas.

On the other hand, Israel has been attacked by the armies of Egypt,
Jordan and Syria (all at once).  These are not a comparative few
people, the armies represented the entire nations... yet you are
silent, which implies assent.  Your extreme prejudice is noted.

Finally, only a comparative few Palestinians are being displaced
by Israel's measures to recover stolen land and buildings (owned
pre-1948) and ensure secure borders.  They can be compensated.

>And what do you call using air missiles to take out the houses
>where israeli soldiers THINK, just think don't know for sure,
>that Hamas leaders might be.

That's ungrammatical, but I'll take it as a question.

I call it legitimate defense against those who commit acts of war
and crimes against humanity; in war, collateral damage is inevitable.
If the Palestinians want the Israelis to stop, they can arrest,
imprison and prosecute the various violent militants themselves.

Israel outlawed the Kach party and arrests any members who are
caught planning attacks.  Tell me, Richard, what has the PA done
to the Al Aqsa Brigades, which are part of Arafat's Fatah faction?
(As I recall, their modus operandi before "crackdowns" is to warn
the militants to go into hiding; when they caught some, they used
to release them within a few days.  That's why Israel started
attacking jails while the militants were there.  Dead militants
won't fit through revolving doors.)

The response of the PA to requests for action is to say "it would
cause a civil war".  If the bulk of the Palestinian population
would fight for the murderers of Hamas and Islamic Jihad, then your
claim that "only a comparative few" are responsible is a lie;
the majority share the moral guilt.

response 104 of 197:

Oct 12 20:48 UTC 2003

Murph, re#84:

> as long as [Jews] [a]re capable of living [in the West Bank] without
> trampling on anybody else's property rights or human rights in the process.

They are and do.

Let's don't forget that ALL the Jews living in the disputed territories were
ethnically cleansed in the Arab attack of 1948.

> As far as I can tell, the Arabs and Jews living in Israel tend to be capable
> of getting along. The Israelis and Palestinians lving in the West Bank don't

Interesting, isn't it, that Arabs & Jews can get a long where Jews are a
majority but not where they are a minority, eh?  And, with a few retaliatory
exceptions, it's not the Jewish "settlers" who are attacking the Arab
population.  (There have been a dozen or two Jewish terrorist attacks on Arabs
in the past 3 years.  An Israeli court recently sentenced 3 Jews to 15 years
in prison for attempted murder. In the same time period, there have been about
10,000 Arab terrorist attacks on Jews. Even those found guilty of murder by
Palestinian Arab courts continue to run free....)

response 106 of 197:

Oct 12 20:51 UTC 2003

Scott, re#90

> My real question is whether Israel has genuinely tried to "play nice"

Each and every time that Israel has lowered security levels -- allowed
Palestinian Arab workers into Israel, lifted curfews, removed checkpoints,
etc. -- Arab terrorists have used this to their advantage and renewed
their murderous attacks.

This is no different than what was said about Israel's 6-mile wide security
strip in Lebanon. If only Israel would play nice and withdraw, attacks on
Israel would cease. This argument was ignorant of history and ignored why
Israel entered Lebanon in the first place (because, even before it had any
presence there, it was being attacked by terrorists based there). Sure enough,
3.5 years after unilaterally and completely withdrawing from Lebanon, Israel
continues to come under attack from Hezbollah.

Tell me, why hasn't the Lebanese Army moved into the area vacated by Israel?
Why is Hezbollah, a terrorist organization, allowed to roam free here? (I
doubt this is the wishes of Lebanon but then it's not a free country, the
other 99% of it being illegally occupied by Syria which controls its
government.  Hmmm. Syria supports Hezbollah materially and financially.
Does that explain it?)

response 108 of 197:

Oct 12 20:54 UTC 2003

Slynne, re#101:

> Has Israel had major problems with Egypt since they gave back the Sinai?

No, but this is the exception that proves the rule.  (:

The sad reality, however, is that even after 25 years, the "peace" is
more like a "cease-fire", held in place via a $3 Billion annual ransom
which the US pays to Egypt.

http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=20020218&s=hammer021802

| "Our aim is to maintain the same hostile feelings toward the enemy." 

| Egyptian hostility toward the Jewish state has never really dissipated

| Mubarak is increasingly concerned, Western and Egyptian officials told me,
| that the escalating violence could spill over into Egypt, destabilizing his
| regime.

Hmmm. Perhaps Mubarak should have considered this before warning Arafat, prior
to Camp David 2000, that Jerusalem wasn't his to give away. (Remeniscent of
the Saudi Peace non-plan, Mubarak is like the Saudis. Absent during peace
talks, but worries about non-peace after-the-fact.)

| The Egyptian military keeps the country on a martial footing in order to
| justify its soaring budget, say political analysts. And, as in other Arab
| nations, the regime uses the intifada to divert popular anger over the
| imploding economy, corruption, and post-9/11 roundups of Islamic
| fundamentalists. "It keeps the people focused on an external enemy," says
| Negad Borai, a lawyer and human rights advocate in Cairo. 

| Meeting me at the Cairo airport, an Egyptian TV journalist suggested I hide
| my Israeli press credentials and anything else that would identify me as
| living in Israel. "If you're coming from Israel, people assume you're a
| Mossad spy," she said. 

| The Egyptian media have fueled this paranoia. Newspapers--both
| government-run and independent--claim that the Mossad is injecting the aids
| virus into the Jaffa oranges it exports. And during the recent Cairo trial
| of 52 homosexuals on charges of "defiling Islam," prominent papers doctored
| photographs to make it look as if several of the accused men were wearing
| Israeli military uniforms.

| Indeed, it's hard to find a public figure or organization that supports
| constructive dialogue with Israel. After some looking, however, I did come
| across one. The Cairo Peace Society bills itself as a foundation committed
| to improving relations with its neighbor across the Sinai. Headed by Egypt's
| former ambassador to the Soviet Union, it boasts a total membership of five
| people.

Be sure to read the rest of the article for yourself.
http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=20020218&s=hammer021802

response 110 of 197:

Oct 12 21:31 UTC 2003

Richard, re#96:

> you classify all palestinians as murderers, when only comparatively
> few have committed such acts.

That may be true, but this "minority" is supported by the MAJORITY.
And this minority is supported by the Palestinian Authority government.

> Killing innocent bystanders in the process.  That is murder too.

No, it's not. Israel TARGETS terrorist militants. That these terrorists
hide behind their own civilian population is not Israel's responsibility.
Israel's actions are within the confines of the Fourth Geneva Conventions.

Murder is intentional. Israel does not intentionally kill bystanders.
It takes great efforts to avoid this, at times endangering its own troops
to achieve this, as in Jenin last year. 

> Israeli forces have killed many innocent palestinians who happened to have
> the bad luck to be in the near vicinity of where they thought Hamas leaders
> were)

Luck has nothing to do with it. If the people were against the terrorists
(especially if they were a "minority"), they'd run them out of town. They
willingly shield the terrorists. As these civilians say, they are willing
to sacrifice themselves to do so. A minority disagrees, but speaking out
risks being labeled an Israeli "collaborator" and being strung up dead in
the town center.

But the overarching question is this: Why hasn't the PA arrested these
terrorists as it committed to doing (the Sharem Agreement of 2000, the
Tenet Agreement of 2001, the Road Map of 2003....). Why does the PA
continue to not just harbor but fund these terrorist murderers?

> Both sides have committed murders.

What a disgusting and false moral equivalence.  Does Richard truly not
see a difference between blowing up an ice cream parlor filled with
young families (or a pizzeria, or a school bus, or a disco) and with
inadvertant casualties while attempting to kill the people who organize
these terrorist murders?!

> why do you feel Israel has more rights than any other country in that region?

Because Jews have been living in this land, continuously, for 3300-4000 years
or more. Because Jews are the only people in history to ever establish a
nation on this land. Why do you think that invading Arab colonizers, many in
the last century and others over the last few -- more recently than the white
man's arrival in the new world -- have more national rights?

Why do you think that France has more rights to France than any other country?
Why do you think that Thailand has more rights to Thailand?

> Both Sharon and Arafat are egomaniacs who are doing a disservice to their
> people.  By acting so militant and staging military actions....

The difference, of course, is that Sharon wasn't in the Israeli government
when Arafat walked out of peace talks and resumed his violent "military"
ways (terrorism, the targeting and intentional murder of innocents).

Sharon was elected (and re-elected) by the Israeli people to combat this.
(Arafat, on the other hand, has postponed elections indefinitely.)

> Sharon is NOT working towards peace.  Sharon doesn't want  peace, he wants
> to win.  Arafat is the same way.  Both need to resign.

Another false comparison.

Arafat refused the Clinton compromise at Camp David because he wants to win
and because in the Arab world "compromise = surrender". Arafat was unable to
make peace and give up on his life long ambition to throw the Jews into the
sea. Contrary to his caricatures (which is really as deep as Richard can
think), Sharon has expressed a willingness to compromise and make peace, a
willingness to dismantle Jewish villages ("settlements").

Think about it. Arafat has headed Fatah since ~1958 and the PLO since 1968.
Sharon was a military man (not a political figure) throughout most of this
time and was first elected Prime Minister in 2001.  Yet Richard seems to
think that Sharon is responsible for the failure of peace throughout this
time period. I bet Richard can't even name all the Israeli PMs that have
been in government during the last half century (most of them were left
wing Labor party members, only 4 were right wing Likud members.)

response 112 of 197:

Oct 13 01:37 UTC 2003

richard, richard, richard.  We are so distraught.  You really know 
how to hurt people.  Please, tell us.  What have we done to have been 
excluded from your anti-Arab axis of evil??

response 116 of 197:

Oct 13 15:13 UTC 2003

Eh?? I too posted several pieces directly from sources. And no one 
bothered to reply to them. 

response 118 of 197:

Oct 13 17:33 UTC 2003

You were wrong, Dan. They're queueing up excuses.

gull: straw man argument.  I've used those sources myself before.
What I did was show that NPR has exhibited bias in their reporting.
But no "AP... BBC... [or] NPR" article contradicted something I said.
(I think this all came up after Jenin, when someone seemed to think that
NPR reporting a "massacre" made it true.)

(If gull feels differently, at least he can tell us what the "point" was, eh?)

sj2: I recall entering a lengthy post in response to something you said.
I don't recall you ever responding. It is possible that you missed it.
(Or that I missed it.)  But as you can see from Scott's excuse, no one
faults me for not responding but, oddly enough, for providing too much
evidence to support what I say....

Scott: Your source, which you originally hid, was electronicintifada.
Sorry if I was so thorough at refuting those lies that it was too much
information for you to handle. But you've been whining about that for
nearly 2 years now. Is that (and cut&pasting propaganda) all you can do?

Dan, I think you're seeing the tip of the iceberg. It's not just the
Jenin lies that various parties swallowed, hook, line & sinker.

As I've previously remarked, gull hasn't yet heard an anti-Israel rumor
he wasn't willing to believe (though when presented with evidence to the
contrary, he has to mull it over, research it, look into it, etc.)
Then, without having researched it, he'll regurgitate the same issue.

mdw has made similar statements, but thinks that because he grew up in
a Jewish neighborhood of NY he's immune to anti-semitism.

rcurl still refuses to accept that the majority of Israeli casualties
in the past 3 years were innocent civilians who were intentionally
murdered by terrorists (opposed to peaceful negotiation and compromise)
whereas the majority of Arab casualties were themselves combatants.
(In fact, despite the overall 3:1 Arab-to-Israeli casualty ratio, more
Israeli women, girls and elderly have been killed. Indeed, 50% of the Arab
population of the territories is female and 50% is 14 and under. Yet these
only account for about 5% of the Arab casualties, about 1/10th of what one
would expect if Israel was truly randomly bombing Arab population centers.)
But this doesn't suit his model so he'd rather ignore it.
(See responses #4 and #9 in this very item!)

Is this really any different than a town which is willing to believe that
any black boy would rape the white girl (and try & convict, if not lynch,
the nearest scapegoat) on the flimsiest of evidence yet demand tons of
proof to determine -- not guilt -- but innocence?

Indeed, no one questioned that Mohammed Ata (the 12-year old Arab killed
early in the intifada) was killed by Israel. The question was only if it
was intentional. Now the evidence shows he was killed by Arab fire, and
under very suspicious circumstances that suggest that he may have been
intentionally murdered to frame Israel. The very people who were outraged
over the death allegedly by Israel don't seem to care anymore.

The underlying assumption of the models we see is that the Jews are guilty.
Of what (not if) and if it can be made to stick is all that remains.

Jews cheat & steal in business transactions.
So why not believe that they "stole land" and "cheated" the Arabs?

Then there are the comments that Jews are arrogant, believe themselves
to be a superior "chosen" race who can do no wrong...

...And if this is what educated Ann Arborites believe, how much more
prevalent is this problem in the real world?

Oh, yeah. 9/11 was a conspiracy.
Organized by Mossad.
It was the Jews.

Isn't that right, oval?

response 120 of 197:

Oct 13 18:41 UTC 2003

An entry for the annual loony-left convoluted reasoning award??

Sounds like a sure winner to us!

response 122 of 197:

Oct 13 19:18 UTC 2003

(Sometimes it's just not worth the effort.)

response 124 of 197:

Oct 13 20:00 UTC 2003

I think lk is paranoid about beig hated. In Asia, except for the middle-
east (which is very small population-wise), people do not even notice 
that jews exist on this earth. Much less hate them. 

Although, I never see any reason to hate a particular community but 
hating jews?? Why?? 

I think lk goes to great lenghts towards giving evidence in support of 
his arguements and tries to argue very honestly but it would help a lot 
if he stopped assuming that the world is full of Israel/Jew haters. Or 
that there is some huge conspiracy to get rid of all jews in the world.