tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9085092.post115281030226925385..comments2023-10-30T08:28:53.519-07:00Comments on The Bush Diaries: Middle East CrisisPeter Clothierhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11525159413387378704noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9085092.post-1152953421804349172006-07-15T01:50:00.000-07:002006-07-15T01:50:00.000-07:00Gringo,You are, in practice, calling for the oblit...Gringo,<BR/><BR/>You are, in practice, calling for the obliteration of the state of Israel, no? Is that any different from Hezbollah or Hamas? Or maybe you're just confounding radical/violent Zionism with the basic definition - that is, the call for a state/nation of Jews, especially in that territory.<BR/><BR/>I get your point about people using their own persecution as an excuse to persecute others - it's a horrifying phenomenon that has a tragic way of repeating itself - as it did in the form of Nazism and as it has in Bushie's catastrophic foreign policy (we were, after all, victims of 9-11). But it absolutely does not help to trivialize the trauma of some refugees and not others. Wasn't that your very point - that Palestinian/Arabic lives are trivialized compared to those of Israeli's?<BR/><BR/>If you really are concerned with equal rights,however, then you must also be willing to look at the systematic torture and injustices wrought by the tyrannical countries in that same neighborhood against their religious and ethnic minorities and against their own people. <BR/><BR/>I don't have much time to explain my earlier numbers - I was noting that the initial exodus of Palestinians in the late 1940's was parallel to the number of Jews expelled from their long-established (ergo 2600 years)homes in neighboring countries around the same time (1940's and 50's). Not that I condone either.<BR/><BR/>I don't know what the answer is, but I can tell you it's not a Nuclear bomb. That may be the key to Armageddon, though.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9085092.post-1152865960503671262006-07-14T01:32:00.000-07:002006-07-14T01:32:00.000-07:00gringosansborders,There is an entrenched history h...gringosansborders,<BR/><BR/>There is an entrenched history here. Israel's "20 of them for every one of us" military tactics are horrendous. Does that mean that the state itself should be wiped off the map? Should the US be wiped off the map for its genocide of the Native Americans? For its current policies in Iraq? What is your solution? Is it a final solution?<BR/><BR/>Your comment that destroying the state of Israel - a.k.a. "Zionist Israel" (Zionism being an ideology that supports a homeland for the Jewish people) - does not infer destroying all jews seems to ignore the complex history of Jews in the region. An equivalent number of jews fled or were expelled from neighboring arabic countries - Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Morocco, where they had resided (and often been persecuted and massacred and what-have-you) for as many as 2600 years - as palestinian refugees from the newly formed state of Israel in the late 1940's - somewhere around 700-800,000. This is not to justify the maltreatment of Palestinians by Israel or the disproportionate military capabilities and casualties.. it is to say that this is not Germany, and it's not Nazism either, even though there is extraordinary racism on both sides. <BR/><BR/>WHAT IS YOUR SOLUTION! for all of the refugees - Jewish and Palestinian?? Clearly violence is not the answer, but I ask you -What is the answer in the face of annihilation?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9085092.post-1152857589189581732006-07-13T23:13:00.000-07:002006-07-13T23:13:00.000-07:00Brit Tzedek Calls for US Intervention to Prevent F...Brit Tzedek Calls for US Intervention to Prevent Full-Scale Arab-Israeli War<BR/><BR/>Brit Tzedek v'Shalom, the Jewish Alliance for Justice and Peace, today broadened its call for urgent and substantive US and other international diplomatic intervention to stem the tide of rapidly escalating violence, following Hezbollah's breach of the internationally recognized border between Israel and Lebanon yesterday. The United States' largest Jewish grassroots peace movement condemned Hezbollah's killing of eight Israeli soldiers on Wednesday and called for the immediate and safe return of two others who were abducted then and of Corporal Gilad Shalit, who was abducted by Hamas on June 25th. <BR/><BR/>Additionally, Diane Balser, Brit Tzedek's executive director, issued the following statement:<BR/><BR/>"Without vigilant US and international leadership, the ferocious cycle of violence in the region that we have witnessed over the past weeks, since the kidnapping of Shalit and Israel's subsequent military actions in the Gaza Strip, is in imminent danger of becoming a full-scale war that could engulf the entire region. It is incumbent on the US and the international community to act now or to risk that the year 2006 could soon bear the same historic resonance as 1967 and 1973. <BR/><BR/>As Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs David Welch said Tuesday in Cairo, "This is a very dangerous but important moment, when the responsibilities of all those who are sincere about finding a path toward peace will be tested." <BR/><BR/><B>Dwelling on questions of blame and who struck first is a dangerous distraction that ultimately does a profound disservice to those whose lives are being jeopardized and increasingly lost in this conflict.</B> <BR/><BR/>The kidnapping of Israeli soldiers and the daily firing of rockets into Israel is unacceptable, and Israel has the right to use all legal measures to ensure the safety of its citizens. However, extreme retaliatory actions by Israel, such as bombing the only power station in Gaza and civilian targets in Lebanon, firing artillery barrages perilously close to civilians, subjecting the residents of Gaza to constant sonic booms at night, and sealing off the Gaza crossing points, are likely to exacerbate the situation, threaten the safe return of the abducted Israeli soldiers, and increase popular support for extremism by precipitating a Palestinian humanitarian crisis.<BR/><BR/>The history of this region has shown us time and again that peace will not be won through a war of attrition; for each soldier kidnapped and every military response that ensues, only loss accrues. It is time for the US and the international community to stand-up, so the increasing numbers of parties to this conflict can stand-down and can get back to the serious business of saving lives by negotiating a comprehensive, tenable resolution to this conflict." <BR/><BR/>Brit Tzedek v'Shalom, the Jewish Alliance for Justice and Peace, is a national grassroots movement 34,000 strong, that educates and mobilizes American Jews in support of a negotiated two-state resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9085092.post-1152826207361121212006-07-13T14:30:00.000-07:002006-07-13T14:30:00.000-07:00Well, now that this is front page news, I wonder w...Well, now that this is front page news, I wonder what Bush is doing behind the scenes? He always finds some radical little tidbit to jump into when everyone's attention is turned away from him. Penny's? Been wanting to get rid of those little neusciences forever..lol. You're right, they go in the little tray so I don't have to carry them around. So much is happening out there today that I turned it all off... too much for the brain today I'm afraid. You have a grand day there Peter:D!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com