The only mocking is being done by the Palistinians, and they think they can get away with it because of imbeciles like you, Ulianov.

Check out what Governor Palin said to Katie coo coo chick. The Governor of Alaska saw this comming down the pipe...the Demos...were and are lulled, all of the time! The terrorists 'dream team' in America is about to take over, they would not be so bold if the other team had won.

I can't believe ulianov would compare armed Palestinians and their supporters to Jews in Nazi Germany. How tasteless can you be? :\ Are you even aware you just likened Zionists to Hitler?

I can't believe ulianov would compare armed Palestinians and their supporters to Jews in Nazi Germany. How tasteless can you be? :\ Are you even aware you just likened Zionists to Hitler?

400 plus dead Palestinians vs. 4 dead Israelis.
Yep, it's a mockery alright.

Posted by: ulianov at January 2, 2009 2:40 PM

I believe the correct term is "winning".

In retrospect it might have been a better idea to carve off a piece of Germany and give THAT to the Jews as a homeland, rather than giving them a chunk of Palestine. After all it was the bloody Germans who were persecuting the Jews AND they'd lost the war to boot. Leave the hothead fanatics to their barren wasteland.

Looks like "Green Helmut Guy" has shown up in Palestine.

http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/7286

Edward- As long as there were still Germans living near by, the Jews were still at risk.

Looks like some Muslim journalists lost their ammunition. Check it out.

http://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2009/01/02/Shoe_avalanche_snarls_Miami_highway/UPI-97041230923829/

Don't worry about ulianov, it's just a middle school kid (obviously from his/her reasoning skills).

It takes a special kind of stupid to compare war dead as a means of determining who is in the wrong. Ulianov has done that beautifully. Congrats idiot.

Pallies always ham it up on camera too. Compare photos and footage of them with people after 9/11 or the Oaklahoma City bombing. The Muzzies literally do stuff like tear their hair out. It looks so fake. No one is ever "in shock" -- they seem to be looking for the nearest shutter so they can start mugging.

PS Ulianov, that ratio sounds pretty good to me. People who weaponize their own children deserve everything they get.

From comments at seriously deluded, immoral Canadian but 'progressive' B lahg.

"Annual odds of an Israeli dying in a Palestinian terrorist attack are 2 in a million! Israelis killed MONTHLY in traffic accidents: about 45. Israeli deaths annually from obesity: 43. Those Palestinian terrorists are SO scary!"

Oh, yeah, Israel should just put up with the rockets & mortars. What possesses these people to root for terrorists, who would murder them in an instant?

Ammunition picture here:
http://news.yahoo.com/nphotos/Thousands-shoes-snarl-Miami-traffic/ss/events/us/010209miamishoes

Those pictures are amateur hour. Qana was real Pallywood, back in the day when Hisbollah torqued the MSM, mutilated dead children for better pictures, violated the dignity of corpses . . the usual sick, demented stuff we have come to expect from these mental midgets.

http://tinyurl.com/zd668

There will always be the MSM fools who will cover for the Hamas soldiers who hide in schools, mosques and hospitals because they are gutless cowards who care not a whit about their won people. The idiots who won't report about Hamas refusing medical treatment for their people because more dead children is what they want. The compliant mental turds who report on "starvation" in Gaza when the UN says it can't accept anymore food shipments from Israel because the warehouses are stocked to the rafters. The simple minded internationalist fellow travelers who complain that Israel is launching terror attacks when the IDF goes to the trouble of hacking Hamas TV and Gaza cell phone networks to warn people about the next Hamas targets to be destroyed.

But there will always be those afflicted with pseudo concern about "400 plus dead Palestinians vs. 4 dead Israelis" as their way of covering for their cold blooded hatred for Israel.

Go IDF go, this is the time to destroy Hamas. I'd say bomb them back to the stone age, but for Hamas and Hisbollah, the stone age would be a few steps forward on the enlightenment scale and I don't think you can bomb these sick demented death loving terrorists "forward".

Sadly, Israel is going to lose this war too, just like Lebanon 2006.

Re: Pallywood Productions Inc., what I find so depressing is Israel's failure to fight the propaganda war, which will decide this conflict.
Remember the Al Dura hoax (the staged "murder" of a Pali pop and son by Israel's IDF) perpetrated by French TV. Even when it was uncovered, after becoming the chief icon of Intifada #2, Israel remained silent about it. If I'm not mistaken, they didn't even show up in the French court.

If the victim of Pallywood fails to defend itself, hard to imagine MSM changing its tune.

Israel has very bad press because it's overly concerned about having very bad press!

There is nothing easier (or more fashionable) than sitting back and criticizing the Isrealis when one is safe and sound in North America.

I would submit that those morally and intellectually challenged cretins that persist in labelling any Israeli response as "dissproportionate" would, if a rocket was to land within a 5 block radius of their homes, promptly lose control of their bodily functions. After recovering their composure and changing their pants, they would immediately demand that such rocket attacks be stopped by whatever means possible.

Keeping score of losses on both sides would somehow become irrelevant.

I doubt all of these pictures are "fancifully posed pictures":

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2008/12/israel_and_gaza.html

Worth a view.

400 plus dead Palestinians vs. 4 dead Israelis.
Yep, it's a mockery alright.

Posted by: ulianov at 2:40 PM

==========================================

most of those 400 are Hamass fighters (ie;soldiers in this context)

what would you suggest the Isrealis use, rubber bombs????

Did you ever notice how leftholes never bring up Darfur? Innocent Darfurians continue to be slaughtered at a rate that far exceeds the current death rate of the paleostinians who either kill themselves or leave others with no choice but to kill them in self defence. How cum leftholes never honestly ask themselves what they would demand from their government if a group of terrorists was constantly aiming rockets at their families? It must be great being a lefthole; you never have to think. You just wait for the left wing intelligentsia to rationalize the actions of any anti-Western or anti-Judeo-Christian group and then pick up the lame talking points and blindly toe the party line. Useful idiots indeed.

Uli. If you care to see some of the reasons for the high casuality rate http://gatewaypundit.blogspot.com/ and
http://www.mypetjawa.mu.nu/ should provide more reasons then the ones you choose to ignore.

Baby pictures with guns, Awww.

Ulianov/Iberia just left out a word:

"400 plus dead Palestinian -soldiers- vs. 4 dead Israeli -soldiers-.

He forgot to mention the Israelis only target known missile sites and known Hamas military (terrorist) targets. That Hamas puts these things inside mosques, hospitals, schools, homes with kids in them is not something under Israeli control.

ulianov also forgets all the Israeli non-soldiers who have gotten hit lately. Somewhat more than four.

ulianov is a textbook example of the kind of convenient memory that makes the Left everything it is.

EyesWideShut, leftholes have an easy replacement for thinking. Invert the truth and run with it. Simple.

I doubt all of these pictures are "fancifully posed pictures:
Posted by: Raphael Alexander at January 2, 2009 3:31 PM

I don't think anyone here is idiotic enough to suggest that ALL of the pix are fancifully posed.
C'mon, man, that the lamest lefty debating tactic there is: the "not all" _____ are ______.

Thanks for the link. I especially enjoyed the one of the dozen or so dead "Palestinian Policemen" aka as Hamas terrorists who want not only all Israelis dead, but you too Raphael.

Me No Dhimmi,

If you care, I have several articles covering why I think Israel has the right to defend itself by any means necessary. Click on my link if you are so inclined.

Oh, and, I'm not a lefty. But I did once make a left turn in my car.

400 plus dead Palestinians vs. 4 dead Israelis.
Yep, it's a mockery alright.
Posted by: ulianov at January 2, 2009 2:40 PM

--Most of the (allegedly, mind you) dead 400 "Palestinians", my dear Ulianov, are believed to be Hamas terrorists, not necessarily civilians (as alleged by Pallywood sources). Further, according to Debka File, the Hamas terrorists have traded in their terror apparel and donned their fake-innocent "civilan" rags, in anticipation of IDF ground forces' coming to get them. You know, posing as civilians amongst civilans whilst acting as combatants is a war crime, and of that, Hamas is guilty. Besides, my dear Ulianov, Hamas deliberately placed their warmongering apparati directly within densely-populated-by-innocent-civilians areas, fully aware that this would eventually bring forth retaliation that would almost certainly take non-targeted collateral casualties as well as actually-targeted enemy-combatant casualties.

As for the MSM, what does one expect? They will, with arrogantly reckless impunity and delusions of entitlement, post pure, unadulterated lies from known liars. And I, a mere part-time, hardly-so-well-known, blogger, have been slammed for simply linking to other sites who mistakenly posted stuff without first scrupulously verifying the claims and vetting the claimants... well, I'm but an amateur, of course, not a big-time, Big-Media giant who knows better...

The Big Media is all too happy to take Pallywood propagandists' lies as if credible accounts by scrupulous sources as if they were already proven to be without bias and without agenda. What is the Big Media, anti-Israel/anti-Semite, then? Fingers need to be pointed at Big Media as well as the Hamas/Pallywood propagandists, who would very much impress infamous propagandists.

Anyone who automatically believes what "Palestinian sources" and the Big Media, who give them their voice, say about what Israel allegedly has done to "Palestinians" is to be considered a dupe.

Raphael Alexander, thanks for the clarification.
Glad to hear that you are an unflinching defender of Israel's right to defend itself.

However, I didn't call YOU a lefty. I said it was a lefty construction, the "not all _____ are _____ which you used in that post.

Odd, tho', that as a strong defender of Israel's right to defend itself, you'd post a link from the uber-liberal Boston Globe showing gruesome pix of dead Israeli enemies.

Don't ask me why, but I was watching the Ceeb the other night and they had footage of Pali kids in the hospital with blood streaming down their faces. You could see from a mile away that the parents had used the old wrestling trick - one quick slash with a razor to the scalp and out gushes the blood. I guess they watch the WWE in between viewings of the Protocols Of The Elders Of Zion.

Next clip, the Ceeb had a "live" explosion of an Israeli bomb! That's right, some Palis just happened to standing around, someone just happened to have a camcorder, and the Israelis were kind enough to drop a bomb that had all the pop of a pack of firecrackers - enough to make some noise but not enough to do much damage. The staging was so lame, but the Ceeb dutifully ran it.

AND

the Hamass target not only Israeli civilians, they also target palestinians Christians crossing over to the west bank at Christmas time

makes one wonder about the leftards morals when they ignore these facts

Ok,ulianov, you caught me. Hamas doesn't actually have soldiers. They have half trained killers who couldn't beat a troop of Boy Scouts in a stand-up fight.

The Israelis, they have soldiers.

Me No Dhimmi,

Sorry, I misunderstood you. Also I was not aware that Boston.com is liberal publication, but I do think their photography blog is phenomenal. Anyway, I recognize that Hamas fakes civilian casualties, and that's unfortunate since it makes it difficult to distinguish between the real ones.

How do you tell a soldier from a civilian? They're being taught to hate the Jews, almost from birth. There can be no bloodless resolution to this situation.

What really astounds me is that most of the Gazan workforce is employed in Israel. The rest live off humanitarian aid. Not a lot of redeeming social qualities in that little strip of land.

What an ugly post, ugly blog, and ugly blogger.

Ulianov - accept it. Its a good old fashioned Israeli ass-kicking. Exactly what Hamas deserves and I hope they don't stop until every one of those terrorists are with their 72 virgins.

ulianov -- let's see some proof there's 400 dead in Gaza at all. For some reason, I have some difficulty accepting "official" Hamas estimates.

Remember the Jenin non-massacre?

What really astounds me is that most of the Gazan workforce is employed in Israel.

That's why so many Pali claims to a "right of return" are phony. Many so-called Pali fore bearers came to the area from surrounding Muslim countries as the Jews provided a means of living as they improved the land and introduced industry (Arafat btw was an Egyptian). The claims of their descendants to the land are fraudulent.

MSM must have this wrong. It should read "target" Israel, shouldn't it?
Why is Egypt walling out the Gazan Arabs? Why protest Egypt's wall? Isn't Egypt a Muslim nation?
If it's correct, as MSM would put it; It's a landmark, a breakthrough, a looming threat to the "Middle East peace process" and the "Israeli military clampdown".
...-

"British protestors target Egypt over Gaza conflict
AFP - 31 minutes ago
LONDON (AFP) - Protestors rallied outside Egypt's embassy in London on Friday, urging Cairo to open its border with Gaza, in the latest in a week of demonstrations here over the Israeli military clampdown."

Funny, I was just saying the other day how I haven't gone here in quite a while.

Excellent insight on why native born muslims seem to cause trouble by George Jonas;

"We accept being outsiders in someone else’s country more easily than in our own, and we regard the country in which we’re born as ours (with considerable justification, I might add.) That’s why, if unassimilated “diverse” communities produce misfits, malcontents, traitors or outright terrorists, they’re more likely to produce them in the second or third generation. The jihadist is the native son rather than the immigrant father. (“If you can’t join ’em,” one said when interviewed, “lick ’em.”)"

"What an ugly post, ugly blog, and ugly blogger."

Posted by: Grossed Out

It never ceases to amaze me how the leftist mind filters out reality and then becomes incensed when it's exposed. What a strange little world, stored in a strange little mind.

Even more strange, is that they come here of their own volition and lay blame. As if they've been forced.

Odd creatures.

The Canadian Sentinel

Very well said. Now I have nothing to rant about (O:}

Goggle “Palliwood”

That is all any doubtful person needs to do and then see the evidence of the Palestinian media farce that is pulled over the worlds eyes and most importantly sympathies. This is not crying wolf – it is about lying to the world to meet an agenda 100%.

If you can believe that one of these fictitious demonstrations is staged, then you can assume that the whole “plight” of the Palestinian people is a great dramatic work of fiction on the world stage!

Well, I'm certainly not a 'leftist' but I disagree with most of the comments here. For once, I agree with ulianov.

With regard to Egypt's closure of the border, what I understand about the situation is that Israel would like Egypt to take over, to assume control of Gaza (ie, take over from either Hamas or Fatah or..). Egypt doesn't want to do this. That would solve the problem of Gaza as part of a proposed Palestinian nation, i.e., it would become part of Egypt.

Gaza, as a land base, a bit over 300sq km, has some arable land, but the closure of the Israeli borders to exports and most imports has reduced the economy to nullity, mostly small scale handcrafts and peasant agriculture.

My guess is that what Israel would really like would be for Egypt to take over Gaza, while Israel settled all of the West Bank - with the Palestinians of the West Bank leaving for other countries.

In other words, I don't see any future for a Palestinian state.

And again, for the zillionth time, Islamic fascism has nothing to do with the I-P situation. Each one would have emerged without the other.

Islamic fascism emerged in the 19th c. as a reaction to the colonial style industrialization of the ME oil countries which, however, retained their tribal hierarchical control of the population rather than developing an empowered middle class. Islamic fascism seeks a 'return' to a pre-industrial state - an impossibility, but all utopias are impossible.

The I-P conflict is over ownership and use of a land base. Nothing to do with tribalism, the lack of a middle class, or a return to a pre-industrial non-democratic era.

"Son of Hamas leader converted to Christianity & now gives glimpse into Hamas (video embeds)

Mosab Hassan Yousef was born the son of Sheikh Hassan Yousef, one of the most influential leaders of the militant Hamas organization in the West Bank. He converted to Christianity, moved to the U.S., and now provides the world an inside look behind Hamas.
(Excerpt) Read more at darkskiesblog.com ..."
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2157838/posts

And again, for the zillionth time, Islamic fascism has nothing to do with the I-P situation.

And maybe by the baz-zillionth time you'll get it through your thick head that it has everything to do with it, and that Islam has been fascist from Day 1.

maz2, thank you. That was an amazing article, maybe because it follows my thinking, that the situation in Israel has become unreal and nobody seems to know why they are fighting- hatred on all sides with a total lack of empathy for the other position or experience.

Please, all of you who have commented on the Gaza situation, read this article. Those who seek to fully blame the other are the true obstacles to peace.

Very formidable obstacles, I must add.

from: Moral Clarity in Gaza

By Charles Krauthammer
Friday, January 2, 2009; A15

"Late Saturday, thousands of Gazans received Arabic-language cell-phone messages from the Israeli military, urging them to leave homes where militants might have stashed weapons.

-- Associated Press, Dec. 27

Israel is so scrupulous about civilian life that, risking the element of surprise, it contacts enemy noncombatants in advance to warn them of approaching danger. Hamas, which started this conflict with unrelenting rocket and mortar attacks on unarmed Israelis -- 6,464 launched from Gaza in the past three years -- deliberately places its weapons in and near the homes of its own people.

What ensued (after Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005? This is not ancient history. Did the Palestinians begin building the state that is supposedly their great national aim? No. No roads, no industry, no courts, no civil society at all. The flourishing greenhouses that Israel left behind for the Palestinians were destroyed and abandoned. Instead, Gaza's Iranian-sponsored rulers have devoted all their resources to turning it into a terror base -- importing weapons, training terrorists, building tunnels with which to kidnap Israelis on the other side. And of course firing rockets unceasingly.

The grievance? It cannot be occupation, military control or settlers. They were all removed in September 2005. There's only one grievance and Hamas is open about it. Israel's very existence."

But the ulianov/ETs of the world think it is Israel's fault that the Arabs have not done anything with the greenhouse industry, etc. How could those victims of Zionism possibly get busy with their own nationbuilding?

What exactly is wrong with the Arabs of Gaza being part of Egypt? They were part of Egypt from 1947-1967 and no one was shouting for them to have their own state or charging Egypt with denying them their rights to statehood?

The I-P conflict is over ownership and use of a land base. Nothing to do with tribalism, the lack of a middle class, or a return to a pre-industrial non-democratic era.
Posted by: ET at January 2, 2009 6:47 PM

ET, I enjoy your postings on SDA, and generally agree with your analysis, but I think in this case you may want to re-think matters.

It occurs to me that you are nominally correct that the I-P conflict is not steeped in Islamic Fascism. However, I posit that the I-P conflict has been hijacked by Islamofascist interests and the two are now irreparably joined. Were the situation in Gaza solely about use of a land base, one would think that Gaza, now three years after the Israeli departure, would be something resembling a nascent nation-state by now.

Instead, we see the situation in Gaza as bad as it's ever been, primarily due to the influence of the Iranians, fighting a proxy war through Hamas.

Ulianov; stop and think about what you just wrote.
In effect you've published proof that there IS NO Zionist conspiracy and especially that (we) Jews DON'T speak with a single voice, and that there is no pro-Israel seamless control of the media. Certainly not in Canada.
My sister and her family, for the first time in my memory, are now within missile range of the homicidal psychopaths of Hamas, so you'll pardon me if I regard your opinion with the disdain it so richly deserves. Ashdod.
http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=31.788614,34.830194&z=8&t=h&hl=en

Canadian Sentinel:

I find it amusing how you and other right whingers complain about pro-Palestinian bias in the media when Canwest is owned by the Aspers and the CEO of CTV Globemedia's is Ivan Fecan. Zionists with a pro-Palestinian agenda?
Posted by: ulianov at January 2, 2009 7:07 PM

--Well, Ulianov, I wonder if you'd call George Soros a "pro-Israeli" and an "anti-Palestinian", then, seeing as he, too, is Jewish? Ditto Noam Chomsky?

ex-liberal, thanks for the link and for your excellet contributions to this debate.

Here's a similar piece.
Dershowitz: Israel, Hamas, and moral idiocy

I always try to counsel doubters to not dismiss Dershowitz because he's a Jew. He's a VERY liberal Jew, a Harvard prof, a man who is not afraid to criticize aspects of Israel's behaviour in the conflict, esp. the issue of the "settlements". His book The Case for Israel is must reading.

ulianov said:
I find it amusing how you and other right whingers complain about pro-Palestinian bias in the media when Canwest is owned by the Aspers and the CEO of CTV Globemedia's is Ivan Fecan. .

This, gentle sir, is a grotesque fallacy -- that Jews are necessarily Zionist. Far from it. For example, Noam Chomsky's accolyte, the despicable Norman Finkelstein, is a rabid Israel-Zionist hater despite his parents being Holocaust survivors.
Moreoever, most of the political, media, and academic elites of Israel are themselves "post-zionists", unwitting (presumably) advocates of Jewicide.

BTW, Ulianov, I was referring to the Big Media in general. I never indicated I meant 100% of it- certainly, sometimes, some of them do demonstrate a semblance of integrity, to their credit.

But by and large, the generally-observed end result of Big Media saturation of the public consciousness is to make a lot of folks, particularly those guillible and naive enough to lean Leftwards, believe that Israel is somehow some gargantuan, mean, old, a-stompin'-on-y'all Goliath and the "Palestinians" some innocent, downtrodden little Davids, when the truth is that Israel is David and surrounded by the Goliath of the massive, overwhelmingly-hostile-towards-Jews-in-the-neighborhood Islamic World and a misinformed International Community who thinks that the Good Guy is bad and that the Bad Guys are good...

Ulianov has proved himself on here to be a Radical Leftist who hates the West and hates Jews. He has indeed proved this over & over & over again.

ET is a completely different matter. I've long respected her views. So let me pose a question to you, ET: "If you were the PM of Israel, precisely what would you do to resolve this matter AND protect your citizens?"

I'd sincerely like to know.

I could use some assistance in interpeting the picture of the 4 yr old wrapped in a yellow flag. Are the palistiane's the new super norse of the world. I figure that I am of average size although I must admit a little vertically challanged for my perfict weight. I was looking at this picture with three adult (at least in age) men carrying her so I went and measured myself across the sholders and came out at aprox 21 inches. Then using a very complicated mathamatical formula determined that this 4 year old girl with the 20something hair do stood about 5'9" tall. So what I need to know is if she'd been allowed to live to puberty Just how tall would she have been????

Here's the latest from the home page of Reuters.com:

Israel's offensive is a violent sequel to a drive led by the U.S. to punish Hamas for resisting a discredited "peace process," analysts say.

And then this link below: "Civilians take brunt of Gaza campaign"

I actually made the effort to read the 2nd story. That headline is not even substantiated by the "facts" of the story, and who knows if they're even true.

There really is a HATE-ON for Israel and Jews in general amongst MSM outlets like Reuters, isn't there?!

Let’s recap, shall we?
The Brits carve 75% off of Mandate Palestine and create the Palestinian state of Trans-Jordan. Jews are forbidden from living there, even though parts of that territory are considered part of historical Israel. The remaining 25% of Mandate Palestine is intended to be the new Jewish homeland.
The Arabs in this 25% of Mandate Palestine, who haven’t lost a stitch of land to this point, carry out a series of pogroms against the Jews. Just to be consistent, their leadership spends time with Hitler in Germany.
The U.N., caving to Muslim aggression, decides to create a second Palestinian state from that 25% originally set aside for the Jews.
The Jews accept and create the state of Israel. The Palestinians do not accept; they along with neighbouring Arab states attack Israel but are defeated. In the conflict close to 1 million Jews leave their ancestral homes in Egypt, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Yemen, etc. and flee to the new state of Israel. Some Palestinians leave Israel on the encouragement of the attacking armies, thinking that they’ll be able to return after Israel is quickly dispatched.
At war’s end Egypt has control of the Gaza Strip and Trans-Jordan has Judea-Samaria (West Bank).
In conclusion, Israel starts off with 25% of the disputed territory. Then they lose even more when the U.N. decides to set up a second Palestinian state. Slightly under a million Jews have walked away from their homes, never to return, never to hope to return, and never to be compensated.
And yet amazingly there are no Jewish suicide bombers. There has been no launching of rockets into Jordan to recover lost land. There is no show on Israeli television with a mouse like Farfar that teaches kids to hate arabs. There is no world-wide Jewish movement to attack Muslim wherever they find them.
Why is it that Jews can lose life, land and property and yet still get on with it, whereas not only do Palestinians react like barbarians to similar events, it’s actually expected of them and apologies are made?
If it’s all about land, why haven’t the Jews, who’ve lost far more land, equivalently acted like animals?
It’s about the Islamofacism, stupid.

Posted by: ulianov at January 2, 2009 8:56 PM>

“Did I mention Noam Chomsky, Finkelstein or Soros?”

Yes you just did!

Bite and be hooked……….”thou dost protest to loudly”.

colin - yes, I agree with you that the I-P situation, which originated only with regard to land rights, has now been highjacked by the Islamic fascist ideology. I've said the same many times. However, the two agendas are NOT the same and there still remains enough of a difference that one must be cautious in merging them.

Islamic fascism, in my view, above all, is not interested in the emergence of a Palestinian state, while the Palestinians most certainly are focused on that. That's a crucial aspect of Islamic fascism; it doesn't want a Palestinian state, and particularly not a democratic one and all its actions will work to prevent one.

I disagree with, for instance, Mississauga Matt who maintains that Islam, as a religion and sociopolitical ideology has been 'fascist' from its origin. I strongly disagree with that. Islam may be against reason, against equality, against democracy, it is collectivist and subordinates the individual --all of which are also fascist themes; it is also tribal and unable to adapt; it may be isolationist but that doesn't make it fascist.

Fascism by itself is a particular political mode focused around an essentialist biological sense of nation or people as a nation; Islam doesn't have any biological notion of 'nation' or people. None. It has instead a notion of ideological and/or military subjugation of others, not exclusion of others as 'not pure'.

Islamic fascism emerged only in the 19th c - and I've explained its origins many times and won't repeat it again but it has to do with a tribal inability to adapt to industrialism and therefore a rejection of the 'impurity' of the West. Nothing to do with any notion of religion.

As for Gaza becoming a nation, I don't think it has the land base capacity to do so on its own; it is, for example, half the size of the city of Toronto. It could only function as an economic appendage to another nation that has the resources, eg hydro, water, industrial devt, to supply it. With the Israeli blockade since 2006, even basic economic development hasn't occurred.

Robert W - I think it's too late now, to enable a Palestinian state. I don't think that there is any 'right' for a people to have a nation. That includes that there is no 'right' for Jewish people to have a nation of their own; no 'right' for Palestinians, no 'right' for Canadians and so on. Nations are not fundamental rights; they are political constructs.

Therefore, one has to consider the constructed reality. Israel, as a nation, now exists. Period. The Palestinian people, as a population or 'ethnos' now exist. Period. What does one do with these two realities? (Not 'rights' but realities).

You ask for a counterfactual scenario. It would, in my view, include a reality where NO settlers would have been allowed to settle the West Bank; and this would have been handed over to the Palestinians, along with assistance to enable the Palestinians to develop a democracy, as the US assisted Iraqis to develop a democracy. And then, assistance to establish a closely linked economy with Israel. I think that the two 'nations' would have to be economically closely linked.

But it's too late for that. Israel, in my view, has no intention of releasing the West Bank and this shows in their continued settlement. I think what Israel wants is for Egypt to take over Gaza, politically and economically, while it takes over the West Bank, politically and economically. The Palestinians? They can't be Israeli citizens because of that Jewish majority clause - therefore, they must go to other countries - but will those other countries, such as Jordan (which now refuses them ) accept them?

So, what we have are these complex and contrary agendas all operating at the same time.

There is the Palestinian desire for a state and anger at seeing their lands taken over by settlers. That desire and anger is, in my view, justified. There is little they can do since they have, militarily and economically, no power and the international world, including the Arab States, does nothing.

Then, there is Islamic fascism, which has taken over this anger to divert away the focus on the problems in their own Arab States. Islamic fascism does NOT want to see a democratic Palestinian state. And they also want to see the fighting between I-P continue!

Then, there is Israel's agenda, which is also not to have a Palestinian state, but for different reasons than that of the Islamic fascists. Israel simply wants the land.

Egypt's agenda, which is NOT to have to look after Gaza and its people.

The other Arab States, which also do NOT want to see a democratic Arab state, Palestine, in their midst - because they want to retain their tribal authority rather than having an example of arab democracy in their midst. And the continued fighting between I-P suits them as well, because it diverts attention from their tribal dictatorships.

Therefore, these other Arab States will be quite willing to turn a blind eye to the actions of the Islamic fascists, who will continue to incite attacks on Israel. And Israel will react to them as it does now. Both Israel and Palestine have a duty to protect their people. Palestine is helpless before the settlers. Israel is not helpless before Islamic fascists (not Palestinians).

So, it's a terrible mess. Maybe 20 years ago, a Palestinian state would have been possible. But now, with the established settlements, and with the use of Islamic fascism to divert attention from the very real political problems in the other ME states (Iran, SA, Syria, Egypt) - it's no longer possible.

I think the real problem is, however, Islamic fascism. And again, it is an error to merge the two. There could be no I-P situation and Islamic fascism would still exist; the problem is in the political structure, tribalism, of the Arab States. That has to end, and democracy has to be enabled.

In your penultimate paragraph above, ET, you state: "Maybe [...] a Palestinian state would have been possible. But now, [...] it's no longer possible". Fine, say I agree with you. Nevertheless, putting away, then, all wishful thinking contrawise, what is your plan for proceeding without a Palestinian state, now that you acknowledge such an alternative is no longer possible.

DaninVan, as for your sister and her family, I certainly don't wish them any harm but at least they can leave the country if they are feeling threatened, an option that the Palestinians don't have.
Posted by: ulianov at January 2, 2009 8:56 PM

--That is because the Islamic World will deport or kill the "Palestinian" Muslims if they try to enter their countries. In fact, Egyptian soldiers are now under orders to fire upon "Palestinians" who attempt to cross from Gaza into the Sinai. Yep- Muslims poised to slaughter "Palesitian" Muslims. Where's the widespread outrage at Egypt, now?

You see, Ulianov, if the Islamic World hadn't been so selfish and hellbent on the destruction of Israel from the beginning, we wouldn't have this conflict as we have it today in the Middle East.

It's all the Islamic World's fault, what's happening there. Both Israel and, ironically, the obviously-disposable "Palestinians" are, in their own ways, the victims of a hatefully intolerant, supremacistic, imperialistic Islamic World. Deal with it.

International outrage is misdirected. The correct direction for the world's outrage is towards the Islamic World and towards those who interfere to facilitate and foment the conflict, like Russia, who we know has always advised and armed the Islamic World to help it attempt to destroy Israel.

ET, I agree that Islamic fascism is the root of the problem.

I also would like, as would Vitruvius, to know your ideas as to how to proceed to deal with the situation, ie. to stop Hamas from attacking Israel, given that it's agreed that a "two-state" solution isn't a viable option.

I do not think, Ulianov, that it is possible for Palestinian and for Israeli states to share that particular limited piece of real estate, at this time, under the historic circumstances currently relevent. I think that, in the name of statehood border integrity, one party or the other is going to have to decamp. Perhaps I may wish same were not so, regardless, reality doesn't care about my wishes. Ergo, I try to analyze reality as it stands, not as how I wish it were to be.

Son of Hamas Leader Gives Glimpse Into Terror Organization
former member of the militant Islamic organization said there will never be lasting peace between the two groups.

"There is no chance. Is there any chance for fire to co-exist with the water?" said Mosab Hassan Yousef, the son of one of the group's founding members.

Yousef added: "It's not about Israel, it's not about Hamas: it's about both ideologies."
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,475226,00.html

ET, thanks for your insight on these matter. Much appreciated. Like Vitruvius and Canadian Sentinel, I'd also like to know your views about moving forward if you were the Israeli PM.

You know, as an extension of what you said, I think back to Mark Steyn's comments that eventually parts of Western Europe will be in a never ending civil war once the Muslims there gain a majority. I wonder if Israel-Palestine will [sadly] be a blueprint for that future Europe?

Posted by: ET at January 2, 2009 9:19 PM>

ET – I do enjoy your posts (although a little lengthy), so please don’t take this completely the wrong way. You are definitely well informed and educated.

But… do you ever consider others opinions opposite your own a worthy consideration?

You are absolutely correct in my opinion about the Islamo-facists, but you indeed seem to fall short with the extended family of Islamo-fascism that interweaves their culture like a handmade blanket. Yes I’m referring to the “moderate” Muslims that can bring a tear to my eye concerning their innocent victimization as merely pawns in the greater scheme of things.

Although I won’t talk about it in any length, I have also silently ground my teeth reading your earlier posts stating Israel as invaders to the Palestinian territories in history. My no committal on the subject has been two fold. First because other posters have clearly illustrated that the concept of Palestine was a western fabrication of the mid century and secondly I care not to be infused in the insane, unmovable argument of Israeli / Palestinian sovereignty.

Other than that I would say, regardless of modern claims to the land in question, early antiquity meaning Egyptian hieroglyphics to the Christian bible (Old Testament), place the Palestinians in the land of Canaan. These people at best were of course Canaanites and they lost the damned war against the Hebrew. The Hebrew people were then expelled by the Romans and the Romans bestowed the lands to the predecessors of the Palestinians for their safeguarding of Rome’s assets. Israelis scattered to the winds of the world, suffered terrible Xenophobia wherever they settled, and then reclaimed their ancestral lands as the only place on earth they could settle unencumbered as a unique culture. We need to address the UN and the British Empire as to how that came about.

The fact is that - it is done. So do we in the west support a likeminded culture such as Israel that operates in the parameters of our civilization? Or do we support the Palestinians and the greater Arabic world, including Islamic ideology and their unmovable claims to this slice of historic land and sliver of people?

If this doesn’t seem very black and white to an educated westerner, it really doesn’t matter, because it’s that black and white to them!

The question as to which other countries would be willing to take them strikes to the moral core of the matter, Ulianov, given that there is no shortage of countries in the region that could easily absorb such like-minded citizens, yet said countries claim that it is not their job to be their brother's keeper, it is Israel's. It is in part because of this moral infidelity that we can more reasonably conclude that the objective of the enemy in this matter is not the support of the Palestinians: it is the destruction of the Israel.

"colin - yes, I agree with you that the I-P situation, which originated only with regard to land rights, has now been highjacked by the Islamic fascist ideology. I've said the same many times. However, the two agendas are NOT the same and there still remains enough of a difference that one must be cautious in merging them."

But, until the Gazans reject their Hamas-Iranian puppet-masters, then the two agendas are one in the same. Being able to recognize the conflation of the two is interesting from an academic standpoint. But, on the ground, it makes no difference given current circumstances. Iran is calling the shots, through Hamas, in Gaza. I argue, therefore, that the I-P conflict is the key front of the Islamofascists. Once conflated, there is no longer any material distinction in my view.

"Islamic fascism, in my view, above all, is not interested in the emergence of a Palestinian state, while the Palestinians most certainly are focused on that."

I disagree: see above. Were the Palestinians, by and large, interested in forming a nation state, we'd see anti-Hamas rallies in Gaza. At the least, there would be a recognizable pro-state-anti-war Palestinian movement. I see no evidence of such an entity.

"As for Gaza becoming a nation, I don't think it has the land base capacity to do so on its own; it is, for example, half the size of the city of Toronto. It could only function as an economic appendage to another nation that has the resources, eg hydro, water, industrial devt, to supply it. With the Israeli blockade since 2006, even basic economic development hasn't occurred."

There are many small nations and nation states that successfully stand on their own, even though they may be dependent on regional neighbors for certain functions. Gaza could operate on a similar model. As to the Israeli blockade, we seem to be in a chicken-versus-egg argument. I'd argue that there would be no blockade if the Gazan government were genuinely interested in co-existing with Israel -- the blockade is a direct result of Hamas hostility. Israel has a history of being allowing its borders be opened for workers, but I don't begrudge the use of an economic blockade while home made Quassam rockets rain down on her citizens.

"Robert W - I think it's too late now, to enable a Palestinian state."

If that's so, it's the Palestinians' fault. They have Gaza, and could have used the last three years to build roads, construct water treatment plants, negotiate trade treaties with other nations, and create a nascent nation state. Instead, the Gazan government chose overt hostility with Israel over all other policy.

"I think the real problem is, however, Islamic fascism. And again, it is an error to merge the two."

Again, it is not an error, in my opinion -- and I suspect we'll continue to agree to disagree on this point. Were the I-P conflict not around, Islamofascists would find another proxy through which to wage their war. But, in our world, the I-P conflict has been hijacked to serve the Islamofascists purposes. I argue the conflation of the two issues makes them one in the same. Separating them is interesting academically, but makes no material difference 'on the ground.'

But, I'm curious...do I interpret you correctly: that the I-P conflict can never be resolved so long as Islamofascism remains? I have a suspicion this might be the case and, if so, it depresses me to no end.

"There could be no I-P situation and Islamic fascism would still exist; the problem is in the political structure, tribalism, of the Arab States. That has to end, and democracy has to be enabled."

On this last point, we have no disagreement. I truly hope the emergence of a free Iraq marks the beginnings of such a transformation. I'm hopeful her Iranian neighbors soon throw off the shackles of their oppressive rulers when they see Iraq rise from the ashes of the previous Baath regime.

ET
Can you explain to me that if isreal only wants the land why was it that isreal offered 90% of its land to paleistine when arafat was in power and he rejected the offer by saying palestine could never live along side isreal and would not be happy until isreal was pushed into the sea?

Posted by: ulianov at January 2, 2009 11:04 PM>

But what is Israel's objective? Keep the Palestinians isolated until...what?>

That has got to be one of the most idiotic statements I have ever read on SDA? Hello is there an award for this kind of sick comedic crap, or is this guy really that far out there?

Hey dickhead! Although you cannot rationalize this point, I’ll put it out for the youngsters anyway……………….. What if the Palestinians, actually adhered to a ceasefire for one year! Yes, just one year. Not rockets over the fence, not little kids forced by their elders to strap a bomb to their mid sections and kill themselves and 20 other diners or commuters. What about trying that for 1 unforgivable by Allah year and see if the Israeli devil worshippers respond in kind??

The fact is …….we ALL KNOW that is all it would take for civil discussions and interpersonal relationships between the two cultures and societies.

Colin, I don't believe there is any dispute that the Iranian mullahs are pulling the strings of Hamas. They certainly are with financing. How closely they are controlling the strategy there is uncertain.

Question: After Obama's victory, many asserted that "dark forces" would test him. Do you think that Iran will be one of these? If so, how?

No, Ulianov, it's not the elimination of the Palestinian people that is at issue, it's the mitigation of the existential threat to Israel. As Israel's neighbours wish to be an existential threat to Israel, thus Israel has to either do something about it, or decamp. Ergo, to the degree that the Palestinian people are being played, and let's be charitable, to be stooges of the Jew-Haters, it remains Israel's problem to deal with the latter reality. The Israelis don't want to eliminate the Palestinians, they want the forces who are manipulating the proxy Palestinians to stop existentially threatening the existence of Israel. After that, the Israelis would like to sell their neighbours desalinization and greenhouse technology, to better the lives of everyone in the middle-east. You have a problem with that?

Ulianov,
You are arguing about unicorns and trolls.

1. There is no Palestinian People. They are Arabs who by various mishap and meanderings settled in that area in the centuries after the destruction of Ancient Israel. The Turks brought some of them in, Lawrence pushed some there, etc...

2. There never was a country called Palestine- EVER.

3. If you were really concerned about those people who have learned to call themselves Palestinians (mainly since 1967) and not just trying to justify your dislike for Israel, you would pay attention to what Vitruvius wrote about the way the elites of the Arab world use them as proxies and doppelgangers while the scapegoat Israel.

ulianov said: "But what is Israel's objective? Keep the Palestinians isolated until...what? They die off? They go away? They agree to become an occupied, walled off pseudo-state?"

Maybe keep them isolated until they stop launching rockets at towns?

My dear retard, do you think the IDF would have any trouble -flattening- Gaza from the air, and then rolling up the survivors and pushing them into the Egyptian desert? Do you think they don't have daisy cutters? Artillery? A whole army of p1ssed off guys happy to do it?

As ET says, the whole fricking Gaza Strip is 300sqkm, that's like 10k wide and 30 long. If they decided to go at them, they could start tomorrow morning and be done by dinner on Sunday.

Instead, as somebody mentioned above, the IDF PHONES EVERYBODY IN THE AREA to tell them when the building full of terrorist missile launchers is going to get hit. And then when they finally hit the thing, they drop it like a controlled demolition.

Clearly, these are the actions of bloodthirsty demons bent on genocide.

The inside of your brain must be one f-ed up mess, my friend.

The Palestinians are definitely first-class drama queens, but I have one question.

Why right do the Jewish people have to reclaim what they call the Holy Land when the Zionist movement has nothing to do with religion?

Not meaning to offend anybody, just curious.

Does anyone here besides me get tired of the endless historical/philosophical debate regarding this conflict? The fact of the matter remains that the real source of the conflict is the striving for power. Its naked, its ugly, its murderous and its name is Evil for its name is power.

Box in a bunch of people feed them hatred with their mother's milk and let them be a proxy that diverts attention from the evils in your own land and nation.

Take a captive people and beat them mercilessly just to show their bigger neighbours that you are a formidable foe not worth the risk of fighting.

Take a crowd of gawkers and manipulate their allegiances to your cause. Divert the intelligentsia and the chattering classes into lobbing verbal H bombs into the opposing rancorous camp.

All that by so doing you shall retain your tyrannical power.

And somewhere near the hobs of hell a demonic laughter is heard rising above the screams of agony from the tortured souls kept captive by their own ignorance and stupidity.

Yes there is a better way. Is anybody interested?

I'm interested, Joe: what is it, that is to say, in your opinion?

Some one far greater than I once wrote, "Do not be conformed to the ways of this world any longer, rather be transformed by the renewing of your mind."

One soul at a time each in in our own little darkness, each in our own little obscurity, let us each reach to that place where peace, true peace is found. Lay aside pride, seek humility, lay aside revenge, seek forgiveness, lay aside conflict, seek peace. Let no man think himself greater than his Master. Let no one presuppose that he unbidden shall do the work of God.

There shall be no peace amongst the nations when there is conflict amongst the people. There shall be no peace among the people while there is conflict in the soul.

Each need cure his own soul and we shall find peace amongst the nations.

After all what shall it profit a man to gain the WHOLE WORLD yet lose his own soul.

You said it all joe thank you.

You see Joe, that’s half the worlds the problem right there!

You have assumed for everyone else in the world that they live in a miserable world with a tortured soul.

I’m telling you - it just aint so Joe!

Believe it or not, I assume you would just say not……a vast majority of people on this planet are quite happy with their lives and their existence. With or without prophetic dictatorships. Not everyone is soul searching or needs to be. I would suggest that that is a conquerable goal for you to achieve, without dwelling in dark mischievous corners of obscure poetry.

No offense, simply trying to help on the cheap.

'Set You Free', I agree with Joe in that trying to decide what's "right" based on old history is a fool's errand. Perhaps it's a popular pastime for college history majors over a couple of beers but ultimately you're going to have a number of different opinions and nothing will ever get resolved.

What I object to is a new thread (to my ears anyway) of some, asking whether Israel should have been allowed to gain nationhood 61 years ago. If that question is going to be opened up then let's also consider dissolving Canada and the United States and ...... You get the picture.

So rather than dwelling on "what should have been", one can only focus on the here & now; that is if one wants to try to resolve this holy mess. (Pun intentional)

http://littlegreenfootballs.com/article/32299_Another_Pallywood_Production

Photo staged?

Posted by: Robert W. at January 3, 2009 2:19 AM>

“What I object to is a new thread (to my ears anyway) of some, asking whether Israel should have been allowed to gain nationhood 61 years ago”.

I don’t know, it just sounds like everyone seems to have the opinion that that choice is theirs to make and not the people of Israel.

I think, and they appear to concur that they will determine their own destiny regardless of what the worlds hacks seem to think is in their best interest.

Knight 99:

A soul incapable of introspection is indeed a soul to be pitied. A soul thusly void shall be the horror of everyone around him.

I would concur with Vitruvius. Canada, the U.S and most European (western culture) nations have traditionally embraced the downtrodden from other nations, despite the fact that the immigrants - either as refugees or simply as people seeking peace, security and economic opportunity - have little or nothing in common with their adopted nation.

Yet the 48 muslim majority nations offer nothing to their 'palestinan brothers' other than arms and disdain. Granted, many of these nations are improvrished, not in small part because of their socio/polictical/religious nature, but many are fabulously wealthy in both land and treasury.

Ulianov asks "who would be FORCED to take them?"

Which begs the question: Canada was not forced to accept thousands of Lebanese, many of whom incidentally, abused the honour and priviledge of being welcomed to Canada by returning to Lebanon at the cease of hostilities and then demanding they be rescued when hostilities recommenced. But I digress.

Why should Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia or any muslim majority nations not welcome those with whom they share both ethnicity and religion? Why, when they see them suffering so, would they not open their hearts and their borders?

Could it be that the palestinians are convenient and willing pawns in the greater goal of a seamless and united muslim middle-east? After all, Israel is the only non-muslim and coincidentally, functional nation in the region which in serves to shine a light on the dangerous nature and shortcomings of the majority culture of the overall middle-east.

Kight99
If so many are so happy with their lives and want to go on just existing,Why do we have so many problems in the world?
By the way you speak you would think that everyone lives in your house.
Joe was qouteing biblical and not some freaky poet that lives in a dark closet.
All humans need structure in their lives and without it we would live in anarcy.
Did your father not have rules for you to live by in your home so that you would some day grow up to be a good person in society or did he let you do what ever you wanted and do you look at your father as a dictator or some one that was evil to you.
Maybe as childeren of God the father,we would listen to him maybe just maybe we wouldnt have all of these problems in the world.
But I will asume that you will also try to blame that on religion.

Posted by: Joe at January 3, 2009 2:41 AM>

“A soul incapable of introspection is indeed a soul to be pitied”

So you say……….or someone else said for you, anyway good luck, nice life and all that, adios.

Posted by: trucman at January 3, 2009 2:54 AM>

Wow that is a head full or mouthful - Truman! I’ll give it a little time but not much afterwards.

“If so many are so happy with their lives and want to go on just existing,Why do we have so many problems in the world?”

**Why do you assume I speak of people who simply want to exist??

“By the way you speak you would think that everyone lives in your house.”

** That’s your presumsion – I would say it’s misled.

“Joe was qouteing biblical and not some freaky poet that lives in a dark closet.”

** Ok whatever it still sounded like some obscure freaky poet to me. So why does that make my opinion about it wrong? Sue me along with 95% of the planet that doesn’t quote the Christian bible by heart (that is including most Christians).

“All humans need structure in their lives and without it we would live in anarcy.”

** Structure to avoid Anarchy may an accurate assessment, but first why are you alluding to a religious structure as the only possibility of structure? Or is what you mean simply Christianity? If so what kind, Catholic, Presbyterian, Anglican?

“Did your father not have rules for you to live by in your home so that you would some day grow up to be a good person in society or did he let you do what ever you wanted and do you look at your father as a dictator or some one that was evil to you.”

** You assume allot about a person’s upbringing, morals and ideals from a simple comment on a blog thread.

“Maybe as childeren of God the father,we would listen to him maybe just maybe we wouldnt have all of these problems in the world.”

** Maybe! And maybe people who have listened to god to intently through others in the history of our civilization have created the most unthinkable problems.

“But I will asume that you will also try to blame that on religion.”

** Again I think you assume too much.

"DaninVan, as for your sister and her family, I certainly don't wish them any harm"
Well yes, Ulianov, you do, if you rationalize Hamas' day in and day out rocket and mortar attacks on Israelis as somehow being fully justified. Because they've been something less than triumphant in their efforts doesn't make them victims, just incompetent.
Had Hamas been more successful in months past, this Israeli reaction would have occurred months ago; NO legitimate Gov't can stand idly by and watch its territory and citizens being assaulted.
Please don't insult anyone's intelligence and claim that's what Hamas is doing; Hamas specifically and Palestinian organizations generally have violated every agreement they've ever entered into with Israel, yet Israel always comes back to the table to give it another chance.
As for your questioning the validity of the 400 Hamas fighters killed, there's at least 12 milling around this rocket transporter when an Israeli precision missile strikes...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qG0CzM_Frvc&feature=channel_page

Knight 99
You speak as though christianty is a bad thing.
Last i recall all of north america was built on it. Or would you be a much happier person living under Muslim rule.
Someday you may have to choose so all I can say is choose wisely.
Oh! and as far as your thoughts go ,heres a penny!

Posted by: trucman at January 3, 2009 4:06 AM>

Trucman I will do my best to not patronize you.

“You speak as though christianty is a bad thing.”

** I made no such comment. Your apparent bias has led you to that conclusion.

“Last i recall all of north america was built on it”
**Your “recollection” is valid Obi wan if you are referring to the Judeo-Christian values of the founders of North American civilization. Otherwise you seem to forget that all was not perfect in the Christian world of our Canadian founders who killed each other with the same zeal as they did their aboriginal counterparts. Louise Riel would most likely vouch for that fact if alive today.

“Or would you be a much happier person living under Muslim rule.”
** You are obviously a newbie to SDA if you question my feelings towards Islam.

“Someday you may have to choose so all I can say is choose wisely”
** Are you referring to a Mercedes or BMW? Save me the sanctimonious crap, you are nothing spiritual in my world to give me some obscure prophetic wisdom of the ages. When you actually grow up you may know what I mean.

Oh! and as far as your thoughts go ,heres a penny!
** Save it you may need it someday. I already have nearly half a billion of them.

And who are those 400 dead "Palestinians", ulianov at January 2, 2009 2:40 PM ?

How many were Hamas?

I think the girl in the video has it correct.

Wow, what a discussion this is. You could watch the MSM for 25 years and never learn 1/3 of what has been imparted here.
If ever there was an argument to maintain a free and open internet, this thread is the ideal example.

lawnguy, I certainly agree that this is an outstanding discussion.

Two thumbs up for Colin from Mission B.C.; Knight 99; and Robert W.

A somewhat rare thumbs down for ET.

ulianov is an example of what happens when people bring their oh so cute kid to an adult party and then allow the kid to distract the adults.

The world tends to divide into those who think that Israel stole the land of ancient Palestinians and those who don't. Let me repeat again - the Jews did not steal anyone's land, they are not evil colonialists/occupiers - this is irrational and today's equivalent of "the Jews killed G-d" (the deicide charge).

Many people have nailed the facts here (Miss. Matt, DamianVan, MND, Phantom who always makes me laugh,irwin,others). The information is out there - and don't just dismiss articles by Jews - I have noticed that people will read articles by Jews who are antiIsrael (look Chomsky said it, and he's a Jew so you know), but proIsrael Jews (like liberal Dershowitz as MND pointed out) are just "biased". Articles by Efraim Karsh, PalestineFacts, MythsandFacts, are good.

The people who call themselves Palestinians are not descendents of Canaanites. Canaanites disappeared in the 8th century BC, and they would have spoken a language similar to Hebrew, not Arabic. The socalled Palestinians are Arabs, and intead of being displaced by Zionist Jews, Arabs flocked to the Zionist enterprise to get jobs and enjoy the new economic disparity. THEIR POPULATION HAS INCREASED, NOT DECREASED. They were not diplaced.

Also it is important, I think, to always remember that the two state solution was proposed by the UN in 1947 (the 1947 partition plan which as MissMatt discribed, would divide up the remaining 20% of British Mandate Palestine). THE JEWS ACCEPTED THIS TWO STATE SOLUTION, THE ARABS DID NOT AND LAUNCHED A WAR OF ANNIALATION. They could have had their state 60 YEARS AGO.

Walid Shoebat, a former PLO terrorist acknowledged the lie he was fighting for and the truth he was fighting against: (from Myths, Hypotheses and Facts Concerning the Origin of Peoples

“Why is it that on June 4th 1967 I was a Jordanian and overnight I became a Palestinian?”
“We did not particularly mind Jordanian rule. The teaching of the destruction of Israel was a definite part of the curriculum, but we considered ourselves Jordanian until the Jews returned to Jerusalem. Then all of the sudden we were Palestinians - they removed the star from the Jordanian flag and all at once we had a Palestinian flag”.
“When I finally realized the lies and myths I was taught, it is my duty as a righteous person to speak out”.

Someone mentioned that Zionists aren't religious. The word Zion is used countless times in the Old Testament. Jews have been saying "next year in Jerusalem" at their Passover seders for some 1800 years. Religious Jews are also Zionists, but yes the modern state was mostly fought for and founded by secular Jews -
G-d works in mysterious ways, what can I say. I know, I know there are black hat dudes who say only G-d can return us to Zion, but they are a fringe - most black hat, kippah wearing, observant Jews are Zionists (which now-a-days is sometimes translated as Jews with guns).

For those who read their Old Testament - the creation of the modern state of Israel, the return of the Jews to their homeland - is fulfillment of G-d's promises. Many Christians have told me they see Israel as fulfillment of biblical prophecy and evidence that G-d keeps his promises.

In answer to Vitruvius et al, about 'the future', I think that the only answer to the I-P situation, since I am also assuming that Israel has no intention of giving up total 'ownership' of the West Bank - is democracy in the other Arab states in the ME.

First - a few comments - I disagree, totally, with any 'first step on the ground' means I can claim the land for the next two thousand years. We have no knowledge of who was on that land base before the Israelites or where they themselves 'first appeared' on this planet. I disagree with 'first footsteps' claims to land. Land ownership is a political not essential right. Therefore, even our N. American natives can't reclaim N. America despite their similar claims to that of the Israelites.

I also disagree that what was offered to Arafat was a nation with sovereign control; all he was offered was municipal control over the towns. The land, resources, water, borders, airspace, would all remain in Israel's hands.

And no, Israel hasn't accepted a Palestinian state.

And no, Gaza wasn't given the opportunity to establish itself as a viable economic locale, since the people there voted for Hamas rather than Fatah (which is quite corrupt)..because Hamas provided more social services. The resultant economic blockade meant that Gaza had no money, no open borders, to develop itself and it went into an economic downturn.

Now, that these facts are clear, what do I think the future holds - since, as I said, it is obvious that Israel has no intention of releasing the West Bank - and that means, no Palestinian state.

I think that the key to future peace is democracy in the other Arab states - Iran, Saudi Arabia, Syria. Democracy means a middle class and a middle class is focused on entrepreneurship, individualism, progress etc. That ideology is the opposite of fascism - and if this emerges, then fascism dissipates to an irrelevant ratio. There will always be fundamentalists, in the Jewish as well as Islamic religions but their numbers will be in the minority.

What will happen to the Palestinians? Oh, and it is totally irrelevant to claim that there never were any 'Palestinians'. Actually, they were called such under the British Mandate, but so what? There never were any Canadians or US people either. Having a 'name' doesn't entitle or disentitle you to a nation.

It is also an error to merge all Arabs into one; they are not the same; location histories, tribal filiations, linguistic variations - all mean that they see themselves as regional rather than homogeneous.

Since Israel won't accept them as citizens, then, who will? The only thing - with democracy - it is possible that other Arab states will.

What is still missing, and I've asked repeatedly but not one person replies - is my puzzlement over why so many people are astonished at the anger of the Palestinians over the loss of their homes and farms. What do you expect from someone who has been living on a farm for generations, only to see his land taken and given to settlers? Someone who sees his farm destroyed, the trees cut down by settlers. You don't think that this person should feel angry? Why not? The insistence that the Palestinians shouldn't feel anger - that stuns me.

ET,
I'm actually tired of going in this circle- no one is astonished that there was anger about "loosing" homes, the astonishment comes from the fact that they are angry at Israel about it. The Arabs who stayed in their homes in 1948-49 kept them and for the last sixty years have had a standard of living (and more political freedom) far better than any in the Arab world. The "refugees" should have been angry at their leaders and the power-elite of the Arab world who started a war, urged them to become refugees and have kept them in the camps for over half a century.
Q. When does a refugee camp become a permanent settlement? A. Never- when the refugees are being used as a weapon by the fascistic Islamic power-elite to redirect the rage of their own people at being the most backward, uneducated and unsuccessful people on earth. Knock the oil prices back down to $13 a barrel and the whole "civilization" would be what it was in 1950- going nowhere, covered in flies.

ET said: "You don't think that this person should feel angry? Why not? The insistence that the Palestinians shouldn't feel anger - that stuns me."

ET, I'm not at all surprised that Palestinians are angry. They've gotten a crappy deal, and that's the truth.

What I have a problem with is what they do in their anger.

Lots of groups over the years have had crappy deals. Like the JEWS, just ferinstance. Palestinians, out of all the people in all the world who have just grievances, are the only "nation" of people in the world at this time who routinely employ atrocity as a method of warfare.

These are not people who have been isolated in the wilds of BongoBongo Land and suddenly thrust blinking into the glare of modern life. They've been there the whole time Israel grew from mud huts to modern cities, they all went to school, they know how to drive cars and all that stuff. They've had -countless- opportunities to make peace, to expel the insane killers from their midst and get on with life.

But they don't. They never do. Their leaders break every promise they make, sometimes the same day. They are set upon a course of self destruction, of ever increasing depravity, savagery and sheer evil. Certainly not all of them, but enough that the PLO and Hamas and Islamic Jihad and all these nut groups never seem to run out of recruits.

The Japanese got NUKED at roughly the same time Israel was created and all these farms you speak of were stolen. The Japanese seem to have gotten over it, what's keeping the Palestinians stuck? Should we care, or should we just stomp on the f-ers like they deserve?

Personally, I'm all for stomping on guys who shoot missiles at towns in the hope of killing a school full of kids, or send their own kids to explode in front of cafes. Their own kids, ET!

If some bunch of cretins pulled a stunt like that here in Ontariostan I'd be in the front line with a rifle, bad knee and all. So would all of us who comment here except maybe ulianov. Jews are supposed to be different?

http://news.sympatico.msn.ctv.ca/abc/home/contentposting.aspx?isfa=1&feedname=CTV-TOPSTORIES_V3&showbyline=True&date=true&newsitemid=CTVNews%2f20090103%2fisrael_gaza_090103

occupation by force is crime
immigration by permision is allowed

if you look at who is guilty

need review documents based
forget jewish muslim isues for a second

forget who you like to live who to die
who to leave and who to stay

--

if we say for sake of arugment Sadam hussain did tried to occupied Kewit as war in Iraq brough all international forced to get him out
as sadam said to kewit taht you pay me and borrow me money to kill iranian they are shia and now
now i have debt and kewit force to get their money back then sadam used this as excus to go and kill kewit civilan and take their oil pump saying as of today kewit is part of Iraq too

what teh wrold react to it to stop him to death
as called him criminal and his act was crime

----
lighter offense was other example
french and english hisotry to canada as not as bad as sadam since tehy plan to live in canada and aboriginal not allowed them they had war after vicotry of ware they did abused indian aborigina to not practice their lanughate for a year not give them job late Harper review the history said for human right we owe to aborigina for this abuse to tell them 'sorry'

----

worst example was hilter said all world belong to him since he is aryean and he is smarter than all of us and ther rest of world are dump then again they called him as war criminal and so on

---

example of paltinanin and isreali is also
matter of occupited of land by foce by kill the peopel since in the begining they jewish was immigrant to that area in palstin they bought land like immigrant and it was welvome and it was safe heaven for htem later jewish isreali treid to OCCUPIED their land by forc

it is like you seat in yoru home nad some with bomb and gun and force of army take your home and get you out of street and let you die in hunger

therefore isreali occuation is crime and must be stop

---

other example of taleban who decied to helped
Saudi guy for find land to kill shai kill other woman not go to school or put acid toe hteir face under name of isalm in afganestan also
was occupied from interanl peopel by foce of saudi guy who every body know him

----

conclusion OCCUPATIOn of land by force is crime and palstinaa has right to get that by force back to begin with

and AMerica tried to fool some stpid jewish over rglion to fight for American to use isreal land as isreal statet to let them control middle east formoney and pay htem money to live by abuse pasltian similar is paktian got moeny from USA too

---

you have be fair to let peopel fair and find solution to area to people
and put

priorty to them not look for money power issue
this is life under treat from both side over years of corruption from past politician

every body know above nothing 'new' i said that

time to fix the past problems today not tommorrow

christian muslim jewish has right to immigrantfreely for any reason person can change place to live and not get lable nad obey law in that country for sure anhy place or live safe in any place of world
and not got bother or killed by act of crime

occupation is crime but immigration is allowed

Posted by: ex-liberal at January 3, 2009 9:28 AM>

“The people who call themselves Palestinians are not descendents of Canaanites.”

I assuming you were making reference to my earlier comment about Canaan? Which is the point I was trying to make - “Egyptian hieroglyphics to the Christian bible (Old Testament), place the Palestinians in the land of Canaan. These people at best were of course Canaanites”. The point I was making is that it was not Palestine nor were the people of antiquity in that area Palestinians. The argument “at best” is referring to indigenous peoples who by generation in an area absorb into the following culture. Something akin to some of the indigenous modern British evolving from the early Celts. In short, I see that the intent of my statement could have been easily misread, it was indeed intended to point out that historical and cultural claims by Palestinian peoples to the land “as before the Jews” as not accurate.

The real answer is to turn the entire middle east into a glass bowl

ulianov writes, "A sentiment which is expressed by many commentators here is that 'Palestinians shouldn't feel anger because they are something less than human.'"

I've read this thread and I do not believe this non-sequitur/make believe statement. (These days, there seems to be a rash of lefties jumping to outlandish conclusions, far removed from the words actually written.) ulianov, prove your point, chapter and verse, from this thread, with quotes.

(Something about which I absolutely agree with ET is that, credibility-wise, mere assertion doesn't cut it. ulianov’s made an undocumented assertion. H/She needs to provide the evidence.)

lookout - I've read about the failure to fully open to border to export/import as well. For example, BBC, Tuesday, August 19/08, there's an article by Aleem Maqbool (I hesitate to provide links) which states that there is little change with the ceasefire agreement:

"Since the ceasefire began, the fighting with Israel has died down, but the strict sanctions remain.

Most of the one-and-a-half million people living in Gaza are now reliant on food aid, and are unable to enter or leave the strip.

Over the last year, tens of thousands of people in Gaza have lost their jobs.

Most industrial operations have stopped because raw materials are not being allowed into the territory, or produced goods allowed out for export. "

However, there are a few other assertions which are without foundation.

First, is the assumption that IF a current population which might now be quite genetically distinct from/or similar to a past population, can state that 'at one time in the past' they lived in such and such an area - then that same area is now and forever 'theirs'. This is an illogical and legally untenable conclusion.

If this were the case, then all of us ought to leave America, for that assertion which is used to justify Jewish dominion over Israel, also means that the indigeneous peoples alone have the right of ownership of America. I've mentioned this several times but no-one has commented on it.

Second, there cannot be any proof of 'First Footstep' because our forebears were mobile rather than settled, were not operating as distinct communities, and to make a claim that 'First Footstep' justifies land ownership for eternity is nonsense.

Equally illogical are the oft-repeated claims that 'there's no such people/name as 'Palestinians' and without a Name, you can't lay claim to being a Nation'. Such would negate the national claims of Canadians, Americans, and just about everyone else on this planet.

Of course, the observation that 'God gave us the land' is equally untenable. Apart from my atheism, I object to such a land defense on the pure grounds of its having nothing to do with human law - and land ownership is a political and legal man-made agreement, and certainly not a religious domain.

phantom - what's keeping the Palestinians 'stuck' is because they lack the resources to build an economy. No land for growing crops, no water rights to irrigate land, no hydro, no gas, no rights to travel on the main roads, no access to Israeli or other markets. Such 'lacks' do indeed, have an effect.

"...my puzzlement over why so many people are astonished at the anger of the Palestinians over the loss of their homes and farms."

I've asked ET before to prove who these Palestinians are. I would like ET to trace for us their historic beginnings to the present and because of that, their rightful and legitimate claims.

On said "loss of their homes and farms," please provide the details.

The original 'Palestinians' were Israel's hated enemy, the Philistines. And as mentioned by Knight 99, a Canaanite people - probably Phoenicians.

Who were definitely not Arabs.

In fact most of the ME people are definitely not Arabs. Although their history, culture, art and knowledge were destroyed and replaced by the imperialist armies of Arabic Islam and their barbaric, anti-human ideology.

These people claiming to be 'Palestinians' today, are completely false. It is a fabricated lie. A recent, conjured up myth.

ulianov praises, quotes ET:
What is still missing, and I've asked repeatedly but not one person replies - is my puzzlement over why so many people are astonished at the anger of the Palestinians over the loss of their homes and farms.

Me:
What is still missing, and I've asked repeatedly but not one anti-Israel person replies - is my puzzlement over why so many people never mention the 800,000 or so Jews who were expelled from all the Arab countries, who lost THEIR homes, their farms, their businesses and all their assets, and am astonished when I hear calls for compensation for Arabs but not for Jews, esp. considering that the Jews living in Arab countries had nothing to do with the Arab-Israeli war which the Arab countries started.

Moreoever, it always astonishes me when anti-Israel persons fail to acknowledge how the Arabs who stayed put in Israel thrived because they wisely refused to be suckered out of their homes by the cynical annihilationist Arab elites, including rich Palestinian Arabs who left early to avoid the inconvenience.

ulainov, I asked you to provide documentation to prove your statement (@2:38 today) that commentators have expressed that "Palestinians shouldn't feel anger BECAUSE they are something less than human".

You've produced a lot of statements, none of which prove your point. Sorry.

Whoops, make that "ulianov".

irwin daisy -

I reject any notion that IF and Only IF a population can lay claim, by assertion or even genetic testing !!, that they are descendants of a population who lived in such-and-such area several thousand years ago, that such population has any legitimate right to a land base.

Land ownership is not held by genetic means, is not held by historic tenure, and is held only by current legal statute. Your assertion, irwin daisy, as I've said many times, would mean that all of American would have to be returned, immediately, to the indigeneous peoples. Now.

Equally, your assertion that IF and ONLY IF a people have a name which they assumed at some time in the past ..and recognizing that before they had this name they might have had OTHER NAMES..and still use this same name..then and only then, are they entitled to bear this name. That would mean that there are no such peoples as Canadians or Americans and so on.

irwin daisy - just google 'loss of Palestinian homes and farms'. Or 'destruction of Palestinian homes and farms by settlers'. You'll find lots of factual evidence. Of course, I know in advance that you'll reject all of it, so..don't bother.

As for your claim that the people of the ME are not Arabs - well, that's your own fictional world in which you live.

But it doesn't matter if they are Arabs or not, doesn't matter if they somehow, carried the name Palestinian from the first moment they stepped on this planet from their alien ships, doesn't matter if they changed their name during the subsequent centuries. None of it matters.

What matters is current reality. What do you do with a population who have been living for centuries, even if they have No Name, on a land base, and another population comes along and starts to settle that land? What if a higher authority (the UN) says that x-place is where you can now live, but these same settlers move in and settle on the land and won't let you do the same? What does one do? Not get angry?

I disagree that real property is held by statute, ET: it is held by force. Sure, statute acts as a facade to domesticate the force-bearing structure, nevertheless, a facade with no undergirding support structure will not stand. It is when citizens forget that humans are red in tooth and claw that we loose our understanding of the undergirding; that is when our abstractions become excessive to the degree of the detachment of the facade from structural reality, and that is when our whole beneficial system of statutory adjudication falls to the ground.

On the other hand, it does seem clear to me that if people repeating the same arguments over and over and over again in blog comments could solve the problem, it would have been solved years ago ;-)

Posted by: trucman at January 3, 2009 4:06 AM

What you have to understand is that Judaism and Islam are basically tribal religions.

Christianity transcended all that with an overarching sentiment of, and I'm paraphrasing, “there's only one race and that's the human race."

The British were somewhat brilliant when they deeded the land they controlled to Israel.

That way, peoples of two basically tribal religions could go at each other's throats and not bother the rest of the world.

It's clear that Ulianov is but a propagandist. I've no doubt about it. I see tactical parallels in Ulianov's communications... parallels with the propaganda tactics of the Chinese Communist Party's agents whom I've encountered online.

And I'm afraid I'm becoming worried about ET...

ET, so what would you have done if you were in Israel's shoes, seeing all those thousands of rockets being lobbed at you from Gaza, the land that you unconditionally turned over to the "Palestinians" as a peace offering, a sign of goodwill, a land that, because of you, was made to be very successful and prosperous for all, including "Palestinians", and which was pretty much turned into an ethnic ghetto and missile launching base by Hamas?

Are you unable to see the forest because you prefer to study each and every tree one at a time? Try to take a realistic overview, a macro-level analysis, and not a complicated historical, anthropological, sociological analytical approach, for this can prevent clarity of view of the actual reality that is the case right now, which is that the "Palestinians" are attacking Israel and Israel is responding in self-defence.

Doesn't take a genius to understand such a blatantly simple concept... if someone throws a rock at one, then one is entitled to whatever defensive action is required to stop that person from throwing any more rocks. Israel has restrained herself over thousands of these "rocks" being lobbed at her and is now retaliating, specifically to put the launchers out of commission and protect Israelis from further attack, as is Israel's absolute right to do so.

"Diplomacy" is already done to death with the "Palestinians". The only thing that works with them is brute force. For them, "Diplomacy" is a stalling tactic only.

Really, the "Palestinians" are the equivalent of the German Nazis and the Imperial Japanese during WWII, in terms of it being too late for "dimplomacy" and the only solution being to defeat them with deadly force.

It's time to quit niggling over old details and get real. The Hamas bastards, they're shooting rockets at Israel, period. Israel is stopping them, period. Support Israel, for she's the victim and the "Palestinians" the hateful aggressors!

Remember, it doesn't take a genius to understand this, ET. Time to give your head a good shake.

vitruvius - if your reference to force means only brute force, the type of 'might makes right' force, then I'll disagree with you. That's because we are not just physical beings but intellectual beings and the force of our reason has brought us tremendous accomplishments, including this computer.

However, if your reference to force means physical reality dominates imaginary reality - there I'd fully agree with you. That's why I feel that Israel exists because it exists. Physically. The intellectual arguments about why it 'ought' to exist (god, First Footprint etc) are irrelevant.

Set you free - yes, it's interesting that Islam and Judaism are both tribal religions. What is also interesting is that the religion in both cases is 'hereditary' while in Christianity it is a choice of the individual (baptism, confirmation etc). And the Judaic is matrilineal - the religion is 'inherited' from the mother's side which suggest to me that this was a culture whose economy was based around small farms (gardens) primarily carried out by the women. The Islamic is patrilineal - an economy based around large animal herds carried out by the men who are away from the women for long periods - which is also why they have such rigid rules about women.

Christianity is completely different; it isn't inherited but chosen, so to speak, by the individual. Its focus is not on the exclusionary tribe as in Judaism or Islam, but on inclusion of any and all. This suggests to me an economy that was settling, expanding, focused on trade and market interactions and that required peace and good neighbours to interact with.

me no dhimmi- for one thing, the Jews who were expelled after 1948 from the Arab lands had a home to go to - Israel, where they were immediately accepted as citizens. Yes, it was wrong, but please note that the Palestinians have nowhere to go to AND were also promised that they were to set up a state. Furthermore, if something is wrong in one place, it doesn't make it right if it happens also elsewhere. It remains wrong.

canadian sentinel - there's no need for you to worry about me; I'm' not worried about me.

Actually, canadian sentinel, your imagery of Gaza is quite romantic; you see, the economic blockade put up by Israel on Gaza immediately on the election of Hamas meant that no goods could be exported, and only humanitarian imports. So, since Gaza is a terrain of about 30 by 10 km, and exists only as a 'sieve' exporting and importing - that blockade ended its economy.

And I don't think that handing Gaza over was a peace offering or sign of goodwill. Not that land. Meanwhile, Israel continued to settle and settle the West Bank. That's the real land that Israel wants for itself; it is not interested in Gaza.

What should the Palestinians do when Israel is settling the West Bank land set aside for them? To use your words - it doesn't take a genius to conclude that the Palestinians might feel justifiably angry.

Actually - my perspective IS on the macrolevel. I'm not involved in the emotional issue of who is 'good or bad'. I'm neither for nor against Israel or Palestine. Both exist; that's my 'starting ground'. For many of you, only one has the 'right' to exist, while I say that there's no such thing as 'right' in this situation. There's only reality. Both peoples exist. So- how does one deal with this reality?

I'm looking at the situation as if I were a total alien, from Mars, so to speak. I'm looking at the population base, as I always do, the land base, the water base, the roads, the infrastructure of industrialism etc..

I think that Israel is not interested and never was interested in Gaza; it wants Egypt to take it over. It is interested in full control of the West Bank and that is why it continues to settle that land base. That is why the Palestinians are angry and I conclude that they are justified in such an emotion.

That's quite the statement - the Palestinians are equivalent to Nazis. I think you are over the line on that.

Sorry, I don't buy your reductionist 'Israel is good' and 'Palestinians are bad'. As I pointed out before, the situation is far more complex than such a simplistic reduction, and no people are all 'good' or 'bad'..and that includes the settlers who burn down the olive groves of the Palestinians.

I need more empirical evidence and analysis than you have provided, canadian sentinel, for me to change my mind. So, don't worry about me; I'm not worried.

...you know, one thing that bothers me about this whole thing - with all the land masses/countries surrounding Israel, none of them is willing to take in the Palestinians till things work out.

Ok Syria. Well...no. Jordan? Not really.

Besides some countries shipping more arms and more missiles - what other great 'Berlin blockade' aide is going in? A little yacht?

Hmm, now there wouldn't be bigotry within the Muslim countries would there be?

Speaking to a diplomat friend of mine a dozen or so years ago, he says most Arab states are thankful Israel is taking the heat and dealing with the 'lazy' Palestinians. No, he wasn't an Israeli diplomat either.

But to answer a question I keep seeing pop up in different forums, yes I'd be PO'd if someone took my land and cut down my trees, that's a no brainer.

But I wouldn't go around killing their children, nor would I send my son out on a promise to get virgins, what's wrong with the ones in town?

Ah, speckled glasses. Ever learning, but never coming to the truth.

No "Palestinian Arab people" existed at the start of 1920, but, by December, it took shape in a form recognizably similar to today's.

Until the late nineteenth century, residents living in the region between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean identified themselves primarily in terms of religion: Moslems felt far stronger bonds with remote co-religionists than with nearby Christians and Jews. Living in that area did not imply any sense of common political purpose.

Then came the ideology of nationalism from Europe; its ideal of a government that embodies the spirit of its people was alien but appealing to Middle Easterners. How to apply this ideal, though? Who constitutes a nation and where must the boundaries be? These questions stimulated huge debates.

Some said the residents of the Levant are a nation; others said Eastern Arabic speakers; or all Arabic speakers; or all Moslems.

But no one suggested "Palestinians," and for good reason. Palestine, then a secular way of saying Eretz Yisra'el or Terra Sancta, embodied a purely Jewish and Christian concept, one utterly foreign to Moslems, even repugnant to them.

This distaste was confirmed in April 1920, when the British occupying force carved out a "Palestine." Moslems reacted very suspiciously, rightly seeing this designation as a victory for Zionism. Less accurately, they worried about it signaling a revival in the Crusader impulse. No prominent Moslem voices endorsed the delineation of Palestine in 1920; all protested it.

Instead, Moslems west of the Jordan directed their allegiance to Damascus, where the great-great-uncle of Jordan's King Abdullah II was then ruling; they identified themselves as Southern Syrians.

Interestingly, no one advocated this affiliation more emphatically than a young man named Amin Husseini. In July 1920, however, the French overthrew this Hashemite king, in the process killing the notion of a Southern Syria.

Isolated by the events of April and July, the Moslems of Palestine made the best of a bad situation. One prominent Jerusalemite commented, just days following the fall of the Hashemite kingdom: "after the recent events in Damascus, we have to effect a complete change in our plans here. Southern Syria no longer exists. We must defend Palestine."

Following this advice, the leadership in December 1920 adopted the goal of establishing an independent Palestinian state. Within a few years, this effort was led by Husseini.

Other identities - Syrian, Arab, and Moslem - continued to compete for decades afterward with the Palestinian one, but the latter has by now mostly swept the others aside and reigns nearly supreme.

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/palarabs.html

...and from Wiki

For the term "Palestinian" as applied to Jews, see Palestinian Jew. For other uses, see Definitions of Palestine and Palestinian.

Palestinian people or Palestinians (Arabic: الشعب الفلسطيني‎, ash-sha`b al-filasTīni; Arabic: الفلسطينيون‎, al-filasTīnīyyūn), also commonly rendered as Palestinian Arabs (Arabic: العرب الفلسطينيون‎, al-`Arab al-filasTīnīyyūn) are terms commonly used to refer to an Arabic-speaking people with family origins in Palestine. The total Palestinian population worldwide is estimated between 10 and 11 million people, over half of whom are stateless and lacking citizenship in any country.[6]

The first widespread use of "Palestinian" as an endonym to refer to the nationalist concept of a Palestinian people by the local Arabic-speaking population of Palestine began prior to the outbreak of World War I,[7] and the first demand for national independence was issued by the Syrian-Palestinian Congress on 21 September 1921.[8] After the exodus of 1948, and even more so after the exodus of 1967, the term came to signify not only a place of origin, but the sense of a shared past and future in the form of a Palestinian nation-state.[7]

Palestinians are predominantly Sunni Muslims, though there is a significant Christian minority as well as smaller religious communities. Roughly half of all Palestinians continue to live in Israel, the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem.[9] The other half, many of whom are refugees, live elsewhere around the world and comprise what is known as the Palestinian diaspora.

The Palestinian people as a whole are represented before the international community by the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO).[10] The Palestinian National Authority, officially established as a result of the Oslo Accords, is an interim administrative body nominally responsible for governance in Palestinian population centres in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

he timing and causes behind the emergence of a distinctively Palestinian national consciousness among the Arabs of Palestine are matters of scholarly disagreement.

In his 1997 book, Palestinian Identity: The Construction of Modern National Consciousness, historian Rashid Khalidi notes that the archaeological strata that denote the history of Palestine — encompassing the Biblical, Roman, Byzantine, Umayyad, Fatimid, Crusader, Ayyubid, Mamluk and Ottoman periods — form part of the identity of the modern-day Palestinian people, as they have come to understand it over the last century,[22] but derides the efforts of some Palestinian nationalists to attempt to "anachronistically" read back into history a nationalist consciousness that is in fact "relatively modern".[22] Khalidi stresses that Palestinian identity has never been an exclusive one, with "Arabism, religion, and local loyalties" playing an important role

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_people

What is the Palestinian Authority and how did it originate?

The 1993 Israel-Palestinian Declaration of Principles (DOP) was the first in a series of steps known as the "Oslo Peace Process". The DOP set forth a two-phased timetable. The first phase, or the "interim period," was to last five years, during which time Israel would incrementally withdraw from Palestinian population centers in Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and Gaza Strip, while transferring administrative power to an elected Palestinian Authority (PA).

A transfer of powers and responsibilities for the Gaza Strip and Jericho took place pursuant to the Israel-PLO May 4, 1994 Cairo Agreement on the Gaza Strip and the Jericho Area. As an immediate result of this agreement, Yasser Arafat was able to return from the PLO exile in Tunisia to take control. The event was chillingly described by eyewitness Michael Kelly in his article titled "Promises but Never Peace":

* Arafat's entry into Gaza was an object lesson: a purposely uncaring display of brute power. He arrived from the Sinai in a long caravan of Chevrolet Blazers and Mercedes-Benzes and BMWs, 70 or 80 cars packed to the rooflines with men with guns. The caravan roared up the thronged roads and down the mobbed streets, with the overfed, leather-jacketed, sunglassed thugs of Arafat's bodyguard detail all the time screaming and shooting off their Kalashnikovs to make their beloved people scurry out of their beloved leader's way.

The transfer from Israel to the Palestinian Authority took place in additional areas of the West Bank pursuant to the Israel-PLO September 28, 1995 Interim Agreement, the Israel-PLO January 15, 1997 Protocol Concerning Redeployment in Hebron, the Israel-PLO October 23, 1998 Wye River Memorandum, and the September 4, 1999 Sharm el-Sheikh Agreement.

After the interim period, the second phase was expected to be the "permanent status" or "final status" negotiations, to resolve "remaining issues, including: Jerusalem, refugees, settlements, security arrangements, borders, relations and cooperation with other neighbors, and other issues of common interest." A final status agreement would mark the official peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, including the possible establishment of a sovereign Palestinian state.

The Palestinian Authority was given the responsibility for combating terrorism and coordinating security with Israel. Following the implementation of the Oslo agreements, the PA gained control over all of the Gaza Strip excluding Israeli settlements (over 85 percent of the area) and 39.7 percent of the territory of Judea and Samaria, the West Bank. The land areas were chosen so that ninety-nine percent of the Palestinian population resides under the Palestinian Authority's jurisdiction.

On January 20, 1996 Palestinian Arabs elected an 88-member legislative council and a president of the Palestinian Authority. The date of the elections was more than 18 months later than planned, a delay used by Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) leader Yaser Arafat to consolidate his grip on the Palestinian populace and silence opposition. Any independent news sources were intimidated into silence and opposing political organizations quietly disappeared. Arafat manipulated the election with rules to forbid anyone from running against him without his express approval, as reported by the UN election observer team. Dr. Haider Abdul Shefi, who had led the PLO delegation at the Madrid negotiations in 1991, offered his candidacy, only to be rejected by Arafat. When Dr. Shefi said that he was going to run anyway, a bomb explosion in Dr. Shefi's home convinced him otherwise.

When the votes were counted, Arafat became the Palestinian Authority's first president, winning 88.1 percent of the vote; his main opponent, Samiha Yusuf Khalil, garnered 9.3 percent. The legislative contests, held in 16 districts of the West Bank, Gaza Strip, and East Jerusalem, saw 50 of the 88 seats go to members of the Arafat's Fatah political movement and most of the rest go to parties who were reliably loyal to Arafat. International monitors noted a number of irregularities, but praised the high turnout and the efficient manner in which the elections were conducted. However, investigations have since documented the methods Arafat used to impose dictatorial rule and ensure his landslide victory.

Final status agreements between Israel and the PA have been delayed because the PA's commitment to Israel's security, embodied in a series of signed documents, has been only an illusion created to gain concessions. The years of the "Oslo Peace Process" have been filled with escalating violence and terrorism against Israel to the point where the time is known in Israel as the "Oslo War". The PA continues to wage the al-Aqsa intifada war of terrorism against Israel and the Oslo process seems to be dead.

http://www.palestinefacts.org/pf_1991to_now_pa_origin.php

I'm certainly not worried about you ET, I think you make an important argument (albeit perhaps with a frequency that can only be understood when one takes into account your great history of services to pedagogy) that needs to be heard, in order for the discerning thinker to reach a balanced conclusion, I just disagree with you on the feasibility of your abstraction, at least in part because I do think that when the resources of our new brain are found to be exhausted by the reality of a situation, then there is nothing to prevent our old brain from doing what it does. When our Deeds in the Land Titles Office no longer have existential value, we are reduced to marking our territories by the human equivalent of the mammalian phenomenon known as pissing in our corners and then protecting said turf in the name of self-defense, to the degree of violence necessary. Or we absquatulate. Or we remove our limbic system. Or we die. Take your pick.

and from the horses mouth, the UN...

The Palestine problem became an international issue towards the end of the First World War with the disintegration of the Turkish Ottoman Empire. Palestine was among the several former Ottoman Arab territories which were placed under the administration of Great Britain under the Mandates System adopted by the League of Nations pursuant to the League's Covenant (Article 22) .

All but one of these Mandated Territories became fully independent States, as anticipated. The exception was Palestine where, instead of being limited to "the rendering of administrative assistance and advice" the Mandate had as a primary objective the implementation of the "Balfour Declaration" issued by the British Government in 1917, expressing support for "the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people".

During the years of the Palestine Mandate, from 1922 to 1947, large-scale Jewish immigration from abroad, mainly from Eastern Europe took place, the numbers swelling in the 1930s with the notorious Nazi persecution of Jewish populations. Palestinian demands for independence and resistance to Jewish immigration led to a rebellion in 1937, followed by continuing terrorism and violence from both sides during and immediately after World War II. Great Britain tried to implement various formulas to bring independence to a land ravaged by violence. In 1947, Great Britain turned the problem over to the United Nations.

After looking at various alternatives, the UN proposed the partitioning of Palestine into two independent States, one Palestinian Arab and the other Jewish, with Jerusalem internationalized (Resolution 181 (II) of 1947). One of the two States envisaged in the partition plan proclaimed its independence as Israel and in the 1948 war expanded to occupy 77 per cent of the territory of Palestine. Israel also occupied the larger part of Jerusalem. Over half of the indigenous Palestinian population fled or were expelled. Jordan and Egypt occupied the other parts of the territory assigned by the partition resolution to the Palestinian Arab State which did not come into being.

In the 1967 war, Israel occupied the remaining territory of Palestine, until then under Jordanian and Egyptian control (the West Bank and Gaza Strip). This included the remaining part of Jerusalem, which was subsequently annexed by Israel. The war brought about a second exodus of Palestinians, estimated at half a million. Security Council resolution 242 (1967) of 22 November 1967 called on Israel to withdraw from territories it had occupied in the 1967 conflict.

In 1974, the General Assembly reaffirmed the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people to self-determination, national independence and sovereignty, and to return. The following year, the General Assembly established the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People. The General Assembly conferred on the PLO the status of observer in the Assembly and in other international conferences held under United Nations auspices.

http://www.un.org/Depts/dpa/ngo/history.html

...and last but not least:

The controversial visit by Ariel Sharon of the Likud to Al-Haram Al-Sharif (Temple Mount) in 2000 was followed by the outbreak of the second intifada. A massive loss of life, the reoccupation of territories under Palestinian self-rule, military incursions, extrajudicial killings of suspected Palestinian militants, suicide attacks, rocket and mortar fire, and the destruction of property characterized the situation on the ground. Israel began the construction of a West Bank separation wall, located within the Occupied Palestinian Territory, which was ruled illegal by the International Court of Justice in 2004. In 2002, the Security Council adopted resolution 1397 affirming a vision of two States, Israel and Palestine, living side by side within secure and recognized borders. In 2003, the Middle East Quartet (US, EU, Russia, and the UN) released a detailed Road Map to a two-State solution, endorsed by Security Council resolution 1515.

In 2005, Israel withdrew its settlers and troops from the Gaza Strip as part of its “Disengagement Plan,” while retaining effective control over its borders, seashore, and airspace.

Following the Palestinian Legislative Council elections of 2006, the Quartet concluded that future assistance to the Palestinian Authority would be reviewed by donors against the new Government’s commitment to non-violence, recognition of Israel, and acceptance of previous agreements.

--------------

So yes, I'd be PO if someone took my farm and cut my trees, but the question I have to ask is:

- what was I doing there in the first place?

ulianov, you put words in my mouth. You wrote—yes, you did—"I did not say commentators WROTE that Palestinians are less than human". Guess what? Smoke and mirrors: I never said you did.

I'm still waiting for words from you that would prove your point.

Why am I not surprised that that still hasn't happened?

Nicely done, Tomax7, four dump posts in a row.
Frankly, sir, I'd be more interested in what you think.

ET,

I'll ask you again, "...prove who these Palestinians are. I would like ET to trace for us their historic beginnings to the present and because of that, their rightful and legitimate claims."

Since you refuse to answer the question, let's ask the 'Palestinians' themselves:

HAMAS LEADER, MAHMOUD ZAHAR TO THE ECONOMIST:

“We [Palestinians] were never an independent state in history,” he notes. “We were part of an Arab state and an Islamic state.”

.....

The leader of the Arab terrorist group As Saiqa --the one who led "Palestinian" Arab Muslims to massacre hundreds of Maronites at Damour, in Lebanon -- Zuheir Mohsen, said the following to James Dorsey in a 1977 inteview in the Dutch newspaper "Trouw":

"The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct "Palestinian people" to oppose Zionism.

“For tactical reasons, Jordan, which is a sovereign state with defined borders, cannot raise claims to Haifa and Jaffa, while as a Palestinian, I can undoubtedly demand Haifa, Jaffa, Beer-Sheva and Jerusalem. However, the moment we reclaim our right to all of Palestine, we will not wait even a minute to unite Palestine and Jordan."

I think any rational person will take this definition of the so-called 'Palestinians' over your fabricated mythology as to who these people are and their falsified claims to legitimacy.

It doesn't matter what you think. What matters is what they think.

Vitruvius, I'm surprized in your comment also.

I posted those because some kept asking for facts and some kept denying was Israel doing.

It wasn't a dump, but a simple post and read what somewhat authoritative sites say.

Who cares what I think?

You see, irwin daisy, I think your question is not legitimate or relevant. Why not? Because it rests on as assumption that the only 'rightful claim' to a land base has to be from an 'ethnos' population.

An 'ethnos' population is one who are genetically, almost 'pure', who can claim a relatively intact lineage from some distant ancestor(s). Actually, this is impossible to prove for any people; all such lineages are narratives rather than factual. But I don't believe that title to a land rests on an 'ethnos' identity. [That's an aspect of fascism, by the way]

I believe that land ownership is a political construct, and rests on a notion of a population as 'demos'. This is a civic rather than ethnic identity; as such, it is open to all people who want to become members of the state while the 'ethnos' identity is closed and open only to members of that 'ethnos'.

This difference, by the way, is what Harper meant when he defined the Quebecois as a 'nation within a united Canada'. He was acknowledging their desire to be 'ethnos' but, within a 'demos' nation.

I believe that 'ethnos', as a definitive clause for a nation to exist is unacceptable in our modern world. We don't, I hope, define nations and their citizens as confined to one single ethnic group.

So, your insistence, irwin daisy, that I define the Palestinians as an 'ethnos' rather than a 'demos' is, to me, an invalid request. They exist, as demos Palestinians because they were living there, in that land called Palestine by the British, for centuries. That's all that is needed; they were citizens of that domain, demos not ethnos citizens. And I prefer the demos to the ethnos. OK?

tomax- what were you doing there in the first place? You and your family had been there for generations, farming there, paying your taxes to the Ottoman and then the British. That's what you were doing. You were legally there - not squatters!

vitruvius, esteemed and venerable as you are, I only repeat my comments because when I say it once, they are ignored.

Yes, tomax - that view of the Palestinians is common among Arabs who think of them, as I've said repeatedly (vitruvius!)..as scum. Ah well.

That's not fully true, ET. When you say it once, I don't ignore you. Sure, some do, but that's life, it is not a reason to replace the extential quantifier with the universal. Anyway, unfortunately, I don't find the signal to noise ratio here to be life-supporting, so I'm going to go do something I do find to be life-supporting, namely, working on SDA Late Nite Radio. Catch all you cats in a few hours, eh what?

BUT ET, while it's true that the Jews in the Arab countries had a new state to go to, it's not Israel's fault that the Palestinian Arabs had no home to go to. That's 100% the fault of the Arab countries (and now Iran) who USED -- and continue to use -- the Palestinian Arabs as proxies for the destruction of Israel. And now that they have been extremely radicalized -- really they are now neo-nazis -- no Arab state wants them. Tragic, but again not Israel's fault.

And even with a home to go to, they lost all their property, for which, if you are at all fair, you should also recommend compensation. OR not, i.e., it's a wash, let it go.

Be clear: I feel very bad about the fate of the Palestinian Arabs, but again Israel bears 0% of the responsibility for this.

As has been pointed out over and over again -- ignoring Jordan (80% of the mandate) which is a de facto "Palestinian" state -- the new 22nd Arab state offered in 1947 is pretty well the state that western elites now recommend for the "Palestinians", namely, all Gaza, all West Bank. They refused this state and started a war of intended anihilation. They will now NOT get this state and if wisdom prevails no state at all, unless the 20,000 or so islamic jihadists are destroyed.

ET,

Their 'ethnos' identity is Arab and, more importantly, to them, Islamic. This is how they define themselves.

I disagree that Islam is a race. It's a ridiculous claim. However, they think so. This is the basis of so-called 'Islamophobia.' OIC pressures on the UN to protect Muslims and other propped up fallacies and false grievances.

"But I don't believe that title to a land rests on an 'ethnos' identity. [That's an aspect of fascism, by the way]"

Once again, it hardly matters what you think. They do think this way. Look at Saudi Arabia and their rejection of Jews setting foot in their country, for example.

Look at how the 'Palestinians' have created a successful 'ethnic' cleansing of historically placed Christians.

Apples and oranges. A total waste of time.

ulianov, it seems that the IDF is more in line with my thinking than yours. Right now, at this very moment, IDF soldiers are hunting down the Hamas terrorists who have been shelling Israel for -years-. The terrorists are bravely hiding behind women and children while sniping at the IDF.

Oddly, no reports of Jews randomly killing Palestinian civilians for the hell of it have surfaced.

Go Sabras!

Btw, yes I do think that terrorists should be stomped on like cockroaches.

Phantom, I agree with you and am pleased that the ground troops have moved in. I hope they do the job they need to do, thoroughly. Yes, civilian deaths are tragic, but that's what Hamas plans for and wants--for both the Israelis and their own people: what despicable snakes they are. The blood is on their hands.

.
Hamas are evil garbage, they must be eliminated. Then, if the rest of the 'Palestinians' really want peace they can give up their dream of destroying Israel, if not, they will never have peace.

Israel must destroy as much of Hamas as possible before the MSM and the idiots and ignorants whine loud enough for them to stop. They must only quit when they are ready.

For EVERY missile shot into Israel at least ONE missile should be returned to the area as close as possible to the shooter. Tit for tat. Every single missile should be returned. Period. Treat them like adults, if they kill, they will be killed. If they send missiles, they will receive them. That is the only way they will learn. Screw public opinion, force them to see the truth, or let them be damned.
.
absurd thought -
God of the Universe says
hope your kids grow up

to strap bombs on babies
to kill other children

.
absurd thought -
God of the Universe says
form a terrorist country

then wish to be destroyed
by committing acts of war

.
absurd thought -
God of the Universe says
blame your failings on the Jews

for a few more thousand years
they are Earth's scapegoats

.
absurd thought -
God of the Universe says
give Israel away

to appease her enemies
dishonor America
.
All real freedom starts with freedom of speech. Without freedom of speech there can be no real freedom.
.
Philosophy of Liberty Cartoon
.
Help Stop Terrorism Today!
.
USpace

:)
.

"because they were living there, in that land called Palestine by the British, for centuries."

If they had been living there for centuries, then why was the UN's definition of "refugee" a anyone who had lived there for 2 years? Where is the evidence that they had been living there for centuries? Where is their history, who were their leaders all those centuries, what are their accumulated stories from all those centuries?

I have been reading your posts on this subject for maybe 3 or more years now - and frankly it worries me that there are university educated people who can twist this in such a way that makes it hard/impossilbe for Israel and the rest of the world to win the battle against Islamic terrorists. How far does your support go?

.
The delusional insanity of the Left is frightening. Hamas are evil garbage, they must be eliminated. Then, if the rest of the 'Palestinians' really want peace they can give up their dream of destroying Israel, if not, they will never have peace.

Israel must destroy as much of Hamas as possible before the MSM and the idiots and ignorants whine loud enough for them to stop. They must only quit when they are ready.

For EVERY missile shot into Israel at least ONE missile should be returned to the area as close as possible to the shooter. Tit for tat. Every single missile should be returned. Period. Treat them like adults, if they kill, they will be killed. If they send missiles, they will receive them. That is the only way they will learn. Screw public opinion, force them to see the truth, or let them be damned.
.
absurd thought -
God of the Universe says
hope your kids grow up

to strap bombs on babies
to kill other children

.
absurd thought -
God of the Universe says
form a terrorist country

then wish to be destroyed
by committing acts of war

.
absurd thought -
God of the Universe says
blame your failings on the Jews

for a few more thousand years
they are Earth's scapegoats

.
absurd thought -
God of the Universe says
give Israel away

to appease her enemies
dishonor America
.
All real freedom starts with freedom of speech. Without freedom of speech there can be no real freedom.
.

Hahaha! Of course! Ya got me...mocking people who hate a certain ethnic group...that's what propagandists do.
Posted by: ulianov at January 3, 2009 6:36 PM

-- "Mocking people who hate a certain ethnic group". You mean like the "Palestinians", who hate a certain ethnic group: Israelis/Jews...

Do I hate "Palestinians"? No. I hate what they are doing, however. To suggest that I hate a "certain ethnic group" is but a standard Hard-Left propaganda tactic, performed by Hard-Leftists who can't win without calling people "racists" just because they criticize certain folks who happen to belong to a certain ethnic group, for doing certain things...

Nevertheless, that's it for me and you. I know better than to continue this wasteful exchange.

Overheard conversation between a father and the local inman...

"...what's wrong with the virgins in our hometown?"

Overheard conversation between a father and the local inman...

"...what's wrong with the virgins in our hometown?"
Posted by: tomax7 at January 4, 2009 11:50 AM

--Imam: "Well, see, they all wear bags over their heads, and you know what that means..."