I don’t know… there are plenty of people in Syria who are right now studying their government very carefully for any sign of weakness. IMHO, they’ve just been given one.
If the army did intervene, the Syrian government would in effect be admitting they knew this was coming . . . might even have to admit they set it up.
Then they’re incompetents. I mean, the Israelis knew they were coming - the beefed-up forces along the border are proof of that. Why didn’t the Syrians?
There are only three possible interpretations for the events, as far as the Assad regime is concerned: that they’re incompetent, that they’re cowards, or that they’re cynical manipulators. None of the options make them look very good.
Has anything EVER made Assad et. al. look good?
Ba’athism, supposedly . . . but I wonder if anyone in Syria even believes in it any more.
Why do we have to choose only one? 
Or, that they’re rational enough to want to avoid a situation where you have Israeli and Syrian troops leveling rifles at each other from opposite sides of the border and somebody might actually fire. Any rational leader would try to avoid that, I hope; Allah knows where it would lead. (Whipping up the Palestinians to charge the fence remains indefensible, of course.)
It is not lawful for Syrians (or Palestinians in Syria) to breech the ‘buffer zone’. They **let **it happen as they planned it.
Alessan’s point was that this was no spontaneous peaceful protest that the big bad IDF troops shot down out of spite and hatred for all that is good and decent about humanity.
Actually not that I particularly am interested in this debate at all, but a sling dramatically increases the lethality of the stone it throws. Slingers were used en masse in many armies of the ancient world and were exceptionally deadly. Thousands upon thousands of people across the Mediterranean world were killed by slings, not to mention their extensive use in hunting.
Yeah luckily no one in the ancient world had armor so slings were never put to the test against it.
Anyway, no one is actually using slings firstly and secondly sovereign states have an intrinsic right to repel unwanted persons from their borders. If lethal force is required to do so, that is an ancient right of all sovereign states, in fact tacitly allowing those borders to be penetrated by crowds of potentially dangerous barbarians is usually a sign that a state is coming to an end as an entity.
I don’t think ancient slings have fuck all to do with this situation. I do think it is basically completely stupid to act like someone getting killed by a sling was actually a “moonshot.” That was a very common thing, it was considered notable because Goliath was some sort of mythical giant and David was a young man nominally unskilled in warfare using a shepherd’s weapon to kill a gigantic, trained warrior. The idea that the sling isn’t dangerous even against armored enemies is what annoys me, because it’s totally historically inaccurate.
The heck they aren’t.I’ve seen video of it.
Probably just Israeli propaganda though. :rolleyes:
Since when does the U.N. publicly condemn an action against any religious building by individual citizens?
Just when the citizens are Israeli?
Since when does the world not condemn terrorist actions against a targeted religious group?
When do Israel jingoes *not *condemn them - when the perpetrators are Jewish? (Hint: That’s the evidence of your post).
Equating some assholes with setting a mosque’s carpet on fire to a guy who blows himself up on a bus is hardly a worthy comparison. :rolleyes:
As the article pointed out, the Israeli government condemned the actions. You know? The actions that were done out of protest re: Israel’s government?!
Good fucking grief. I don’t recall the U.N. responding to Israel’s calls to please prevent the destruction and desecration of Jewish holy sites and synagogues. Gazan synagogues were wrecked and pissed on. Did the U.N. say anything about Joseph’s Tomb, either? I don’t recall. Can we find that one? If they did, did they put the blame on the PA?
Apparent evidence the march on the border was orchestrated. With original document in arabic, and full translation.