Thanks Puzzler
FWIW, here’s a little metaphorical fable:
There once was an impoverished baker who scraped together the last of his ingredients to make one final loaf of bread. A little later a man walks in and says, “The previous owner of this shop cheated me out of a loaf of bread years ago, so I’ll take that one”—and he seizes the loaf. Naturally the baker doesn’t like this and he begins fighting with the man to get the bread back. Just then a local magistrate comes by and after hearing the issue, decides to divide the loaf in two. But the baker remains convinced that the entire thing belongs to him, so as soon as the official leaves he lunges for the other half and the fight resumes. But the man has the better of it and soon has both halves even as the baker is beaten bloody. What’s more, the man has eaten one of the halves and is starting to wolf down the other, which makes the baker even angrier. At some point the baker starts to consider that accepting the half-loaf he was promised isn’t such a bad idea, but by now all the man is willing to let him have is a handful of crumbs equivalent to a quarter-loaf. Well, the baker has been having a pretty bad day, so he’s not about to accept this. Let’s say the man has his 6-year-old daughter with him, so the baker starts hitting her! The wretched baker is certainly going berserk, but at some point the man has got to start wondering if eating half of the second half was such a good idea.
Now go to Squeaky Wheels and despair.
Uh, mods? I think Squeels posted in the wrong thread.
While I’m pretty sure Alessan got the analogy, here’s a translation for possibly confused lurkers: Baker = Palestinians, Loaf = Israel / Palestine, Man = Jews, magistrate = international community, halving the loaf = partition plan of 1947, beating the girl = terrorism acts.
So, here’s a brief summery of Squeels’s… errr…. interesting version of the Israel-Palestinian conflict:
The Palestinians owned the land currently known as Israel + OT. Working very hard, with minimal means, they dried the swamps of the area, watered the desert, and managed to build a successful state, with flourishing agriculture, industry, and commerce.
Into this finished state, came those pesky Jews, claiming ownership of the state due to harm been done to them 2000 years before.
The international community, disregarding the ownership of the Palestinians of the land and the massive labor they had put into turning this once-deserted land into the flourishing country that it is, decided to divide the land between the Palestinians and the Jews.
Naturally and understandably, the Palestinians didn’t accept this plan, and as soon as possible gathered their meager means to fight (all on their own) the brutal Israel. Unfortunately, they loose the war, and Israel gets their half as well.
At some point, the Palestinians are even willing to compromise, and to accept the half of the land (that is rightfully their in full, mind you!). However, ant this stage, Israel is only willing to hand over the OT, not the original '47 partition.
The poor Palestinians are going berserk, and use terrorism against Israel. While this is regrettable, Israel has only itself to blame.
What can I say, Squeels? You have an eye for the truth and for the fine details of reality. Bravo!
[I’d use the :dubious: here, but its eyebrow is not nearly high enough for my needs.]
Now that is something.
I must admit that the Hamas charter is more than a bit unsettling. Knowing about this charter, why didn’t Israel prevent Hamas from running? Or, at the very least, warn the electorate of the possible consequences of a Hamas-led government. Israel did neither. Why? I don’t get that. It’s almost like having Hugo Chavez and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad running a two year campaign to be the next President of Mexico without a peep from the Americans until after the election. It defies reason. The Hamas charter didn’t materialize out of thin air; indeed, your cite shows that it has been in existence since 1988.
- Honesty
As I just wrote in my previous post in this thread, I find the Hamas charter to be more than unsettling. The issue I have is that world isn’t punishing the Hamas government, they are punishing the Palestinian people. If you want to punish Hamas, then do it! Such methods were used against North Korea when sanctions prevented sale of weaponry and luxury items. Even the sanctions toward Iran have mostly been restricted to the sale of arms, nuclear aid, and freezing assets of companies/individuals tied to the production of nuclear energy.
This wasn’t even tried with Palestine.
Israel, with the world behind her, collapsed the country’s government without warning and regard for the Palestinians. Now, this meddling has yielded a watered down government and a disenfranchised electorate. Israel thinks of itself as the beacon of democracy in the Middle East, yet they punished ordinary citizens for voting for the incorrect party. When one looks at the aftermath of the Palestinian and Lebanese elections, it is no wonder the Arabs flinch when the West promises to bring democracy to the world.
- Honesty
:dubious:
Anyway, moving right along as you’d agree your last post was not your strongest ever. There seems to be some residual interest in the Hamas Charter. This seems unusual to me, as the point made is exceeding slender. Although your last post was written in anger and is little coherent you do show signs of moving forward.
Of course. All hostility to Jews is in the context of support for the Israeli state. Remove that cause and there’s nothing. Now to take the Koranic verse quoted in the Hamas Charter, The one about talking trees.
- It is not, contrary to your assertion, about killing all Jews.
- It is quoted in support of a prayer to defeat Zionism.
- There is no support or other contextual evidence in the Hamas Charter for the proposition that Hamas plans to kill all Jews.
- The claim that Hamas does plan that, a genocide, is an extraordinary one, and requires extraordinary evidence in support, I’d expect a plain language, ‘Here’s our plan to kill all Jews.’ None of which is forthcoming.
(Now the question is one of debate but distracts from the main issue here. So for an interesting discussion, I refer you to the Hamas Wikipedia page, in particular Accusations and Denial of Anti-Semitism.)
To return
This alone of your silly claims previously merits a request for evidence. It does, because it is a common claim of zionist propaganda, or what Norman Finkelstein terms the Holocaust Industry.
Or as someone recently put it
Some of the other silly claims you may wish to reconsider:
??
- You are experienced in guerilla & resistance tactics? Who knew
- Pick up and leave? That’s just my thought experiment. The evidence is Hamas is prepared to have a minority Jewish population in the contested lands.
- Establishment document? 1998 was Hamas’ birth?
Again, show us the rhetoric about evil Jews. It needs to be outside the context of zionism & demonstrate that Hamas’ hostility is independent of that cause.
Honesty,
It was clear to all that a Hamas victory was risking international sanctions if Hamas once in power refused to grow up and renounce their committment to use violence in pursuit of hegemony over all of Israel and the OTs.
Knowing that was a risk the Palestinian people voted for Hamas. Perhaps they gambled that Hamas in power would take the responsibility to be pragmatic seriously. Perhaps they thought that if it took Nixon to go to China that it would take Hamas to acccept Israel. I don’t know. But they made an informed choice.
As to trying to isolate the effects onto Hamas, well, the fact of the matter that humanitarian aid has actually increased since the Hamas victory.
You would want Israel to prevent the Palestinians from voting freely?!? The Palestinians had every right to vote however they wanted to. And they have every responsibility for the consequences of that vote.
So long as the ruling party of the PA maintains a stated committment to use violent attacks on Israel until all of the land is under control of an Islamic theocracy, then funding the PA is tantamount to enabling those attacks.
Bolding mine.
You said something similar about Israel controlling elections in The Lebanon.
Israel does not control Palestine, just as it does not control The Lebanon, there is no way it wants to interfere in the affairs of what it considers independent States.
If Israel had come out strongly in favour of Mahmoud Abbas’s Al Fatah party, then it would probably have exactly the opposite effect, but that would be like the Canadian government telling the USA electorate who to vote for, and generally people don’t do that - meddling is just not on.
Israel’s interference with Palestine is defensive, if they wanted to they could wipe the place out - but that would be like an adult shooting a small kid because he has been throwing stones at the adult’s windows.
To your credit, you have a concerned, liberal, outlook - and just can’t get inside the minds of people in the Middle East.
Let us imagine that there was a group in Mexico that said that Americans were evil and responsible for all wars and that not only did all of the Texas territory belong back in Mexican hands but that all of Ameerica should be Mexico as well. They were committed to accomplishing this by terror atttacks on the US. They also did some good things for the poor in Mexico, the previous Mexican administration was corrupt and when they ran in the general election they won. In power they stood by their stated goal of America’s destruction and publically celebrated an AlQaeda attack on American targets. There was well grounded suspicion that they helped fund a set of murders and kidnappings in America with government funds.
Would the US be justified in economically isolating the Mexican government or only in cutting off luxury goods and weapons?
I contemplated for a long time if I should reply to Sevastopol’s post. For one thing, it is directed to Tom. For another, I found sev in the past to be less than a honest debater.
I opted at last to reply, as I fear some future reader might interpret the lack of response as an agreement. I will not address anything directed at tom personally, as I know he can respond far better that I can. I will concentrate on the factual claims alone.
Oh?
Let me point a couple more highlights (much snipped):
Note the separation of Israel, Judaism and Jews. They have no problem with using, e.g., Zionists when they choose to. Therefore, I find it reasonable that when they write “Jews”, they mean… Jews.
Are you reading the same verse?
Right. So it’s OK then, right?
Do re-read the charter, will you.
You are not a lawyer, are you? Because I, for one, would enjoy seeing your defense of an attempted murderer.
"Ladies and Gentlemen of the jury. Yes, it is true that he had an illegal gun in his possession. Yes, it is true he had the whereabouts of the victim, Mr. Smith charted. Yes it is true that he even shot Mr. Smith and wounded him.
“But, Ladies and Gentlemen of the jury, murder is an extraordinary crime, and requires extraordinary evidence in support, I’d expect a plain language, ‘Here’s my plan to kill Mr. Smith’ on the diary of the defendant. None of which is forthcoming. Thus, you must acquit!”
I read it carefully. It is almost entirely devoted to proves of the anti-Semitic nature of Hamas.
So, you feel that is Israel had a majority Muslim population and Islamic leadership, Hamas would still continue its activities without change? :dubious:
Cite?
1998? The charter is from 1988, one year following Hamas’s establishment. I think it can be fairly referred to as the establishment document.
You know, this is probably one of the silliest claims I have heard.
Zionism, and Israel are here, and were present at the time of the Hamas establishment. Of course Hamas would refer to it.
But tell you what: I’ll return the challenge. Show me that the Nazis hostility toward the Jews was independent of the Jewish presence at Europe. Unless you don’t consider the Nazis to be anti-Semitic, that is.
Not quite - Sevastopol is spreading anti-Semitic lies, as usual. The quote is from the Q’uran, which much predates the modern state of Israel. Therefore it can’t possibly refer to Zionism.
Regards,
Shodan
Of course. What I meant was that the quote in the Hamas charter was in context of anti-Zionism section. But that doesn’t make it any less anti-Semitic for that.
Sure. That is why they include lies about the French Revolution, WWI, the Masons, and various fraternal organizations that, with the single exception of WWI, all occurred prior to the founding of Zionism. It is simply false to claim that all those lies were stated in the context of Israel or Zionism.
- No, just all the Jews in the Levant.
- a “prayer” that includes a number of blatant lies and which speaks only of destruction, not coexistence. You are saying that Hamas is simply one more al Qaida clone, then?
- You are repeating yourself.
- There are no plans in the Hamas charter for anything. Only declarations of belief and intent. People do not put plans in charters or constitutions, so this is merely a red herring.
Far more than you, apparently.
Intersting experiment. The Jews have to leave their homes in Israel, but the Arabs do not have to leave their homes. Where do you propose the Jews (particularly the Jews who already livend in the Levant or the Jews who were forced to move to Israel when they were expelled by Arab nations in the 1940s), go and why should they have more need to abandon a place they have lived for thousands of years more that the Arabs. (Yes, Israel has a lot of immigrants–of course, many of them are immigrants from Arab nations that evicted them in 1948, so it is not merely a bunch of European Jews invading the land–that is part of the Hamas propaganda machine that you choose to ignore–or support.)
There is no such evidence.
Aside from the fact that the rhetoric quoted is clearly outside the context of Zionism, why would you set such an arbitrary rule? Silly references to the French Revolution have nothing to do with Zionism–a movement that did not occur for nearly a 100 years. Idiotic claims about the Masons have nothing to do with Zionism, which postdates the founding of the Masons by several hundred years. The Hamas rant is against Judaism, not Israel or even Zionism.
You know what? It makes not one whit of a difference to me if Hamas hates me because I’m a Jew or hates me because I’m an Israeli. Why should it?
It might make a difference to what sort of haters they can recruit to their cause, meaning you would need to take a different approach to get the world to take action to prevent the funding and support of those who would kill you.
I understand what you’re saying, but I don’t like the implications.
Because… by claiming that the people attacking us now are cut from the same cloth as our past enemies, its as if we’re saying that we Jews are the same as we were in the past. And that’s not true. The way we used to live, the way we used to think back in Europe and elsewhere, that’s not going to happen again, at least not as far as we Israelis are concerned. We’ve changed the rules, the basic understandng of how the world works and where we stand in it. History isn’t repeating itself.
Some responses don’t merit answers. Their lack of substance is self-evident.
Sort of like “my post is my cite” … his post is the only cite needed to document the lack of any substance in his position. Why waste good electrons?
That is really interesting, I would be very interested in a quick description of how the Jews were in the past, and how thinking has changed.
I’ve formed my views, and am curious to hear yours.
This might be an interesting topic, but I suspect that it would be better suited to a separate thread.