Oh, Lust4Life, I forgot to ask you. How do these back-alley conversations with the native Muslim population go?
“How much for this rug/pottery/t-shirt?”
“10 dirham”
“Thanks very much. Do you want to anihilate Israel?”
Do these conversations really trump things like, I dunno, quantifiable facts? Numbers and statistics and such? Because my conversations with Palestinians usually go something like, “I don’t hate Jews. I don’t give a flying f*ck if they celebrate Passover or worship a keg of Heineken. I just wish it wasn’t such a pain to go visit my relatives. And I miss my grandfather’s orchards.” But I certainly wouldn’t use that as proof that Palestinians are all peace-loving, nonviolent, who are perfectly capable of coexisting with Jews and Christians and whoever else. There are some fanatics who want nothing more than to blow themselves up and take out a handful of rabbinical students while they were at it.
Oddly I would say the opposite, the Israelis tend to get a bad press
What about the Madrassas in Pakistan and Saudi
the Saudis tried to buy off their Mullahs by letting them run the education
Pakistan has some problems - I think they are trying to clamp down
On 7th July 2005 a bunch of idiots blew themselves up on the underground and on a bus.
In Luton, a town 20 miles North of London, there is a substantial population of Pakistani origin. They were driving around honking their horns and yelling.
It was not in the press - I only know because a friend of mine saw it.
If you listen to Palestinians on the radio, some of the things they say are astonishing.
Also, what do you think the Imams in the radical mosques were telling their congregations.
I think it is fair to say that Islamisists hate the West
ie: they don’t just hate Israel and the USA - they hate the West
but there are plenty of non-Islamisist Moslems who are just fine
Well, getting bad press is not the same as being victims of media bias. Palestinians get a bad press too. This report seems to indicate media bias towards Israel (assuming it is factually correct). If it isn’t, then I don’t know, it’s hard to figure out who’s got an agenda and who’s trying to be impartial.
Well, Saudi Arabia as a whole is a disgrace to arabs in my opinion. Women aren’t allowed to go out alone or drive? <insert a dozen insane laws here>? That’s just crazy. I’m not defending them.
The pakistani Madrassas promoting hatred and dabbling in politics are a blight as well. I believe they are the exception to the rule though. The vast majority of Pakistani schools are probably normal.
I’m sure 99.9% of the pakistanis in the u.k were horrified by the event. I’m not saying you’re lying or even wrong, I just don’t find it significant. I’m sure there are plenty of american, european, israeli and japanese wackos, extremists or what have you that are shaming their respective populations. i remember the first thing I thought on 9/11 after the customary “this can’t possibly be happening” and “Did that guy just jump off a window? Oh god no…” was “that’s just great. This is just what I needed right before leaving for the U.S.”. My point is that terrorist attacks and murders benefit very few people (if any…) and they certainly harm anyone who has anything in common with those murderers simply by association.
I have no doubt of it. I’m sure I could walk in the streets of gaza shouting “I hate Israel” without anybody objecting to it. I would probably hate Israel if I was born and raised there just as I’d probably hate the U.S if I lived in Iraq and knew innocent people killed as collateral damage (and so on…). I’m sure I’d hate palestinians if I lived in Israel and some crazy bastard exploded himself killing my two children, or my parents, or brothers, and so on. There is a lot of hatred out there. That’s for sure.
Sigh. Bad things? And I’m sure Imams in the 99.99% of non-radical mosques tell boring things to their congregations. This is just common sense.
You know, that’s just wrong. Islamists , by which I’m guessing you’re referring to radical fundamentalist muslims (hereby referred to as fundies) can hate lots of things. Algerian islamists hated the algerian government. Nowadays, it’s “trendy” for fundies to hate Israel (and most muslims sympathize with palestinians and are not fond of Israel for sure) and many hate the U.S government for providing weapons to Israel (used to kill palestinians) and now, also because of the war in Iraq.
They don’t hate “the west”. They might think negatively of things such as western porn or homosexuality or any of those things christian fundies dislike but they don’t actually hate the west. A lot of them have family living in the west (I’ve got at least 20 family members living in the west). The vast, crushing majority of the muslim population in the west (We’re talking tens of millions) loves it there, enjoys the democratic, relatively non-corrupt governments, the freedom of speech, the standards of living and the decent economy among other things. Why wouldn’t they? Sure, they feel homesick sometimes and go to ye ole’ country to see their extended families on vacation but you can bet they’ll go back to France or Holland or the U.S or wherever it is they live.
And of course, for every fundy out there, there are a hundred guys who’d just love a chance to go live in the west. That’s why there are hard to obtain visas required for people to enter those countries. Remove that requirement and watch the floodgates open. Remember that most of those people under 40 grew up drinking coke, wearing Levy’s jeans, washing their clothes with Tide, watching the Disney channel, Dallas, Hollywood movies, fantasizing about Angelina Jolie and Cameron Diaz, eating at McDonalds and so on. Trust me, they love the west more than westerners do :). No kidding…
You know, I would really like to believe that the Islamists are small in number, and that truly 99% of Pakistanis were horrified by the terror attacks. But that’s simply not the case.
Support for Bin Laden in Pakistan hovers around 50% of the population, and has been as high as 65%. It’s hard to imagine people supporting supporting someone who’s actions ‘horriified’ them.
This is one of the great opinion divides on the war on terror. Some believe that the problem is a handful of nutcases. Get bin Laden, arrest terrorists, root them out like criminals, and the problem can be contained. Other point to the widespread hatred for the west in many Middle Eastern countries, and the widespread support for Bin Laden, and say that there’s a deeper problem that needs to be fixed or the terrorist problem will continue to get worse, with or without Bin Laden.
I read a report a couple of days ago that the Taliban and al-Qaida were mustering an army of 200,000 men inside Pakistan. That’s a HUGE army. To be able to recruit that many men for what are almost certainly suicide missions against American troops is an indicator of a widespread acceptance of terrorism in Pakistan and a large pool of people who hate the west enough to be willing to die for it.
@Gozu There are several strands to the problem. In my opinion the majority of people regardless of religion, are pretty tolerent, decent and just fine.
However there are minorities who are, in my opinion, just plain mad. With the Islamists, part of it is through indoctrination, part through resentment and a good bit through complete ignorance. I suspect that to the majority of non-Islamist Moslems, these fanatics are just plain obnoxious.
It gets even stranger, just an example, statistically irrelevant, but interesting. I read an interview with a guy from, and in, the Yemen who was an ardent Khat chewer, and had lived in London for a long time. He had also fought in Bosnia and in Afghanistan with the Taliban. He liked the English, happily volunteered that no English person that he knew would ever believe that he had fought with the Taliban - and he came across as a thoroughly nice guy.
Of the UK suicide bombers at least one seems to have been pretty much Ok, oddly he was their leader, and of the failed follow up, yet again at least one seems quite reasonable.
I put it down to young males getting caught up in a ‘Boys Own’ adventure, and things progressively getting out of control.
In many ways I can see parallels with the IRA and the UDA.
I’m not sure what we can do about it, but I’m pretty sure of one thing, Islamists are more of a threat to their fellow Moslems than to anyone else.
One thing to remember is that Hamas and Hezbollah are not political parties in the way that most Americans think of them these days.
Depending on where they operate, they are the force in their neighborhoods. Need a new apartment? Call Hamas. Your son is in trouble? Call Hezbollah. Jobs, new apartments, clean water - all come from the party, not the government. (I think I’m thinking more of Lebanon and Syria, but I may be mistaken.)
The rule of law is not writ large in these places, and the people benefit from the services the parties provide.
So it’s possible that the people who benefit from these services pick up the anti-Israel rhetoric from the parties that provide them day-to-day needs, vs. the other way around. (That is, people who are anti-Israel looking for a party to represent them.)
(Not taking sides at all, not anti one thing or the other, just trying to provide an extra bit of knowledge.)
Lots of people in North America are prone to disproportionate and fearful violence, like I said. Legions make it their profession for the US to fight Israel’s battles for her.
Iraq’s the price you are paying for ignoring those two facts. They’ll have you in Iran next. That happens when you protect ignorance.
I really think you are wrong when it comes to the USA’s motives for attacking Iraq, and while I’m sure that Israel has been providing intell on Iran, if the USA attacked Iran it would not be to favour Israel.
Israel is quite capable of looking after itself, it does not need the USA to fight proxy battles on its behalf.
I suppose one could say that the USA is supplying Israel with weopons, but realistically Israel could manufacture them domestically or buy elsewhere.
Personally I put the blame firmly on Bush.
Now, I would not be at all surprized if Israel struck at Iran, but then it would not be to aid the USA - it would be a replay of wiping out Saddam’s nuclear plant.
I must apologize. I would answer further but each post takes me at least 2 hours to write. It seems I write slower and slower as years go by. I must be going senile.
I’m willing to believe there are phenotypic cues that allow individuals native to Israel discern Jewish from Arab. Obviously, how else are the Arabs living in Israel specifically discriminated against? Too bad we don’t get to hear Israeli-Arab music like this and that.
The problem is that the Israelis treat the Arabs like shit and far, far, far worse than the whites treat us blacks in America. Even the Klu Klux Klan can go to a sporting event without hurling racial epithets at the players. Not the Israelis. The Arab soccer players are taunted from the crowd with phrases like “No arabs, no goals.” That would never fly in America.
The Arabs living in Israel have higher incarceration rates and unemployment. And, for good measure, it seems Israel even enacts laws that specifically prevents Israelis from having a spouse in the Gaza Strip or the West Bank live in Israel. That is, Joe the Israeli marries Lila the German, Lila can stay in Israel as long as she wants. If Joe decides to marry Fatah from the Gaza Strip, Fatah is not allowed to live with Joe in Israel. What I find absolutely horrific about this law is that if a Israeli and an Arab has a child, the kid can stay with the Israeli parent in Israel until the child is 12, after that, the child has to leave the country. :eek: No Western country should have racist and ridiculous laws like that.
When one looks at examines how Israel treats the Arabs living within its own borders, the cruelty in which Israel created a humanitarian disaster in Lebanon becomes somewhat less shocking.
Hezbollah was elected by the Lebanese people in 2005 . This wasn’t a sham election, in fact, the whole thing watched over the United Nations. This election should have marked a great leap forward for Lebanon which had been war-torn for the last few decades. Nope, not a chance. A year later, Israel invades, reduces the capital to rubble, cluster bombs civilian targets, and sends over a million civilians into exodus.
The Palestinian people in 2006 also had an election in which they voted for the “wrong party”. In response, Israel collapsed of Palestinian economy. Not only are the Arabs in Israel treated like crap, but Israel makes sure that all of the Arabs in surroundings countries are feeling just as crappy. Everytime a neighboring Arab country puts one step down toward democracy, Israel is simultaneously moving her hand toward the bright red “Kill Arabs” button blinking on the wall. Israel should just occupy Lebanon and Palestine and be done with it. Call it “Greater Israel” or something catchy.
No, I imagine that the Israeli take on it is that the problem is terrorism.
Think of it like the Deep South during the sixties in the US, except that the blacks are using suicide bombs instead of Freedom Riders. And are being supported by Canada and Mexico and Cuba.
You seem to have left out a bit of history over that year you skipped over so blithely. Stuff like invasions, kidnappings, terrorist attacks, etc.
This part is too stupid to bother with. You might not be aware that Israel had occupied Lebanon, and then pulled out. The response was an increase in cross-border attacks and terrorism.
Have you seen pictures of Beirut after Israel got through with it?
If this is true, why not attack Hezbollah itself? Why annihilate civilian targets and cluster bomb homes and apartment buildings? This is something you’d expect some African warlord to do, not a Western nation that boasts of being the beacon of democracy in the Middle East. I put the following in italics as if I were screaming them: *If do not possess the intelligence to attack the enemy specifically and surgically, then don’t wage a war in the first place. * It’s that simple.
Clearly, the voice of the Lebanese people have been silenced by Israel. These people have no impetus to vote or participate in free elections. The only humane thing to do is to absorb Lebanon and enact laws that prevent anti-Israeli parties from running from office, ban anti-Israeli speech, and, more importantly, crackdown on terrorist activity. Israel is in more of a position to stop these terrorists than these weak, puppet governments that are installed to assuage Israel’s concerns.
My biggest fear is that the Lebanese and Palestinian people will have another election, vote for the wrong party, and have to bear the brunt of Israel’s white-hot fury again. It is Israel’s responsibility, as they are doling out the meat of the punishment, to prevent such crises from occuring again by making sure anti-Israeli candidates cannot run for office in these two countries.
I have started a new thread to specifically focus on analyzing cmkeller 's assertion that the Arab inhabitants of the current State of Israel mostly left of their own accord, as part of a plan for the destruction of Israel. I invite anyone interested in examining the relevant history in a respectful fashion to join me there.
I thought you were condemning Israel for invading Lebanon. Now you are recommending it.
Once again you are suggesting what you previously condemned.
So now you think Israel did not go far enough. Is that it?
Why are you not making this recommendation to the terrorists? They are certainly not attacking the Israelis surgically, unless you call deliberate attacks on civilians “specific”.
I’m guessing that if Israel deliberately made it impossible to attack her military without incurring civilian casualties, you would recommend that the Palestinians and Lebanese stop their attacks. Right?
Do you mean the real pictures, or the photoshopped ones where the Hezbollah lackey used the stamp tool to replicate damage that didn’t exist?
Because Hezbollah uses homes and apartment buildings as bases to launch attacks from, precisely because it causes civilian damage, which is good for PR. The blame is entirely Hezbollah’s.
So what’s a ‘surgical’ attack on a rocket emplacement sitting on top of a school? And I suppose you hold no blame for Hezbollah engaging in such tactics?
I’ll admit I haven’t read all of the posts in this thread. I’m guessing it’s making the same points that have been made before. So I’ll do the same.
Israel exists. The other countries in the Middle East are going to have to learn to accept this.
Most of the people now living in Israel were born there. They’re living in their native land. They’re not immigrants.
Nobody owes anybody a country. The British owned Palestine. The Jews convinced the British to give them part of it. The Israelis now own the country. If the Muslims want part of it, they’re going to have to convince the Israelis to give it to them.
Israel is a democratic country with decent civil rights and a healthy economy and has usually supported the interests of the United States. Yes, we tend to favor Israel but we do so for good reasons.
Israel has a record of generally being willing to discuss the possibility of reasonable negotiation and compromise with the Palestinians and other Middle Eastern countires. But reasonable negotiation and compromise has to be a two-way street.
The neighbourhoods considered Hizballah strongholds were levelled. The remainder of the city - something like 95% - was untouched.
Surgical enough for you?
Seriously: the levels of ignorance displayed by your posts is astounding. Can you even find Lebanon on a fucking map?
Because thats where Hizballah WAS. That’s where they were quartering their troops and storing their weapons. That’s where they were firing their rockets from.
My God, you sound like the kind of person who looks for their car keys under the streetlamp.
On the contrary - carpet bombing enemy cities is a supremely Western way of waging war. In fact, I’d call it a Western invention.
Everything we do, we learned from the West.
So besides knowing nothing about the Middle East, you know nothing about war, either. Great.
What you seem to be saying is that if your cities are being bombed, you should either respond in a pinpoint military fashion, or if circumstances don’t allow you to do that, you should do nothing. Let me reiterate: there are circumstances in which you advocate doing nothing in response to an attack. You’d let your own people die to avoid the risk of someone else getting hurt.
I swear to God, I’m starting to believe in Creationism. Obviously, no creature honed by millions of years of natural selection could display such a singular lack of survival instinct. Darwin must have been wrong.