All of them do?
Appreciate your comment, especially as you didn’t make this into an attack.
In any case, I actually agree with ground attacks being more efficient in some cases. Sometimes they aren’t possible, and we all have to accept that (and it seems that you did) but a group of soldiers is not only less likely to kill civilians but more likely to catch the bad guy, in addition to Israeli presence causing other terrorists to come out of hiding where they will be fightable.
The only problem is that if Israel started sending ground troops in, we’d have problems like teenagers shooting handguns or throwing rocks at the soldiers, then getting shot, then go crying to the UN. If a man attacks a soldier, his age does not matter. He should be attacked back. The soldiers aren’t there for fun, they have a job to do.
No, not all of them. But the group in power does. And that group puts out propaganda like this (http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/pictures/Pictures/baby-gunman-01.jpg) and videos directed at kids as described in this article: Palestinian TV uses Mickey Mouse to promote resistance | Palestinian territories | The Guardian
OK, but I’m not sure the fact that Hamas creates fairly perverse childrens programing means we should be devoid of all sympathy for the Palestinians, as DanBlather’s post seems to suggest. Rather the opposite, IMHO.
I did not say that we should be devoid of sympathy. DanBlather is probably not saying that, either. What I (and I think DB) are saying is that the Palestinians are not just innocent victims. Hamas literally brainwashes the kids who live there, as Palestinian leadership has been for years.
As an example of this, a relative of mine worked quite frequently with Palestinian laborers. (Arab day labor is very common). One day, he called one of the workers and his son picked up the phone. Rather than using my relative’s given name, he said “It’s the Jew”. Had I or any Israeli I know picked up the phone and there was a call from a Palestinian for our father, we would NEVER have said something like that.
Make of it what you will.
EDIT: By the way, I appreciate your civil tone, Simplicio.
Lets turn this question around. What should the Palestinians who aren’t involved in any terrorism do? They can’t leave the territory because no other country will accept them. What can they do to prevent Israel from bombing their schools and hospitals?
Well since you asked so nicely. Stop retaliating and stop provoking them.
Go in on foot with small arms.
Over civilians? Yes. 1 civilian is worth a thousand soldiers. A million.
I don’t. When would this be?
Based on what reasoning?
I’ll take a stab at this one.
Because a soldier tends to have volunteered for his/her position and has had a lot of time and money spent on preparing them for the job at hand — which as far as I’m aware, isn’t killing non-combatants! If the only way to get to your target is through coerced civilians, you need to find another way to fight your battles.
As a Jew, I ask how that is any more repugnant than this:
Perhaps the most shocking design shows a Palestinian mother weeping next to her dead baby’s grave, also in the crosshairs of a rifle. It suggests it would have been better if the child had never been born, with the slogan “Better use Durex”.
You gotta be fucking kidding me…
Oh, it’s just “Boys will be boys!” and a bit of black humour. We shouldn’t take it so seriously!
ivan, I know you’re just being sarcastic, and that article mentions an IDF spokesman issuing a statement denouncing those shirts as “unacceptable” and inconsistent with “IDF values,” (and it was an Israeli newspaper that broke the story) but anyone who would print or wear a shirt with an image celebrating a mother weeping beside her child’s grave, or one with a crosshair over a pregnant woman’s stomach, might as well just give up any pretense of morality or righteousness and wear a fucking swastika.
This is especially true of we Jews. Rabbi Hillel was once challenged to teach the Torah to someone on one foot:
*“I shall teach you the Torah while you stand on one foot. This is our Holy Torah: ‘What is hateful to you, do not do unto others.’”
“Does it mean that the heathens and the Jews and all of us are brothers? Does it mean that we must be kind to one another like brothers?” asked the heathen, wonderingly.
“That’s it, my son. That’s the meaning of the whole Torah. All the rest is only an explanation of that. Go, go, my son. Go and study it,” said Hillel kindly.*
Anyone who would have anything to do with a shirt like that described above, or (as in this thread) accuse others of propagandizing while ignoring his own propaganda, isn’t fit to come anywhere near my Torah, let alone claim to be a follower of it.
And I accept that there are many others like you. It’s just a shame more of you aren’t in positions of high authority. Or is a cut-throat mentality a pre-requisite of getting there?
Does that include child soldiers ?
They should overthrow their terrorist leaders? You keep on saying that not ALL Palestinians are terrorists, which is true. But if the majority of Palestinians don’t support terrorism, why don’t they take a stand against it?
Not retaliating would be the most moronic thing Israel could do. And don’t provoke them? Israel doesn’t provoke them!
Civilian casualties will still happen, since civilians in Gaza often attack soldiers with small arms or rocks. Should soldiers just not shoot back?
kidneyfailure:
I find those shirts just as disgusting as you do.
What’s more repugnant? How about sending your own child, strapped into a bomb filled with shrapnel specifically designed to inflict horrible wounds, onto a bus filled with women and children so that he can not only blow up himself, but kill and wound as many other people as possible?
Of course I could be wrong, maybe wearing that shirt is worse.
Guess I should have added: As much as I hate those shirts, the Palestinian baby with guns is about 50 times worse.