Israeli Terrorism, Have The Abused Become the Abusers?

Great Debates
21

You know what, two wrong’s DON’T make a right.

We are always reading posts here about how Israel is the only “democracy” in the Middle East, and the only “western-style power” (not necessarily from you, but from many others) and how it deserves to join a bloc such as the EU.

Well if so, maybe it should set an example. Other western countries aren’t behaving like it is behaving. If Irael wants special treatment, and to be given privileges and power and help (and weapons) and recognition that Palestine isn’t, maybe it should stop using Palestine as its yardstick for behaviour.

22

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Agreed.

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Other western countries don’t have to put up daily with what Israel puts up daily. Do you think, for a minute, that if the Welsh (for example) started a violent uprising against the English, with the intent to wipe England off the map (and replace it with a Welsh country covering the entire island of Great Britian) that inculded suicide bombings and the like that Israel deals with that there wouldn’t be military action, checkpoints, curfews and the like?

Zev Steinhardt

23

Fang, it’s just not true anymore that Israeli terrorists and criminal elements in the IDF are investigated:

http://www.btselem.org/ (publications/Foreseen but not Prevented: The Performance of Law Enforcement Authorities in Responding to Settler Attacks on Olive Harvesters)

24

sorry that should of read: “aren’t investigated”

25

Zev

Substitute Irish for Welsh, and you’re talking history pretty much as it happened. But as I said above, IRA are terrorists, Fatah are “freedom fighters” (the PC position, if you hate the Jews enough).

26

I find this a bit amusing. Israelis are terrorists. So are Palestineans. Each are pointng to one another and shouting “theyre the bigger terrorists!”

What does it matter who is the bigger terrorists when both are terrorising each other? I would agree that Israel are using terrorist methods and are pretty good at them. Everytime they get hit, they hit back, harder than they were hit. An eye for an eye with interest. Shouldnt the logical conclusion be that you shouldnt hit Israel? Historically, they are a nasty lot. Why are they constantly being poked at?

I find it amusing that a country complains about being slapped harder when It slapped first.

27

aaaphen256, you seem to have an acuate case of Jenin syndrome. Jenin syndrome can be diagnosed by a number of syndromes, including:
[list=a]
[li]The belief that Israel is run by murderous terrorists[/li][li]Ignoring Palestinian attacks against civilians, and[/li][li]The unwillingness to accept a single iota of evidence supporting Israel[/li][/list=a]

Jenin syndrome received its name from the confusion surrounding the raid of the refugee camp of Jenin. Israeli forces entered the refugee camp after a suicide bombing that killed a family eating a holiday dinner (an important strategic target!). Immediately, thousands decried the action and spoke of Palestinian casualties in the hundreds.

They were farther from the truth than we are from agreeing on this topic. The death toll came out to (about) 54 Palestinians. Compare that to the 24 Israeli soldiers killed in the raid, and it becomes obvious that this was no massacre.

Most people see the whole conflict with the “Palestinians good, Israelis bad” viewpoint, similar to how the raid in Jenin was viewed. Is Israel perfect? Of course not! But it’s far from a nation of ravaging beasts. Just think, they could have carpet bombed the city.

28

I know, but I stayed away from that for two reasons:

(1) Wales is physically on the island of Great Britian and, in the hypothetical, terrorists would have a far easier time getting to England (as the Palestinians are on the same land mass as the Israelis).
(2) I wanted my example to be a hypothetical.

Zev Steinhardt

29

boyohboy, you forgot to note that the largest outbreak of Jenin Syndrome happened at the UN, where the General Assembly passed a resolution condemning the Israeli “massacre” in Jenin, which even the UN’s own report admitted never happened.

30

Istara,

Of course two wrongs do not make a right.

But the point of the op was that Israeli offenses do not get the Western press play that they “should” and to further clarify, another poster explicitly stated that “the western press, in particular the U.S. press bends over backward to make Israel look good, and lies continuously about what is happening.”

In that context it is relevant that worse PA offenses are not reported either.

I can provide many examples that appear as if the media is biased against Israel, and you can provide the counterfactual. But the likely reality is that the media is interested in what sells.

Who cares about human rights and why?

Israeli press and human rights groups should be critical of Israel. It is their government and they are its watchdog. A rightist government can have support because citizens are willing to give up on some human rights in return for security against terror. And besides in the United States, that happens in Israel too. Watchdogs work to keep those abuses in check.

AI and HRW care. They care because it is human rights and no compromise is ever justified to them. They are critical of everyone according to the level of offense. They may be unrealistic but they are to be respected and held as fair. Even when we disagree with their assessments.

The UN should care about human rights but it doesn’t. The UN GA and the UN Human Rights Commission single out Israel while igniring worse offenses elsewhere. The UN Human Rights Commission exists now to protect the freedom of the worst abusers to abuse while using Israel as an international scapegoat.

How about the posters on this thread? Do they care about human rights? If they did then, and they only cared about Palestinians, then, even then, one would expect them to be as critical of worse PA abuses as they are of Israeli ones. No. They have another agenda.

Finally to echo zev’s cogent remarks - please find me another country that has suffered as many terror attacks/unit population that has done better than Israel at human rights preservation. Okay, find me one that has had any significant number of terror attacks that has done better. Want to check out AI’s pages on Britian? Russia? The USA even? Or should Israel be the shining example that no one else has achieved while enduring more?

I think that many Israelis think she should be. I’d love to see it too. But I don’t see it as a fair expectation even if it is to be strived for.

31

To be fair, Fang, the UN report stating that the “massacre” was non-existent came several months after the resolution. Was the resolution ever repealed, though? Did the UN at least say, “Whoops, sorry, we jumped the gun there”? I’m not positive, but I wouldn’t bet money on it.

Jeff

32

Boyohboy,

There was no massacre and the UN again demonstrated how willing she is to condemn Israel in isolation, ignoring anything done against Israel or by others. But Jenin was no shining example of Israeli restraint either. The HRW report documented the lack of a massacre, but also documented a willful endangerment of civilian lives, manslaughter if not murder.
There was supposed to be an Israeli investigation of Jenin. Anyone know how it turned out?

33

Just to lend some thoughts to this debate.

Just focusing on the Israeli abuses without mentioning the Palestinian ones is a valuable exercise. As DSeid points out, there is a universal standard to be upheld and every country should be held to that standard. That being said, I think Israel gets closer to this standard than nearly anyone else in a war situation.

We cry out as Israeli actions simply because they hold themselves up to be a lighthouse of democracy and human rights in the region. Yet in the end, we are just armchair diplomats screaming for unilateral withdrawal. We, like the UN, are totally powerless to do anything if unilateral withdrawal fails. Just like we are powerless to prevent shelling of Israeli Sheba’a Farms after unilateral withdrawal from Lebanon. Israelwill be left holding the mess if unilateral withdrawal fails. It is a far easier mess to deal with now than after there is an independent Palestine.

I think there are very few Israelis who would deny an independent, peaceful, coexisting Palestine the right to exist. We are a long way away from that picture, and I don’t think any of us have a decent solution on how to get to peaceful coexistence in the region. The way we have now is war, in all its brutality. The openess of Israeli society lets us witness the brutality first hand. It is not the best way, but unfortunately Israel has discovered none better.

I watched the movie Gandhi tonight for the first time in several years. The British massacred and beat peacefully protesting Indians. At Amritsar alone, they killed 240 unarmed civilians. They arrested tens of thousands. And this was without violent protest. Think of how much worse Israel could have done.

34

Just a question for istara on my above post.

Of all of the examples of urban warfare in history, which countries do you believe have done a better job on a human rights front than Israel? How about in warfare in general? How about in violent national liberation movements? How about in nonviolent national liberation movements? I think you will find that Israel is better than par on these grounds.

35

Israel became the bad guy (with sub-plots of genocide) under Gen. Sharon in 1982.

Yes kids, Israel, with full and active support of the US, is recreating the Warsaw Ghetto in the West Bank. The “settlers” are the proto-brownshirts, amassing under the protection of the IDF, until they can “claim” their God-given land (screw the treaties, the UN) - “God gave US this land”!

p.s. - it’s not the Palestinians who are cutting off food, water, and income to the Israelis.

36

HH

Hopefully this is your typical hit-and-run visit, using emotive words and insulting language, then disappearing! Then maybe people who have something meaningful to say won’t be bothered by yourpseudo- intellectual blather.

MC

I guess the mandatory “48-hour MC window” required for you to post corrections to your corrections has now closed, so I can answer your question to me.

I watch BBC news at least twice a day. I listen to BBC World Service for at least 2 hours a day. I can report many instances of blatant bias, if not indeed lying, in favour of the Palestinian cause. Here’s one of many. On Thursday last week, a clash between Israeli troops and Palestinian gunmen in Gaza left two dead. Result - top billing in BBC news headlines for the rest of the day (and the headline says “Two killed in Gaza raid”, not exactly descriptive of the facts.). On Friday, an unarmed Israeli civilian was stoned to death while on a business visit to a West Bank village. Result - not even a mention!

37

That’s complete bullshit. Israel doesn’t even meet minimal standards of conduct for an occupying force–even granting its right to occupy the West Bank and Gaza. Israel routinely violates the 4th Geneva Convention, which outlaws among other things, the importation of civilians into occupied territory. Israel is routinely condemned for its human rights abuses in the occupied territories, and is the only country in the world with an official policy of torture.

The treatment of Palestinians in the occupied territories is some of the worst treatment of human beings on the face of the Earth. These are the least free areas on Earth. Israel better than most…BAH!

It is all the more disgusting when people blame the Palestinians for the situation. What utter depravity! There is no lower type of human being than those who blame the victims for their troubles. If a woman is beaten for years by her husband, do you blame her for not getting the dinner done on time? or for speaking back too much? Oh, and if only that bitch hadn’t have worn that short skirt, I wouldn’t have raped her. And, if only the Palestinians were nice and docile, and didn’t fight back, we wouldn’t have to demolish their homes and shoot their children.

38

No axe to grind either way on this but I’m curious: What is Israel’s “official policy of torture?”

Testy

39

Rampisad, headlines rarely go into detail (something you too are guilty of when you neglected to mention that one of the dead was an old man who was killed when the IDF demolished his house while he was still inside it) the report did mention the clash between Palestinian gunmen and the IDF, but what exactly did you want a 5-6 word headline to say?

On the killing of Massoud Mahlouf Elon, the only mention this received in any of the mainstream press outside of Israel was as a footnote to an article that was syndicated to about half-a-dozen regional newspapers in the US. This kind of killing is all to common in Israel/OT and all round the world and it probably was not seen as a newsworthy event. Many deaths as a result of the current conflict go unreported (in the mainstream media), for example a seven year-old girl who was shot after a school was opened fire on by the IDF http://indymedia.org.il/imc/israel/webcast/46256.html

40

Alot of deaths go unreported (by the BBC/mainstream media) due to the sheer volume of them, but by only examing one case, you cannot draw the conclusion of bias.