By the way, I apologize to the members of the Peanut Gallery reading along. Just because we’ve got some people pretending not to know things in order to troll the thread doesn’t mean that anybody reading along who doesn’t know the news is guilty of similar actions.
Hopefully for those reading along this should clear up the truth value of the anti-Israel crowd’s continued willful ignorance of Lebanon’s complicity in the current war. And, of course, as to their intellectual honesty just look at their claims that they would support Israel if only it was limiting its attacks to Hezbollah. Such trollish games of let’s-pretend should be beneath anybody posting to these forums. Unless, of course, anybody is actually fooled into thinking that the anti-Israel folks would support and praise Israel for its retraint for invading southern Lebanon and going house-to-house.
Your reply assumes an invasion of south Lebanon. Excluded middle and all that.
Of course, Hizbullah made the same assumption. It’s easy to exploit the weakness of someone when you can so easily predict how they’ll react.
BTW, my definition of a massacre: Unicef says that a third of the 300 or so Lebanese killed so far are children. And Finn Again’s propaganda-filled handwaving aside, the Lebanese army still hasn’t fired a shot.
That’s a massacre.
As noted before, some of your terminology wants definition. Most importantly, the “anti-Israel” crowd, apparently somewhat loosely defined as “whomsoever shall disagree with Finn on this issue”. It is a shabby tactic, far beneath the usual calm reasoning and rhetoric you display on virtually any other subject. Criticism is not enmity, one criticizes one’s friends with their best interests at heart. As you probably know, I adamantly oppose US policy on any number of points, I trust this does not mean I am “anti-American”?
If my friend should sit in a chair and pour a cup of lighter fluid into his lap and reach for the matches, I will slap them from his hand, sieze him by the lapels and rail at his stupidity. Because I am a friend.
I further hasten to point out to you that your position is enthusiasticly endorsed by such shit witted maroons as Newt Gangrene. This alone should give you pause. A regional conflagration in the ME would be a catastrophe of Biblical proportion, Israeli incursions into Lebanon increase that risk. And to what end? Have any previous demonstrations of Isreali military might and determination produced any security? Would you risk your life, and your neighbor’s, at 100 to 1 odds if the prize were a toaster?
Israels real enemies would like nothing better than to inflame public opinion against Israel with stacks of civilian casualtys. Make no mistake, such casualties are probably justifiable on the principle of self-defense. But a policy that creates more enemies than it neutralizes is foolish and self-destructive.
Does this require nearly superhuman restraint and wisdom on the part of Israel? Yes, it does. Pray that she has such. And while there, pray for us all.
The only thing ridiculous about mine is that I underestimated the number of rockets by a factor of ~10,000.
Yes. A country needn’t be able to defeat you to threaten you. Are you seriously suggesting that 10,000 missiles (with more where those came from) is not a threat? And don’t be misled by thinking the particular incident (kidnapping of Israeli soldiers) that started this latest round of violence is some isolated event. You need to look at this in the context of what has been going on between Hezbollah and Israel for decades.
Well, that’s the main problem. They can’t patrol their own country, so when private militias threaten another country, that country has to take matters into its own hands.
“Quite far”? Israel and Lebanon are both about the size the Connecticut. Nothing is “quite far”.
Actually, quite apt. If Mr. Hawkings fires a Katusha at point blank, toe-squashing range, it would be a suicidal act of self-defense. One wholly justified, mind you. If that matters. When everybody is, like, dead and stuff.
If this is a relatively common event, why the need for uncommon response?
At what cost? At what risk? Do you not agree that this situation has the potential for disastrous consequences?
“Out of range” is quite sufficient. No Hizbollah rockets are being launched from Beirut. Hence, attacks there are more punitive than military. Unwise.
Good! It may surprise you to hear that some people find my views and expressions thereof annoying. Hard to credit, I know, but there you have it…
Quite frankly, the only think analogies do here is obscure the actual situation, and there’s no need to compare it something else. Sure, Israel is the stronger of the two nations-- by a long shot. So what? This isn’t about matching equal sized armies against each other in a “fair” fight-- it’s about survival.
You missed the point. We keep hearing about a “disproportionate respone” from Israel, but this is much more than a matter of 2 kidnapped soldiers. Hezbollah has been arming itself to the teeth, and is under no constraining force other than its Iranian and Syrian sponsors.
Of course it does. But so does inaction. It’s a terrible, nasty sitaution this dealing with terrorist entities. There is no good solution, only less bad ones. This is not some trumped up situation like Bush taking us into Iraq. This real, and Israel is fighting for its life. It’s no accident that they have a large, strong army-- they’d be gone a long time ago if they didn’t.
Look, I’m not going to go in and second guess every tactical decision they make-- I’m not going to pretend to know all the details and you shouldn’t either. I will support Israel’s right to defend itself in general, even if I might disagree with exactly how that’s done.
Perhaps they feel its necessary to disrupt the command and control structure or the supply infrastructure. Perhaps that’s more effective then eliminating the rockets themselves. Perhaps both are necessary. I don’t think Israel has any allusions about this effort being the end of Hezbollah-- Israel knows it’s in a constant state of war with several of it neighbors. But they have no territorial interests in Lebanon and would be quite happy to make peace with that country. If only that were true of Lebanon wrt Israel (and I’m using “Lebanon” for “Hezbollah” here). Any Arab country that wants peace with Israel can get it.
Well, beyond disproportionate, it’s also crude. That’s number one. Secondly, fighting Hizbullah is hardly a fight for survival.
This is not 9/11, in the sense that the attack that started all of this couldn’t have been entirely unanticipated by Israel. If their contingency for this consisted solely of bombing the hell out of Lebanon, well, that’s just stupid.
As I said, we found ourselves the Northern Alliance after 9/11, then proceeded to peel the Taliban away from the Afghans as we advanced. We didn’t attack the Northern Alliance and the territory they held as well; that would have been stupid.
In this situation, the Hizbullah attack, because it was so totally unprovoked, provided an absolutely perfect opportunity to do the same; the initial reaction, from everything I’ve read all over the place, was shock and revulsion on the part of the Lebs, in at least equal measure to that of the Israelis. Combined with the grumbling the non-Shia part had already been doing about the fact that everyone else had laid down their arms while Hizbullah hadn’t, you had some strong sentiment that could easily have been used to isolate them internally. Given that Syria and Iran are already isolated internationally, the ground for isolating and disarming them was very well prepared.
Then there’s the trap argument: I read somewhere (I’ll try to find it) that the last talks about Iran’s nuclear stuff went very badly, with Iran basically not being cooperative at all. Next, they went to Damascus, then home.
Rather interesting itinerary, eh? Why would they land in Damascus on the way home? Me, I think a trap was being laid; as we know from our hostage crisis in Iran the Iranians know a thing or two about taking hostages and timing; they didn’t release ours until the day Carter stepped down, quite literally. But the trap only works if the other side falls into it. Israel fell into this one.
Note that the pro-Syrian side has been immeasurably strengthened as a result of this. A clever approach that would have involved the Leb government in opposing Hizbullah would have isolated the pro-Syrian guys in the government as well. Now, forget it. It is very likely now that the Leb Army will join up with Hizbullah against the IDF in actual fighting, which will just mean even more mayhem.
Think about that for a second: the Leb Army hasn’t fought Israel since 1948. This mess just might achieve something that no one thought could happen even a month ago. That’s how unbelievably crude and stupid the Israeli reaction has been.
As for disarming Hizbullah, that will never happen now; no Lebanese would back it. Since they claim to have missiles that can go 60 miles, you’d have to back them up all the way to Beirut, I think, to get any part of Israel out of range. After that, the Israeli troops would have to stay there to enforce that buffer, which of course would only be good until Iran supplies them with even longer range missiles. This isn’t going to happen. So, add counterproductive to the list.
Hizbullah ain’t the PLO; they’re a lot more dangerous. To defeat them, you need smarts as well as brawn. I don’t see any smarts here.
There are few things in this world that I have faith in, but one is the Israelis’ determination to fight their enemies every conceivable way. The fact that they still exist is proof enough, for me. Have you ever flown on El Al? These guys invented smart.
I’ve seen this before. It is the line-in-the sand trap. It used to go like this:
“Look, no positive evidence of WMD, vague claims in favour. Will you admit you were duped if no WMD turn up in 3 months and then oppose US policy? 6 months, a year, ever? No?”
What is the point of this? Once you establish to the satisfaction of every reasonable person that Israel has a massive and indiscriminate program of massacring innocent Lebanese underway, is there a real expectation that the IDF cheersquad will revise their position? Of course not. Unlike the IDF the facts beat them back on a daily basis. Then will there be an honourable surrender to better argument? No, as per the WMD squad, some will quietly vanish and others will look the whale in the eye and deny it exists.
There is no way the current Pro-Israeli’s are going to condemn Israel in future or surrender their ties of consanguinity merely because the humble weight of evidence and argument and decency compels it absolutely. Just so we’re clear here.
No, Luc, it does -not- mean that. It means those people who are, time after time, opposed to all of Israel’s actions. Do you honestly contend that people like Der Trihs aren’t reflexively anti-Israel? That trolls like pantom who pretend that being at war with a state that started a war with you is a ‘massacre’ ? That people who, time after time, claim that Israel is engaged in “terrorism” aren’t anti-Israel? That’s a pro-Israeli self-defense position, that attacking the country which declared war on it is terrorism? Do you honestly deny that there are most certainly people who time after time after time come down on Israel and condemn them with intellectually dishonest claims with no possible resolution other than Israel surrending to its enemies?
If you’re prefer not to use the phrase as a statement of long-time action, we can certainly apply it only to this situation as those who are, as the phrase suggests, against Israel in this case. As I pointed out, the issue is intellectual honesty. All the claims for a ‘measured’ response, and one that targets Hezbollah are bull. The last time I asked if you and the rest of the people against Israel in this conflict would praise Israel for invading south Lebanon you ignored the question.
Without allowing any act of self defense, you disallow them all.
And yes, if there was a situation where there were pro and anti positions, it’s not horrible to say that people who are against something are, in fact, anti-that-thing.
Why? Your position has Der Trihs on your side, does that make you question your position?
Neither 1948 nor 1967 brought about the end of the world. And although it won’t get to that point, if it did, it would be because there are numerous regional actors who have been attacking Israel via proxy forces, a clear casus belli.
It wasn’t annihilated in 1948 or 1967. It showed Egypt that it would be far better to have a border with a friendly state than with one that would wreck its military if it tried anything again. And this time, it is showing that proxy attacks will no longer fool anybody. Well at least not members of the anti-Isr… er… faction which repeatedly claims that Lebanon has nothing to do with Hezbollah and that responding to a sovereign state that declares war on you is terrorism.
This is another common statement made by those who are, erm… against Israel in this situation. No, Israel’s actions, no matter what they are, will produce a magic effect whereby their enemies no longer become genocidal. It will, however, clearly show the state sponsors of terrorists that they can no longer feign ignorance, and that their proxy attacks will be treated as acts of war.
And, again, this is my point on intellectual honesty and why the position that is, erm… not-for Israel’s actions isn’t cogent. How many times have you seen the meme “Israel’s demand that Lebanon stop arming and start fighting Hezbollah are crazy, it won’t have 100% percent success.” Which, of course, deliberately ignores the fact that there’s a huge difference between arming and opposing a terrorist group, that one action makes them a terrorist proxy and the other makes them your enemy.
And it isn’t, by any flight of fantasy, wrong for Israel to demand that its neighbor-states stop giving weapons to their proxy forces and start making it hard for those proxy forces to murder Israelis from their sovereign territory.
How do you define ‘real’ enemies? And since when has public opinion been on the side of Israel?
Yes, the terrorist proxy forces and terrorist forces have a long history of making their bases in civilian areas. And people who routinely take erm… non-pro-Israel positions claim that any attempt on Israel’s part to deal with those terrorists is ‘civilian targeted’ , etc… deliberately ignoring that it’s the terrorists’ fault that civilians are brought into the mix, and ignoring that yet again asking for ‘restraint’ means ‘doing nothing.’
Not just probably, but definitely justified. And as Israel has never been lacking for murderous enemies, this won’t have much of a noticable effect at all. Except, of course, to show the state sponsors of terrorists that they can’t have a get out of jail free card anymore. If Lebanon, Syria, etc… don’t feel free to use terrorist proxy forces with impunity in the future, than that’s nutralized a massive threat.
To what end? Continued attacks? Rockets raining down on Israeli cities day after day? Pizza parlors and busses blown to pieces and then museums raised celebrating those murders? Waiting until a dirty bomb goes off? Showing Israel’s enemies that Israel is totally impotent, and that they can attack it as much as they want?
What, in your view, does such restraint accomplish other than more dead Israelis?
I pray that Israel has the ability to defend itself, even though the people who are, erm… opposed-to-Israel’s-actions think that the only proper response is to sit there and let its enemies murder as many people as they want.
I don’t know, I haven’t hung on his every word and measured next to the standard of loyalty to Israel. I do know many good and thoughtful people who, like myself, are troubled by Israels actions, who urge restraint upon a friend with the motives of a friend.
Awww, c’mon, Finn, you know you’re supposed to avoid the “t” word. Where are your manners?
You make a lot out of this whole “state” thing, like a legal pedant seizing upon a technicality. The word “massacre” is almost certainly an exaggeration, I haven’t the facts to be definitive. But at the very minimum, such incursions as these set the stage for massacre, they increase the *likelihood * exponentially. I don’t give a fig for the nationality of victims, only that they are victims.
Eye of the beholder. Isn’t any determination to instill fear in others “terrorism”? Are you suggesting that Israel’s record is pure and angelic, unsullied by the blood of the innocent? It follows, then, that if they can err once, they can err again. Being they, as we, human.
Sure there are. But the extremity of your rhetoric doesn’t permit honest criticism, you aren’t painting with a broad brush, you’re painting with a fire hose.
Ooops, you did it again. “You and the rest of the people against Israel…” No matter how many times I say it ain’t so, you go blithely on. No, I don’t want Israel to invade, not because I crave to see them crushed beneath the jackboot, but because I think it’s a really, really bad idea. So I’m not ignoring the question, I’m trying not to embarrass you by pointing out what a dumb question it is! Of course I’m not going to praise Israel for such an invasion, I’m agin it! Ain’t made that clear yet?
Nah. I urge restraint as a principle, I don’t pretend to offer a menu of acceptable and unacceptable actions. I do most definitely hold that collective responsibility (the principle that allows a village to be punished for the actions of some of its inhabitants) is repugnant. The distinction between that and terrorism is too puny to trouble with.
No, they didn’t bring the end of the world. But note your following construction: if it did, it would be the fault of others. Who do you imagine will be comforted to know this? Its seems as though you seek to assert that if one can claim victimhood, all moral bets are off. So long as you didn’t start it, you have no responsibility for how you conduct yourself.
Stop that. Its annoying as a cat sharpening its nails on a blackboard.
No, really. Such annoying rhetorical devices are beneath us both.
Well, whoopty fuck a doo! Is this some form of progress? It will somehow eradicate public posturing and state-sponsored bullshit? Well, halleluja and hosanna!
(groan)
Pretty much zero. I could probably find it if I went looking for it. But why would want my beautiful mind sullied by such crapola?
Its not the motivation I question, but the actions. Still haven’t managed to make that clear? Sure tried.
Agony. I’ll sign anything, I confess. Take pity.
No, it doesn’t, it means what it means. Restraint. You could look it up.
Anyone dumb enough to believe that is too stupid to make their own oatmeal. Israel, the cringing victim? No sale.
That ripped it. I’m gonna get drunk now, and its all your fault.
Must have happened during my hibernation. So you can call somebody a “troll” now, huh? You can say “troll”? Troll, troll, troll. And I won’t have to stay after and clap erasers for Ms. Diva?
What word/phrase would you prefer as less ‘pedantic’? Country? Sovereign-nation? And it isn’t a technicality, it’s part of the meat of the issue. When a country starts a war with you, that entire country is at war with you.
Or if America invaded Canada tomorrow, would only red states be able to be hit in retaliation?
No, I reject that as a useless definition and one that’s far too broad. And I’ve pointed out, for some time now, it’s too vague as to have any real meaning.
Not at all. I know full well, for instance, about Sabra and Shatilla. But the fact remains that there are people who will, in any instance where Israel defends itself, declare that it’s an act of terrorism.
Not at all, which is why I’ve been asking the people who are calling for a more ‘proportionate’ and ‘restrained’ response if invading southern Lebanon and conducting brutal house-to-house fighting would lead them to praise Israel for its proportionate and restrained response.
If they can’t answer yes, then they have to admit they’re being intellectually dishonest. They don’t want a proportionate response that only attacks Hezbollah and not its state sponsor. They want -no- response, but they use words like ‘proportionate’ and ‘restrained’.
A response that doesn’t exist can hardly have an adjective applied to it, eh?
I’ve also asked what other means of protecting themselves Israel would be allowed, most of the time the answer is “they’re not allowed to protect themselves.”.
Neither intellectually dishonest formulations nor claims that Israel should simply do nothing are honest criticism. If you want honest criticism, come up with a valid military response you’d get behind. Saying that they should just let their citizens be murdered isn’t a plan, it’s suicide.
You can say it aint so as many times as you want, but this semantic tomfoolery is just silly. you are against, not for, condemning, (insert semantic quibble), Israel’s actions. What term would you prefer?
And although you want to cast this in terms of helping out a friend, your previous analogy was just silly. Instead of someone pouring lighter fluid in his lap, you’ve got a friend who has someone trying to knife him and you’re counseling him to let himself get stabbed until his murderer gets tired.
Name a better way for them to protect themselves and show Lebanon that it can’t attack Israel with impunity any more? Well, name a better way than your previous suggestion of letting themselves be attacked, which, as should be obvious, isn’t a solution. It’s the problem.
It’s not a dumb question, at all. Nor would intellectual dishonesty on your part embarass me. The question, asked time and again both explictly and implictly is “how can Israel protect itself”. The answer that, erm… those who are against-Israel’s-actions (:rolleyes: ) is “they aren’t allowed to protect themselves.” As should be obvious, -that- is a ‘dumb’ answer to the question of how Israel should protect itself.
And, as my specific question points out, those who claim that Israel should limit its attacks to Hezbollah are full of it. If Israel actually did that, not one of them would say it was a good thing, they’d just think up new objections.
Yes, and I’ve been trying, and failing, to get you to address how you can cast suicide as the council of a friend (with any intellectual honesty). Can you provide -any- solution which allows Israel to protect itself? Or is your only concil that they should just let their citizens be murdered again, and again, and again?
And yet, you’ve said that Israel responding to an act of war as if they’re at war is ‘unacceptable’, no?
If you’re claiming that you haven’t disallowed Israel from defending itself, please list the one single military action you’d be okay with Israel taking to defend itself. Otherwise, then yes, you have indeed said that self defense is unacceptable and that there are no acceptable measures that Israel can take to secure its defense.
Correct, and a fact that’s often glossed over by, erm… those who are, um… not-for Israel being allowed to defend itself.
I can tell you who should be discomforted by it; the nations which have allowed it, encouraged it, turned a blind eye to it, and said that Israel can’t respond to attacks on it. If people were -really- worried about a Middle East war, then they’d be demanding that sanctions be imposed on Iran, Syria, and Lebanon without delay, at the very least. But they’re not concerned about that, only with Israel protecting itself.
Or is there any reason that Israel defending itself is a ‘crisis’, but hundreds of rocket attacks against Israeli civilians are just business as usual?
Not true, at all. I would condemn Israel (and thus, be anti-Israel on that issue) if Israel, say, nuked Lebanon. Or firebombed their cities. Or conquered the country and salted the earth.
But showing the Lebanese government that it cannot launch a war and then remain in the clear is not beyond the pale. Not even close.
Then stop playing the semantic games that disallow people who are against Israel’s actions (and against Israel’s right to self defense) from being labeled as such.
Again, I’d be happy to simply say ‘pro-Israel’ and ‘anti-Israel’ in this debate, but you view that as somehow wrong. You’ve gone as far as to say that advising Israel to allow its civilians to be murdered is a friendly position.
What term would you prefer I use?
Why, yes, that is progress. Stopping state sponsorship of terrorism is a much better thing than allowing state sponsorship of terrorism. Again, what term exactly should be used to describe those who think that stopping state sponsorship of civilian targeted attacks on Israel is -not- a good thing?
Hey, give me a term that accurately describes the position that Israel has no right to self defense, and should let its citizens be murdered. “Friend” is not that term.
It’s been used in this thread. But okay, at least we agree that it’s crap.
And evidently I haven’t made it clear that it’s intellectually dishonest to claim that you don’t have a problem with Israel defending itself, as long as Israel doesn’t actually do anything to defend itself.
I’ve been pointing this out for several posts now. There are -no- actions that the people opposed to Israel’s actions in this situation would be okay with. None. Except allowing their civilians to be murdered.
Give me the term that can be used to honestly describe the position that Israel should allow its civilians to be murdered and not take action to protect them, and I’ll use that instead.
:rolleyes:
Then name a ‘restrained’ Israel action taken in self-defense that isn’t doing nothing?
But if you’re really interested in more semantic games of obfuscation, okay. If you’re using definition 1A, then you are indeed saying that Israel should take no defensive reactions (eg. do nothing). If 1B, then you’d be saying that Israel should limit its actions. But, as nobody has (or will) suggest another defensive action Israel can take, we’re back to doing nothing. You, yourself, suggested just that, saying that a restrained reaction of just dealing with Hezbollah in the south of Lebanon was off the table. Likewise, the second use, to moderate, falls foul of the objection to 1B. None of the people opposed to Israel defending itself have suggested a moderated action, they have suggested, yet again, no action.
If people are going to use restraint to mean ‘take no action’, then they shouldn’t be pretending to talk about ‘restrained action’. As you can’t have a ‘restrained’ action if no action is taken.
Really? Too stupid? Please, then, define the ‘smart’ way it would be taken if Israel never responded to those attacking it? You honestly think that letting their civilians be murdered till the cows come home, and doing not one thing to stop the murderers, would be a show of strength?
Hey, if saying that people who are opposed to Israel’s actions are opposed to Israel’s actions is cause for you to get drunk, I fear for your liver.
