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5 comments

1 ComradeDread  Aug 2, 2014 6:51:27pm

And by bombing Gaza back to the Stone Age, killing so many non-combatants, and doing nothing to lift the siege, they ensure that yet another generation of Palestinians knows nothing but hate for them and will continue to plot to do whatever it takes to kill them.

Utterly depressing. Why is the United States taking sides in this again?

2 ausador  Aug 2, 2014 11:13:43pm

re: #1 ComradeDread

Hyperbole much?

To start with I’m not going to give you an account of middle-eastern history and American politics from 1948 to the present day to explain why America is on Israels side in this (not to mention the religious aspect for many Americans). You seem to have a brain, use it, do some research on the subject.

Israel has not “bombed Gaza back to the stone age” nor has it killed non-combatants indiscriminately. The Palestinian dead number around 1650 with no reliable numbers of any kind on how many of those were Hamas fighters and how many were civilian casualties.

There are just over 1.8 million Palestinians living within the 139 sq. miles of the Gaza strip so in non-partisan, non-political, non-hyperbolic reality the death toll is surprisingly small. That isn’t meant to be callous, it isn’t like I’m simply shrugging my shoulders and saying that each life lost doesn’t matter. It is simply a statement of fact when you consider the amount of ordinance exchanged between the combatants and Israel’s ground forces incursion into Gaza.

Perhaps you have forgotten the death tolls (or are too young to remember) associated with previous clashes between Israel and the Palestinians? America has actually helped there, perhaps you might not see it that way, but it really has. A lot of that latest generation military tech that the Israelis are using was either supplied or partially funded by us while Israel developed it themselves. The death toll would have been much higher if Israel hadn’t been trying hard to avoid civilian casualties and didn’t have weapons that (mostly) allowed it to do so.

Your also ignoring that Hamas was purposefully storing rockets and launching rockets at Israel from densely populated areas and in places that violated the Geneva conventions. Either they wanted civilian casualties that they could blame on Israel or they gambled (and lost) that Israel would withhold their fire and allow Hamas to continue launching rather than face the bad P.R. in the press.

Lift the siege? With Hamas still in control of the Gaza strip? The people whose charter calls for the extermination of Israel? Sorry but that is tantamount to calling for Israel to just commit mass suicide so as to get out of Hamas’ way faster. You are aware of how many arms shipments from Qatar, Iran, and even North Korea headed for Hamas have been intercepted in the last decade or so, right?

I understand, to you it is all just about big bully Israel beating up on poor defenseless Palestine, it is what you think you know to be the truth. All I can say (again) is do some research that goes beyond just clicking on the first link at the top of the search results page. Don’t go to partisan sites with easy simplistic answers, study the factual history of this conflict.

Maybe then you can come back here and make some type of suggestion that actually makes sense. ;)

3 BroncD  Aug 3, 2014 12:43:09am

re: #2 ausador

They ensure that yet another generation of Palestinians knows nothing but hate for them and will continue to plot to do whatever it takes to kill them.

You didn’t address this part.

4 thedopefishlives  Aug 3, 2014 5:02:32am

re: #3 BroncD

You didn’t address this part.

Fine, then I will. As noted in ausador’s #2, Hamas’s own charter calls explicitly for the destruction of Israel. While the ongoing warfare is sure to cement their hatred, ask yourself this question: How many Palestinians don’t already hate Israel due to the brainwashing they’ve been receiving since they were kids? Is it Israel’s fault that Hamas is deliberately spreading lies and misinformation about Israel to ensure that the cycle continues?

5 ComradeDread  Aug 3, 2014 7:14:21am

I have done the research, friend.

And because I have done so, I’m not blindly pro-Israel any longer.

Both sides have committed atrocities. Both sides are full of bad actors, and both sides have their legitimate and illegimate grievances they can air about the other.

And as far as I can tell, the only benefit the United States has reaped for its support of Israel is a reliable client state to sell/give weaponry to and some shared intelligence.

Yes, when you make the largest power plant non-functional and imperil the drinking water of quite a few in the region, and leveled whole neighborhoods, you have bombed them ‘back to the Stone Age.’

As to your justifications for civilian deaths:

- You have no evidence that they were anything other than civilians, despite the claims of Hamas association you propose.
- The dead had friends and relatives. How do you think they feel about Israel today? How would you feel as a surviving father or mother of dead children? Do you think you’d be more predisposed to support peace with Israel or do you think you’d be willing to repay the hurt you’ve received with any means available? Do you think you’d buy the justification of “Well, we didn’t kill that many of you…”
- And I find it darkly amusing that folks that would normally outright reject a terrorist group’s logic of ‘we only kill civilians because of the actions of their government’ will embrace that logic when it is a favored nation state making that rationale.

Do you know how ridiculous it is to assert that Israel’s survival requires effectively turning Gaza in to the world’s largest prison camp? As if lifting the siege would somehow turn Hamas from a rather ineffective guerrilla militia into a modern army capable of challenging one of the world’s nuclear powers equipped with the best hardware the United States can give it. I’m sure the Israeli government could retain checkpoints, serve as Customs officials, and otherwise take steps to ensure their security while allowing for a functional economy in Gaza that allows for farming, fishing, import/exports.

There was a time when I would have agreed with you that Israel was imperiled, but that time has passed. Israel is the regional power in the Middle East. And unless you embrace dispensational theology, she’s going to be around for some time.

And no, I think the situation is far more complex than Israel beating up on Palestinians. I think it’s a bloody quagmire of mutual atrocities, ethnic hatreds, grievances, and excuses. And I think its time that the United States washed our hands of the whole mess, cut all non-humanitarian aid to both sides, and let them hash it all out without our support or interference.


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