crackerjack
Well-known member
Are you out of your mind? The U.K. and the U.S. bankrolled Zionism from DAY ONE honey. Ask GW Bush (or any number of other Americans)--they're PROUD of it.
What's the evidence of this?
Are you out of your mind? The U.K. and the U.S. bankrolled Zionism from DAY ONE honey. Ask GW Bush (or any number of other Americans)--they're PROUD of it.
Mr. Tea makes excellent points.
What about going in and seizing someone else's land by force is NON-THREATENING?
Who, incidentally, America also trained and armed and empowered in many ways.
oops. i meant "whom"
Are you out of your mind? The U.K. and the U.S. bankrolled Zionism from DAY ONE honey. Ask GW Bush (or any number of other Americans)--they're PROUD of it.
If you destroy a house with no concern for whether the people inside survive or not, I think that's pretty much the same thing as intentionally killing them.
What, the Israeli army? LOL.
Let's assume for a moment you meant Hezb. These guys managed to kill 120 Israeli soldiers and a total of 44 civilians: the IDF, on the other hand, killed around 500 Hezb fighters (which is fair enough: they did start it, after all) and around one thousand Lebanese civilians. Not to mention the one million Lebanese displaced by the conflict (compared to 300,000 to 500,000 Israelis displaced):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_Lebanon_War
Which kicked off as a result of "Hezbollah militants fir[ing] rockets at Israeli border towns, wounding several civilians, as a diversion for an anti-tank missile attack on two armored Humvees patrolling the Israeli side of the border fence.[21] Of the seven Israeli soldiers in the two jeeps, two were wounded, three were killed, and two were seized and taken to Lebanon."
So a thousand innocent Lebanese died in an action that began to avenge a few injured civilians and rescue two soldiers. And you wonder why Israel isn't exactly the Middle East's Mister Popular?
I'm sure Palestinian militants would tell you their actions are a response to the threat posed by Israel to their existence as a nation.
Depends which way you slice it. Abbas has committed himself to a political solution and Fatah have been largely disengaged from terrorism for several years now.
Also, a list of Israeli leaders with links to pre-48 terrorism, or post-48 war crimes (Sabra-Shatila?) wouldn't lack for names.
I'm not defending the bombing of bus stops. Why are you defending the bombing of Lebanese villages? Or were 1,000 Lebanese civlians hanging around Hezb military positions for no particular reason, and got caught in the crossfire?
Sabra and Shatila was carried out by Lebanese Christians, allied with Israel, avenging similar massacres carried out by the Palestinians (such as Damour). Anyway, it wasn't the Israeli state, which is what I'm asking for.
But they acted under the blessing of the Israeli military, didn't they? Sharon's endorsement of the Phallangists is the thing most often mentioned when people talk about his war crimes.
True enough, perhaps. Why don't you post some?
In 1941 Shamir was imprisoned by British authorities. After Stern was killed by the British in 1942, Shamir escaped from the detention camp and became one of the three leaders of the group in 1943, reforming it as "Lehi". During his tenure, Lehi was also responsible for the 1944 assassination of Britain's minister of state for the Middle East, Lord Moyne; an assassination attempt against Harold MacMichael, the High Commissioner of Palestine in the same year,[2] and the 1948 assassination of the United Nations representative in the Middle East, Count Folke Bernadotte who was seen by Shamir and his collaborators as an anti-Zionist and "an obvious agent of the British enemy".[3]
Shamir and his fellow underground fighters greatly admired the Irish Republicans and sought to emulate their anti-British struggle. Shamir himself took the nickname "Michael" for Michael Collins.
Begin (Irgun - the group blamed for the King David Hotel bombing),
Shamir (here's a delightful para from his wiki entry)
Sharon, as defence minister, allowed the Lebanese Phalangist militia to enter the camps and murder civilians. It has never been denied permission was granted to these armed psychos to enter. But Sharon claimed they claimed they wwere simply looking for PLO fighters. Te Israeil govt (led then by Begin, no hand-wringing lefty) didn't believe him and he was sacked.*
*Yes, I appreciate the sacking is to the credit of Israeli democracy. The fact that 20 years later he could return as PM isn't..
Well, I didn't expect that to take 13 pages. Irgun and Lehi were terrorists and as condemable as any Palestinian group. Do the rest of the board recognise this? I wonder. Like I said upthread, you have to go pretty far back to find any Israeli terrorism. I think that's also to the credit of Israel. Does the existence of these groups in the past justify Palestinian attacks today?
No, but it does make the high-hand considerably less of a trump card, especially since so many people connected with those groups have had successful political careers.
Israel doesn't need non-state terrorism now, for reasons I know I don't have to explain.
Perhaps it doesn't need it now, but if (*) that's the case then in the absence of asymmetry and military domination Israel should have made use of it. It didn't, and you have to go pretty far back to find any evidence of it.
I find this argument funny---it sounds very hypocritical (`should') given what you've said upthread. Though maybe you are joking? Doesn't sound like it though...
The recent violent outburst of Hamas in Gaza, killing Fatah members and overtaking government buildings, brought smiles to the faces of many an Islamist in Britain and beyond. Today, Islamist terrorism in pursuit of a utopian Islamist state is a global reality. But we would be ill-served if we forgot the Zionist terrorism of the notorious Stern Gang, assassination of British personnel, raids on Palestinian villages, and the blowing-up of the King David Hotel in 1946. Disregard for the sanctity of human life is a hallmark of both Zionism and Islamism.