Some actual FACTS about the weekend Israeli assault

[indianasmith]

OK, given that this topic has become a bit of a dust-up - especially between me and Lester, I did a little research this afternoon about the weekend incident between the Israeli self-defence forces and the Turkish "relief" ship.  If all I knew was what the mainstream media is reporting, and the heavily edited vidoe footage we are being shown, I would be pretty ticked at Israel too. My defense in the other thread was more a generic defense of Israel's generally embattled condition; I said several times that I did not have enough information to condemn or condone the actions this weekend.  Now I do, and here is what I learned.

1.  Israel itself sends 40,000 tons of food a week to the Palestinians in Gaza.
2.  Foreign food and medical relief to Gaza is welcome as long as it is landed in an Israeli port first in order to be screened for weapons and other contraband items.
3.  The organization that sent these "relief" ships from Turkey, the IHH, is a Hamas front group that is associated with the worst of the jihadists - Hizbollah and Al Qaeda.  They have repeatedly called for the abolition of Turkey's secular government and the imposition of Sharia law.
4.  The blockade of Gaza is over a year old and well known.  These ships deliberately tried to break it rather than offloading their cargo at an Israeli port, where it could be inspected.
5.  Since the imposition of the blockade, over 7000 rockets have been fired from Gaza into Israel.  Weapons are constantly being smuggled into Gaza from a variety of sources.
6.  The ships of the flotilla were REPEATEDLY warned to divert to an Israeli port for inspection and clearance and refused to do so.
7.  Israeli self defense forces boarding the ships were attacked, physically, by the "activists" aboard.  Granted, the activists had few firearms and were using knives and other improvised weapons.  But what is a soldier to do?  Let himself be skewered or bludgeoned because his attacker is wielding a knife when the soldier has a gun?
8.  The protesters in Turkey and in other places apparently had their signs made up IN ADVANCE of the Israeli response, so that the "spontaneous" protests could begin the minute Israel defended itself.

SO WHAT THE HELL WERE THE ISRAELIS SUPPOSED TO DO?

They have provided a safe channel for international relief to reach the Palestinians. This group ignored that channel in order to create an incident so Israel could once again be beaten up in the world media, and the media, as always the willing tool of Israel's enemies, played into their hands perfectly.

If America had an aggressive racial minority that was DAILY firing rockets into our cities, would we set up a relief fund to feed them?  Would we allow a foreign ship, with unknown cargo, manned by a known terrorist organization, to sail past our navy and unload its contents?  Of course not. 

Lester, I sincerely respect you most of the time.  But on this topic, you have become a shameless, clueless shill for Israel's enemies - who also happen to be America's enemies.  This isn't about "purified water for Palestinian children," as Al-Jazeera would have you believe.  This was a carefully orchestrated attempt by Israel's enemies to win a battle in the court of world opinion by forcing the Israelis to defend their people. Who are "they"? you keep asking me. Call them Al Qaeda, Call them Hizbollah, call them Hamas - they are all just the mutliple faces of an Islamic jihadist movement that longs to destroy first Israel, then the West.  Your ignorance and knee-jerk hostility to Israel assists them in that goal.

[Doggett]

Its very unethical to set up a blockade for an area that needs aid.
Yes, there are bad guys in there, but even so.
The ship ignored the blockade to prove a point that is was wrong to do such a thing and it wouldn't give in to such silly laws.


Most people on the Gaza strip just want to get on with their lives, they don't all pick to up guns and attack. Food and water is more important than politics. They're simply not getting enough.


Where did you find number 8 from ?

I have a feeling we'll just have to agree to disagree, Indy.
As always, I do respect you.

[lester1/2jr]

look at these idiots rying to run a naval blockade

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/3/3a/Exodus.jpg/800px-Exodus.jpg

obviously a bunch of leftist terror sympathizers

indiana- I don't think there are too many people who would claim the blockade, whatever its intention has had very terrible effects on the people of Gaza besides those who manufacture rockets. netanyahus aide said himself the intenion was to put gaza "on a diet" or something. 


the blockade is not just for weapons its to put the gazans in their place.  it is mostly about the psychological effect I think actually.

what's crazy to me and has been from the start is how Fatah has somehow been painted as this moderate secualr group of nice guys. anyone who grew up watching this thing in the news would remeber Yassir arafat. He was like pretty much #2 after saddam of ME baddies. fatah is his party is horribly anti semetic and also terrorist

Lester, I sincerely respect you most of the time.  But on this topic, you have become a shameless, clueless shill for Israel's enemies - who also happen to be America's enemies.

lol. they aren't my enemies.  maybe they are yours.  My governments concerns have no relation to me.

This isn't about "purified water for Palestinian children," as Al-Jazeera would have you believe

have you ever watched al jezeera. I mean literally. It's a regular news channel and is I think more or less fair. just curious

Your ignorance and knee-jerk hostility to Israel assists them in that goal.

excellent point. I mean. I am assisting hezbollah by posting on the badmovies forum  thread about a pretty obvious news incident that most people who have heard about have been shocked by.

[Flick James]

You folks are not going to get anywhere with this. You do realize this, don't you? Yet here I go, getting involved. I ought to have my head examined.

Look, before the establishment of the Israeli state, if the Jews had wanted to try and establish a homeland in Germany, at the height of the Nazi movement, everyone would have told them they were nuts. "What? You want to put your roots down in a place where most of the people around you want to exterminate you? Are you mad?" Well, in 1948, they did worse than that. They went to war against five Islamic countries to establish a religious and ethnic homeland surrounded by those that want them exterminated. And Islam is probably ten times worse than the Nazis in terms of their hatred. We're talking a short-lived European movement versus thousands of years of religious opposition and hatred. And we helped them do it. I'm not saying I know where the scattered and homeless Jews of the early part of the last century should have adopted a homeland, but why there? Well, for religious and ethnic reasons, really. So why are we surprised there are problems? And why are we surprised that the middle east hates us, when we almost unconditionally have supported it?

The mind reels. Sorry, I don't stand with Israel, or any state founded on religion or ethnicity for that matter. Our founding fathers, many of them deists, tried to warn us of this. Did we listen? Nope. Now we're embroiled in a holy war that we have no hope of getting out of. Our hands are dirty and we're in too deep.

Very sad, really.

[ulthar]

 Well, in 1948, they did worse than that. They went to war against five Islamic countries to establish a religious and ethnic homeland surrounded by those that want them exterminated.

Huh?

Israel was not established in 1948 by the Israelis going to war with 5 Islamic countries.  It was by international decree, that's mostly the United Nations, in 1947 as an aftermath to World War II.  They declared independence in 1948, and WERE ATTACKED the very next day.  Declaring independence is NOT a declaration of war...the other party can freely peaceably grant that independence - the Arabs CHOSE not to.

But the antecedents go back even further (see for example the Balfour Declaration of 1917 and the Mandate for Palestine given to the British by the League of Nations after WWI).  I think we should all be very careful not to oversimplify what is a very, very complex issue.

[indianasmith]

I think it also must be acknowledged that the Jews are perhaps the single most unique ethnic and religious group in the entire world.  They were forcibly scattered from their homeland of some 1600 years by the Romans in 70 AD.  They were dispersed across three continents, and later spread to two others.  Yet they kept their language, their culture, their racial identity, and their faith intact - despite the fiercest of persecution and mistreatment in nearly every land where they sojourned.

But Israel was always home.  For nearly 2000 years, every Jewish family toasted Passover with the pledge, "Next year, in Jerusalem!"  In their wedding vows, they pledge their faith to their homeland before they plight their troth to each other - "Oh Jerusalem, if I forget you, may my right hand forget her cleverness!"

No other race in the history of the world has held onto their identity that long after being dispersed.  And throughout history, they came back when they could.  The Holocaust drove home, as nothing else could, that these people needed a place of their own.  A place that was truly theirs.  The place where their faith and culture was born.

The Arabs were given numerous chances to come to a peaceful settlement that would have left the Palestinian Arabs with a place of their own to dwell.  They always have, and apparently always will, choose war over peace where the Jews are concerned.  But I believe the Jews have a right to dwell in peace in their ancestral home.

Lester, I'm sorry that you apparently don't have a scrap of loyalty to your country in you.  "My governments concerns have no relation to me."  That is perhaps one of the most foolish, and selfish, things I have ever heard anyone say.  the Middle East is overrun with people who would gladly cut your head off with a dull butter knife for simply BEING an American.  I would say that makes the government's concerns have SOME relation to you!  The fact that you seem to think Al Jazeera is "more or less fair" shows how far off your train of thought runs from reality.  You probably think the Hamas "Mickey Mouse" character urging children to grow up to become suicide bombers was good children's programming too!  OK, OK, that was hyperbole.  My whole point is, the ships that tried to run the blockade were repeatedly warned of the consequences, and did so anyway.  Then some of them got the bright idea to charge at heavily armed soldiers with knives and clubs.  They were IDIOTS and frankly got what they deserved!

[Allhallowsday]

You folks are not going to get anywhere with this. You do realize this, don't you? Yet here I go, getting involved. I ought to have my head examined.  Look, before the establishment of the Israeli state, if the Jews had wanted to try and establish a homeland in Germany, at the height of the Nazi movement, everyone would have told them they were nuts. "What? You want to put your roots down in a place where most of the people around you want to exterminate you? Are you mad?" Well, in 1948, they did worse than that. They went to war against five Islamic countries to establish a religious and ethnic homeland surrounded by those that want them exterminated. And Islam is probably ten times worse than the Nazis in terms of their hatred. We're talking a short-lived European movement versus thousands of years of religious opposition and hatred.  And we helped them do it. I'm not saying I know where the scattered and homeless Jews of the early part of the last century should have adopted a homeland, but why there? Well, for religious and ethnic reasons, really. So why are we surprised there are problems? And why are we surprised that the middle east hates us, when we almost unconditionally have supported it?  The mind reels. Sorry, I don't stand with Israel, or any state founded on religion or ethnicity for that matter. Our founding fathers, many of them deists, tried to warn us of this. Did we listen? Nope. Now we're embroiled in a holy war that we have no hope of getting out of. Our hands are dirty and we're in too deep.  Very sad, really.

This is not accurate information, but rhetoric, though I seriously believe FlickJames has construed this from his own reading.  You could read your history, even as recent as the post-War '40s, to be better informed.  And for long term views, let me point out (yet again) the Islamic world was much more tolerant of Jews and Christians, and for centuries, when Christians were neither tolerant of Jews, Muslims, or each other.  Let me stress that I do agree with much of what FlickJames has to say, but hardly all. 

[lester1/2jr]

first let me say that regardless of the millenia long history of this region and so forth, this thread was started on something much much more basic and TOTALLY DEVOID of all this context:

an aid ship was stopped and for one reason or another people who were on the boat were killed. YOu might justify this by whatever military historical whatever but just ON ITS FACE, that is a shocking story. and I'm sorry whatever context you can provide does not make that story less shocking!


okay

Lester, I'm sorry that you apparently don't have a scrap of loyalty to your country in you.

the government is not the country. our country is ourselves, our families and our communities. Nancy Pelosi and her henchpeople making 6 figues in DC for naming post offices and subsidizing stuff I don't want or need is not "America". 

The fact that you seem to think Al Jazeera is "more or less fair" shows how far off your train of thought runs from reality.

have you ever seen it? I mean you can argue no news is fair. That the BBC is inherently whatever because it's run by the govt or something but relative to other news services its normall. al manar and other arab stations are definately not unbiased. The New York Times is biased but it's not insane is what I'm saying. If you are in the middle east AL Jezeera is the generic news source.

They were IDIOTS and frankly got what they deserved!

well maybe they were idiots but I don't think they deserved to DIE. I mean did the people at Waco deserve to die?

more sort of realpolitik-ey was it really worth all this to keep a bunch of boats from going to gaza? I think in politics especially you pick your battles.

[Flick James]

You folks are not going to get anywhere with this. You do realize this, don't you? Yet here I go, getting involved. I ought to have my head examined.  Look, before the establishment of the Israeli state, if the Jews had wanted to try and establish a homeland in Germany, at the height of the Nazi movement, everyone would have told them they were nuts. "What? You want to put your roots down in a place where most of the people around you want to exterminate you? Are you mad?" Well, in 1948, they did worse than that. They went to war against five Islamic countries to establish a religious and ethnic homeland surrounded by those that want them exterminated. And Islam is probably ten times worse than the Nazis in terms of their hatred. We're talking a short-lived European movement versus thousands of years of religious opposition and hatred.  And we helped them do it. I'm not saying I know where the scattered and homeless Jews of the early part of the last century should have adopted a homeland, but why there? Well, for religious and ethnic reasons, really. So why are we surprised there are problems? And why are we surprised that the middle east hates us, when we almost unconditionally have supported it?  The mind reels. Sorry, I don't stand with Israel, or any state founded on religion or ethnicity for that matter. Our founding fathers, many of them deists, tried to warn us of this. Did we listen? Nope. Now we're embroiled in a holy war that we have no hope of getting out of. Our hands are dirty and we're in too deep.  Very sad, really.

This is not accurate information, but rhetoric, though I seriously believe FlickJames has construed this from his own reading.  You could read your history, even as recent as the post-War '40s, to be better informed.  And for long term views, let me point out (yet again) the Islamic world was much more tolerant of Jews and Christians, and for centuries, when Christians were neither tolerant of Jews, Muslims, or each other.  Let me stress that I do agree with much of what FlickJames has to say, but hardly all. 

Don't we all construe? I know our own personal faith is irrelevant to logical, secular discussion, but I'll put mine on the table for one reason, because I don't want any conception that my views are based on any religious bias. I am a deist, have been for going on ten years. I was inspired first by our founding fathers, many of whom were deists, and it just grew from there. I have a natural disdain for religion. Thomas Jefferson was a deist, which is why the word Creator appears in the constitution rather than the word God. So there you have it, you all know my faith, and if you care to know more about it, I'll leave it to you to do your own research.

[indianasmith]

Actually, Flick, Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence, not the Constitution, and that is where he used the term "Creator".  But I agree - he was probably the most pure Deist out of all our founders.  Many of them bounced back and forth between their Christian upbringing and the Deism that was very much the intellectual fad of the day.  Jefferson stuck by his Deistic principles his whole life; however, he also served as President of the American Bible Society, and recommended that the Bible be read and used in the public schools he helped establish in the District of Columbia.
  Our founders are a very fascinating group of people; their background was overwhelmingly Protestant Christian, but their beliefs ranged from very traditional Anglican or Congregational Christianity to the fully blown Deism of Jefferson to the in between philosophy of Benjamin Franklin.  Franklin spent most of his life believing in a rather Deistic view of God, but at the Constitutional Convention he made this declaration: "I have lived a long time, and the longer I live the more I am convinced of this - that God governs in the affairs of men!"  That is hardly the "clockmaker" view of God classical Deism insists on, although to my knowledge Ben Franklin never fully embraced traditional Christianity.  This is a fascinating topic worthy of a thread of its own.

  Lester, old friend, maybe these guys didn't DESERVE to die in the moral sense of the term.  But, at the same time, charging at heavily armed Israeli troops with knives and clubs certainly  qualifies every one of them for the Darwin Award!!  Had it really been about simply getting aid to the Palestinians, they could have gone through proper channels.  This was about politically embarassing Israel, which they did.  The fact is they were willing to put their lives at risk for the sake of such a shallow goal.  But the reporting of the event has been overwhelmingly one-sided.  I simply wanted to give the other side.

[Flick James]

Actually, Flick, Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence, not the Constitution, and that is where he used the term "Creator".  But I agree - he was probably the most pure Deist out of all our founders.  Many of them bounced back and forth between their Christian upbringing and the Deism that was very much the intellectual fad of the day.  Jefferson stuck by his Deistic principles his whole life; however, he also served as President of the American Bible Society, and recommended that the Bible be read and used in the public schools he helped establish in the District of Columbia.
  Our founders are a very fascinating group of people; their background was overwhelmingly Protestant Christian, but their beliefs ranged from very traditional Anglican or Congregational Christianity to the fully blown Deism of Jefferson to the in between philosophy of Benjamin Franklin.  Franklin spent most of his life believing in a rather Deistic view of God, but at the Constitutional Convention he made this declaration: "I have lived a long time, and the longer I live the more I am convinced of this - that God governs in the affairs of men!"  That is hardly the "clockmaker" view of God classical Deism insists on, although to my knowledge Ben Franklin never fully embraced traditional Christianity.  This is a fascinating topic worthy of a thread of its own.

  Lester, old friend, maybe these guys didn't DESERVE to die in the moral sense of the term.  But, at the same time, charging at heavily armed Israeli troops with knives and clubs certainly  qualifies every one of them for the Darwin Award!!  Had it really been about simply getting aid to the Palestinians, they could have gone through proper channels.  This was about politically embarassing Israel, which they did.  The fact is they were willing to put their lives at risk for the sake of such a shallow goal.  But the reporting of the event has been overwhelmingly one-sided.  I simply wanted to give the other side.

Oops. Meant to say Declaration of Independence.

[ulthar]

I'm giving karma to each person in this thread.

It's so refreshing to have a discussion that ranges from history, facts, personal beliefs (even touching on religion and faith) and for folks to share points of disagreement in a respectful, open fashion.

[lester1/2jr]

I don't know all the details of the actual incident, I don't know who does. I just can't imagine there weren't alternatives to shooting and killing so many people aboard a vessel carrying aid. I don't care who's spin I'm falling for, it's just not decent.

[3mnkids]

 IMO both sides of this bigger conflict are wrong. Period. the problem I have with Israel is their utter lack of compassion and unwillingness to acknowledge their cruelty. Its always well, its not OUR fault. Its self defense... hm, well, I see it like this.. if someone throws a drink on you and you whip out a machine gun and open fire it is NOT self defense.

They are heavy handed and more often than not their reaction is over the top. I just cant understand how so many can give them a pass. It makes no sense to me. They have killed children. Nope, they don't get a pass from me. They are no better than hamas.

Back to the most recent "attack"... I could be wrong(it happens a lot) but my understanding is they were one, in international waters, and two, 25 miles from the blockade... sounds more like piracy than a defensive action. Also, one of the victims is a 19 yr old who was shot 4 times in the head and once in the chest. Heavy handed is an understatement.

I would love to see the unedited version of the video Israel released. What happened immediately before what they show. Honestly, does anyone really believe that they would show themselves in a bad light? I heard they confiscated all other video, cell phones.. etc. from the passengers.. why?

Im just not buying their official story but even if I did, these people did not deserve to die.

I wish we could just take away all the weapons from both sides, build a huge wall, shove them all in and make them figure it out. Stop killing each other FFS.

[trekgeezer]

I agree with a couple of analysts I heard today.   This flotilla was meant to bring attention to Gaza, but also to show Israel in a negative light.  The Israelis were dumb enough to help them by attacking these ships.

I too think the Israelis aren't just keeping the weapons out, they are punishing the Palestinians, behavior  we wouldn't tolerate from anyone else.


The truth about this conflict is that is is fueled by centuries of hate on both sides.  Believe me there are a lot of Jews who would gladly have the Palestinians wiped off the face of the earth.


Just keep the hate off this board please