Kevin  on July 26, 2006

I’ll offer a resounding here, here to that.

The Swearing Lady  on July 27, 2006

Hmm. I answered no to none of those questions. However, I still don’t quite understand how Israel can justify a war against a neighbour when they’re not being attacked by said neighbour. Do the actions of a terrorist organisation provide a legitimate reason for attacking a civilian population? That’s a question a lot of Irish people should think twice on… we’ve been there, and luckily didn’t suffer much because of the actions of the “modern” IRA, a criminal and terrorist organisation which claimed to represent us all. And what of the years of genocide and ethnic cleansing carried out by the Israelis against the Palestinians, whom they claim do not have a legitimate right to exist? Obviously one cannot know the entire story watching on from Ireland, but when one is presented with the facts of Israel’s policies towards the Palestinians, one might find it very very hard to claim that Israel has any right to sympathy, support or mass retaliation.

I can’t see a way out of this horrendous situation for any of the nations currently involved in this war. But the fact that so many are suffering, and have been suffering for so long, is something I can’t forget in the name of faux democracy which has little interest in anything beyond imperialism. Naturally no sane person can rejoice in Israeli civilian deaths, but the numbers don’t quite correlate with the dead in Palestine, Iraq or indeed in Lebanon today.

This quote… “a hostility preceding rather than following from Israel’s actions” is rather short-sighted. Most of Israel’s critics have condemned Israel’s actions for a hell of a lot longer than these past fifteen days.

Tom  on July 27, 2006

Only the US and the UK opposed the call for a cease fire at the recent summit in Rome. There is no proportion in the reaction of the Israeli’s to the kidnapping of two of their soldiers, nor is there any justification for their destruction of much of Lebanon’s infrastructure. In fact, there are numberous reports that suggest the two Israeli soliders were captured while on an incursion to the Lebanese town of Aita Al Chaab.

‘It all started on July 12 when Israel troops were ambushed on Lebanon’s side of the border with Israel. Hezbollah, which commands the Lebanese south, immediately seized on their crossing. They arrested two Israeli soldiers, killed eight Israelis and wounded over 20 in attacks inside Israeli territory. [Asia Times 7/15/06]‘

I totally agree that the Israeli’s need to defend their own country, that they need to protect their troops and their people, but that does not give them carte blanche to do with as they please in the Middle East. As long as they have the unconditional support of the US and their cloak of international political legitmacy, the UK, they have no incentive to find a lasting peace with the palestinians, a festering sore at the heart of any peace efforts in the middle east.

Branedy  on July 27, 2006

When someone, anyone uses these types of phrases to ’set up’ the opposition to their opinions

“not just by the now openly pro-tyrant-and-terrorist segment of the left, but also by the massed ranks of left-liberal bien-pensants of the global dinner party”

Then you can tell that the argument is bias, as are the five questions slanted.

Have you stopped kicking your Dog?, has no meaningful answer in a Yes/No world view of the author.

To add to the lack of meaning in the Israelis argument, why did they kidnap Palestinians two days before their soldiers were counter kidnaped, and why hasn’t the press told anyone?

Israel isn’t standing on the moral high ground here. If they had, no one would be arguing for a ceasefire.

conor  on July 27, 2006

Few small comments.

Hezbollah are part of the Lebanese government and have been firing rockets at Israel for years, so I think that pretty much counts as war.

Most Israelis fully support an independent, honest, non-agressive Palestinian state and voted accordingly in recent elections. Palestinians on the other hand voted for an organization whose constitution has the destruction of Israel as one of its aims.

Horrendous things have been done by both sides since 1947 but you have to hand it to the Palestinian leadership, they are masters of PR.

You would never think that in the last 60 years they had launched multiple wars against Israel with their allies, created a state within a state in Jordan and then attempted a coup, tried to repeat that in Lebanon and put their citizens in mortal danger, murdered athletes, slaughtered schoolchildren, embezzled hundreds of millions of dollars in aid and had a suicide wing murdering civilians in Israel all the time that they claimed to support Oslo. Yet it’s always “the poor Palestinans” and “the nasty Israelis”. Masterful.

I assume “imperialism” is standard Fiskian US antagonism rather than referring to Israel which has spent 60 years with every single one of its neighbours trying to exterminate them. Survival would be a more accurate word in their case.

I am a little surprised that anyone honestly thinks that this is about two Israeli soliders. They were simply the last straw. The actions of Hezbollah and their sponsors in Syria and Iran will never end until they learn for once and for all that Israel will not take agression lying down.

As for kidnapped Palestinians and the lack of coverage in the press, that is probably due to the worldwide Jewish conspiracy, ZOG and Zionist controlled media.

Having said all of that, I think Israel is wrong to drop all those bombs on Lebanon. They should be dropping them on Assad in Damascus and Ahmadinejad in Tehran who are the cause of all the current problems.

Branedy  on July 27, 2006

However when one is in a hole (PR or otherwise) one should stop digging.

Tom  on August 1, 2006

AS to who is the master of PR, this link provides an interesting view into the situation leading up to current stage of conflict. I can’t really call it a new conflict because there seems to be constant conflict over there. It highlights some of the actions by both sides over the last few months.

http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=2928

conor  on August 1, 2006

Very good article indeed. However, anything that reaches back just two months to provide context on something that has been going on for 60 years is just a smidge constrained.

Tom  on August 2, 2006

Well, to be fair, covering the actions of all sides in the last 60-odd years prior to this current iteration of the conflict is a bit beyond even me. And I won’t even get into the post-colonial problems which have had an impact since the turn of the 19th century and up to the first world war. And when you get right down to it, the Romans were fairly involved in the whole situation as well, and what have they ever done for us?

conor  on August 2, 2006