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June 25, 2006
Who Was David and Who Was Goliath?
I don't have particularly strong feelings about the Middle East, beyond a fervent hope for peace and a suspicion of anyone who goes overboard in proclaiming the virtue of one side against the viciousness of the other. Maybe that's why these quotes Laura Turner found, from novelist Amos Oz, appealed to me so much.
June 25, 2006 in The Middle East | Permalink
Comments
"a suspicion of anyone who goes overboard in proclaiming the virtue of one side against the viciousness of the other."
Do you really believe that? Do you believe the Israeli and Palestinian postions are morally equivalent?
Arafat turns down, according to Clinton, "the best deal the Palestinians could hope for". Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Fatah all have official policy that states Israel must be removed from existance. Palestinian schoolchildren are taught to hate and kill Jews. Palestinian schoolbooks portray jews as rats and doesn't even recognize Israel exists. Palestinian 'martyrs', heroes to the Palestinian people, purposely target innocent Israeli citizens and children for death on a regular basis.
Israel has given the Palestinians land and the offer of cooperation in exchange for peace.
I would say Israel is the David in this instance. The anti-semitic UN is against Israel (refusing to recognize Palestinian terrorism against Jews but quick to condem Israel retaliation), many of the anti-semitic EU nations regularly condem Israeli retaliation against Palestinian terrorism and the anti-semetic modern American liberals oppose Israel protecting itself.
Thank God American liberals are not in power.
Posted by: Captain Toke | Jun 25, 2006 10:57:48 AM
Sorta makes Neil's point for him, does Captain Toke from the screamingmonketresearchlab. :-)
Regards, Cernig
Posted by: Cernig | Jun 25, 2006 11:24:30 AM
I would say Israel is the David in this instance.
They're the ones with all the tanks and planes and nuclear weapons, right?
Posted by: Iron Lungfish | Jun 25, 2006 12:04:20 PM
Im not sure how anyone thought we could artificially create a state out of someone elses land without winding up as a generational struggle.
In this argument we've held Israel to be sacrosanct for too long in American politics. They do nothing to deserve the billions in aid that we give them, and the biollions more that we give to their neighbors essentially on their behalf.
There needs to be a real conversation about US aid to Israel and the escalating talk about whos been the victim for longer needs to take a back seat.
Posted by: david b | Jun 25, 2006 12:13:07 PM
"They're the ones with all the tanks and planes and nuclear weapons, right?"
And the whole world, except the US (currently) supports the Palestinian's right to target innocent Israeli citizens. If liberals get into power in the US, the whole world would be against Israel's right to defend itself from terrorism.
Posted by: Captain Toke | Jun 25, 2006 12:17:21 PM
And the whole world, except the US (currently) supports the Palestinian's right to target innocent Israeli citizens.
Really? They do? Oh good, then you can find me several quotes of, say, Tony Blair, Jacques Chirac, and Angela Merkel endorsing Hamas attacks on innocent civilians, just to start. And while you're at it, you can provide some quotes by prominent Democratic leaders - the liberals whose takeover you dread - doing the same.
Posted by: Iron Lungfish | Jun 25, 2006 12:28:03 PM
"They do nothing to deserve the billions in aid that we give them,"
I can think of few nations who actually earn their US foreign aid, but Israel did knock out Saddam's nuclear program in the early 80s. That turned out to be a big favor for the rest of the world, even as the world criticized the act. Israel was the only democracy in the middle east for fifty years.
But what the heck, let's let Iran and the rest of the middle eastern countries drive Israel into the sea.
Posted by: Captain Toke | Jun 25, 2006 12:28:37 PM
But what the heck, let's let Iran and the rest of the middle eastern countries drive Israel into the sea.
Captain, you might want to bone up on your logical fallacies.
Posted by: Iron Lungfish | Jun 25, 2006 12:33:38 PM
Nice work, Iron Lungfish.
I guess Ezra's arrived now, huh ? A resident troll .
The "left" - hah, you wish - isn't the author of all-encompassing incompetence which threatens to rob the U.S. of any possibility of brokering peace ( although it helps to want to ).
I noted a marvellous rant at Kung Fu Monkey for Memorial Day. Now, WaPo has a human interest story that illuminates more of the virtues of the fearless ( and feckless LOL ) Oval Office.
http://www.hoffmania.com/blog/2006/06/the_washington_.html
Posted by: opit | Jun 25, 2006 1:14:14 PM
One day I will figure out why this particular conflict gets wingnuts all bent out of shape.
Posted by: Amanda Marcotte | Jun 25, 2006 4:55:11 PM
Amanda it's easy, the left, especially the EUnuchstanian left-nuts don't mind killing Jews. The Muslim-nuts don't mind killing Jews either or their own children, or muslim gays, or anyone for that matter who is not their 'tribe', but should not judge other cultures.
Most countries in that region were created by the British and French, yet Jew haters never question the legitimacy of Iraq, or Saudi Arabia, or Jordan or Kuwait or.......only the legitimacy of Jews in Israel is questioned. Perhaps America, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Spain should vacate their occupied lands. That would be a fun world. Where would self hating American Jews go? Russia? France? Germany?
:(
Everywhere you dig in Israel and parts of Arabia you find Jewish artifacts.
Posted by: abc123 | Jun 25, 2006 6:15:51 PM
the left, especially the EUnuchstanian left-nuts don't mind killing Jews. The Muslim-nuts don't mind killing Jews either or their own children
More Palestinian civilians have been killed by Israelis than vice versa. By your logic, then, does the right not mind killing Arabs? Do "the Jewish-nuts" not mind killing Arabs either or their own children, which are, after all, drafted into in the IDF at age 18?
And who, exactly, is questioning the legitimacy of Israel outside the Middle East? Every country in "EUnuchstan" - which I'll somewhat generously assume refers to Europe - recognizes Israel, while neither France, Germany, nor Britain has recognized the state of Palestine. In fact, if you've been following any news from the region at all lately, you may have noticed that the EU withheld millions in aid from the Palestinian Authority until Hamas agrees to recognize Israel. So where is this liberal, European, Jew-hating boogeyman you're afraid of?
Everywhere you dig in Israel and parts of Arabia you find Jewish artifacts
You'll also find Arab and Muslim artifacts, along with Phoenician artifacts, Sumerian artifacts, Egyptian and Greek and Roman artifacts, many of which predate any Jewish settlement in the region that would later become Israel. You'll certainly find no dearth of Native American artifacts here in America, and yet somehow I think you'd object to having your home confiscated and demolished by a Native American military occupation. The presence of cultural artifacts does not legitimize that culture's ownership of a region, nor does legitimacy as a nation devolve into a game of "who came first." If it did, we'd all be living under the rule of the trilobites.
The point of the comments Neil linked to was that this asinine game of "who came first" and "who did what to whom and for how long" has to stop if there's going to be any peace in the Mideast. The reassertion of historical grudges and ancient claims from extremists in America - which is supposed to be trying to broker that peace - isn't helping.
Posted by: Iron Lungfish | Jun 26, 2006 8:33:17 AM
One important point got lost in the back and forth above: Capt. Toke's starting assertion, that Barak offered Arafat the moon at Camp David, but Arafat was too wedded to the conflict to take the "best deal ever." This commonly held view is extremely problematic, but has been very resistant to critique. Dennis Ross wrote something as thick as a phone book to make this argument. Among the many problems with this line is that, in fact, there never was a deal in writing and there were no maps showing what migh be on offer. These are the sorts of concrete facts that get lost in this highly emotional discourse.
Posted by: N.Stein | Jun 28, 2006 4:50:56 PM
As the de facto administrator of the Security Fix blog, I've spent many an hour deleting spammy links left in the comments section -
- comments that usually lead back to the same kinds of Web sites you most commonly see advertised in junk e-mail.
Posted by: Garri Azz | Feb 15, 2008 10:55:14 PM
The comments to this entry are closed.
