James Lileks has a brilliant, mordant last eulogy on the latest bombing in Israel: "But before I didn’t care what happened to the people in the organizations that arrange these attacks. Now I don’t care about what happens to the culture that permits it. Approves of it. Defends it, sanctions it, shelters it, sings it praises, names streets after the men who do it. I’m done.... "I never want to see Arafat asking for anything anywhere any more. I don’t want to see people on the West Bank cheering as clumsy Scuds lumber over their heads in February, because I know they’ll head to Israeli hospitals when the germs hit them, and I know they’ll be admitted for treatment. "I’m not saying I wish them ill. But the line of people I care about now is very, very long. The apologists and supporters of the bombers can get behind the 100 wounded I never met. The 20 who died. The one who was the child of a father my age. And when it’s their turn to ask for my sympathy, I’ll probably point to the line with 3000 New Yorkers, and kindly request that they head to the back." http://www.lileks.com/bleats/archive/03/0103/010302.html#010603
BWA HA HA HA HA HA HA Do you really place the United States and Israel in the same category as those who strap bombs onto brainwashed children and send them out to kill indiscriminately? What is the cause of your envy of the United States?
I always thought that the Palestinians had some legitimate issues with Israel, but the sight of Palestinians dancing in the streets celebrating the thousands of innocent dead after 9/11 left me forever tainted against anything they do or say. Bruce
"We don't need no stinkin' moral distinctions" I re-post from another thread (11-02-02) the following finding from Human Rights Watch: Human Rights Watch Gets Clue: Suicide Bombings Crime Against Humanity (Finally) Israel/PA: Suicide Bombers Commit Crimes Against Humanity -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- (Gaza, November 1, 2002) The people responsible for planning and carrying out suicide bombings that deliberately target civilians are guilty of crimes against humanity and should be brought to justice, Human Rights Watch said in a new report today. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "The people who carry out suicide bombings are not martyrs, they're war criminals, and so are the people who help to plan such attacks. The scale and systematic nature of these attacks sets them apart from other abuses committed in times of conflict. They clearly fall under the category of crimes against humanity." Kenneth Roth, Executive Director of Human Rights Watch -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The 170-page report is the first full-fledged examination of individual criminal responsibility for suicide bombings against civilians in Israel and the Israeli-occupied territories. [SNIP!] FULL Report at: http://humanrightswatch.org/press/2...isrl-pa1101.htm ============================================ WE always thought so--but what took these "authorities" so long? --Orson. ============================================ ============================================ dlkereluk, Certainly, one can make the case for moral equivalence of Hamas, IDF, U. S., and Al Qaeda from a consistently pacifist perspective.... But those who accept the right of self-defense and the necessity of compromise in politics (i.e., Israel ain't disappearing as Arafat's PA assumes), will take sides from a different moral perspective, by definition; those who categorically reject the deliberate targeting of civilians (shades of WWII!) will judge differently as well. (Plus, I noticed yesterday that less than 2% of all United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees comes from Arab countries--none at all from 5 or 6 nations like Egypt, Kuwait, U.A.E., and Libya, while 38% comes from the EVIL U.S. [See UN figures, http://www.un.org/unrwa/finances/cont-june02.htm] SO much for Washington Senator Patty Murray's plaint that OBL has curried favor through his munificence whale the U.S. has not--and that's just one of a dozen examples one could give. See "The Real Roots of Arab Anti-Americanism," Barry Rubin, Foreign Affairs, Nov/Dec, 2002.) A close friend of mine participates in a forum of Muslims (www.alt.muslim.com), claiming to take these and other matters seriously, to debate and discuss these issues. Mostly, they don't! They won't! Denial, defensiveness, and rejection of all criticism is almost uniform. Enlightenment is unknown. As Martin Kramer writes: "The problem is that...real Muslims have treated would-be reformers very shabbily [i.e., with assassination and threats]; the space between Islamism and the authroitarian state remains a leaderless void.... By all means let us pray five times a day for an Islamic Reformation. But let us admit that there is no Luther in sight who could inspire one." (Commentary, Dec. 2002, 17) They appear to be today the very same people that histories and historians like Bernard Lewis speak of: if they could use ancient Greek or Western texts for war, they did--anything else, they ai't curioous about. I t seems to be a culture of stasis and death--the least suceptible world religion to the prerequisites of progress on the planet. --Orson (...and that's why there are no Muslims in Star Trek! The tragic truth is this [and it's painful for me to come to this judgement about any sector of humanity]: they have no future.)
I'm sorry, but I still have to disagree with you. A terrorist is a terrorist regardless of his or her faith or ethnic background. I don't think highly of any terrorist group, whether it be under the command of Arafat, Sharon, or Bush (I and II). All people have the right to live in a peaceful manner--this includes the Palestininans, Israelis, and anybody else for that matter.
Are you nuts? I'm not envious of the US nor do I hate it. Do you remember the CIA's "involvement" in Chile in 1973, and in several of the banana republics in the 50's? Do you call this being "democratic"? It's well and good for people in the US government who stand to profit from military interventions to push their views on other nations by sending the CIA and the US armed forces to interfere in the affairs of this countries, but when somebody questions US foreign policy, right away people like you offer the tired reply about being envious of the US...Get real, already.
Fair enough; I remember interventions in Dominican Republic in 1964, Gautemala in the '50, etc. However that was also part of the Cold War. The Cold war is over. How is this history relevent to a "War on Terrorism" today? If the argument is that intervention has usually or typically counterproductive, I'll readily agree!! If the argument is that military intervention can never benefit locals, this is manifestly false--peoples freedoms in Panama, Grenada, the Philipines are clearly better now than before interventions. (NOT that this is therefore an argument FOR military adventurism--it isn't!) I won't attempt to reply to the latter point for Charles, but if you might give an example of "people in the US government who stand to profit from military interventions...?" Most US trade and growth in trade is confined to developed countries; third world countries, save oil rich states, remain out of the loop of global trade. Cui bono? If "the people" you refer to above include US Vice President Chaney whose former firm Halliburtin (sp?), the oil services firm, stands to benefit from a free, oil rich Iraq--I'll conceed that, as was famously said, "nations don't have friends, they have interests." So? But then what is Saddam Husein's "interest" in forgoing an estimated $132 billion lost in resisting disarmament? (This is the opportunity cost of the UN trade embargo against Iraq over the past 12 years.) What could be so unfathomably important to hide through bearing such a huge loss--or else who would so "irrational?" And how does all this answer or buttrice your original contention: the moral equivalence of "terrorists" who deliberately target unarmed and defenseless citizens versus "terrorist" nations who don't? Or does the word "is"--or "terrorist"--not mean the same thing to you as it does to me? --Orson
But what makes you think that Palestinians WANT to live in peace? Suveys of Palestinians showthat, with depressing uniformity, large majorities support targeting terrorism against ordinary unarmed citizens, e.g., an AP story (Dec 19? 2002) reads: "JERUSALEM - Most Palestinians believe suicide bombings against Israel are justified and only a handful support ending the violent uprising that has claimed nearly 2,700 lives on both sides, according to a poll released Wednesday. "Some 63 percent of 1,200 Palestinians surveyed said suicide bombings should continue, and only 17 percent said they oppose the intefadeh, 26 months of violence that has claimed the lives of 1,997 Palestinians and 685 Israelis. Eighty percent said the intefadeh should continue." How does the US and Israel support the same? Or don't sovereign nation states have a right to self-defense (that include proscriptions and penalties for targeting noncombatants--i.e., are observant of international law)? --Orson
I am aware of U.S. involvement in South America. This however is not relevant to this discussion. You try to imply that the organizations behind homicide bombers are the moral equals of the United States. Your relativist nonsense is not only wrong, it is dangerous. Any one can play your silly memory game. Do you remember the Canadian Parachute Regiment? http://www.forces.gc.ca/somalia/vol1/indexe.htm The sad story of what led to the regiment's disbandment is not relevant either. However, a discussion on ethics of the decision to disband the regiment would be interesting.
Full details of the last poll data on Palestinian support for terror are at: http://www.imra.org.il/story.php3?id=15261 --Orson
