Hamas have really ****ed up here. They want to be taken seriously and sit at the negotiating table to get the blockades lifted so they can start importing whatever they need. But now Israel are gonna finish what they've started and then pull out unilaterally, probably within the next 2 days with Hamas totally humiliated. They'll have achieved nothing except martyred women and children. The saddest thing of all is that the people of Gaza don't have the strength or organisation to overthrow Hamas or the PLO and seek a reasonable peace for both sides, so this cycle of violence is going to go for a long long time yet.
These words are by British musician Brian Eno in an email to American musician David Byrne- "Dear All of You: I sense I'm breaking an unspoken rule with this letter, but I can't keep quiet any more. Today I saw a picture of a weeping Palestinian man holding a plastic carrier bag of meat. It was his son. He'd been shredded (the hospital's word) by an Israeli missile attack - apparently using their fab new weapon, flechette bombs. You probably know what those are - hundreds of small steel darts packed around explosive which tear the flesh off humans. The boy was Mohammed Khalaf al-Nawasra. He was 4 years old. I suddenly found myself thinking that it could have been one of my kids in that bag, and that thought upset me more than anything has for a long time. Then I read that the UN had said that Israel might be guilty of war crimes in Gaza, and they wanted to launch a commission into that. America won't sign up to it. What is going on in America? I know from my own experience how slanted your news is, and how little you get to hear about the other side of this story. But - for Christ's sake! - it's not that hard to find out. Why does America continue its blind support of this one-sided exercise in ethnic cleansing? WHY? I just don't get it. I really hate to think its just the power of AIPAC… for if that's the case, then your government really is fundamentally corrupt. No, I don't think that's the reason… but I have no idea what it could be. The America I know and like is compassionate, broadminded, creative, eclectic, tolerant and generous. You, my close American friends, symbolise those things for me. But which America is backing this horrible one-sided colonialist war? I can't work it out: I know you're not the only people like you, so how come all those voices aren't heard or registered? How come it isn't your spirit that most of the world now thinks of when it hears the word 'America'? How bad does it look when the one country which more than any other grounds its identity in notions of Liberty and Democracy then goes and puts its money exactly where its mouth isn't and supports a ragingly racist theocracy? I was in Israel last year with Mary. Her sister works for UNWRA in Jerusalem. Showing us round were a Palestinian - Shadi, who is her sister's husband and a professional guide - and Oren Jacobovitch, an Israeli Jew, an ex-major from the IDF who left the service under a cloud for refusing to beat up Palestinians. Between the two of them we got to see some harrowing things - Palestinian houses hemmed in by wire mesh and boards to prevent settlers throwing **** and piss and used sanitary towels at the inhabitants; Palestinian kids on their way to school being beaten by Israeli kids with baseball bats to parental applause and laughter; a whole village evicted and living in caves while three settler families moved onto their land; an Israeli settlement on top of a hill diverting its sewage directly down onto Palestinian farmland below; The Wall; the checkpoints… and all the endless daily humiliations. I kept thinking, "Do Americans really condone this? Do they really think this is OK? Or do they just not know about it?". As for the Peace Process: Israel wants the Process but not the Peace. While 'the process' is going on the settlers continue grabbing land and building their settlements… and then when the Palestinians finally erupt with their pathetic fireworks they get hammered and shredded with state-of-the-art missiles and depleted uranium shells because Israel 'has a right to defend itself' ( whereas Palestine clearly doesn't). And the settler militias are always happy to lend a fist or rip up someone's olive grove while the army looks the other way. By the way, most of them are not ethnic Israelis - they're 'right of return' Jews from Russia and Ukraine and Moravia and South Africa and Brooklyn who came to Israel recently with the notion that they had an inviolable (God-given!) right to the land, and that 'Arab' equates with 'vermin' - straightforward old-school racism delivered with the same arrogant, shameless swagger that the good ole boys of Louisiana used to affect. That is the culture our taxes are defending. It's like sending money to the Klan. But beyond this, what really troubles me is the bigger picture. Like it or not, in the eyes of most of the world, America represents 'The West'. So it is The West that is seen as supporting this war, despite all our high-handed talk about morality and democracy. I fear that all the civilisational achievements of The Enlightenment and Western Culture are being discredited - to the great glee of the mad Mullahs - by this flagrant hypocrisy. The war has no moral justification that I can see - but it doesn't even have any pragmatic value either. It doesn't make Kissingerian 'Realpolitik' sense; it just makes us look bad. I'm sorry to burden you all with this. I know you're busy and in varying degrees allergic to politics, but this is beyond politics. It's us squandering the civilisational capital that we've built over generations. None of the questions in this letter are rhetorical: I really don't get it and I wish that I did."
A lot of words there from eno. But about as biased as the bias he is speaking out against. More of the support seems to jump on the opportunity to attack usa rather than any sincere feelings for the people of Gaza.
What a heap of ****e, how one sided can somebody get He mentions Israel maybe guilty of war crimes but fails to mention the UN have stated that Hamas have broke international law and may have to face accusations of war crimes. He mentions of seeing a Palestinian man carrying a bag with his 4 year old son in and how his thoughts were with that man and his own son. No mention of that could have been an Israeli man carrying his son in a body bag, I mean after all Hamas are only firing rockets into Israel. He talks about one sided war and ethnic cleansing. He fails to mention Hamas have it in their charter that Israel and all of it's people must be destroyed and become an Islamic state. He fails to mention it's only a one sided war because Israel have a better army and weaponry (surely Israel can't be vilified for that), he doesn't mention that the Hamas intent to cause mass killings on a large scale is there.
He's a music bloke . Wrote OOOOOOOOOOOOOOooohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh VVVVVVVVVVVVvvvvviiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeennnnnnnnnnnnnnnaaaaaaaaaaa.
Interesting piece from a jewish writer in the New York Times its from about 3 years ago but may give you an insight into what goes on there - this refers to the West Bank but I don't suppose that will be any different to Gaza (apart from more kids being exterminated of course) http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/06/opinion/cohen-come-home-to-israel.html?_r=0 I don't know how many of the older members of not606 remember South Africa but that has the same stench of aparthied to me. Incidentally if they are advertising for these "ex pats" to come back where would they live?
Post 74 "I know Bri but ill health/stress/wine/anger is a dangerous combination on a Wednesday night - apologies if I offended anyone btw" - maybe I was a little bit angry at seeing toddlers body parts being removed from rubble - although they may have been evil toddlers I suppose
Could quite easily have been Israeli toddlers had Hamas got their rockets on target. That is a very pitiful excuse by the way, I suffer from ill health but I'm not coward enough to use it as an excuse for my actions. Man up and stop making excuses for that rant.
There was a demonstration in town last saturday, ironically the Jewish lot were surrounded on both sides by pro-Hamas (essentially that's what they are, let's not call them peaceful Palestinians), every now and then one of the 'slims would launch themselves at the Israel lot and bounce off like some Iron Dome had just dispatched them from the area. Jewish lads/ladies had signs saying "Free Gaza from Hamas" and "Peace to Palestinians" and the 'slims had a couple that said "Israel, the UN and the whole world hates you". This is with my own eyes, and there were several of Allan's snackbar children aged probably 3/4/5 running across the street into traffic, so eventually the police had to close Deansgate. I feel absolutely empty with what's happening in the middle-east, the entire place is awash with indoctinated, ultra-religious people who cannot apply common sense because of a fear of god. As an atheist am I supposed to take sides based on what? Humanity? There's a void of humanity across the entire region, systematic murdering and no value for life, as with the animal kingdom, yet I don't feel I need to sit and mourn every wilderbeast that is ripped apart by a pride of Lions. Until they start showing respect for their own lives, and gain some perspective on the value of human life, then to me they're all victims because of their beliefs and where their beliefs will lead them.
Well I''m gonna say it red card or not but the muzzi's get on my ****ing tits. In my eye's muslims are the filth of the Earth, hate the bastards. Hope Israel wipes ****ing Palasbastardstine out.
Chill Billy mate, not worth getting banned over is it? It's ****ing other people's mess to be concerned over, you're one of the top posters on here it's **** when you get lobbed off! We all know how it is mate
Sweet, go and revise that post then so you don't get slung off here! Only looking out for you mate I'm trying to remove myself from it all because I do just get angry about it being thrust onto the UK, so it's best for me to turn a blind eye. There's plenty of people gone before me who'd advise me it's not worth wasting my time on, getting angry at people who refuse to be educated, lifes way too short.
This conflict really has nothing to do with me, I know it's been going on a long time both sides have committed evil both sides feel wronged by the other. I'm just so pleased I was lucky to be born here in the north east in a safe stable country. I have no desire to argue for one side being right over the other.
The plight of Christians in Iraq, and many other areas where Islamic fundamentalism is rife, seems to be going under the radar, but in my opinion is potentially even worse than what is going on in Israel/Gaza. Every single one of them has been given an ultimatum to convert to Islam, pay a non Islamic tax or face the death penalty. Christians in this area have already had the letter 'N' daubed on their properties to identify them as a Nazerine. I'm not a Christian (agnostic actually), but I find this wholly unjust , and the world just seems to be turning a blind eye..
