ME: the Diplomatic Game

[don]

Re: ME: the Diplomatic Game

IMO this has to be one of the most blatantly biased, inconvenient-facts-be-damned, pot calling kettle black propoganda pieces I've ever read. Simply stunning.

The difference between Western mendacity and Arab mendacity is the latter can do very little and the former can do very much.

[Raz]

Re: ME: the Diplomatic Game

a different take on Gaza than that of our MSM . . .

Netanyahu loses plot to new Gaza reality
By Ramzy Baroud

Aside from being a major military setback, Israel's war on Gaza has also disoriented the policies of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu like never before. Since the announcement of a ceasefire on 26 August, his statements appear erratic and particularly uncertain, an expected outcome of the Gaza war.

Since his first term as a prime minister (1996-99), Netanyahu has showed particular savvy at fashioning political and military events to neatly suit his declared policies. He fabricated imminent threats that were neither imminent nor threats, for example, Iraq's non-existent weapons of mass destruction. Later, he took on Iran.

He created too many conditions and laid numerous obstacles for peace settlements to ever be realized. The late Palestinian leader, Yasser Arafat, labored for years to meet Israel's conditions, and failed. ...

This was as far as I could go.

Anyone who knows anything about Arafat should see this statement for the blatant, bald-faced lie that it is.

[don]

Re: ME: the Diplomatic Game

The difference between Western mendacity and Arab mendacity is the latter can do very little and the former can do very much.

In 1937, with Adolf Hitler in power, Geoffrey Dawson, editor of The Times in London, wrote the following in his diary: "I spend my nights in taking out anything which will hurt [German] susceptibilities and in dropping in little things which are intended to soothe them."

On July 30, the BBC offered viewers a masterclass in the Dawson Principle. The diplomatic correspondent of the program Newsnight, Mark Urban, gave five reasons why the Middle East was in turmoil. None included the historic or contemporary role of the British government. The Cameron government's dispatch of ?8 billion worth of arms and military equipment to Israel was airbrushed. Britain's massive arms shipment to Saudi Arabia was airbrushed. Britain's role in the destruction of Libya was airbrushed. Britain's support for the tyranny in Egypt was airbrushed.

As for the British invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan, they didn't happen, either.

The only expert witness on this BBC program was an academic called Toby Dodge from the London School of Economics. What viewers needed to know was that Dodge had been a special adviser to David Petraeus, the American general largely responsible for the disasters in Iraq and Afghanistan. But this, too, was airbrushed.

In matters of war and peace, BBC-style illusions of impartiality and credibility do more to limit and control public discussion than tabloid distortion. As Greg Philo pointed out, Jon Snow's moving commentary on YouTube was limited to whether the Israeli assault on Gaza was proportionate or reasonable. What was missing - and is almost always missing - was the essential truth of the longest military occupation in modern times: a criminal enterprise backed by western governments from Washington to London to Canberra.

As for the myth that "vulnerable" and "isolated" Israel is surrounded by enemies, Israel is actually surrounded by strategic allies. The Palestinian Authority, bankrolled, armed and directed by the US, has long colluded with Tel Aviv. Standing shoulder to shoulder with Netanyahu are the tyrannies in Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Qatar - if the World Cup ever gets to Qatar, count on Mossad to run the security.

Resistance is humanity at its bravest and most noble. The resistance in Gaza is rightly compared with the 1943 Jewish uprising in the Warsaw Ghetto - which also dug tunnels and deployed tactics of subterfuge and surprise against an overpowering military machine. The last surviving leader of the Warsaw uprising, Marek Edelman, wrote a letter of solidarity to the Palestinian resistance, comparing it with the ZOB, his ghetto fighters. The letter began: "Commanders of the Palestine military, paramilitary and partisan operations - and to all soldiers [of Palestine]."

Dr Mads Gilbert is a Norwegian doctor renowned for his heroic work in Gaza. On August 8, Dr Gilbert returned to his hometown, Tronso in Norway which, as he pointed out, the Nazis had occupied for seven years. He said, "Imagine being back in 1945 and we in Norway did not win the liberation struggle, did not throw out the occupier. Imagine the occupier remaining in our country, taking it piece by piece, for decades upon decades, and banishing us to the leanest areas, and taking the fish in the sea and the water beneath us, then bombing our hospitals, our ambulance workers, our schools, our homes.

"Would we have given up and waved the white flag? No, we would not! And this is the situation in Gaza. This is not a battle between terrorism and democracy. Hamas is not the enemy Israel is fighting. Israel is waging a war against the Palestinian people's will to resist. It is the Palestinian people's dignity that they will not accept this.

"In 1938, the Nazis called the Jews Untermenschen - subhuman. Today, Palestinians are treated as a subhuman people who can be slaughtered without any in power reacting.

John Pilger

[vt]

Re: ME: the Diplomatic Game

Hamas propaganda.

Perhaps Pilger prefers the tyranny of the Muslim Brotherhood who trampled the Egyptian constitution. I thought we were against theocracies here.

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Ne...6#.VBL7GPk7uM4

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relatio...the_Arab_world

[Thailandnotes]

Re: ME: the Diplomatic Game

Hamas propaganda.

Perhaps Pilger prefers the tyranny of the Muslim Brotherhood who trampled the Egyptian constitution. I thought we were against theocracies here.

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Ne...6#.VBL7GPk7uM4

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relatio...the_Arab_world

Pilger = propaganda?

.....hardly

Worked with an Israeli diplomat for a while. Was just getting into making middle eastern food. Couldn't get falafel right. His Palestinian friend had taught him some tricks. While we were making the first batch, he said, "Orwell would have reveled in the current lies of both sides."

That was 1994.


http://moelfabansuppers.com/2013/04/...rfect-falafel/

[shiny!]

Re: ME: the Diplomatic Game

The late Palestinian leader, Yasser Arafat, labored for years to meet Israel's conditions, and failed

I wonder if that was before or after he was responsible for murdering the Israeli Olympic athletes at Munich? All those resistance fighters under his command, bravely murdering unarmed people. So heroic. Even now the "Palestinian resistance" hides their munitions in and fires their rockets into Israel from schools and hospitals, using their own innocents as human shields. But the media doesn't report that. They only report when Israel fires back in self-defense. Then it's reported as Israel attacking innocent civilians in schools and hospitals.

They don't report that Israeli doctors and hospitals treat sick and wounded Palestinians. Nor do they report incidents like this, either.

Yasir Arafat's Timeline of Terror

Members of the media are focusing much attention on Yasir Arafat's legacy. Many of the historical briefs and timelines being published whitewash his decades-long involvement in terrorism. While they note that Arafat led Fatah and the PLO, the terrorist acts committed by these groups are often ignored.

For example, a Nov. 4 AP timeline, reproduced in the publications and Web sites of many different media outlets, lists only one failed act of sabotage in 1965, 3 suicide bombings in December of 2001 and one in 2002.


In fact, groups under Arafat's direct or indirect command – including Fatah, Black September, Tanzim and Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade – were responsible for hundreds of bombings, hijackings, assassinations and other attacks, including the 1972 murder of 11 of Israel's Olympic athletes in Munich, the 1973 murder of the American ambassador to Sudan, Cleo Noel, and the 1985 hijacking of the Achille Lauro cruiseship (resulting in the murder of wheelchair-bound Leon Klinghoffer).


The AP timeline instead highlights Israel's anti-PLO actions without providing the reason – decades of terrorist attacks against innocent civilians. Not only is the PLO's history of international hijackings, kidnappings and child murders ignored, the terrorist organization and Arafat's leadership of it are actually praised:

Feb. 4, 1969: Arafat takes over PLO chairmanship, transforms it into a dynamic force that makes Palestinian cause known worldwide.

A Knight-Ridder/Tribune timeline of Arafat's life that appeared in Newsday only mentions terror once, in 2001: “Blamed for not controlling terrorist attacks on Israel by Hamas, other radicals.” Typical of many of the flawed timelines, it implies only that Arafat failed to control terror, not that he was actively involved in funding and supporting it.


In order to report on Arafat's history objectively, one must include his decades-long involvement in terror, his goal of destroying Israel, and his siphoning of hundreds of millions of dollars from money donated to help the Palestinian people that went instead into his own private accounts.


Yasir Arafat is known to many as the “father of modern terrorism.” Below is a timeline of some of the key events of his life and terrorist acts with which he was associated. (Prepared by www.camera.org)

Key Events in Yasir Arafat's Terrorist Career

– Aug 4, 1929: Born in Cairo. Arafat, then named Muhammad Abdel Rahman Abdel Rauf al-Qudwa al-Husseini, is fifth child of prosperous merchant, Abdel Raouf al-Qudwa al-Husseini.
– 1933: Arafat's mother dies. He and his infant brother are sent to live with uncle in Jerusalem.
– Late 1950's: Arafat co-founds Fatah, the “Movement for the National Liberation of Palestine.”
– Jan. 1, 1965: Fatah fails in its first attempted attack within Israel — the bombing of the National Water Carrier.
– July 5, 1965: A Fatah cell plants explosives at Mitzpe Massua, near Beit Guvrin; and on the railroad tracks to Jerusalem near Kafr Battir.
– 1965-1967: Numerous Fatah bomb attacks target Israeli villages, water pipes, railroads. Homes are destroyed and Israelis are killed.
– July 1968: Fatah joins and becomes the dominant member of the PLO, an umbrella organization of Palestinian terrorist groups.
– Feb. 4, 1969: Arafat is appointed Chairman of the Executive Committee of the PLO
– Feb. 21, 1970: SwissAir flight 330, bound for Tel Aviv, is bombed in mid-flight by PFLP, a PLO member group. 47 people are killed.
– May 8, 1970: PLO terrorists attack an Israeli schoolbus with bazooka fire, killing nine pupils and three teachers from Moshav Avivim
– Sept. 6, 1970: TWA, Pan-Am, and BOAC airplanes are hijacked by PLO terrorists.
– September 1970: Jordanian forces battle the PLO terrorist organization, driving its members out of Jordan after the group's violent activity threatens to destabilize the kingdom. The terrorists flee to Lebanon. This period in PLO history is called “Black September.”
– May 1972: PFLP, part of the PLO, dispatches members of the Japanese Red Army to attack Lod Airport in Tel Aviv, killing 27 people.
– Sept. 5, 1972: Munich Massacre —11 Israeli athletes are murdered at the Munich Olympics by a group calling themselves “Black September,”said to be an arm of Fatah, operating under Arafat's direct command.
– March 1, 1973: Palestinian terrorists take over Saudi embassy in Khartoum. The next day, two Americans, including United States ambassador to Sudan Cleo Noel, and a Belgian were shot and killed. James J. Welsh, an analyst for the National Security Agency from 1969 through 1974, charged Arafat with direct complicity in these murders.
– April 11, 1974: 11 people are killed by Palestinian terrorists who attack apartment building in Kiryat Shmona.
– May 15, 1974: PLO terrorists infiltrating from Lebanon hold children hostage in Ma'alot school. 26 people, 21 of them children, are killed.
– June 9, 1974: Palestinian National Council adopts “Phased Plan,” which calls for the establishment of a Palestinian state on any territory evacuated by Israel, to be used as a base of operations for destroying the whole of Israel. The PLO reaffirms its rejection of United Nations Security Council Resolution 242, which calls for a “just and lasting peace” and the “right to live in peace within secure and recognized boundaries free from threats or acts of force.”
– November 1974: PLO takes responsibility for the PDFLP's Beit She'an murders in which 4 Israelis are killed.
– Nov. 13, 1974: Arafat, wearing a holster (he had to leave his gun at the entrance), addresses the U.N. General Assembly.
– March 1975: Members of Fatah attack the Tel Aviv seafront and take hostages in the Savoy hotel. Three soldiers, three civilians and seven terrorists are killed.
– March 1978: Coastal Road Massacre —Fatah terrorists take over a bus on the Haifa-Tel Aviv highway and kill 21 Israelis.
– 1982: Having created a terrorist mini-state in Lebanon destabilizing that nation, PLO is expelled as a result of Israel's response to incessant PLO missile attacks against northern Israeli communities. Arafat relocates to Tunis.
– Oct. 7, 1985: Italian cruise ship Achille Lauro is hijacked by Palestinian terrorists. Wheelchair-bound elderly man, Leon Klinghoffer, was shot and thrown overboard. Intelligence reports note that instructions originated from Arafat's headquarters in Tunis.
– Dec. 12, 1988: Arafat claims to accept Israel's right to exist.
– September 1993: Arafat shakes hands with Israeli Prime Minister Rabin, inaugurating the Oslo Accords. Arafat pledges to stop incitement and terror, and to foster co-existence with Israel, but fails to comply. Throughout the years of negotiations, aside from passing, token efforts, Arafat does nothing to stop Hamas, PFLP, and Islamic Jihad from carrying out thousands of terrorist attacks against Israeli civilians. With Arafat's encouragement and financial support, groups directly under Arafat's command, such as the Tanzim and Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, also carry out terror attacks.
– Oct. 21, 1996: Speaking at a rally near Bethlehem, Arafat said "We know only one word - jihad. jihad, jihad, jihad. Whoever does not like it can drink from the Dead Sea or from the Sea of Gaza." (Yediot Ahronot, October 23, 1996)
– April 16, 1998: In a statement published in the official Palestinian Authority newspaper Al-Hayat Al-Jadeeda, Arafat is quoted: "O my dear ones on the occupied lands, relatives and friends throughout Palestine and the diaspora, my colleagues in struggle and in arms, my colleagues in struggle and in jihad...Intensify the revolution and the blessed intifada...We must burn the ground under the feet of the invaders."
– July 2000: Arafat rejects peace settlement offered by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, which would have led to a Palestinian state.
– September 2000: New "intifada" is launched. Arafat continues to incite, support and fund terrorism.
– Jan. 3, 2002: Israelis intercept the Karine-A, a ship loaded with 50 tons of mortars, rocket launchers, anti-tank mines and other weapons intended for the Palestinian war against the Israelis. The captain admits he was under the command of the Palestinian Authority.
– September 2003: IMF report titled "Economic Performance and Reforms under Conflict Conditions," states that Arafat has diverted $900 million of public PA funds into his own accounts from 1995 - 2000.
Below are some of the attacks since Sept 2000 perpetrated by groups under Arafat's command:

– May 29, 2001: Gilad Zar, an Itamar resident, was shot dead in a terrorist ambush by Fatah Tanzim.
– May 29, 2001: Sara Blaustein, 53, and Esther Alvan, 20, of Efrat, were killed in a drive-by shooting south of Jerusalem. The Fatah Tanzim claimed responsibility for the attack.
– June 18, 2001: Doron Zisserman, 38, shot and killed in his car by Fatah sniper fire.
– Aug 26, 2001: Dov Rosman, 58, killed in a shooting attack by Fatah terrorist.
– Sept 6, 2001: Erez Merhavi, 23, killed in a Fatah Tanzim ambush shooting near Hadera while driving to a wedding.
– Sept 20, 2001: Sarit Amrani, 26, killed by Fatah terrorist snipers as she was traveling in a car with her husband and 3 children.
– Oct 4, 2001: 3 killed, 13 wounded, when a Fatah terrorist, dressed as an Israeli paratrooper, opened fire on Israeli civilians waiting at the central bus station in Afula.
– Nov 27, 2001 - 2 killed 50 injured when two Palestinian terrorists opened fire with Kalashnikov assault rifles on a crowd of people near the central bus station in Afula. Fatah and the Islamic Jihad claimed joint responsibility.
– Nov 29, 2001: 3 killed and 9 wounded in a suicide bombing on an Egged 823 bus en route from Nazereth to Tel Aviv near the city of Hadera. The Islamic Jihad and Fatah claimed responsibility for the attack.
– Dec 12, 2001 - 11 killed and 30 wounded when three terrorists attacked a bus and several passenger cars with a roadside bomb, anti-tank grenades, and light arms fire near the entrance to Emmanuel in Samaria . Both Fatah and Hamas claimed responsibility for the attack.
– Jan 15, 2002: Avi Boaz, 71, an American citizen, was kidnapped at a PA security checkpoint in Beit Jala. His bullet-riddled body was found in a car near Bethlehem. The Fatah's Al-Aksa Brigade claimed responsibility for the murder.
– Jan 15, 2002: Yoela Chen, 45, was shot dead by an Al Aqsa Brigade terrorist
– Jan 17, 2002: 6 killed, 35 wounded when a Fatah terrorist burst into a bat mitzva reception in a banquet hall in Hadera opening fire with an M-16 assault rifle.
– Jan 22, 2002: 2 killed, 40 injured when a Fatah terrorist opened fire with an M-16 assault rifle near a bus stop in downtown Jerusalem.
– Jan. 27, 2002: One person was killed and more than 150 were wounded by a female Fatah suicide bomber in the center of Jerusalem.
– Feb 6, 2002 - A mother and her 11 year old daughter were murdered in their home by a Palestinian terrorist disguised in an IDF uniform. Both Fatah and Hamas claimed responsibility.
– Feb 18, 2002 : - Ahuva Amergi, 30, was killed and a 60-year old man was injured when a Palestinian terrorist opened fire on her car. Maj. Mor Elraz, 25, and St.-Sgt. Amir Mansouri, 21, who came to their assistance, were killed while trying to intercept the terrorist. The terrorist was killed when the explosives he was carrying were detonated. The Fatah al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades claimed responsibility for the attack.
– Feb 22, 2002: Valery Ahmir, 59, was killed by terrorists in a Fatah drive-by shooting north of Jerusalem as he returned home from work.
– Feb 25, 2002: Avraham Fish, 65, and Aharon Gorov, 46, were killed in a Fatah terrorist shooting attack south of Bethlehem. Fish's daughter, 9 months pregnant, was seriously injured but delivered a baby girl.
– Feb 25, 2002: Police officer 1st Sgt. Galit Arbiv, 21, died after being fatally shot, when a Fatah terrorist opened fire at a bus stop in the Neve Ya'akov residential neighbhorhood in northern Jerusalem. Eight others were injured.
– Feb 27, 2002: Gad Rejwan, 34, of Jerusalem, was shot and killed by one of his Palestinian employees in a factory north of Jerusalem. Two Fatah groups issued a joint statement taking responsibility for the murder.
– March 2, 2002: A suicide bombing by Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade in an ultra-Orthodox Jewish neighborhood of Jerusalem killed 11 people and injured more than 50.
– Mar 5, 2002: 3 were killed and over 30 people were wounded in Tel-Aviv when a Fatah terrorist opened fire on two adjacent restaurants shortly after 2:00 AM.
– Mar 5, 2002: Devorah Friedman, 45, of Efrat, was killed and her husband injured in a Fatah shooting attack on the Bethlehem bypass "tunnel road", south of Jerusalem.
– Mar 9, 2002: Avia Malka, 9 months, and Israel Yihye, 27, were killed and about 50 people were injured when two Fatah terrorists opened fire and threw grenades at cars and pedestrians in the coastal city of Netanya on Saturday evening, close to the city's boardwalk and hotels.
–March 21, 2002: An Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade suicide bomber exploded himself in a crowd of shoppers in Jerusalem, killing 3 and injuring 86.
– March 29, 2002: Two killed and 28 injured when a female Fatah suicide bomber blew herself up in a Jerusalem supermarket.
– March 30, 2002: One killed and 30 injured in an Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade suicide bombing in Tel Aviv.
– April 12, 2002: Six killed and 104 wounded when a female Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade suicide bomber blew herself up at a bus stop on Jaffa road at the entrance to Jerusalem's Mahane Yehuda open-air market.
– May 27, 2002: Ruth Peled, 56, of Herzliya and her infant granddaughter, aged 14 months, were killed and 37 people were injured when a Fatah suicide bomber detonated himself near an ice cream parlor outside a shopping mall in Petah Tikva.
– May 28, 2002 - Albert Maloul, 50, of Jerusalem, was killed when shots were fired by Fatah terrorists at the car in which he was traveling south on the Ramallah bypass road.
– May 28, 2002 - Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade terrorists killed Netanel Riachi, 17, Gilad Stiglitz, 14, and Avraham Siton, 17, three yeshiva high school students playing basketball.
– June 19, 2002: Seven people were killed and 37 injured when a Fatah suicide bomber blew himself up at a crowded bus stop and hitchhiking post in the French Hill neighborhood of Jerusalem.
– June 20, 2002: Rachel Shabo, 40, and three of her sons - Neria, 16, Zvika, 12, and Avishai, 5 - as well as a neighbor, Yosef Twito, 31, who came to their aid, were murdered when a terrorist entered their home in Itamar, south of Nablus, and opened fire. Two other children were injured, as well as two soldiers. The PFLP and the Fatah Al Aqsa Brigades claimed responsibility for the attack.
– July 25, 2002: Rabbi Elimelech Shapira, 43, was killed in a Fatah shooting attack near the West Bank community of Alei Zahav.
– July 26, 2002: St.-Sgt. Elazar Lebovitch, 21, of Hebron; Rabbi Yosef Dikstein, 45, of Psagot, his wife Hannah, 42, and their 9-year-old son Shuv'el Zion were killed in a Fatah Al Aqsa Brigade shooting attack south of Hebron. Two other of their children were injured. – July 30, 2002: Shlomo Odesser, 60, and his brother Mordechai, 52, both of Tapuach in Samaria, were shot and killed when their truck came under Fatah fire in the West Bank village of Jama'in.
– Aug 4, 2002: 2 killed and 17 wounded when a Fatah terrorist opened fire with a pistol near the Damascus Gate of Jerusalem's Old City.
– Aug 5, 2002: Avi Wolanski (29) and his wife Avital (27), of Eli, were killed and one of their children, aged 3, was injured when terrorists opened fire on their car as they were traveling on the Ramallah-Nablus road in Samaria. The Martyrs of the Palestinian Popular Army, a splinter group associated with Arafat's Fatah movement, claimed responsibility for the attack.
– Aug 10, 2002: Yafit Herenstein, 31, of Moshav Mechora in the Jordan Valley, was killed and her husband, Arno, seriously wounded when a Fatah terrorist infiltrated the moshav and opened fire outside their home.
– Sept 18, 2002: Yosef Ajami, 36, was killed when Fatah terrorists opened fire on his car near Mevo Dotan, north of Jenin in the West Bank.
– Oct 29, 2002: Three people, including 2 fourteen year olds, were shot to death by a Fatah terrorist.
-- Nov 10, 2002: Revital Ohayon, 34, and her two sons, Matan, 5, and Noam, 4, as well as Yitzhak Dori, 44 - all of Kibbutz Metzer - and Tirza Damari, 42, were killed when a Fatah terrorist infiltrated the kibbutz, located east of Hadera near the Green Line, and opened fire.
– Nov 28, 2002: 5 killed and 40 wounded when two Fatah terrorists opened fire and threw grenades at the Likud polling station in Beit She'an, near the central bus station, where party members were casting their votes in the Likud primary.
– Apr 24, 2003 - 1 was killed and 13 were wounded in a suicide bombing outside the train station in Kfar Sava. Groups related to the Fatah al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades and the PFLP clamied joint responsibility for the attack.
– May 5, 2003 - Gideon Lichterman, 27, was killed and two other passengers, his six-year-old daughter Moriah and a reserve soldier, were seriously wounded when Fatah terrorists fired shots at their vehicle in Samaria.
– May 19, 2003: 3 were killed and 70 were wounded in a suicide bombing at the entrance to the Amakim Mall in Afula. The Islamic Jihad and the Fatah al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades both claimed responsibility for the attack.
– Aug 29, 2003: Shalom Har-Melekh, 25, was killed in a Fatah shooting attack while driving northeast of Ramallah. His wife, Limor, who was seven months pregnant, sustained moderate injuries, and gave birth to a baby girl by Caesarean section.
– Jan 29, 2004: 11 people were killed and over 50 wounded in a suicide bombing of an Egged bus no. 19 at the corner of Gaza and Arlozorov streets in Jerusalem. Both the Fatah-related Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades and Hamas claimed responsibility for the attack.
– Mar 14, 2004: 10 were killed and 16 wounded in a double suicide bombing at Ashdod Port. Hamas and Fatah claimed responsibility for the attack.
– May 2, 2004: Tali Hatuel, 34, and her daughters - Hila, 11, Hadar, 9, Roni, 7, and Merav, 2 - of Katif in the Gaza Strip were killed when two Palestinian terrorists fired on an Israeli car at the entrance to the Gaza Strip settlement bloc of Gush Katif. Fatah and Islamic Jihad claimed joint responsibility for the attack.

[Woodsman]

Re: ME: the Diplomatic Game

I wonder if that was before or after he was responsible for murdering the Israeli Olympic athletes at Munich?

So what does it mean that Presidents and Prime Minsters shake his hand?




Yes sir, it's tough sledding PR-wise for Yassir's memory now that he's fallen off the guest list.



If only the occupied and conquered had equivalent support, who knows?


CAMERA's 1989 Conference fills the Park Plaza Ballroom.

One might doubt that some meager justice was meted out to Yassir, but in the end it's just one more eye for another, one more body on the pile. The war continues seemingly without end.

"I have learned that an age in which politicians talk about peace is an age in which everybody expects war: the great men of the earth would not talk of peace so much if they did not secretly believe it possible, with one more war, to annihilate their enemies forever. Always, "after just one more war" it will dawn, the new era of love: but first everybody who is hated must be eliminated. For hate, you see, is the mother of their kind of love. Unfortunately the love that is to be born out of hate will never be born. Hatred is sterile; it breeds nothing but the image of its own empty fury, its own nothingness. Love cannot come of emptiness. It is full of reality. Hatred destroys the real being of man in fighting the fiction which it calls "the enemy." For man is concrete and alive, but "the enemy" is a subjective abstraction. A society that kills real men in order to deliver itself from the phantasm of a paranoid delusion is already possessed by the demon of destructiveness because it has made itself incapable of love. It refuses, a priori, to love. It is dedicated not to concrete relations of man with man, but only to abstractions about politics, economics, psychology, and even, sometimes, religion."

If things had worked out, maybe the airbrush of history might have softened Yassir's complexion as it did for Messrs. Stern, Begin and Shamir. But even so, the old chestnut about "one man's terrorist is another's freedom fighter" is too cynical even for me. Oh Harry, why'd you get us mixed up in this?

In terms of dead Olympic Athletes and all victims of terrorism everywhere, I share the outrage. Too many of these criminals have been coddled and their crimes airbrushed from history for the sake of geopolitical convenience. The peacemakers always seem to die young and warmongers seem ever immortal and unaccountable. So it goes.

We're not ready for real peace and real security.

[vt]

Re: ME: the Diplomatic Game

Until the Palestinians acknowledge Israel's right to exist it's all propaganda with no basis in truth.

Until Hamas stops putting missiles in residential areas, they are to blame for civilian deaths.

Until any critics of Israel acknowledge the nations right to exist, and call out Hamas and other terrorists for transgressions, they have no truth to speak.

Israel only wants to live in peace in their homeland.

Egypt has now offered the Palestinians a home, which they should accept.

[Woodsman]

Re: ME: the Diplomatic Game

Until the Palestinians acknowledge Israel's right to exist it's all propaganda with no basis in truth.

Until Hamas stops putting missiles in residential areas, they are to blame for civilian deaths.

Until any critics of Israel acknowledge the nations right to exist, and call out Hamas and other terrorists for transgressions, they have no truth to speak.

Israel only wants to live in peace in their homeland.

Egypt has now offered the Palestinians a home, which they should accept.

You're a little late to the party, vt.

n 1988 Yasser Arafat declared that the Palestinians accepted United Nations Security Council Resolutions 242 and 338 which would guarantee "the right to exist in peace and security for all".[24] In 1993, there was an official exchange of letters between Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Chairman Arafat, in which Arafat declared that "the PLO affirms that those articles of the Palestinian Covenant which deny Israel's right to exist, and the provisions of the Covenant which are inconsistent with the commitments of this letter are now inoperative and no longer valid."

With best wishes, maybe read the Merton quote again and pray with me for peace and for men with the courage to wage it.

[vt]

Re: ME: the Diplomatic Game

Hamas?

[ProdigyofZen]

Re: ME: the Diplomatic Game

VT, you mean the virtual internment camps that the Palestinians live in? I know I wouldn't be happy if I couldnt live a small little area when I wanted to.

But then again I wouldn't be happy with bombs dropping in my larger living area or so called terrorists blowing themselves up in crowded market places.

I would like to see the last 15 years of Palestinian civil deaths vs. the last 15 years of Israeli civilian deaths.

I bet the amount of civilians women and children who have died this summer in Palestine is more than all the Israeli civilian deaths the last 15 years.

But as Larry David says "the Palestinians make the best chicken!" This episode cracks me up and I'm Jewish

[lakedaemonian]

Re: ME: the Diplomatic Game

You're a little late to the party, vt.



With best wishes, maybe read the Merton quote again and pray with me for peace and for men with the courage to wage it.

The PLO grudgingly accepted it.

But the PLO is no longer is power. Hamas is.

Has Hamas acknowledged Israel's right to exist?

If not, is the acknowledgement by the PLO still relevant?

[vt]

Re: ME: the Diplomatic Game

Well, direct you concerns to Hamas. They lob hundreds of missiles at Israel and attack through tunnels with money meant to help Palestinians.

Hamas is causing the deaths, not Israel.

[Raz]

Re: ME: the Diplomatic Game

You're a little late to the party, vt.



With best wishes, maybe read the Merton quote again and pray with me for peace and for men with the courage to wage it.

Your heart is in the right place, Woodsman; it's your mind that isn't.

Arafat's signature on the Oslo Accords wasn't worth a cup of warm spit.

Unless one understands Taqiyya one doesn't understand that ALL treaties between Muslims and infidels mean NOTHING.
They are at best a truce - until the Muslims have the upper hand, while in fact they are nothing more than a ruse.

http://www.meforum.org/2538/taqiyya-islam-rules-of-war

http://palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=711...23&doc_id=1476

http://palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=711...23&doc_id=5253

[Woodsman]

Re: ME: the Diplomatic Game

Your heart is in the right place, Woodsman; it's your mind that isn't.

Err, thanks? I think?

Anyway, you'll understand if I pass on a ride in Danny Pipes' Islamophobia crazy train.