So, it must be all a lie because the Left brought it to public attention.
Remember how the World Socialist Web Site was slandered some months ago for being first to present evidence that there was ample forewarning of 9/11, and that War on Terrorism plans existed well before the September attacks.
What does the WSWS say about this important new film?
WSWS : News & Analysis : North America
Why is the US media blacking out documentary on war crimes in Afghanistan?
By Kate Randall (21 June 2002)
Massacre in Mazar, a documentary by Irish director Jamie Doran, was screened last week before select audiences in Europe. The film documents events following the November 21, 2001 fall of Konduz, the Taliban’s last stronghold in northern Afghanistan. [See: “Afghan war documentary charges US with mass killings”]
The film presents powerful testimony from Afghan witnesses that US troops collaborated in the torture and killings of thousands of Taliban prisoners near Mazar-i-Sharif. The film, which has prompted demands for an international commission of inquiry on war crimes in Afghanistan, received widespread coverage in the European press, with major stories in the Guardian, Le Monde, Suddeutsche Zeitung, Die Welt and other papers.
This major story, however, has received virtually no coverage in US newspapers or on network or cable television. Aside from stories on some alternative Internet publications, and a June 16 article on Salon.com, the story has been essentially blacked out in the US.
A search for news about the documentary in the major dailies—including the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune, the Boston Globe and the Miami Herald —turned up empty. Web sites for ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox News and CNN have likewise carried nothing on the film.
Repeated telephone calls by the WSWS to these news sources, inquiring why they have failed to cover the story, went unanswered. How is it possible that not a single major US media outlet chose to cover such an important news event? There is no innocent or journalistic explanation.
This wholesale political censorship cannot be justified on the basis that Massacre in Mazar —or the events it depicts—are not “newsworthy.” The two screenings of the documentary in Germany prompted calls by a number of European parliamentary deputies and human rights advocates for an independent investigation into the atrocities exposed by the film. Calling for an inquiry, prominent human rights lawyer Andrew McEntee commented it was “clear there is prima facie evidence of serious war crimes committed not just under international law, but also under the laws of the United States itself.”
The film includes scenes of the aftermath of the massacre of hundreds of Taliban fighters who were taken prisoner outside Mazar-i-Sharif, at the Qala- i-Jangi prison, showing captured troops who were apparently shot with their hands tied. The filmmaker also interviewed eyewitnesses, who describe the torture and slaughter of 3,000 prisoners, who were allegedly driven to a desert area and massacred. These witnesses—who were not paid—have offered to provide testimony before any independent investigation into the events...
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This all disturbingly meshes with the claim made by a returned U.S. soldier, which I posted here, that our forces were under "orders" to kill everyone, women and children included, as everyone was supposedly the "enemy".
Remember My Lai. Remember the El Chorillo massacre in Panama City.
We have to get to the bottom of what we're actually doing in Afghanistan, and elsewhere, for the sake of our place in history.
So, it must be all a lie because the Left brought it to public attention.
No, just wanted to see your reaction when someone else tried this tactic of the left. If it had been a right wing extremist group making claims against Clinton, you all would have been laughing it off as such partisanship.
When terrorism become a tactic of some who are part of a much larger group -- a people -- who have an eminently just cause, we need to take great care to avoid equating the wrong conduct of the extremists with that broader cause itself. Â Â
Gee Dennis, I thought I heard you say a few times that Arafat was their elected leader? So if he is their elected leader as you've proclaimed then why should we separate the two, I mean it would be one thing if these were just rogue people in his nation, eveyone has them but he also makes little or no attempt to really reign them in. Oh I know, I forgot he condems them. Wink wink nudge nudge. He can't controll everyone but perhaps if he made a real effort to thwart murder he would have some ground to stand on. He doesn't but that's never stopped you and others from turning the other way because the ends somewhat justify the means in your eyes. You decry bemoan and berate our efforts to stop and apprehend memebers of terrorist organizations. Funny because aparrently you and others are pretty quiet if it's a cause you believe in, the same thing you accuse others of. So you deride our efforts because of the way we are doing so in where civilians are killed albeit unintentionally. Then you turn around and champion the Palestinian cause and make little mention or whine:
we need to take great care to avoid equating the wrong conduct of the extremists with that broader cause itself. Â Â
Gee, that's funny I've never heard you say that about U.S troops or others.
Sad part is that we will never hear yellowtimes, common dreams, WSW etc. Spend a miniscule fraction of the effort condemming Palestines actions. They'll give it a little lip service and then go on to equate it morally or excuse it because of the cause. Too bad you don't see the massivie hypocrisy in that. Then again it's obvious whose side your on. And yet you still fail to apply the same litmus test to these nations as you would the one you supposedly are a citizen of.
I bow in deference to your deep and thorough knowledge of Yasir Arafat and Palestinian reality.
After all, you got it from where?
The "balanced" U.S. media and Bush administration spin surgeons.
Plus Ariel Sharon's mouthpieces on CNN and FOX NEWS.
(tries to stifle laughter)
Do you know that, at this very moment, all Palestinians are under essential house arrest -- with NO media permitted anywhere nearby to ascertain the severity of the pervasive human rights violations they're undoubtedly experiencing?
By the way, my copy of the American Legion magazine came today.
In it I was shocked to find Alan Dershowitz seriously arguing for torture as a viable American policy.
Well, why not?
The Bill of Rights has been Ashcrofted and Ridged to tatters, and Bush wants to use Pearl Harbor-style "sneak attacks" on any country where legitimate freedom fighters exist but can be palmed off to gullible fools at home as terrorists.
"Look over here! Arafat! Arafat! Arafat!"
And the hurrying lemmings turn to gawk.
Not seeing the precipice before them.
I swear, I believe you won't admit that good and evil have traded places and that WE are now the supreme, global bad guys...even when the general round-ups begin and the goose-stepping starts in front of the Jefferson Memorial!
I bow in deference to your deep and thorough knowledge of Yasir Arafat and Palestinian reality. After all, you got it from where? The "balanced" U.S. media and Bush administration spin surgeons. Plus Ariel Sharon's mouthpieces on CNN and FOX NEWS. (tries to stifle laughter) Â Â
You mean like all the unbiased bathroom readers you hail as the gospel. Like the Jenin Massacre Pffffft. Yea, the World Socialist Website, now there's some balanced covrage. That's funny.
You're the one who claimed Arafat was elected. So instead of debating or refuting it you switch the topic.
I swear, I believe you won't admit that good and evil have traded places and that WE are now the supreme, global bad guys. Â Â
You won't even admit human rights abuses in Cuba or answer questions directly so I know how frustrating it is. You wouldn't know evil if it bit you in the rump. Instead you apply and twist evrything to fit your politcal mantra and use ANY misfortune or wrong as a reason to buy into the joke of socialism. You are the master at moral relativity and hypocrsiy. You bend over backwards to make excuses for terroists and those whom support them ie: "we need to take great care to avoid equating the wrong conduct of the extremists with that broader cause itself." Well Dennis they aren't in the minority, many support those actions, heck, some right here. Good vs. evil ? You moan ad nauseum about our actions in Afghanistan and turn around and say yea those terrorists are naughty but, but, but. You bitch about the bill of rights being trampled and yet have no misgivings about giving more power to the government. It would be amusing if it weren't so sad.
Yasser Arafat is the duly and massively elected, legitimate leader of his people, having won their fervent backing by devoting his entire life to their broadest, most elemental interests and aspirations. Â Â
But as you said earlier "we need to take great care to avoid equating the wrong conduct of the extremists with that broader cause itself."
It's still funny how you only apply that to causes you buy into to promote your social agenda. They are the rule not the exception and you either know that or are just being dishonest in not admitting it. Not to say they all are but the majority supports the homocide bombers. If as you asserted that he is the duly elected leader then he must have had enough support from people for his policies. Oh wait I forgot Arafat denounces terrorism. Like after the bombing in Netanya when he said he'd have to take a few days to denounce the bombing. Sure. Right. And he will crackdwn on terroism, he really really really really means it this time, promise, with jelly on top.
Ararat is a joke and been the one constant for 30 plus years that's why I was glad to see Bush say today that he supports a Palestinian (did you hear that Dennis, he supports a Palestinain state. but with Arafat out of the picture. Good, he should be, he's corrupt and many of his own people know it. He's been of no help and only made his peoples plight worse. Not good enough as I'm sure you'll claim ? Well guess what this weekend his adsvisors were saying Arafat would be willing to accept the Clinton proposals for a Palestinan state. A little to late Yassir. Only when he sees the writing on the wall that his days are numbered does he suddenly have a change of heart. Funny how suddenly this weekend he had no problem accepting the Clinton proposal. Well Yassir, you crapped your own crib and destined your nation for failure. He'll hold power at his own peoples cost and yet some defend him. How sad for them.
An American head of state who would have been chosen by a minority of all voters even if he'd been legitimately elected -- as opposed to the Florida/Supreme Court sham and coup -- tells Yasir Arafat, who received an overwhelming mandate from his people in Palestinian elections...that he, Arafat, has to step down because his rule supposedly isn't valid!
That's bogus and arrogant in the unbelievably extreme.
Plus, as a condition for "getting" a state, not only does Arafat have to go, but the entire, current Palestinian leadership has to hightail it as well.
"Oh, and scrap your constitution, too. 'Cause we don't like it."
Meanwhile, over in Venezuela, where they've got probably the most authentically democratic and advanced constitution in the world, Bush operatives are working feverishly to launch another coup against Chavez...because the Brazilian Workers Party candidate, "Lula", is a two-to-one favorite in election polls leading up to this fall's presidential contest there -- and Bush's big business string pullers are scared shitless that Latin America is going to go Red, by popular will.
Forget democracy.
In Venezuela, Brazil and the Occupied territories, the only outcome acceptable to the American axis of evil -- the corporate hierarchy, high finance, and the Pentagon -- is one that Washington dictates, from the unabashed standpoint of being beneficial to Wall Street.
The United States has become a mockery of a mockery. A farce on steroids.
It now stands for nothing beyond perniciously ill-gotten superprofits.
All of our professed ideals have been prostituted to the point of tawdry unrecognition.
We can't get respect anywhere, and make only enemies, because we have no respect for ourselves.
Tom Paine's ghost is feverishly trying to get out of the casket, so it can slap Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Dubya himself upside their traitorous, sell-out, fool heads.
"I cannot find President Bush's statement acceptable. . President Arafat is the leader of the Palestinian people. He is the president of the Palestinian people. The Palestinian leaders do not come from Washington."
"The real issue is we need is to specify a road map, as the president says, to end the (Israeli) occupation." "We need to take forward the vision that Bush spoke about in a way that guarantees the end of the Israeli occupation. The problem is the Israeli occupation, which represents the highest form of terrorism."
"Palestinian leaders don't come from parachutes from Washington or anywhere else. Palestinian leaders are elected directly by the Palestinian people. President Yasser Arafat was directly elected in a free and fair election... The world and President Bush must respect the democratic choice of the Palestinian people."
Mahmoud Zahar, a prominent Hamas leader in the Gaza Strip
"We see the speech as Hebrew words that were translated into English and spoken by Bush on behalf of Sharon."
Husam Khader, Palestinian Legislative Council member
The speech "is very bad. It did not offer anything new, and claims the Palestinian people bear the responsibility of what's going on."
Mohamed el-Sayed, Washington bureau chief for the Egyptian daily Al-Ahram
"The Arab world will not sleep tonight.” Bush “practically demanded the removal of Arafat, the symbol of Palestinian unity. The Palestinians have elected Arafat and they will elect him again. If the Palestinians re-elect Arafat, are they going to be punished?"
Mostafa Bakri, editor in chief of the independent weekly El Osboa
The Palestinian state "is just a temporary promise, an illusion without borders, without identity.” Bush's speech "means giving Sharon the green light to get rid of Arafat." "Arab countries, especially Egypt and Jordan, have a major role to play in implementing this initiative, including working on expelling the Palestinian leader."
Reda Helal, a columnist and member of the Egyptian Council of Foreign Relations
"Bush announced frankly and clearly that he is not giving Arafat a chance, which will disappoint the hopes and demands of moderate Arab regimes"
If you and I had been around at the time -- and if the success of the American Revolution had depended upon, say, gouging out the eyes of every English man, woman and child (plus those of their Tory supporters) -- we'd have been Eye Gougers Supreme.
No?
You'd have let a moral, tactical consideration make you stop and, instead, live permanently under King George's tyranny?!
Well, English rule of the Colonies was actually immeasurably less harsh than the brutal conditions Palestinians have had to live under for incredibly repressive decades.
That most of us know so little about that repression's true authoritarian nature (thanks to effective Israeli censorship) makes us look upon the increasingly savage retaliatory actions of the Palestinians -- born out of a total denial of any chances for grievance redress via more acceptable, democratic means -- as the chief difficulty in the Middle East.
But it is the Occupation, of course, which is the paramount problem, and a source of far more Palestinian deaths over time than Israel has experienced through suicide-bomber rage, or by any other means.
Most Palestinians aren't such bombers, and aren't even active participants in the Intifada on a direct level. But, having read Frantz Fanon and a couple other specialists on the psychology of oppression, I understand clearly, and without condemnation, why visible and dramatic blows against the empire, whatever their nature, are popularly cheered.
That doesn't mean that a whole people is diabolically devoid of morality, as Israeli propaganda tries to make us think.
It's simply a case of a shopkeeper in Jenin, for example, who's been personally slighted by Israeli occupiers in a thousand dignity-crushing ways -- and who has relatives who either languish in the refugee camps or who've been brutalized in Jewish prisons -- hearing the news of an explosive action in Tel Aviv, spontaneously shouting: "Yes! Take that, you bastards!"
As for Arafat or anyone else controlling individual terrorism, at least two important factors ought to be considered first:
The extremist factions are better armed than forces at the disposal of the Israeli-decimated Palestinian Authority's security forces. Going up to Hamas and saying, "Okay, stop it now" is a bit more difficult and dangerous than delivering a pizza.
Second, whatever else it would entail, doing so would further Sharon and Bush's desires to create splits within a struggle whose success depends on unity. Bush's "Palestinian State" proposal is the ludicrously blatant culmination of that splitting tactic -- premised on the absurdity that Palestine will eventually become "free" provided its people first submit to unacceptable impositions from the U.S. and Israel.
Going back to our American Revolution analogy...
It'd be like the British telling us we could have "our" country provided we dumped George Washington and made Benedict Arnold president instead, and that all that silly talk about "taxation without representation" stopped.
"WHERE WERE YOU WHEN THEY KILLED OUR FREEDOMS, DADDY?"
"If we continue to allow president Bush to change our rights to how He feels they should be, we are lost. Unending punishment for aliens like that cab driver in Boston and those who will be kept Forever in Cuba are one thing, but to now take away the most basic rights of an American-born citizen in the case of Jose Padilla is going too far. Guilty or not makes no difference, without right to counsel, presumption of innocence, and the right to Habeus Corpus every American citizen has lost his freedom. America now has its own Gestapo headed by our own president." -- James Glaser, Reader Weekly
Arab-Americans have been victimized by hateful violence and deprived of basic civil liberties.
Our secret police can disregard Constitutional protections by surveilling, harassing and intimidating anyone...without prior cause.
The Bill of Rights is in a shambles.
Our populace is whipped into a propagandized frenzy of jingoism and xenophobia.
The Bush administration -- which acquired power without majority support, plus ample voting irregularity and widespread disenfranchisement -- has assumed the illegitimate authority to forcefully implement "regime changes" in other countries. (Example: Much evidence points to the U.S. using illegal, covert means to facilitate an attempted overthrow of the duly-elected Chavez government in Venezuela.)
Bush now speaks of "pre-emptive strikes" against those deemed "enemies" only on his political tendency's reactionary, ideological say-so. Attention indepedently-minded international movements and states not willing to kow-tow to the Wall Street/Pentagon version of dictated Utopia: America will bomb you without warning!
Please answer these questions...
Based on such tyrannical and aggressive developments within the United States, have we not become frighteningly like the fascist regimes in Europe before WWII?
Concentration camps at home and blitzkrieg invasions of other lands (starting with Iraq) seem ominously in the offing.
While the key blame for this lies with ultraconservative special interests that have achieved a successful, defacto coup in the former land of the free and home of the brave, wasn't it what amounts to collective cowardice -- an unwillingess to criticize obvious flaws and wrongs in the "war on terrorism" out of fear of being singled out as "anti-American" -- that's made this country a perverted mockery of what we were all taught it stood for?
That's turned us into a conformity-imposing bully, at home and overseas, and the very antithesis of what the Sons of Liberty fought for?
Abraham Lincoln said: "To sin by silence when they should protest makes cowards of men."
And tyrannies of democracies.
Won't history define those who remained mute as sinners?
If you and I had been around at the time -- and if the success of the American Revolution had depended upon, say, gouging out the eyes of every English man, woman and child (plus those of their Tory supporters) -- we'd have been Eye Gougers Supreme.
The difference is Dennis that we DIDN'T even though we faced overwhelming odds and Englands massive firepower. Read again WE DIDN"T TARGET CIVILIANS IN THE REVOLUTION IN OUR STRUGGLE FOR FREEDOM EVEN THOUGH WE FACED OVERWHELING FIREPOWER. We declared our intentions and went to war and attacked the TROOPS. NOT civilians. Palestine faces overwhelming odds as well as you have pointed out so many times and yet instead of using other means they blow up kids at a pizza parlor or murder entire families at Seder celebrations. And they or you would expect a majority of rationale people champion their cause ?
According to Amnesty International, in the first 408 days of the current Intifada, 570 Palestinians were killed compared to 150 Israelis who died. Out of those figures, 150 Palestinian children were killed to Israel’s 30. Amnesty continues to report that “Israeli forces have killed Palestinians unlawfully by shooting them during demonstrations and at checkpoints although lives were not in danger. They have shelled residential areas and committed extrajudicial executions... All Palestinians in the Occupied Territories — more than three million people — have been collectively punished. Almost every Palestinian town and village has been cut off by Israeli army checkpoints or physical barriers. Curfews on Palestinian areas have trapped residents in their homes for days, weeks or even months. In the name of security, hundreds of Palestinian homes have been demolished.” Just going by Amnesty’s casualty count, if President Bush used the word “terror” for Palestinians ten times in his address, the number of associations between Israelis and “terror” should have numbered around fifty.
--Arsalan Tariq Iftikhar, Independent Writers Syndicate, Washington University School of Law in St. Louis
I extend full, emphatic solidarity to the Palestinian people's eminently just struggle for an independent, unitary, truly sovereign homeland.
Whatever tactics, policies, and leaders the Palestinian majority itself judges to be necessary to achieve that goal, I will support -- always appreciative of the importance not to be diverted, and to constantly realize that the Israeli Occupation is THE great evil fueling this entire issue.
What if that results in efforts to "drive the Jews into the sea"?
Well, Israel has a fundamental obligation to moderate its hardline stance, make basic concessions, and do the right thing to give the Palestinians VALID REASONS to confidently believe that such extreme measures aren't required.
The key responsibility, and the ultimate credit or blame, squarely rests with Israel.
That it's summertime now, and we should get away from these fool computers, plop down in a lawn chair out front, sip lemonade, and watch comely young ladies saunter past.
Won't history define those who remained mute as sinners?
You mean like abortion ? Those who supporti it better hope not. Sorry, off topic.
Whatever tactics, policies, and leaders the Palestinians themselves judge to be necessary to achieve that goal, I will support -- always appreciative of the importance not to be diverted, and to constantly realize that the Israeli Occupation is THE great evil fueling this entire issue.
Ie: It's wrong to kill civilians and horrid when the U.S does it yada, yada, yada But it's o.k if the Palestinians do it intentionally because you agree with their cause. Funny, how you have accused everyone in here of being wrong or dismissing their belief that the U.S was doing the right thing in the war on terror. Many or most believe we are doing what's needed and you chide them for that but you have no problem campaigning for Palestine even though they use terrorism because you believe in the cause.
O.K so you stick by your assertion that Arafat is duly elected. O.K I am not going to deabte that or open that can of worms I don't think he is/was truly elected. But for now let's just say o.k He's elected. His corruption is well known by his own people, he does little more than window dressing on fighting terrorism. His talk changes depending on whom he is talking too. and if he is truly elcted as you say then we should apply your standard of criticism. You accuse the U.S of pretty much everything from A-Z and really don't pick out leaders in particular but tend to generalize of the bad things we have done. Well then we should and will say the same for the Palestinians. If Arafat is elected as you say then they are all guilty of promoting terrorism. You konw that anyway, they either support them or say nothing over such a horrid practice. And we're supposed to buy this line that it's only a few extremists ? Please, it may only be a few extremists but those few are also supported by the majority and see suicide bombings as a good thing. Yes. let's negotiate with such rational people. BTW How's Daniel Pearl's wife and child doing ?
That it's summertime now, and we should get away from these fool computers, plop down in a lawn chair out front, sip lemonade, and watch comely young ladies saunter past.
What the heck did you think I was talking about?!
Later...
Agreed :)
Like a country time lemonade commercial ? I kind of like those, reminds me of being a kid, ahhh sweet summer. If we only knew how good we had it to play day after day of stickball, bike riding, swimming, kick the can till mom called for you, camping out in the wilds of the backyard in St.Paul. Climbing trees, swinging, playing in the sandbox, fishing, catching frogs, going to the candy store, Your only concern was what to do the next day. 3 months of true unadulterated fun and freedom. I look and see the kids playing and wish I could somehow fast forward them into their adult life to show them the endless work days and commitments and say "see, being an adult really kind of sucks, enjoy it kid:" For those who want year round school, why should we rob kids the chance of being kids ? They'll have their whole life to be underpaid, under appreciated and overworked. I say let em be kids and do what kids do.
Dennis, here's the thing. I support what we are doing in the WOT for the most part and you support Palestine. Fine whatever melts your butter. But What Arafat and his cronies or others are failing miserebly to see is that Palestine could and would have a state sooner rather than later if they quit using terror as a weapon. When they do they will get more support from other non-arab nations. Without it, they will get nowhere and fail to see that. I saw a poll recently that said something like 60% of americans believe Palestine should have it's own state. I would agree but agian I am losing concern after every bus is blown up. And most others are, that same poll showed over 70% believe that they shouldn't recieve any support from us until they end or put forth a legitamate end to terror and killing civilians intentionally. That's what has been asked recently, hey, cut out the terror and we'll sit down. They can't even do that. If they do get a state they are probably destined for failure.
Whatever tactics, policies, and leaders the Palestinian majority itself judges to be necessary to achieve that goal, I will support -- always appreciative of the importance not to be diverted,
Amazing, ,no, really, it is. You accuse others of the same blind trust of your own government and yet you give more lattiude or apologism for them than your own nation. How sad.
and to constantly realize that the Israeli Occupation is THE great evil fueling this entire issue.
Yes those peace loving innocent Pal's who are blameless.
The key responsibility, and the ultimate credit or blame, squarely rests with Israel.
Well they are willing to talk if Ararat's thugs could take a day or two off from murdering people as a hobby. And they won't even do that. Israel has shown far more restraint than the Palestinian ever would if the situation was reversed.
Well they are willing to talk if Ararat's thugs could take a day or two off from murdering people as a hobby. And they won't even do that. Israel has shown far more restraint than the Palestinian ever would if the situation was reversed.
Rob, you say things that you unquestioningly accept just because somewhere, in our media, somebody with a particular axe to grind said it first, and you happened to be listening.
Such as "His (Arafat's) corruption is well known by his own people".
I think it's pretty safe to say that you haven't a clue about what the Palestinians know or think, even as you make blanket assertions about them in the bleakest light.
I'm not singling you out, by the way.
There are certain issues about which we've been so propagandized over time (socialism/communism, the Arab stereotype, Israel's purported goodness and that damned Yasir's corresponding, alleged moral depravity) that knowing nothing at all would make us more qualified to address the topics fairly.
It's interesting to note how Arafat is responding to Bush's provocation last night. While others in Palestinian and Arab leadership, plus voices from the street, are roundly condemning Bush's ploy as nothing more than Sharon's agenda presented by an American president (which it clearly is), Yasir is essentially saying, confident of his standing with his people: "Elections? Bring 'em on!"
My personal view, based on the Palestinian cause having been my passion and topic of study for roughly three decades, is that so long as Arafat remains alive, NOBODY else will emerge as Palestine's leader, in free elections.
What else?
Yes, we didn't use individual terrorism during our Revolution. That's mainly because the concept hadn't really gained currency (although there was plenty of pretty nasty "pillaging" back in those times and before). We have, however, employed state terrorism on a global scale, either directly or through our fully-supported proxies, to a degree vastly surpassing any other power...in our foreign policy misdeeds for a long, long time. Under bipartisan leadership. It reminds me of song Dion once had out: "So unless you have made no mistakes in your life, be careful of stones that you throw."
It simply isn't true that Palestinians could have had their state by now if suicide bombings had never been employed. First of all, this tactic is very recent. In all the years before they began, there was never any actual Israeli movement toward permitting such a state, or any tolerance for democratic means that could have ultimatly brought one about peacefully. Zionism DOES NOT philosophically allow for any control in the Holy Land but Jewish control.
I'd guess it's probably true that most Palestinians DO feel visceral satisfaction when this tactic of last-resort desperation brings panic to the oppressor state which has caused them such deprivation and denial for decades. I don't read into that any demonic immorality that would still be there under different circumstances. It's just a case of a savagely oppressed underdog finally getting in some effective counter blows, and exulting in THAT aspect of it.
As for my "hypocrisy" -- which you delight in accusing me of -- it probably DOES exist. I'm no saint and I don't adhere to any absolutes. A case in point: Three innocent black men were hanged from a lamp post in Duluth in 1920. A moral outrage, in my eyes. In Italy, during WWII, Benito Mussolini was hanged from a lamp post (upsidedown no less) by local partisans. Well and good, I've always felt.
Rob, you say things that you unquestioningly accept just because somewhere, in our media, somebody with a particular axe to grind said it first, and you happened to be listening.
Same could be said of your sources too really, that debate could go on forever.
Such as "His (Arafat's) corruption is well known by his own people".
I think it's pretty safe to say that you haven't a clue about what the Palestinian know or think, even as you make blanket assertions about them in the bleakest light. Â Â
So the accounts of some of Hezbollah and co. Aren't frustrated by Arafat and they have no issue with money not going where it's supposed too ? Those aren't true ? I don't think everyone is on board with him. I agree that he would walk away with an "election" hands down. He really doesn't have challengers because he has ruled with a pretty tight reign. He has stifled the competition to the point where you or I would stand a better chance of getting elected French Prime Minister than he would being defeated. But can you honestly say that there isn't any derision within his own ranks ?
Bush wants the "Palestinian people" to have something to hope for. He's willing to recognize an actual Palestine if certain conditions are met. And maybe men of good reason and intent will accept the fact that a country, a real country, could be formed if it is willing to act in a civilized manner. But an awful lot has to change, on both sides.
Arafat may have been elected by the "Palestinian people," but he doesn't enjoy more than about 30 or 35% support. He says and does what is expedient at the moment and he can't be trusted. The people who call themselves Palestinians deserve better.
Part of the problem is that they have to accept democracy, and their leaders want no part of that. How the heck can they take over the world with a democracy? Unfortunately, formally nominal democracies like most of Europe back them up, for scurrilous reasons of their own. They have a voice in the world court of public opinion (i.e., the General Assembly of the United Nations, a farce for a different post) and they think that makes them legitimate.
I don't care how many countries or philosophizers or journalists or men-on-the-street justify what the terrorists do, or why. Wrong is wrong.
Last fall, the New York Times reported that Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon and his advisors had decided to undermine Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat’s authority. Their plan was to blame Arafat for every act of violence committed by any Palestinian against any Jew and to declare Arafat an ineffective leader, thus irrelevant to the peace process.
The plan has succeeded admirably, with plenty of help from the U.S. government and news media. Arafat’s supposed “irrelevance” is now widely accepted in the U.S. as a fact, even though he remains the only Palestinian leader capable of making peace with the Israelis. So let’s take a page from Israel’s playbook. Let’s blame Bush for everything that goes wrong, anywhere, and demand that he leave office.
--Ira Chernus, Professor of Religious Studies, University of Colorado, Boulder
As the periodic bloodshed continues in the Middle East, the search for an equitable solution must come to grips with the root cause of the conflict. The conventional wisdom is that, even if both sides are at fault, the Palestinians are irrational "terrorists" who have no point of view worth listening to. Our position, however, is that the Palestinians have a real grievance: their homeland for over a thousand years was taken, without their consent and mostly by force, during creation of the state of Israel. And all subsequent crimes - on both sides - inevitably follow from this original injustice.
This paper outlines the history of Palestine to show how this process occurred and what a moral solution to the region's problems should consist of. If you care about the people of the Middle East, Jewish and Arab, you owe it to yourself to read this account of the other side of the historical record.
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<The conventional wisdom is that, even if both sides are at fault, the Palestinians are irrational "terrorists" who have no point of view worth listening to.>>
Bulltweet.
Most of the world is bending over backwards to give legitimacy to absolutely every tiny complaint the "Palestinians" have and demanding that the Israelis roll over and let themselves be murdered.
That Jethro's notion is actually seriously entertained by an influential part of the Israeli political spectrum is simultaneously mind-boggling and soul-numbing.
Did Jewry rise from the ashes of Auchwitz to impose a genocidal "final solution" on the Palestinians?!
Some 700,000 Palestinians are currently suffering immensely at the hands of a brutal Israeli "lockdown" that's reminiscent of nothing so much as the Nazi tactics employed against Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto.
Is anyone so foolish as to think a desire for peace isn't a top priority among those terribly repressed people, following closely behind their impassioned yearning for justice and freedom?
The Palistinians have always been for peace, but not the false peace of a subugated client state overseen by collaborators -- which is precisley what both Sharon and Bush want.
That's why they've almost always supported the various United Nations resolutions, for example, which have been passed by the international community with an honest eye toward a fair and equitable Middle East solution.
Resolutions routinely rejected by Israel.
Washington has often joined in those rejections, or it's "abstained," giving a small fig leaf poorly disguising its constant opposition to a true, free Palestinian homeland.
As opposed to one "governed" by a Palestinian Quisling, who'd do Tel Aviv and Washington's bidding in exactly the manner that's plainly intended in Bush's recent, utterly unacceptable "peace" speech.
Let's not lose sight of the reality here.
It is Israel, with copious U.S. diplomatic, monetary and military backing, that continues to perpetrate the staggering outrage of the world's only ongoing major military occupation of another people's land, using methods that smack of both minority South Africa's barbaric enforcement of apartheid...and the means of intensely repressive control Hitler's forces used throughout Europe.
Including against the Jews themselves.
It's that incredible role reversal that has progressive Jews around the world raining condemnation on the Sharon gang and all Zionist extremists -- who comprise a granite block of stubborn resistance to what is an emphatic historical imperative.
With the Hiroshima and Nagasaki anniversaries a little more than a month away, these words published yesterday by the Guardian of London should weigh heavily in our thoughts:
Return to the summer of 1945. Sixty-six of Japan's largest cities had been burned down by napalm bombing. In Tokyo a million civilians were homeless and 100,000 people had died. They had been, according to Major General Curtis Lemay, who was in charge of the fire bombing operations, "scorched and boiled and baked to death". President Franklin Roosevelt's son and confidant said that the bombing should continue "until we have destroyed about half the Japanese civilian population." On July 18 the Japanese emperor telegraphed President Truman, who had succeeded Roosevelt, and once again asked for peace. The message was ignored.
A few days before the bombing of Hiroshima, Vice Admiral Radford boasted that "Japan will eventually be a nation without cities - a nomadic people". The bomb, exploding above a hospital in the center of the city, killed 100,000 people instantly, 95% of them civilians. Another 100,000 died slowly from burns and effects of radiation.
"Sixteen hours ago," President Truman announced, "an American airplane dropped one bomb on Hiroshima, an important Japanese army base." One month later the first uncensored report - by the intrepid Australian journalist Wilfred Burchett - described the cataclysmic suffering he encountered after visiting a makeshift hospital in the city.
General Groves, who was the military director of the Manhattan Project for planning and manufacturing the bomb, hastily reassured congressmen that radiation caused no "undue suffering" and that "in fact, they say it is a very pleasant way to die". In 1946 the US strategic bombing survey came to the conclusion that "Japan would have surrendered even if atomic bombs had not been dropped".
" that's reminiscent of nothing so much as the Nazi tactics employed against Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto."
I thought that just people on this board ended up getting called Nazi. No one is immune from the Nazi taint. Sad to say, but if the Jews of Warsaw began boming coffee shops and bars in Berlin filling the streets with pieces of the innocent dead, how many people would suddenly have developed a little more sympathy for the Nazis?
The Jews suffered horribly, but they didn't lose their humanity. Because from what I've learned from Jews that I know, holding on to your humanity is everything.
"Is anyone so foolish as to think a desire for peace isn't a top priority among those terribly repressed people,"
A TOP PRIORITY? Color me foolish. Peace could occur.
Answer this Dennis:
If the sucide bombings stopped, would the IDF stand down?
If the IDF stood down first, would the suicide bombings stop?
It's with no degree of satisfaction that I'm starting to think that the statement attributed to Golda Meir is true:
There will be peace when the Palistianians start to love their children more than they hate Israel.,
So, it must be all a lie because the Left brought it to public attention.
Remember how the World Socialist Web Site was slandered some months ago for being first to present evidence that there was ample forewarning of 9/11, and that War on Terrorism plans existed well before the September attacks.
What does the WSWS say about this important new film?
WSWS : News & Analysis : North America
Why is the US media blacking out documentary on war crimes in Afghanistan?
By Kate Randall (21 June 2002)
Massacre in Mazar, a documentary by Irish director Jamie Doran, was screened last week before select audiences in Europe. The film documents events following the November 21, 2001 fall of Konduz, the Taliban’s last stronghold in northern Afghanistan. [See: “Afghan war documentary charges US with mass killings”]
The film presents powerful testimony from Afghan witnesses that US troops collaborated in the torture and killings of thousands of Taliban prisoners near Mazar-i-Sharif. The film, which has prompted demands for an international commission of inquiry on war crimes in Afghanistan, received widespread coverage in the European press, with major stories in the Guardian, Le Monde, Suddeutsche Zeitung, Die Welt and other papers.
This major story, however, has received virtually no coverage in US newspapers or on network or cable television. Aside from stories on some alternative Internet publications, and a June 16 article on Salon.com, the story has been essentially blacked out in the US.
A search for news about the documentary in the major dailies—including the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune, the Boston Globe and the Miami Herald —turned up empty. Web sites for ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox News and CNN have likewise carried nothing on the film.
Repeated telephone calls by the WSWS to these news sources, inquiring why they have failed to cover the story, went unanswered. How is it possible that not a single major US media outlet chose to cover such an important news event? There is no innocent or journalistic explanation.
This wholesale political censorship cannot be justified on the basis that Massacre in Mazar —or the events it depicts—are not “newsworthy.” The two screenings of the documentary in Germany prompted calls by a number of European parliamentary deputies and human rights advocates for an independent investigation into the atrocities exposed by the film. Calling for an inquiry, prominent human rights lawyer Andrew McEntee commented it was “clear there is prima facie evidence of serious war crimes committed not just under international law, but also under the laws of the United States itself.”
The film includes scenes of the aftermath of the massacre of hundreds of Taliban fighters who were taken prisoner outside Mazar-i-Sharif, at the Qala- i-Jangi prison, showing captured troops who were apparently shot with their hands tied. The filmmaker also interviewed eyewitnesses, who describe the torture and slaughter of 3,000 prisoners, who were allegedly driven to a desert area and massacred. These witnesses—who were not paid—have offered to provide testimony before any independent investigation into the events...
---
This all disturbingly meshes with the claim made by a returned U.S. soldier, which I posted here, that our forces were under "orders"
to kill everyone, women and children included, as everyone was supposedly the "enemy".
Remember My Lai. Remember the El Chorillo massacre in Panama City.
We have to get to the bottom of what we're actually doing in Afghanistan, and elsewhere, for the sake of our place in history.
So, it must be all a lie because the Left brought it to public attention.
No, just wanted to see your reaction when someone else tried this tactic of the left. If it had been a right wing extremist group making claims against Clinton, you all would have been laughing it off as such partisanship.
So, it must be all a lie because the Left brought it to public attention.
No but, I'm very skeptical of it.
I've told you before to be careful ingesting what they spoon feed you for it just might be poison.
Dennis,
Gee Dennis, I thought I heard you say a few times that Arafat was their elected leader? So if he is their elected leader as you've proclaimed then why should we separate the two, I mean it would be one thing if these were just rogue people in his nation, eveyone has them but he also makes little or no attempt to really reign them in. Oh I know, I forgot he condems them. Wink wink nudge nudge. He can't controll everyone but perhaps if he made a real effort to thwart murder he would have some ground to stand on. He doesn't but that's never stopped you and others from turning the other way because the ends somewhat justify the means in your eyes. You decry bemoan and berate our efforts to stop and apprehend memebers of terrorist organizations. Funny because aparrently you and others are pretty quiet if it's a cause you believe in, the same thing you accuse others of. So you deride our efforts because of the way we are doing so in where civilians are killed albeit unintentionally. Then you turn around and champion the Palestinian cause and make little mention or whine:
Gee, that's funny I've never heard you say that about U.S troops or others.
Sad part is that we will never hear yellowtimes, common dreams, WSW etc. Spend a miniscule fraction of the effort condemming Palestines actions. They'll give it a little lip service and then go on to equate it morally or excuse it because of the cause. Too bad you don't see the massivie hypocrisy in that. Then again it's obvious whose side your on. And yet you still fail to apply the same litmus test to these nations as you would the one you supposedly are a citizen of.
I bow in deference to your deep and thorough knowledge of Yasir Arafat
and Palestinian reality.
After all, you got it from where?
The "balanced" U.S. media and Bush administration spin surgeons.
Plus Ariel Sharon's mouthpieces on CNN and FOX NEWS.
(tries to stifle laughter)
Do you know that, at this very moment, all
Palestinians are under essential house arrest -- with NO media permitted anywhere nearby to ascertain the severity of the pervasive human rights violations they're undoubtedly experiencing?
By the way, my copy of the American Legion magazine came today.
In it I was shocked to find Alan Dershowitz seriously arguing for torture as a viable American policy.
Well, why not?
The Bill of Rights has been Ashcrofted and Ridged to tatters, and Bush wants to use Pearl Harbor-style "sneak attacks" on any country where legitimate freedom fighters exist but can be palmed off to gullible fools at home as terrorists.
"Look over here! Arafat! Arafat! Arafat!"
And the hurrying lemmings turn to gawk.
Not seeing the precipice before them.
I swear, I believe you won't admit that good and evil
have traded places and that WE are now the supreme, global bad
guys...even when the general round-ups begin and the goose-stepping starts in front of the Jefferson Memorial!
You mean like all the unbiased bathroom readers you hail as the gospel. Like the Jenin Massacre Pffffft. Yea, the World Socialist Website, now there's some balanced covrage. That's funny.
You're the one who claimed Arafat was elected. So instead of debating or refuting it you switch the topic.
You won't even admit human rights abuses in Cuba or answer questions directly so I know how frustrating it is. You wouldn't know evil if it bit you in the rump. Instead you apply and twist evrything to fit your politcal mantra and use ANY misfortune or wrong as a reason to buy into the joke of socialism. You are the master at moral relativity and hypocrsiy. You bend over backwards to make excuses for terroists and those whom support them ie: "we need to take great care to avoid equating the wrong conduct of the extremists with that broader cause itself." Well Dennis they aren't in the minority, many support those actions, heck, some right here. Good vs. evil ? You moan ad nauseum about our actions in Afghanistan and turn around and say yea those terrorists are naughty but, but, but. You bitch about the bill of rights being trampled and yet have no misgivings about giving more power to the government. It would be amusing if it weren't so sad.
Dennis Rahkonen 6/24/02 2:28pm
Bitch, bitch, bitch.
Those poor Palestinians.
When are you going to spew some rhetoric for the innocent people killed by suicide bombers?
btw: The Bill of Rights only applies to citizens, not terrorists.
Dennis,
Here's what you said. Post # 55
But as you said earlier "we need to take great care to avoid equating the wrong conduct of the extremists with that broader cause itself."
It's still funny how you only apply that to causes you buy into to promote your social agenda. They are the rule not the exception and you either know that or are just being dishonest in not admitting it. Not to say they all are but the majority supports the homocide bombers. If as you asserted that he is the duly elected leader then he must have had enough support from people for his policies. Oh wait I forgot Arafat denounces terrorism. Like after the bombing in Netanya when he said he'd have to take a few days to denounce the bombing. Sure. Right. And he will crackdwn on terroism, he really really really really means it this time, promise, with jelly on top.
Ararat is a joke and been the one constant for 30 plus years that's why I was glad to see Bush say today that he supports a Palestinian (did you hear that Dennis, he supports a Palestinain state. but with Arafat out of the picture. Good, he should be, he's corrupt and many of his own people know it. He's been of no help and only made his peoples plight worse. Not good enough as I'm sure you'll claim ?
Well guess what this weekend his adsvisors were saying Arafat would be willing to accept the Clinton proposals for a Palestinan state. A little to late Yassir. Only when he sees the writing on the wall that his days are numbered does he suddenly have a change of heart. Funny how suddenly this weekend he had no problem accepting the Clinton proposal. Well Yassir, you crapped your own crib and destined your nation for failure. He'll hold power at his own peoples cost and yet some defend him. How sad for them.
Okay, so what have we got here?
An American head of state who would have been chosen by a minority of all voters even if he'd been legitimately elected -- as opposed to the Florida/Supreme Court sham and coup -- tells Yasir Arafat, who received an overwhelming mandate from his people in Palestinian elections...that he, Arafat, has to step down because his rule supposedly isn't valid!
That's bogus and arrogant in the unbelievably extreme.
Plus, as a condition for "getting" a state, not only does Arafat have to go, but the entire, current Palestinian leadership has to hightail it as well.
"Oh, and scrap your constitution, too. 'Cause we don't like it."
Meanwhile, over in Venezuela, where they've got probably the most authentically democratic and advanced constitution in the world, Bush operatives are working feverishly to launch another coup against Chavez...because the Brazilian Workers Party candidate, "Lula", is a two-to-one favorite in election polls leading up to this fall's presidential contest there -- and Bush's big business string pullers are scared shitless that Latin America is going to go Red, by popular will.
Forget democracy.
In Venezuela, Brazil and the Occupied territories, the only outcome acceptable
to the American axis of evil -- the corporate hierarchy, high finance, and the Pentagon --
is one that Washington dictates, from the unabashed standpoint of being beneficial to Wall Street.
The United States has become a mockery of a mockery. A farce on steroids.
It now stands for nothing beyond perniciously ill-gotten superprofits.
All of our professed ideals have been prostituted to the point of tawdry unrecognition.
We can't get respect anywhere, and make only enemies, because we have no respect for ourselves.
Tom Paine's ghost is feverishly trying to get out of the casket, so it can slap Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Dubya himself upside their traitorous, sell-out, fool heads.
What an abysmal state of sordid affairs!
Chief Palestinian Negotiator Saeb Erakat
"I cannot find President Bush's statement acceptable. . President Arafat is the leader of the Palestinian people. He is the president of the Palestinian people. The Palestinian leaders do not come from Washington."
"The real issue is we need is to specify a road map, as the president says, to end the (Israeli) occupation." "We need to take forward the vision that Bush spoke about in a way that guarantees the end of the Israeli occupation. The problem is the Israeli occupation, which represents the highest form of terrorism."
"Palestinian leaders don't come from parachutes from Washington or anywhere else. Palestinian leaders are elected directly by the Palestinian people. President Yasser Arafat was directly elected in a free and fair election... The world and President Bush must respect the democratic choice of the Palestinian people."
Mahmoud Zahar, a prominent Hamas leader in the Gaza Strip
"We see the speech as Hebrew words that were translated into English and spoken by Bush on behalf of Sharon."
Husam Khader, Palestinian Legislative Council member
The speech "is very bad. It did not offer anything new, and claims the Palestinian people bear the responsibility of what's going on."
Mohamed el-Sayed, Washington bureau chief for the Egyptian daily Al-Ahram
"The Arab world will not sleep tonight.” Bush “practically demanded the removal of Arafat, the symbol of Palestinian unity. The Palestinians have elected Arafat and they will elect him again. If the Palestinians re-elect Arafat, are they going to be punished?"
Mostafa Bakri, editor in chief of the independent weekly El Osboa
The Palestinian state "is just a temporary promise, an illusion without borders, without identity.” Bush's speech "means giving Sharon the green light to get rid of Arafat."
"Arab countries, especially Egypt and Jordan, have a major role to play in implementing this initiative, including working on expelling the Palestinian leader."
Reda Helal, a columnist and member of the Egyptian Council of Foreign Relations
"Bush announced frankly and clearly that he is not giving Arafat a chance, which will disappoint the hopes and demands of moderate Arab regimes"
Blunder, upon blunder, upon blunder.
Bush is a disaster for America...and the world.
An American head of state who would have been chosen by a minority of all voters even if he'd been legitimately elected
Not this again.
Geez, I couldn't stand Bush but I'm happy he's the President.
I can only imagine how screwed up things would be in this country if Gore were "Commander in Chief".
If you and I had been around at the time -- and if the success of the American Revolution had depended upon, say, gouging out the eyes of every English man, woman and child (plus those of their Tory supporters) -- we'd have been Eye Gougers Supreme.
No?
You'd have let a moral, tactical consideration make you stop and, instead, live permanently under King George's tyranny?!
Well, English rule of the Colonies was actually immeasurably less harsh than the brutal conditions Palestinians have had to live under for incredibly repressive decades.
That most of us know so little about that repression's true authoritarian nature (thanks to effective Israeli censorship) makes us look upon the increasingly savage retaliatory actions of the Palestinians -- born out of a total denial of any chances for grievance redress via more acceptable, democratic means -- as the chief difficulty in the Middle East.
But it is the Occupation, of course, which is the paramount problem, and a source of far more Palestinian deaths over time than Israel has experienced through suicide-bomber rage, or by any other means.
Most Palestinians aren't such bombers, and aren't even active participants in the Intifada on a direct level. But, having read Frantz Fanon and a couple other specialists on the psychology of oppression, I understand clearly, and without condemnation, why visible and dramatic blows against the empire, whatever their nature, are popularly cheered.
That doesn't mean that a whole people is diabolically devoid of morality, as Israeli propaganda tries to make us think.
It's simply a case of a shopkeeper in Jenin, for example, who's been personally slighted by Israeli occupiers in a thousand dignity-crushing ways -- and who has relatives who either languish in the refugee camps or who've been brutalized in Jewish prisons -- hearing the news of an explosive action in Tel Aviv, spontaneously shouting: "Yes! Take that, you bastards!"
As for Arafat or anyone else controlling individual terrorism, at least two important factors ought to be considered first:
The extremist factions are better armed than forces at the disposal of the Israeli-decimated Palestinian Authority's security forces. Going up to Hamas and saying, "Okay, stop it now" is a bit more difficult and dangerous than delivering a pizza.
Second, whatever else it would entail, doing so would further Sharon and Bush's desires to create splits within a struggle whose success depends on unity. Bush's "Palestinian State" proposal is the ludicrously blatant culmination of that splitting tactic -- premised on the absurdity that Palestine will eventually become "free" provided its people first submit to unacceptable impositions from the U.S. and Israel.
Going back to our American Revolution analogy...
It'd be like the British telling us we could have "our" country provided we dumped George Washington and made Benedict Arnold president instead, and that all that silly talk about
"taxation without representation" stopped.
"Oh, and no more tossing tea into Boston Harbor."
say, gouging out the eyes of every English man, woman and child (plus those of their Tory supporters) -- we'd have been Eye Gougers Supreme.
My God, now he has done a 180 and supports hurting non-combatants.
"WHERE WERE YOU WHEN THEY KILLED OUR FREEDOMS, DADDY?"
"If we continue to allow president Bush to change our rights to how He feels they should be, we are lost. Unending punishment for aliens like that cab driver in Boston and those who will be kept Forever in Cuba are one thing, but to now take away the most basic rights of an American-born citizen in the case of Jose Padilla is going too far. Guilty or not makes no difference, without right to counsel, presumption of innocence, and the right to Habeus Corpus every American citizen has lost his freedom. America now has its own Gestapo headed by our own president." -- James Glaser, Reader Weekly
Arab-Americans have been victimized by hateful violence
and deprived of basic civil liberties.
Our secret police can disregard Constitutional protections by surveilling, harassing and intimidating anyone...without prior cause.
The Bill of Rights is in a shambles.
Our populace is whipped into a propagandized frenzy of jingoism and xenophobia.
The Bush administration -- which acquired power without majority support, plus ample voting irregularity and widespread disenfranchisement -- has assumed the illegitimate authority to forcefully implement "regime changes" in other countries. (Example: Much evidence points to the U.S. using illegal, covert means to facilitate an attempted overthrow of the duly-elected Chavez government in Venezuela.)
Bush now speaks of "pre-emptive strikes" against those deemed "enemies" only on his political tendency's reactionary, ideological say-so. Attention indepedently-minded
international movements and states not willing to kow-tow to the Wall Street/Pentagon version of dictated Utopia: America will bomb you without warning!
Please answer these questions...
Based on such tyrannical and aggressive developments within the United States, have we not become frighteningly like the fascist regimes in Europe before WWII?
Concentration camps at home and blitzkrieg invasions of other lands (starting with Iraq) seem ominously in the offing.
While the key blame for this lies with ultraconservative special interests that have achieved a successful, defacto coup in the former land of the free and home of the brave, wasn't it what amounts to collective cowardice -- an unwillingess to criticize obvious flaws and wrongs in the "war on terrorism" out of fear of being singled out as "anti-American" -- that's made this country a perverted mockery of what we were all taught it stood for?
That's turned us into a conformity-imposing bully, at home and overseas, and the very antithesis of what the Sons of Liberty fought for?
Abraham Lincoln said: "To sin by silence when they should protest makes cowards of men."
And tyrannies of democracies.
Won't history define those who remained mute as sinners?
Bill, the magazine is actually my Dad's.
Being that my wife and I are his guardians, it comes to our house.
The difference is Dennis that we DIDN'T even though we faced overwhelming odds and Englands massive firepower. Read again WE DIDN"T TARGET CIVILIANS IN THE REVOLUTION IN OUR STRUGGLE FOR FREEDOM EVEN THOUGH WE FACED OVERWHELING FIREPOWER. We declared our intentions and went to war and attacked the TROOPS. NOT civilians. Palestine faces overwhelming odds as well as you have pointed out so many times and yet instead of using other means they blow up kids at a pizza parlor or murder entire families at Seder celebrations. And they or you would expect a majority of rationale people champion their cause ?
According to Amnesty International, in the first 408 days of the current Intifada, 570 Palestinians were killed compared to 150 Israelis who died. Out of those figures, 150 Palestinian children were killed to Israel’s 30. Amnesty continues to report that “Israeli forces have killed Palestinians unlawfully by shooting them during demonstrations and at checkpoints although lives were not in danger. They have shelled residential areas and committed extrajudicial executions... All Palestinians in the Occupied Territories — more than three million people — have been collectively punished. Almost every Palestinian town and village has been cut off by Israeli army checkpoints or physical barriers. Curfews on Palestinian areas have trapped residents in their homes for days, weeks or even months. In the name of security, hundreds of Palestinian homes have been demolished.” Just going by Amnesty’s casualty count, if President Bush used the word “terror” for Palestinians ten times in his address, the number of associations between Israelis and “terror” should have numbered around fifty.
--Arsalan Tariq Iftikhar, Independent Writers Syndicate, Washington University School of Law in St. Louis
Bottom line:
I extend full, emphatic solidarity to the Palestinian people's eminently just struggle for an independent, unitary, truly sovereign homeland.
Whatever tactics, policies, and leaders the Palestinian majority itself judges to be necessary to achieve that goal, I will support -- always appreciative of the importance not to be diverted, and to constantly realize that the Israeli Occupation is THE great evil fueling this entire issue.
What if that results in efforts to "drive the Jews into the sea"?
Well, Israel has a fundamental obligation to moderate its hardline stance, make basic concessions, and do the right thing to give the Palestinians VALID REASONS to confidently believe that such extreme measures aren't required.
The key responsibility, and the ultimate credit or blame, squarely rests with Israel.
And your point would be ?
That it's summertime now, and we should get away from these fool computers, plop down in a lawn chair out front, sip lemonade, and watch comely young ladies saunter past.
What the heck did you think I was talking about?!
Later...
Dennis,
You mean like abortion ? Those who supporti it better hope not. Sorry, off topic.
Ie: It's wrong to kill civilians and horrid when the U.S does it yada, yada, yada But it's o.k if the Palestinians do it intentionally because you agree with their cause. Funny, how you have accused everyone in here of being wrong or dismissing their belief that the U.S was doing the right thing in the war on terror. Many or most believe we are doing what's needed and you chide them for that but you have no problem campaigning for Palestine even though they use terrorism because you believe in the cause.
O.K so you stick by your assertion that Arafat is duly elected. O.K I am not going to deabte that or open that can of worms I don't think he is/was truly elected. But for now let's just say o.k He's elected.
His corruption is well known by his own people, he does little more than window dressing on fighting terrorism. His talk changes depending on whom he is talking too. and if he is truly elcted as you say then we should apply your standard of criticism. You accuse the U.S of pretty much everything from A-Z and really don't pick out leaders in particular but tend to generalize of the bad things we have done. Well then we should and will say the same for the Palestinians. If Arafat is elected as you say then they are all guilty of promoting terrorism. You konw that anyway, they either support them or say nothing over such a horrid practice. And we're supposed to buy this line that it's only a few extremists ? Please, it may only be a few extremists but those few are also supported by the majority and see suicide bombings as a good thing. Yes. let's negotiate with such rational people. BTW How's Daniel Pearl's wife and child doing ?
Agreed :)
Like a country time lemonade commercial ? I kind of like those, reminds me of being a kid, ahhh sweet summer. If we only knew how good we had it to play day after day of stickball, bike riding, swimming, kick the can till mom called for you, camping out in the wilds of the backyard in St.Paul. Climbing trees, swinging, playing in the sandbox, fishing, catching frogs, going to the candy store, Your only concern was what to do the next day. 3 months of true unadulterated fun and freedom. I look and see the kids playing and wish I could somehow fast forward them into their adult life to show them the endless work days and commitments and say "see, being an adult really kind of sucks, enjoy it kid:" For those who want year round school, why should we rob kids the chance of being kids ? They'll have their whole life to be underpaid, under appreciated and overworked. I say let em be kids and do what kids do.
sorry, back to thread.
Dennis, here's the thing. I support what we are doing in the WOT for the most part and you support Palestine. Fine whatever melts your butter. But What Arafat and his cronies or others are failing miserebly to see is that Palestine could and would have a state sooner rather than later if they quit using terror as a weapon. When they do they will get more support from other non-arab nations. Without it, they will get nowhere and fail to see that. I saw a poll recently that said something like 60% of americans believe Palestine should have it's own state. I would agree but agian I am losing concern after every bus is blown up. And most others are, that same poll showed over 70% believe that they shouldn't recieve any support from us until they end or put forth a legitamate end to terror and killing civilians intentionally. That's what has been asked recently, hey, cut out the terror and we'll sit down. They can't even do that. If they do get a state they are probably destined for failure.
Dennis,
I had to adress this before I left.
Amazing, ,no, really, it is. You accuse others of the same blind trust of your own government and yet you give more lattiude or apologism for them than your own nation. How sad.
Yes those peace loving innocent Pal's who are blameless.
Well they are willing to talk if Ararat's thugs could take a day or two off from murdering people as a hobby. And they won't even do that. Israel has shown far more restraint than the Palestinian ever would if the situation was reversed.
Bullshit. Prove it.
Wow, Eloquant Duane, The master of wit strikes again. What a zinger!
Rob, you say things that you unquestioningly accept just because somewhere, in our media, somebody with a particular axe to grind said it first, and you happened to be listening.
Such as "His (Arafat's) corruption is well known by his own people".
I think it's pretty safe to say that you haven't a clue about what
the Palestinians know or think, even as you make blanket assertions about them in the bleakest light.
I'm not singling you out, by the way.
There are certain issues about which we've been so propagandized
over time (socialism/communism, the Arab stereotype, Israel's
purported goodness and that damned Yasir's corresponding, alleged
moral depravity) that knowing nothing at all would make us more
qualified to address the topics fairly.
It's interesting to note how Arafat is responding to Bush's provocation last night. While others in Palestinian and Arab leadership, plus voices from the street, are roundly condemning Bush's ploy as nothing more than Sharon's agenda presented by
an American president (which it clearly is), Yasir is essentially saying, confident of his standing with his people: "Elections?
Bring 'em on!"
My personal view, based on the Palestinian cause having been my passion and topic of study for roughly three decades, is that so long as Arafat remains alive, NOBODY else will emerge as Palestine's leader, in free elections.
What else?
Yes, we didn't use individual terrorism during our Revolution. That's
mainly because the concept hadn't really gained currency (although there was plenty of pretty nasty "pillaging" back in those times and before). We have, however, employed state terrorism on a global scale, either directly or through our fully-supported proxies, to a degree vastly surpassing any other power...in our foreign policy
misdeeds for a long, long time. Under bipartisan leadership. It
reminds me of song Dion once had out: "So unless you have made no mistakes in your life, be careful of stones that you throw."
It simply isn't true that Palestinians could have had their state by now if suicide bombings had never been employed. First of all, this tactic is very recent. In all the years before they began, there was never any actual Israeli movement toward permitting such a state, or
any tolerance for democratic means that could have ultimatly brought
one about peacefully. Zionism DOES NOT philosophically allow for any control in the Holy Land but Jewish control.
I'd guess it's probably true that most
Palestinians DO feel visceral satisfaction when this tactic of last-resort desperation brings panic to the oppressor state which has caused them such deprivation and denial for decades. I don't read into that any demonic immorality that would still be there under different circumstances. It's just a case of a savagely oppressed underdog finally getting in some effective counter blows, and exulting in THAT aspect of it.
As for my "hypocrisy" -- which you delight in accusing me of -- it probably DOES exist. I'm no saint and I don't adhere to any absolutes. A case in point: Three innocent black men were hanged from a lamp post in Duluth in 1920. A moral outrage, in my eyes. In
Italy, during WWII, Benito Mussolini was hanged from a lamp post (upsidedown no less) by local partisans. Well and good, I've always felt.
I'm done.
Dennis,
Same could be said of your sources too really, that debate could go on forever.
So the accounts of some of Hezbollah and co. Aren't frustrated by Arafat and they have no issue with money not going where it's supposed too ? Those aren't true ? I don't think everyone is on board with him.
I agree that he would walk away with an "election" hands down. He really doesn't have challengers because he has ruled with a pretty tight reign. He has stifled the competition to the point where you or I would stand a better chance of getting elected French Prime Minister than he would being defeated. But can you honestly say that there isn't any derision within his own ranks ?
I'm out too. Have a good Fourth of July.
Time will decide everyone's place in history.
I want to go down as the man who finally caught that old, monster smallmouth that's outsmarted me four times this season...and gotten away clean.
(I hope nobody's heard my cussing!)
Good night.
Bush wants the "Palestinian people" to have something to hope for. He's willing to recognize an actual Palestine if certain conditions are met. And maybe men of good reason and intent will accept the fact that a country, a real country, could be formed if it is willing to act in a civilized manner. But an awful lot has to change, on both sides.
Arafat may have been elected by the "Palestinian people," but he doesn't enjoy more than about 30 or 35% support. He says and does what is expedient at the moment and he can't be trusted. The people who call themselves Palestinians deserve better.
Part of the problem is that they have to accept democracy, and their leaders want no part of that. How the heck can they take over the world with a democracy? Unfortunately, formally nominal democracies like most of Europe back them up, for scurrilous reasons of their own. They have a voice in the world court of public opinion (i.e., the General Assembly of the United Nations, a farce for a different post) and they think that makes them legitimate.
I don't care how many countries or philosophizers or journalists or men-on-the-street justify what the terrorists do, or why. Wrong is wrong.
Why does the left support the Palestinians against Israel?
BUSH IS IRRELEVANT AND MUST GO!
Last fall, the New York Times reported that Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon and his advisors had decided to undermine Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat’s authority. Their plan was to blame Arafat for every act of violence committed by any Palestinian against any Jew and to declare Arafat an ineffective leader, thus irrelevant to the peace process.
The plan has succeeded admirably, with plenty of help from the U.S. government and news media. Arafat’s supposed “irrelevance” is now widely accepted in the U.S. as a fact, even though he remains the only Palestinian leader capable of making peace with the Israelis. So let’s take a page from Israel’s playbook. Let’s blame Bush for everything that goes wrong, anywhere, and demand that he leave office.
--Ira Chernus, Professor of Religious Studies, University of Colorado,
Boulder
And that's a new strategy? The left is really running out of ideas.
That's an old strategy. They were out of ideas a long time ago.
Well, they DO believe in recycling.
http://www.cactus48.com/truth.html
As the periodic bloodshed continues in the Middle East, the search for an equitable solution must come to grips with the root cause of the conflict. The conventional wisdom is that, even if both sides are at fault, the Palestinians are irrational "terrorists" who have no point of view worth listening to. Our position, however, is that the Palestinians have a real grievance: their homeland for over a thousand years was taken, without their consent and mostly by force, during creation of the state of Israel. And all subsequent crimes - on both sides - inevitably follow from this original injustice.
This paper outlines the history of Palestine to show how this process occurred and what a moral solution to the region's problems should consist of. If you care about the people of the Middle East, Jewish and Arab, you owe it to yourself to read this account of the other side of the historical record.
--Jews for Justice in the Middle East
<
<The conventional wisdom is that, even if both sides are at fault, the Palestinians are irrational "terrorists" who have no point of view worth listening to.>>
Bulltweet.
Most of the world is bending over backwards to give legitimacy to absolutely every tiny complaint the "Palestinians" have and demanding that the Israelis roll over and let themselves be murdered.
http://www.yellowtimes.org/article.php?sid=427&mode=thread&order=0
ARAFAT CALLS FOR DEMOCRATIC ELECTIONS IN THE UNITED STATES...
Pictures from a graduation of kindergarteners that the left supports:
Wake up, Israel.
Simple justice and doing the right thing will solve everything.
Otherwise, succeeding generations of Palestinian freedom fighters will
show you no peace.
"Simple justice and doing the right thing will solve everything. "
If only that were true.
They ain't living in some song out of the '60s, Dennis.
Dan Zachary 6/28/02 1:33am
Disgusting!
Look what Israel has to deal with.
Freedom fighters my ass!
Evil hatemongers, that's what they are.
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/world/DailyNews/mideast020628_bomber.html
Destroying the Palestinians seems to be Israels only choice.
That Jethro's notion is actually seriously entertained by
an influential part of the Israeli political spectrum is simultaneously mind-boggling and soul-numbing.
Did Jewry rise from the ashes of Auchwitz to impose a genocidal
"final solution" on the Palestinians?!
What sign has Palestine given that they are interested in peace, Dennis?
Some 700,000 Palestinians are currently suffering immensely at the hands of a brutal Israeli "lockdown" that's reminiscent of nothing so much as the Nazi tactics employed against Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto.
Is anyone so foolish as to think a desire for peace isn't a top priority among those terribly repressed people, following closely behind their impassioned yearning for justice and freedom?
The Palistinians have always been for peace, but not the false peace of a subugated client state overseen by collaborators -- which is precisley what both Sharon and Bush want.
That's why they've almost always supported the various United Nations resolutions, for example, which have been passed by the international community with an honest eye toward a fair and equitable Middle East solution.
Resolutions routinely rejected by Israel.
Washington has often joined in those rejections, or it's "abstained," giving a small fig leaf poorly disguising its constant opposition to a true, free Palestinian homeland.
As opposed to one "governed" by a Palestinian Quisling, who'd do Tel Aviv and Washington's bidding in exactly the manner that's plainly intended in Bush's recent,
utterly unacceptable "peace" speech.
Let's not lose sight of the reality here.
It is Israel, with copious U.S. diplomatic, monetary and military backing, that continues to perpetrate the staggering outrage of the world's only ongoing major military occupation
of another people's land, using methods that smack of both minority South Africa's barbaric enforcement of apartheid...and the means of intensely repressive control Hitler's forces used throughout Europe.
Including against the Jews themselves.
It's that incredible role reversal that has progressive Jews around the world raining
condemnation on the Sharon gang and all Zionist extremists -- who comprise a granite block of stubborn resistance to what is an emphatic historical imperative.
Namely...Free Palestine.
With the Hiroshima and Nagasaki anniversaries a little more than a month away, these words published yesterday by the Guardian of London
should weigh heavily in our thoughts:
Return to the summer of 1945. Sixty-six of Japan's largest cities had been burned down by napalm bombing. In Tokyo a million civilians were homeless and 100,000 people had died. They had been, according to Major General Curtis Lemay, who was in charge of the fire bombing operations, "scorched and boiled and baked to death". President Franklin Roosevelt's son and confidant said that the bombing should continue "until we have destroyed about half the Japanese civilian population." On July 18 the Japanese emperor telegraphed President Truman, who had succeeded Roosevelt, and once again asked for peace. The message was ignored.
A few days before the bombing of Hiroshima, Vice Admiral Radford boasted that "Japan will eventually be a nation without cities - a nomadic people". The bomb, exploding above a hospital in the center of the city, killed 100,000 people instantly, 95% of them civilians. Another 100,000 died slowly from burns and effects of radiation.
"Sixteen hours ago," President Truman announced, "an American airplane dropped one bomb on Hiroshima, an important Japanese army base." One month later the first uncensored report - by the intrepid Australian journalist Wilfred Burchett - described the cataclysmic suffering he encountered after visiting a makeshift hospital in the city.
General Groves, who was the military director of the Manhattan Project for planning and manufacturing the bomb, hastily reassured congressmen that radiation caused no "undue suffering" and that "in fact, they say it is a very pleasant way to die". In 1946 the US strategic bombing survey came to the conclusion that "Japan would have surrendered even if atomic bombs had not been dropped".
Dennis Rahkonen 6/30/02 6:21am
Cut down the cr@p.
I'd rather prefer them to "suffer immensely" sitting home, than to dance in the streets with joy at Jewish toddlers' slughter.
And if they don't like it, they're free to go to Jordan, their country. Good riddance.
" that's reminiscent of nothing so much as the Nazi tactics employed against Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto."
I thought that just people on this board ended up getting called Nazi. No one is immune from the Nazi taint. Sad to say, but if the Jews of Warsaw began boming coffee shops and bars in Berlin filling the streets with pieces of the innocent dead, how many people would suddenly have developed a little more sympathy for the Nazis?
The Jews suffered horribly, but they didn't lose their humanity. Because from what I've learned from Jews that I know, holding on to your humanity is everything.
"Is anyone so foolish as to think a desire for peace isn't a top priority among those terribly repressed people,"
A TOP PRIORITY? Color me foolish. Peace could occur.
Answer this Dennis:
If the sucide bombings stopped, would the IDF stand down?
If the IDF stood down first, would the suicide bombings stop?
It's with no degree of satisfaction that I'm starting to think that the statement attributed to Golda Meir is true:
There will be peace when the Palistianians start to love their children more than they hate Israel.,