Israel

[dead0man]

Not as bad as the troubles they had when they didn't control the Golan.

[dead0man]

What about it?

[dead0man]

What about it?

Posession of the Gaza Strip. What's in it for Israel?

They don't have posession of the Gaza Strip

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[dead0man]

They were probably hoping for a little less terrorism in their own lands.  The whole "if we fight them 'over there' we won't have to fight them here" meme you hear from the Right in this country.  Except the "over there" in Israel is in their backyard.  Whether it worked or not is debatable I guess.  Since Israel has left Gaza, has attacks increased or decreased coming out of the Strip?

Why do you think Israel was there and in the Golan to this day?

[dead0man]

To be honest, I can't think of a good reason, it's just the far-right pushing their imperialist goals.

And what has made you come to that conclusion?

[dead0man]

In fact, that brings up an interesting question: why would anyone want to move to Israel?

Because they know they won't be persecuted there in the future (assuming we allow them opportunity to hold on long enough).  Like the Roma(Gypsies), the Irish, Ukrainians, Kurds, etc, they just want a place to call there own where they know they can go when/if the persecutions start again.  A home land to live in, love, and defend.  Some groups have been successful(Ukrainians, Georgians), some sort of (Irish, Jews) and some are still looking for the brass ring(Kurds, Roma).  You can disagree with the Nationalistic nature of it, but that's not going to stop them from existing.

[dead0man]

To be honest, I can't think of a good reason, it's just the far-right pushing their imperialist goals.

And what has made you come to that conclusion?

The boundaries of Isreal are nowhere near where they were originally supposed to be.

As Tory said that could mean anything. The original Zionists actually wanted a state which would iirc stretch as far as the Euphrates - In modern day Iraq.

Why? Jews are no longer persecuted anywhere in the West.

In fact, that brings up an interesting question: why would anyone want to move to Israel?

We are talking about the Early Zionists here. And the area stretching from the Euphrates is the historic "Abrahamic" Israel or Canaan iirc. Abraham coming from Ur in Mesopotamia itself iirc.

Nobody (in any position of power) is calling for that today though.  On the other hand, there are still world leaders calling for the destruction of the state of Israel.

[dead0man]

sorry.

they have to accept the facts.

great britain won't get the usa back.

germany won't get the lost territories in eastern europe back.

france won't get louisiana back.

spain won't get floridas back.

spain won't get the netherlands back.

and (surprise)

the arabs won't get jerusalem or any other piece of israel back.

While I don't like the use of the Holocaust to justify the State of Israel, Israel is a necessary country in the proper place.  If the Arabs would stop attacking, a peace settlement could be reached.  However, the Arabs refuse to have peace.  When the leaders of bordering countries are calling for your extermination, you need to be always prepared.

I'd like Xahar to comment on these two points.

[dead0man]

If all Jews moved back inside the green line, do you think the attacks against Israel would stop?

[dead0man]

You should just randomly fire rockets at their front door.

[dead0man]

No sh**t!  Nobody irrationally hates the Jews like Arabs do.  You're right Xahar, the Jews shouldn't have moved from one group of monsters to a BIGGER group of monsters.

[dead0man]

Odd, they did this last week on the 8th.  What's going on here?

[dead0man]

Wow... and here I thought that would make the debate devolve into some kinda Buckley/Vidal shouting match that ended in you calling my a crypto fascists and me calling you a queer.

We're getting there!  I predict page 11.

[dead0man]

How dare they defend themselves!

If a bunch of Arabs claimed Illinois as their personal territory, they'd have no right to defend themselves.

If they managed to hold onto it for several generations, then yeah, eventually the surrounding states would be retarded to continue getting their asses kicked.

[dead0man]

Subtle.  I like it.

[dead0man]

Do you know how Israel treats Jewish converts to Christianity?

Better than how Saudis treat Islam coverts to Judaism?

[dead0man]

Arabs will outnumber Jews within the next 10 to 20 years, according to demographers.

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C05EFDA173AF936A25754C0A9629C8B63&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all

One man.  One vote.  One time.  It just takes one election to kill a democracy.

[dead0man]

Do you know how Israel treats Jewish converts to Christianity?

Better than how Saudis treat Islam coverts to Judaism?

Answer: There aren't any.

Any guesses as to why?

[dead0man]

Arabs will outnumber Jews within the next 10 to 20 years, according to demographers.

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C05EFDA173AF936A25754C0A9629C8B63&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all

One man.  One vote.  One time.  It just takes one election to kill a democracy.

And I doubt the Arabs will muster more voters than Jews in Israel.

That's their (the Arabs) goal.

[dead0man]

Do you know how Israel treats Jewish converts to Christianity?

Better than how Saudis treat Islam coverts to Judaism?

Answer: There aren't any.

Any guesses as to why?

Because Judaism doesn't encourage conversion.

hehe, you get my point though.

[dead0man]

Rocket hits Israel, second violation of Gaza truce

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If there is one thing we've learned it's that this will never stop until all the Jews are gone.  If every Jew left every settlement in the West Bank would anybody be shocked if two days later rockets started flying out of there?  Would anybody be shocked if the anti-Zionists around here defended the rocket attacks?

[dead0man]

I hope those comments aren't directed at me dead0man.

You'd know better than I if those comments were directed at you. 


(I wasn't thinking of you when I wrote it, but that doesn't mean it doesn't apply)

[dead0man]

Rocket hits Israel, second violation of Gaza truce

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If there is one thing we've learned it's that this will never stop until all the Jews are gone.  If every Jew left every settlement in the West Bank would anybody be shocked if two days later rockets started flying out of there?  Would anybody be shocked if the anti-Zionists around here defended the rocket attacks?

Don't be ridiculous. Would anyone here be surprised if Israel attacked Iran tommorow and all of the Zionists here defended Israel?

If Iran gave up land first (or some other card they had in their hand) and then Israel attacked, no, I wouldn't defend them.

[dead0man]

I don't think anybody has denied that Israel did some funked up things early on.

[dead0man]

Unwilling to negotiate? I would say it was rather hard for the Palestinians to negotiate at all given that the British had dismantled both the Higher Arab Committee and the Supreme Muslim Council in 1936, leaving Palestinian Arabs lacking in effective and united leadership. So who represents the Palestinian cause? The Arab League whose member states were facing mounting domestic unrest and in many cases had an intrinsic interest in there not being a viable Palestinian state: for instance Abdullah of Jordan's involvement in the 1948 war was primarily a bid to control the Palestinian part of the partition, rather than any meaningful attempt at establishing an independent Palestinian state as the Israeli historian Avi Shlaim has shown in his work on the 1948 war (I'll be happy to give a reference if you want).

Even here though, Israel is far from the only "bad guy".  You'd think the Pali's would be really pissed at their own brothers for turning on them.  You'd expect Jews and Arabs not get along, but Arabs and Arabs?  Why is the state of Israel the one that takes all the sh**t when there are obviously more guilty parties involved?