Question State Terrorism?

[Helme]

If anyones intrested btw, this is the list of banned items:

sage, cardamom, cumin, coriander, ginger, jam, halva, vinegar, nutmeg, chocolate, fruit preserves, seeds and nuts, biscuits and sweets, potato chips, gas for soft drinks, dried fruit, fresh meat, plaster, tar, wood for construction, cement, iron, glucose, industrial salt, plastic/glass/metal containers, industrial margarine, tarpaulin, sheets for huts, fabric (for clothing), flavor and smell enhancers, fishing rods, various fishing nets, buoys, ropes for fishing, nylon nets for greenhouses, hatcheries and spare parts for hatcheries, spare parts for tractors, dairies for cowsheds, irrigation pipe systems, ropes to tie greenhouses planters for saplings, heaters for chicken farms, musical instruments, size A4 paper, writing implements, notebooks, newspapers, toys, razors, sewing machines and spare parts, heaters, horses, donkeys, goats, cattle, and chickens.

Notable entries are: irrigation pipes, paper and pencils, heaters, toys and clothes, seeds, dried fruit and fresh meat, chickens and cattle.

 

[Raven]

Everything a terrorist needs!

 

[ECA]

Yeah banning construction materials, incase those dirty Palestinians start building catapults!

Also musical instruments combined with sage, cumin and nutmeg forms a deadly explosive!

 

[Helme]

Another point against the blockade itself is that you can argue that Israel are commiting crimes against humanity, a few examples of the situation in Gaza;


*8 out of 10 Gazans depend on foreign aid to survive.

*The World Food Program says Gaza requires a minimum of 400 trucks a day to meet basic nutritional needs - yet an average of just 171 trucks worth of supplies enters Gaza every week,

*95% of Gaza's water fails World Health Organization standards leaving thousands of newborns at risk of poisoning.

*Anemia for children under the age of 5 is estimated at 48%.

Also during the bombings of 2009: More than 120,000 jobs were lost as Gaza's industrial zone was destroyed. 15,000 homes and apartments were damaged or destroyed. 1/3 of all schools were destroyed - and none can be rebuilt because Israel does not allow building materials out of fear that Hamas will use them to build bunkers.

This is just god damn ridiculous, but as I've previously said nothing will change because the US won't allow the world to touch Israel.

Ironically the source of these numbers are ANERA(American Near East Relief Association).

 

[Wij]

OK (previous few posts) but that's all only marginally relevant until there's some kind of ruling on the blockade. To play devil's advocate you could just as easily say that babies in Dresden in the 40s were completely innocent but they were collectively punished with Nazis. Isreal will still argue that the blockade saves Isreali lives.

Also, we have now moved on to the legality of the blockade. Which, as I said, I was assuming for now, but was quite willing to accept that the act was illegal if the blockade was also illegal.

 

[SilverHood]

They are denying basic supplies and the ability to leave at will for the entire population of Gaza because Hamas won an election. This includes half a million children who were too young to vote, people who voted for the other options or abstained.

That is pretty much the definition of collective punishment, which according to the Geneve convention is illegal - and since 93 the Geneve convention has passed into customary international law which makes it binding even to non-signatories like Israel.

edit: Amnesty and the UN are the biggest sources of this - and both have urged Israel several times to lift the siege, the problem is that the US works against them at every turn. Veto'ing any kinds of sanctions.

It's very hard to be lenient to a political entity whose sole purpose is to destroy your country. Takes two to play ball nicely.

On the legality of the blockade:

Q&A: Is Israel's naval blockade of Gaza legal? | Reuters

or to quote: "On the basis that Hamas is the ruling entity of Gaza and Israel is in the midst of an armed struggle against that ruling entity, the blockade is legal, ..."


The Palestinians elected their government. As the quote goes... "people get the government they deserve".

The Turks are worse than the Israeli's when it comes to the Kurds in eastern Turkey. But bashing Turks is not as easy as bashing Jews. Nor as fashionable it seems.

As for Terrorist State... why play by the rules when none of your neighbors do? I don't see any bashing Egypt, Syria, Iran, Jordan or Lebanon. Compare them in a table like for like, and I'm pretty sure that Israel is the place that treats its people the best, regardless of ethnicity or religious orientation.

 

[Helme]

I'm not bashing those countries because they didn't kill 9 aid workers on international waters.

I'm fully aware of Turkey being a shit country, aswell as Egypt and alot of the others, that's not relevant to how Israel handled this situation however.

 

[Raven]

Here we go. Don't, whatever you do criticise Israel, that would be antisemetic!

 

[SilverHood]

They just their kill their own people and the world goes on because it didn't happen in international waters. Israel is held to a higher standards than its neighbors.

Yemen blockade

Where is the Arab outcry, the western media frenzy over denied aid? It hasn't even been in the news.

As for aid workers... assuming blockade is legal, then resisting the inspection by using violence means they lose their status as civilians and turn into combatants. This cartoon sums up the way I see it:

 

[ECA]

Ah so we're all racist because we disagree with you.

cool.

 

[Helme]

I'd just want to reply; fuck right off.

 

[dysfunction]

Where is the Arab outcry, the western media frenzy over denied aid? It hasn't even been in the news.

Indeed..mainly because the world treads on egg shells when it comes to Israel and as a result they can literally get away with murder.

Hamas is certainly not innocent and the Palestinians do provoke Israel but Israel does tend to use excessive force and their blockade is just insane.

I am amazed so many people cannot see this

 

[DaGaffer]

Ah so we're all racist because we disagree with you.

cool.

I didn't read anywhere where he said you were racist. He just pointed out there seem to be some interesting double standards at play, especially when Turks start bleating about human rights, and its hard to disagree.

I'd just want to reply; fuck right off.

Thank you, Oscar Wilde.

 

[Embattle]

Indeed..mainly because the world treads on egg shells when it comes to Israel and as a result they can literally get away with murder.

Hamas is certainly not innocent and the Palestinians do provoke Israel but Israel does tend to use excessive force and their blockade is just insane.

I am amazed so many people cannot see this

Does not reporting one as much as the other make it better in some way?

 

[dysfunction]

Does not reporting one as much as the other make it better in some way?

No.

I see it as follows:

Israel is a strong well built bully picking on a weak weedy younger child in school. The younger child probably throws a stick at the bully, and calls for him to be eliminated every now and again and then the bully beats the crap out of him for a few days...and prevent's him from getting his wounds attended to

The bully will get lot's more "media" attention...it goes without saying

 

[Raven]

Israel are guilty of just about every international crime going, they illegally occupy land which isn't theirs, they carry out calculated attacks on a civilian population, they carry out an illegal blockade and the latest is, they attack an aid convoy with special forces in international waters.

Their neighbours are hardly civilised either but that's not the point here, I am English not Turkish and I am condemning the Israelis, someone needs to put a stop to them thinking that, because they are predominately Jewish and had such a hard time 70 years ago that they can do whatever the fuck they like.

 

[Ch3tan]

They do whatever the fuck they like because we and the US let them; don't forget who created this mess in the first place.

 

[Scouse]

OK (previous few posts) but that's all only marginally relevant until there's some kind of ruling on the blockade.

Just reading all this again but Wij - it's not "marginally relevant".

You can't separate out the really bad shit just because it's convenient. Well, you can, but that's what the US and Israel do...

But bashing Turks is not as easy as bashing Jews. Nor as fashionable it seems.

Who's Jew-bashing here? Once again with the thinly veiled accusations of anti-semitism. The thread is about state terrorism - not Jewish terrorism. But a few Israel defenders around here seem to have this basic emotional response...

 

[Scouse]

He just pointed out there seem to be some interesting double standards at play

No. There's no double standards at play. Nobodys denying that the Turks/Arabs are are capable of disgraceful actions. However, this is a thread about the actions of the state of Israel. A state we support as a country. A state the west gave nuclear weapons (to point out how powerful our support is). One of our allies is acting like a terrorist.

It's not anti-semitic, it's not denialist, it's an assessment of the actions of well-armed Israel against a caged-in, frequently invaded, bombed to fuckery, denied aid, denied movement, prisoner-race.

But *boo hoo* sorry for not pointing out that Turkey can be a bunch of arses as well... :sigh:

 

[rynnor]

They do whatever the fuck they like because we and the US let them; don't forget who created this mess in the first place.

No one factor created Israel - zionism, crusades, the holocaust, WW1, WW2, the UN and probably loads more.

 

[Scouse]

May be true to a point rynnor, but the fact is unless the British had performed their nation building early last century there wouldn't be a "state" of Israel - it was all Palestine before then...

 

[rynnor]

May be true to a point rynnor, but the fact is unless the British had performed their nation building early last century there wouldn't be a "state" of Israel - it was all Palestine before then...

I think thats a mis-understanding of the history. Israel existed as a concept due to the rise of zionism amongst jews from the 19th century onwards but they couldnt get enough support to make it a reality and unsurprisingly the people who already lived there were not keen on it.

Britain created the state of Palastine not Israel - Israel was created by the UN - Britain refused to help in the partitioning of Palastine and withdrew.

 

[DaGaffer]

No. There's no double standards at play. Nobodys denying that the Turks/Arabs are are capable of disgraceful actions. However, this is a thread about the actions of the state of Israel. A state we support as a country. A state the west gave nuclear weapons (to point out how powerful our support is). One of our allies is acting like a terrorist.

It's not anti-semitic, it's not denialist, it's an assessment of the actions of well-armed Israel against a caged-in, frequently invaded, bombed to fuckery, denied aid, denied movement, prisoner-race.

But *boo hoo* sorry for not pointing out that Turkey can be a bunch of arses as well... :sigh:

No, there are interesting double standards at play from the Turks themselves. That was the point of the comment. No-one's expecting the west to have an even-handed pop at everyone but the Turks, who are making most of the racket here, are very much in a glass house.

May be true to a point rynnor, but the fact is unless the British had performed their nation building early last century there wouldn't be a "state" of Israel - it was all Palestine before then...

Way to oversimplify; and for clarity, "Palestine" was never a country.

 

[Scouse]

It's not a misunderstanding of history rynnor. Britain promised the creation of a jewish homeland - and it happened.


On a separate note - there's very little archaeological evidence that a state of "Israel" ever existed (and none that's undisputed). Of course, Christian theology supports this, but we're not taking history lessons off the bible now are we

Way to oversimplify; and for clarity, "Palestine" was never a country.

Yes, it's an oversimplification, but I don't want to start a topic on the historical creation on the state of Israel. I don't much care to have yet another internet conversation about how it came into being, have no interest in "wiping it off the map" and I think it's off-topic anyway. But I will say that it's an essentially correct assessment.

 

[rynnor]

It's not a misunderstanding of history rynnor. Britain promised the creation of a jewish homeland - and it happened.

The British had a very different idea of a jewish state though - they actually said they supported it but it couldnt impact those who were already living in the region which is a bit of a contradiction

The reality was that the British valued their relationship with the Arabs above the creation of a state for a bunch of increasingly rebellious jewish immigrants.

The real support for Israel came from the US (who were far away and didnt have to deal with the messy reality on the ground).

Personally I blame the Crusaders who took the holy land for the tensions in the area - christians/muslims and jews lived peacably side by side until they captured the holy land slaughtering everyone else in the process.

This lead to a muslim backlash and a cycle of violence that has repeated ever since.

 

[Scouse]

The British had a very different idea of a jewish state though - they actually said they supported it but it couldnt impact those who were already living in the region which is a bit of a contradiction

They said it shouldn't impact on the people already living there. But that's just government bullshit.

Britain was instrumental in making this whole new shitstorm happen. The fact that the government of the day was involved in a "PR" campaign to cover their own asses shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone.

Remember how New Labour used to say one thing, but mean exactly the other? Same thing

 

[rynnor]

Remember how New Labour used to say one thing, but mean exactly the other? Same thing

I think the reality was that the Brits didnt particularly want Israel because it would upset their good relations with the arabs but they were over a barrel to the US because without their loans Britain would go bankrupt.

 

[Scouse]

I think the reality was that the Brits didnt particularly want Israel because it would upset their good relations with the arabs but they were over a barrel to the US because without their loans Britain would go bankrupt.

None of that changes the fact that Britain was instrumental in setting up the new state of Israel.


Anyway, I'm being drawn in. It's all inconsequential to the central argument.

Israel's recent history is one of an emboldened state acting exactly how it likes and thumbing it's nose to most of the international community whilst meating out collective punishment upon a walled-in bunch of prisoners.

 

[rynnor]

Israel's recent history is one of an emboldened state acting exactly how it likes and thumbing it's nose to most of the international community whilst meating out collective punishment upon a walled-in bunch of prisoners.

I think the history of its creation is a big part of the psychology that dictates their actions.

Israel is more like an outpost in an unfriendly land than a country - its that siege mentality that explains the harshness of their actions.

The only way this could change is if the US were to pressure them to start dealing fairly with their neighbours but I dont think this is likely - the jewish lobby is very powerfull in the US.

 

[Scouse]

Psychology may influence their actions but it doesn't excuse them.