Freedom Flotilla hijacked

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We've gone down the bunny trail of who hit who first already. I don't think there is an end to it. My only point is that Hamas is throwing everything they have at Israel, even their food. Israel, on the other hand, looks like it's just trying to containt the situation.

Israel has peace with all it's neighboring Arab nations. Israel and Fatah in the West Bank appear to have settled on an uneasy truce (at least, all the reports of violence from there are talking about civilians punching and kicking each other now, with the settlers attacking Israeli security as often as Palestinians). I don't claim that Hamas' actions exist in a vacuum, just that evidence suggests they could have found peace by now, if they wanted it.

Hamas and Israel have talked several times in the past. Renewed violence has always been the result. Either Hamas isn't really interested in it, or they can't actually control the various groups inside Gaza. Or some combination of the two.

Hamas claims it's other groups firing the rockets, not them. I don't know if that's disputed or not. Either way, it's proof that peace discussions with Hamas aren't going to be productive. Either Hamas doesn't mean it, or they don't have enough influence to actually produce peace from the peace talks.

Can you provide any sources for this? My google searches returned nothing. Nothing at all. And your wiki link was a nice article, but mentioned nothing about herbicide attacks, either.

... Oh, yes, Israel can do no wrong in the US media. That's why they were flayed alive following the flotilla assault (which started this whole thread). That's why there are hundreds of articles on the violence, the peace talks, the demolitions, and all of that. Because the US media doesn't talk about what Israel does.

 

Not true. I know one for sure where that is not the case: Israel is not at peace with Syria. Israel to this day refuses to sign a peace with them because that would inevitably involve Israel having to give back the Golan. Netanyahu is especially unlikely to do this, since his major coalition partners are from the far right to the extreme right - and to them giving up a piece of Greater Israel is anathema.

Syria in return expresses her dissatisfaction with that state of affairs by supporting Hezbollah and Hamas. Before that they supported secular and socialist Palestinian groups for the same reasons. Get the idea?

 

http://www.merip.org/mero/mero051003.html
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article2871.shtml
http://www.jkcook.net/WebphotosBig/GalileeNegev05.htm
http://www.dukium.org/user_uploads/docs/yelidim_4UNations_ver3.pdf

You need to learn how to use the search function in Google. As I just demonstrated, the very first page of my search results for Google produced four relevant sources.

The wiki link I provided *explicitly* mentioned the use of herbicides on Bedouin crops, and sourced their claim with an article from Haaretz!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negev_Bedouin#Unrecognized_villages

"The Israeli government frequently demolishes homes and sprays toxic pesticides onto crops in the unrecognized villages, including one episode where Bedouin homes were demolished to make way for the establishment of a Jewish town.[48]"

I'm finding it very hard to take you seriously regarding this issue, when you won't even go to the effort of reading the sources I provide.

They weren't 'flayed alive', not by any stretch of the imagination. Quite the contrary, apologists immediately tried to find excuses to justify yet another human rights abuse by the Israelis.

I'm sorry, but I read this as something along the lines of: "Boo hoo hoo, poor poor Jew!"

 

Still making friends, mordea?

 

LOL, Barmy, I'd have repped you for that, if I could

 

Ok, here's a bit of news: Israel appears to be removing restrictions on what foodstuffs are permitted to enter Gaza.

A step in the right direction, imo.

 

There's a difference between pesticides and herbicides. Spraying crops with pesticides is common practice, while spraying them with herbicides generally isn't (unless you have resistant crops or specially targeted herbicides).

I have read the sources you've provided. The wiki never mentioned herbicides, and the other links you've provided are suspicious at best. I'm sorry, but when you link to a site called 'Electronic Intifada', it's not the most creadible source out there. The 'Negev Coexistence Forum For Civil Equality' piece was much better, but further googling for info connected to them showed little other mentions of herbicide spraying. Most of the debate seems to be over political rights, village recognition, and the like.

Just for fun, compare some of your sources to things like this. And remember, the internet is filled with lies. Because of this, finding creadible sources is important.

Read again, you obviously missed the point. The point is that Israel can to wrong by the eyes of the US Media.

There have been rumblings of this for a little while now. We'll see how much of a difference it makes.

 

NOG, here is what I think mordea was refering to in his wiki link, as you probably read it too fast :

 

all pesticides can have toxic properties, as the article doesnt mention what pesticides were used it is impossible to determine if the pesticides were harmful or simply used to protect against the spread of harmful insects, plant pathogens, weeds, molluscs, birds, mammals, fish, nematodes (roundworms), and microbes that destroy property, spread disease or are a vector for disease or cause a nuisance.

 

What apparently happened is this: The Israelis didn't allow Bedouin to plant cops, so when Bedouin planted some anyway, Israeli authorities destroyed those crops. Let's assume that the description is at least correctly describing that the Israelis did that by spraying something on those crops. The context suggests that the Israelis then used herbicides on those crops. That is also plausible, since that is a cost effective way to destroy crops with minimal manual labour.

So this is likely a simple case of of sloppy language and you guys are wasting your and everybody else's time agonising about this point. I plead for less typing and more thinking!

Whether the Israelis destroyed those crops with herbicides or pesticides is utterly secondary. It doesn't so much matter how but that they apparently destroyed the crops. Now what about the interesting part, why?

 

Hang on a second, what are we arguing here? It is forbidden (illegal) for the Bedouin

so, they break the law and establish these settlements and the Isralies then destroy them? whats your argument? If I went and built a house in the middle of the Brecon Beacons it would be torn down by the British Government, If I planted crops in Pembrey country park, the government would remove them.

 

To be fair, what I cited said 'pesticides', not 'herbicides'. So it was my cock up. I often get confused between the two.

However, a number of other sources I posted did make it clear that the Israelis used herbicides to destroy Bedouin crops. This evidence was dismissed out of hand due to being obtained from 'biased' sources ("Oh my God, they are Arabic news/human rights organisations, BIAS BIAS BIAS!!!"), as if such a thing as an unbiased source exists.

http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/bedouin-petition-court-against-ila-crop-spraying-1.117532

This article from Haaretz (an Israeli new organisation) makes it very clear that crop spraying is used to destroy Bedouin crops, and replaced the old Israeli practice of just driving through the crops with tractors to destroy them.

How dare the natives attempt to establish farms on their own land by Jewish squatters (Oh no I didn't!), instead of being herded into concentration towns with inadequate water and electricity.

We are talking about a semi-nomadic people who, prior to Jewish invasion (Oh no I didn't!), made an honest living in harsh conditions. Then they were forcibly dispossessed of their land, denied their ancestral way of life, and crowded into cesspools of civilisation which lacked even the essentials of life that you and I take for granted.

And when they have the 'audacity' to try to return to the desert in order to escape their bleak existence, you condemn them?

What the hell?

I re-iterate: What the hell?

If any other Western nation in the world was doing that to their natives in today's day and age what the Israelis are doing to the Bedouin, they would be tarred and feathered by the international community. But since it's the Jews, the powers that be turn a blind eye. "Oh poor Jews, they need a Jewish only apartheid state to protect them from all the mean anti-semites."

You know, I can understand if people who have something tangible to gain from supporting Israel do so. It's just human nature to screw someone over to make a buck or make a gain in power and status. But when people pretend that they are being fair, just, holy and righteous while screwing someone else over, I just say "**** YOU!" over and over again in my mind.

The Israelis should be thanking their lucky stars that the Bedouin aren't 1/100th as hostile as the Native Indians were to foreign enroachment. Or perhaps not. Then they could use that to justify their abuses against the Bedouin. The demolishment of the farmhouses would be necessary to 'eradicate terrorist strongholds', and the destruction of the crops would be necessary to halt material aid to evil brown insurgents.

 

The original argument by mordea was this :

To my understanding, he is saying that the israelli exert too much control over the region. They force people who have always been in the region to meet many criterias to be able to live off the land. If they don't, they deal with them with force, like they do with the Bedoin.

What people are basically challenging from the start is the validity of Israel's actions, even if they are legal. Legal does not mean just.

As for the pesticides thing, of course it's toxic, that goes without saying! It's like saying poison is toxic, you don't need to say it. The point of a pesticide is to kill pests (insects and such that harm the plant). However, when it is mentioned, it's because some pesticides are toxic to humans. Meaning if you eat a fruit that has been sprayed by that toxic pesticide, you become really sick... Not that hard to understand, really...

EDIT : I'll help you mordea..

Pesticides : Kills insects and such to protect the plant. Sometimes though, the pesticide is harmful to humans.
Herbicide : Kills the plant. Used in places where you don't want plants to grow.

 

Shoshino,
it is easy to create unfair legal norms. The Israelis are committing injustices towards Arabs the way modern states commit injustices - through an unfair administrative law.

When the Nazis prohibited for instance Jews to work in certain fields, them doing so then became illegal, for no other reason than that the law - enacted arbitrarily - said so. There often was no or very limited recourse. Obviously such law and the process were hideously unfair. That was the point.

The Israelis are unfair towards Israeli Arabs and Palestinian Arabs as far as building and using the land in general is concerned. Since 1948, almost no Arab neighbourhood or town has legally been permitted to expand. Many of the unapproved homes have gone up without authorization simply because Palestinians face extraordinary difficulties obtaining construction permits, for instance in East Jerusalem. The choice is to either build illegally, or not at all. Such homes are then being demolished by Israel as illegal.

To add insult to injury, when houses are not being demolished and Palestinians are simply expelled from their homes, sometimes Jewish settlers are already waiting outside to move in. Often, in place of the demolished homes, projects by settler groups are being built. There are regular protests against that in Jerusalem, by Israeli groups like B'tselem, that don't make it into mainstream media in the US.

Another problem for them is Israel's conduct about the right of residency for Palestinians. In 2008 Israelis revoked the right of residence of 4,577 East Jerusalemites in 2008 - 21 times the average of the previous 40 years. For legal reasons. Of course.

To be blunt: The Israelis are pursuing politics of 'Judaization' in Israel. That is so in East Jerusalem and in other places as well - Haifa for instance (an award winning Israeli semi documentary movie "Ajami" was made about that). And it is apparently not all that different towards the Bedouin in the Negev.

It's nowhere explicit, but IMO it has a lot to do with Israel being defined as a state for Jews first of all, and such policies reflect that. There is racism in Israel towards Arabs, towards blacks. If you want to catch the character of what 'Judaisation' means - it is a policy of one sided favouritism of ethnic Jews at the expense of other ethnic groups. There is historical precedent for things like that, and it ain't pretty.

 

Im Welsh, I live in a land which is occupied by the English government, which is run by the english government and the welsh have very little say in how our country is run, it is run by laws created in england and enforced through a police force regulated by the english. The english government decides where I can build a house, if they say no, I cant do it, if I do it anyway, theyll tear it down. we pay high taxes for a low income area, our council taxes are off the scale. we're not talking about the 16th century here, this is today.

I agree, its seen all across the world, look at the arab emirates their laws are strict and often rediculous, however, they are enforced - its easy to complain, but there really isnt any choice but to obey or suffer their consequences.

 

Zoning laws as a weapon in a war for territory

Another thing that came to my mind was how the Israelis use zoning laws. Say there is an Arab neighbourhood. Developing zoning plans for such neighnbourhoods is a low priority. So say the Arab neighbourhood is growing, children get born, grow up, have new families - need space to live in. Due to the neglect to develop proper development plans for the neighbourhood the areas surrounding the Arab neighbourhood are thus still zoned as unused land. Inhabitants try to get construction permits to build homes for their new families. In the meanwhile they have to stay with their families. That is bad since we can assume that Arabs, just like the rest of us, probably like to keep a distance to mothers in law and the like. They wait, and wait and eventually get their permit refused on grounds that the neighbouring land is zoned as unused, and that thus building is not permitted. In the meanwhile life goes on, and eventually they just build.

They can't just buy land, and do there as they please. Israel has often tolerated illegal buildings for decades, only to at some point come, lament the blatant illegality and tear the house down. Like when there's a settlement to be built.

It's like playing with someone who uses a stacked deck of cards, who always gives, and always wins, and who can compel you to have to play with him.

This has to be understood in light of Israeli settlers seeing the struggle with the Palestinians and the Arabs as a struggle for the land of Greater Israel. Zoning and permits and rights of residence, rent increases and ultimately settlements are weapons in that fight. 5,477 Arabs have lost their right of residence in East Jerusalem? Progress on the long march towards making Jerusalem the Jewish city it is in the minds of the settlers.

Brilliant article by Max Blumenthal, highlighting the role of US donations to settlers, and their impact in Israel: Gambling with Conflict: How Settlers and a California Casino King Control Israeli Policy.

 

From FOX News, of all outlets, this accurate and candid report in video: Why Palestinians Can’t Buy Land

Remarkable in its own right is the quoted response by the Mayor of Jerusalem to FOX' interview request.