The New Catastrophe in Gaza

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its nto extreme, hamas are an elected government, the people of palestine are responsible for putting them there, israel are now reminding the people of the mistake they have done. to bring down a leader you must attack his people.

as i always say, one mans patriot, is another mans terrorist

 

Which evidently includes killing children. I can't make accomodations for that.

 

i can, better they die now; innocent, then to die later as terrorists blowing up a bus.

everyone does it:
do you think the germans cared about children when they firebombed london?

do you think the british cared about children when they firebombed dresden?

do you think the americans cared about children when they nuked hiroshia and nagisaga?

do you think the coalition cared about children when we carried out "shock and awe"?

did they bollocks!

 

Do you honestly think that most Americans approved of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki or the "Shock and Awe" strategy? I, for one, did not. the people arguing against Israel's tactics, by and large, do not approve of wantonly attacking civillian targets anywhere. What their nations have done before they were even alive or, in the case of "Shock and Awe", without their approval is irrelevant regarding whether or not Israel's tactics are viable or humane.

 

luckily, they are the people who dont have to make the decisions, cos without hiroshima and nagisaga hundreds of thousands if not over a million american soldiers could have lost their lives and the prolonged war could have easily resulted in american losses on their home soil.

withough shock and awe, we dould have been facing a defensive force which could have easily caused our forces severe casualties, how do you think these people would have liked it when reports of 2000 american service men killed taking baghdad reached home, or 200 british soldiers killed taking basra made itw way back to the british isles?

i think if normal minded people could seriously weigh up the risks and the other possible outcomes they would realise that we made the right choices.

you attack or draw a superior power into a fight and you deserve everything you get...

you think a hornet gives a sh*t about a bee?

 

I don't think American lives hold any more value than Japanese or Iraqi lives. The net ammount of human lives lost would likely have been lower if we used a different strategy in Iraq (like, uh, not going in the first place) or Japan. I don't care about whether the lives lost were American, Japanese, Israeli, Palestinian or Martian. I care about getting the job done with the least possible lives lost. Nuking Japan comes close to the top of the list of the USA's greatest shames (I'd actually put it at the top) and the Iraq war never needed to happen at all.

 

One of the main difference I see is that all Israelis are part of one entity, the state of Israel. Israel has a democratic elected government with a well developed and centralized infrastructure. That means that it can easily be argued that each individual Israeli is part of the force that is occupying and fighting Palestinians. In contrast, despite what anyone may say there is no organized centralized Palestinian state or administration. All the fighting is pretty much done by ragtag small independent groups which have little to nothing to do with each other and absolutely nothing to do with the Joe on the street getting killed in Israeli artillery strikes.

The analogy with the two year old fighting the seven year old is very valid.

 

To shoshino: your argument is not valid. If someone has used the same tactics in the past it doesn't mean they're correct. It only means we as humans haven't improved a single bit. That's why I say you and snook are stuck in the middle ages. Your logic is that of a dictator. Your hypothetical fear is not a valid reason to justify your actions, or those actions you agree with. It is not, because you may end up attacking the wrong targets. Why aren't you torturing Osama's parents, and their descendants so hard that they will remember it for ages? I've heard that one of his cousins posed for magazine.
Aside from this, I'd like to say that news are very depressing. The media absolutely denies Israel's history by saying they were attacked for no aparent reason. I wonder how isolated Palestinians must be that we never hear a word from them. Also, for the media, kidnapping a soldier is an act of war, while firing missiles on civilian buildings is not. And they also fired upon the Palestinian Foreign Affairs Ministery (wtf??? I say). That speaks how civilized and diplomatic Israel is. I don't care what Palestine has done or does. I never heard they did something like this. And I don't think they even *can* do it.
Here are two handy definitions.
Terrorism def.
Collateral damage
So, the question that remains is: if the target is inside a civilian building, then the whole building must pay for it?

 

Yes of course the whole building has got to go down, would you rather let them slip away because they are hiding in a so called non military building ? How can a building be non military in a warzone anyway ? Every house, office, or shack has a strategic value for Hamas, Islamic Jihad and all those other groups. Should Israel let Lebanon get away with giving shelter to Hezbollah, who apparently now also hold two Israeli soldiers captive ? The answer is always: of course not. Syria will get what's coming to them soon enough too.

What's so strange about firing upon a foreign affairs ministry from a Hamas lead government ? Hamas would definitely do the same if they had the tools for the job. And you don't care what palestine has done or does ? Does that mean that you simply don't care how many Israeli civilians have died in bombexplosions ?

 

@Pac Man: Some of us believe that knowingly killing 26 civilians because a few people that killed one of it's people may be in the same building is a callous and excessive response.

 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/5175160.stm

Escalated to include the Lebanon, now that Hezbollah have decided to join in.

 

I have a friend who just returned from a three week visit to Israel. Surprisingly, he says what gets reported in the media makes it look a whole lot worse than how it is viewed over there. It appears that Palestinians and Israelis view the violence in a very matter-of-fact way. One statistic that he gave me was quite surprising. Every year, the number of Palestinians and Israelis that die through military actions or terrorist strikes are actually fewer than the number who die in those countries each year due to vehicle accidents. In fact, for the Israelis, the number killed in car crashes far outnumbers the ones who die from terrorists by a margin of 10 to 1.

My friend says a lot of Israelis will even tell you that they are much more likely to die in a car accident than by a terrorist, and since nothing is being done to prevent car crashes, worrying about terrorism isn't a big deal.

I just find this view very surprising.

 

who are you to tell me that my opinion is not valid, it is just as valid as everyone elsees opinion

if it worked it worked

yes, you level that building down to its foundations, civillians who willingly remain in a warzone are free game.

that is a grade A target

callous? I call it practical, in war you cannot let moral objections get in the way of what you must do.

that is completely different, its like saying that if i picked up a weapon and walked the streets randomly shooting people im not dangerous or should be worried about because more people die from the common cold every year.
wipe out the cold... worry about me later, im doing little harm

 

@Shoshino: Relax, it was your ARGUMENT that was called invalid, not the opinion behind it.

@Drew: Some of us believe that stepping onto a bus while knowingly wearing and explosive vest and killing any number of civilians just because they're there, and then having the official government pay a pension to the family of the bomber, to be callous and excessive.

 

That's not what my point was. My point was to enlighten people (well at least it was enlightening to me when I heard it) that the Israelis don't seem to be overly bothered by what seems to the rest of us to be a constant threat. I'm not saying that's a reason to not respond to terrorist strikes, I just find it odd that in a country that sees frequent terrorist attacks, most people don't seem to be too worried about dying in a terrorist attack. I find this odd, yet for some reason, you do not.

EDIT: Just checked out CNN, and seems like this Israeli's a laying a royal beatdown on the Lebanese. The Lebanese are now seeking UN intervention to call for a ceasefire. They probably should have considered these possible consequences before kidnapping the Israeli soldiers. They evidently didn't remember what happened in 1982.

[ July 13, 2006, 20:12: Message edited by: Aldeth the Foppish Idiot ]

 

i think my argument has a more reliable logic behind it then anyone opposing it, mankind has done so in the past and will continue to do so in the future.
simple and true

 

Here is the money quote from the AP report

 

Without reading the thread, I must say, I'm afraid the Israeli, Palestinian, and Lebanese people will suffer greatly for the idiotism of a few people. More than they have in a very long time.

 

Good call, Rutters. That sums it up nicely.

 

It certainly is excessive, but that is the act of an individual....not a government. Big difference.

I have a hard time calling such a clear act of desperation (purposely killing yourself along with your enemies is always the result of desperation) "callous".