You’re so right about the fact that investigating the Palestinian side is forbidden. It’s uncanny how even survivors of the Lebanese civil war caused by the Palestinians, stand against Israel. Confounding.
Seeing that this is Part 5 of a series I looked down the list of titles of your articles and I looked into and briefly skimmed a previous article in this series and I see that you are consistent, though you haven't revisited this series in quite some time.
I'm an old actor and, though I'm no longer performing, drama is my way of being. So I'll express my understanding of your argument as a monologue spoken by you as I understand your argument.
"These are bad people, educated to be wrong and bad. The proof is that the whole world has a problem with these people and won't even tolerate them as refugees. They will annihilate all the good people where ever they live. They are liars and terrorists. They will not compromise. They demand sole possession of the whole world. So there is only one solution. They must be exterminated."
There was a time when war covered the whole globe because of a similar causus beli. But in that former war the antagonist who proclaimed its desire to rule the world by annihilating its opponent did not have nuclear weapons. Such weapons came about only at the last phase of that war.
If the war of extermination of one side or the other continues and if the resolution of that war can only be extermination of one side by the other there must be some area outside of this fight, some arena or killing ground from which the rest of us can stand outside. So that when the annihilation is over there will be peace and raising children and growing and trading food and treating one another with compromise and decency and law so that humanity may live.
But, son, you say only the other side, your enemy, wants to exterminate your side. Yet the conclusion of your argument seems to me to inevitably be that your enemy must be exterminated.
And it is your side which has nuclear weapons which they refuse to admit to but in this they lie. Nuclear weapons if used will not be able to be contained. Israel – or Palestine or the Levant or Canaan, the series of names is tiresome! – will be a radioactive wasteland. But so will New York and London and Moscow and Vancouver and Paris and ...
So as for your argument which I think I have restated fairly, that extermination is the end game (please convince me if I'm being unfair to you) ... I'm playing the referee in this fantasy of ours.
TIME OUT. One guy has a gun, the other has a knife. I'm taking away the gun for the safety of the spectators and substituting a knife. Now they both have knives and they are in the ring and the spectators are not. Have at it I guess, since neither of these bad guys are willing to stop. after the fight? The winner is a murderer. But the neighbourhood will still be alive. Too bad there's nobody in the real world to take away the nuclear gun.
Oh. I'M a hypocrite? The USA has and Russia has and China has nuclear weapons. The right to bear arms ought to be universal. So you guys, your side, Israelis, get to Bear nuclear arms. And also proclaim their right to annihilate 2 million people? The other guys, they don't get to bear nuclear arms because they are the bad guys?
That guy Gallant didn't say the IDF denies food and water and electricity to Gaza because all of those people are Hamas and human animals and we'll treat them as such? The IDF hasn't bombed crowded Gaza to rubble?
Young man, I'm not on board your war wagon. If you insist I'm going to have to be on the other side. Not my choice!!
I'm with Miko Peled and Norman Finkelstein and Max Blumenthal. They are in the right and you are in the wrong.
I truly appreciate the time you took to articulate your thoughts the way you did. I enjoyed the dramatic flair (well, you did warn me!)
I have to make 2 important corrections:
First: I have no ‘side’. When I talk with friends in Europe, they often accuse me of being ‘pro-Trump’, even when all I did was rectify factual errors in their thinking, without ever making any claim about Trump, nor about my own position towards him. Now, I actually am pro-Trump, but nothing in my words to them could reasonably lead to that conclusion. In a polarized world of ‘my people’ versus ‘your people’, clear ‘we are right’ versus ‘you are wrong’, any defense, any correction, will indeed be seen as taking sides with ‘the others’. Where does that come from?
Second: I am not proposing an extermination as the ‘solution’. Where would I have hinted at such? That would be a major mistake in my writing, if anything in my words would let my readers believe that such would be my ‘inevitable’ solution.
What I am doing, and always do, is start by looking at the facts. And, where necessary, by those facts that are most often not highlighted, known or accepted. A lot becomes much clearer if you start with a proper taking stock of the lay of the land.
If we could stop wars, and give everyone knives, so only the belligerents are at risk, and none of the ‘spectators’ or surrounding innocents, or, even better, we give only the leaders calling for the wars a knife, to fight it out among themselves, at risk of their own lives, and not the lives of countless others, I’d be all for it. But then we’d quickly get back to a time where ‘heroes’ become leaders, with war and training and fighting on their mind, and not ‘wise men’, with the welfare of their people and those around them on their mind.
And I would not say you’re a hypocrite, at all. On the contrary, you show reasonable thinking, and try to apply it properly. Nothing wrong with that. You ran ahead of my intent, and that is the worst I can and want to claim about your comment.
This is an absolute mess of a situation, where the rot has been allowed to fester for way too long. Both sides have their own responsibility, where the Israeli side of mistakes is very well known (with a lot of propaganda mixed in, deserved or not) and the Palestinian side not so much.
My ‘wagon’, if you want me to use such idea, would be that Israel has a right to exist. If you want to go down the very basic realpolitik: the same right as Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and Jordan, created out of the ashes of the Ottoman Empire by its conquerors. Straight lines drawn on maps, cutting tribes, families, religion, etc. in different sides and nations.
I am still waiting for anyone to give me a good reason why Israel would have no right to exist. That would be hypocrisy, speaking from nations that were founded on the same principle as Israel was founded.
And to be clear: Palestinians ALSO have a right to a country of their own. For some of the same reasons.
I could go further, but I think this should suffice for now.
Again, thank you for the input, and the open and frank way you presented it!
Enough said. Events will play out as they must. No government is sacred. Governments can be changed or abolished and the people – Jews, Christians, Muslims, atheists ... – will still be there facing the same problem they had before the fighting began: how to live together in decency and peace. I'm paraphrasing Abe Lincoln there. "You cannot always fight ..." he said.
New here and have read about half your posts. Without a doubt, your work is some of the best. The bases for that opinion is your tremendous focus on details, and the really great effort to present what seems via logic true and avoid the all too common putting out click bate. Add to that, what makes your posts exceptional, is your willingness to take a good look at and consider, conflicting views.
Thank goodness that God is in control.
🙏
You’re so right about the fact that investigating the Palestinian side is forbidden. It’s uncanny how even survivors of the Lebanese civil war caused by the Palestinians, stand against Israel. Confounding.
Seeing that this is Part 5 of a series I looked down the list of titles of your articles and I looked into and briefly skimmed a previous article in this series and I see that you are consistent, though you haven't revisited this series in quite some time.
I'm an old actor and, though I'm no longer performing, drama is my way of being. So I'll express my understanding of your argument as a monologue spoken by you as I understand your argument.
"These are bad people, educated to be wrong and bad. The proof is that the whole world has a problem with these people and won't even tolerate them as refugees. They will annihilate all the good people where ever they live. They are liars and terrorists. They will not compromise. They demand sole possession of the whole world. So there is only one solution. They must be exterminated."
There was a time when war covered the whole globe because of a similar causus beli. But in that former war the antagonist who proclaimed its desire to rule the world by annihilating its opponent did not have nuclear weapons. Such weapons came about only at the last phase of that war.
If the war of extermination of one side or the other continues and if the resolution of that war can only be extermination of one side by the other there must be some area outside of this fight, some arena or killing ground from which the rest of us can stand outside. So that when the annihilation is over there will be peace and raising children and growing and trading food and treating one another with compromise and decency and law so that humanity may live.
But, son, you say only the other side, your enemy, wants to exterminate your side. Yet the conclusion of your argument seems to me to inevitably be that your enemy must be exterminated.
And it is your side which has nuclear weapons which they refuse to admit to but in this they lie. Nuclear weapons if used will not be able to be contained. Israel – or Palestine or the Levant or Canaan, the series of names is tiresome! – will be a radioactive wasteland. But so will New York and London and Moscow and Vancouver and Paris and ...
So as for your argument which I think I have restated fairly, that extermination is the end game (please convince me if I'm being unfair to you) ... I'm playing the referee in this fantasy of ours.
TIME OUT. One guy has a gun, the other has a knife. I'm taking away the gun for the safety of the spectators and substituting a knife. Now they both have knives and they are in the ring and the spectators are not. Have at it I guess, since neither of these bad guys are willing to stop. after the fight? The winner is a murderer. But the neighbourhood will still be alive. Too bad there's nobody in the real world to take away the nuclear gun.
Oh. I'M a hypocrite? The USA has and Russia has and China has nuclear weapons. The right to bear arms ought to be universal. So you guys, your side, Israelis, get to Bear nuclear arms. And also proclaim their right to annihilate 2 million people? The other guys, they don't get to bear nuclear arms because they are the bad guys?
That guy Gallant didn't say the IDF denies food and water and electricity to Gaza because all of those people are Hamas and human animals and we'll treat them as such? The IDF hasn't bombed crowded Gaza to rubble?
Young man, I'm not on board your war wagon. If you insist I'm going to have to be on the other side. Not my choice!!
I'm with Miko Peled and Norman Finkelstein and Max Blumenthal. They are in the right and you are in the wrong.
I truly appreciate the time you took to articulate your thoughts the way you did. I enjoyed the dramatic flair (well, you did warn me!)
I have to make 2 important corrections:
First: I have no ‘side’. When I talk with friends in Europe, they often accuse me of being ‘pro-Trump’, even when all I did was rectify factual errors in their thinking, without ever making any claim about Trump, nor about my own position towards him. Now, I actually am pro-Trump, but nothing in my words to them could reasonably lead to that conclusion. In a polarized world of ‘my people’ versus ‘your people’, clear ‘we are right’ versus ‘you are wrong’, any defense, any correction, will indeed be seen as taking sides with ‘the others’. Where does that come from?
Second: I am not proposing an extermination as the ‘solution’. Where would I have hinted at such? That would be a major mistake in my writing, if anything in my words would let my readers believe that such would be my ‘inevitable’ solution.
What I am doing, and always do, is start by looking at the facts. And, where necessary, by those facts that are most often not highlighted, known or accepted. A lot becomes much clearer if you start with a proper taking stock of the lay of the land.
If we could stop wars, and give everyone knives, so only the belligerents are at risk, and none of the ‘spectators’ or surrounding innocents, or, even better, we give only the leaders calling for the wars a knife, to fight it out among themselves, at risk of their own lives, and not the lives of countless others, I’d be all for it. But then we’d quickly get back to a time where ‘heroes’ become leaders, with war and training and fighting on their mind, and not ‘wise men’, with the welfare of their people and those around them on their mind.
And I would not say you’re a hypocrite, at all. On the contrary, you show reasonable thinking, and try to apply it properly. Nothing wrong with that. You ran ahead of my intent, and that is the worst I can and want to claim about your comment.
This is an absolute mess of a situation, where the rot has been allowed to fester for way too long. Both sides have their own responsibility, where the Israeli side of mistakes is very well known (with a lot of propaganda mixed in, deserved or not) and the Palestinian side not so much.
My ‘wagon’, if you want me to use such idea, would be that Israel has a right to exist. If you want to go down the very basic realpolitik: the same right as Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and Jordan, created out of the ashes of the Ottoman Empire by its conquerors. Straight lines drawn on maps, cutting tribes, families, religion, etc. in different sides and nations.
I am still waiting for anyone to give me a good reason why Israel would have no right to exist. That would be hypocrisy, speaking from nations that were founded on the same principle as Israel was founded.
And to be clear: Palestinians ALSO have a right to a country of their own. For some of the same reasons.
I could go further, but I think this should suffice for now.
Again, thank you for the input, and the open and frank way you presented it!
Enough said. Events will play out as they must. No government is sacred. Governments can be changed or abolished and the people – Jews, Christians, Muslims, atheists ... – will still be there facing the same problem they had before the fighting began: how to live together in decency and peace. I'm paraphrasing Abe Lincoln there. "You cannot always fight ..." he said.
New here and have read about half your posts. Without a doubt, your work is some of the best. The bases for that opinion is your tremendous focus on details, and the really great effort to present what seems via logic true and avoid the all too common putting out click bate. Add to that, what makes your posts exceptional, is your willingness to take a good look at and consider, conflicting views.
Agree