Israel/Palestine
Related: About this forumThe Israeli Government is moderate - compared to some (many) Israelis
The following items are from Ha'aretz
You have to understand the culture in which we live, said Kedar. The only thing that deters [Hamas leaders] is a threat to the connection between their heads and their shoulders. When presenter Yossi Hadar asked if that could filter down the organizations ranks, Kedar replied: No, because lower down the considerations are entirely different. Terrorists like those who kidnapped the children and killed them the only thing that deters them is if they know that their sister or their mother will be raped in the event that they are caught. What can you do, thats the culture in which we live.
When Hadar said, We cant take such steps, of course, Kedar continued: Im not talking about what we should or shouldnt do. Im talking about the facts. The only thing that deters a suicide bomber is the knowledge that if he pulls the trigger or blows himself up, his sister will be raped. Thats all. Thats the only thing that will bring him back home, in order to preserve his sisters honor.
Therefore, in a time of war, the attacked nation is permitted to punish the enemy population with whatever measures it deems proper, like blocking supplies or electricity. It may bomb the entire area based on the judgment of the war minister and not wantonly put soldiers at risk deterrent measures to exterminate the enemy [are also allowed], Rabbi Dov Lior, the senior West Bank settler rabbi and the rabbi of the West Bank settlement of Kiryat Arba adjacent to Hebron, reportedly wrote.
The defense minister may even order the destruction of Gaza so that the south should no longer suffer, and to prevent harm to members of our people who have long been suffering from the enemies surrounding us, Lior continued.
/snip
Lior also supported the publication of the notoriously racist book Torat HaMelech, written by two top students of extremist Chabad-linked Rabbi Yitzchak Ginsburgh, Rabbis Yosef Elitzur and Yitzhak Shapira. Among other things, the book argues that the IDF should intentionally murder Arab babies during times of war which Ginsburgh interprets broadly to include almost any situation Israel has existed in since its founding. Like Lior, Ginsburgh also praised the mass murderer Goldstein, writing a book and naming it Baruch HaGever (Baruch the Strong) after him.
Loudly
(2,436 posts)And all you are experiencing is institutionalized hatred and terrorism.
intaglio
(8,170 posts)Or are they not to be considered?
Loudly
(2,436 posts)A pathetic devotion to continually doubling down on the worst investment they could possibly make.
intaglio
(8,170 posts)Or do you believe they are beyond such motives for cruelty?
Loudly
(2,436 posts)I believe that the Jews would welcome indifference as opposed to active animosity.
Muslims to chill is an absolute key to world peace.
intaglio
(8,170 posts)Israel has the support of the USA and most of Europe for much of the time.
Please do not spout Israeli propaganda as your own thought.
Loudly
(2,436 posts)Vaguely true, but aspirationally inaccurate.
intaglio
(8,170 posts)that includes those living both inside and outside Israel.
You seem totally ignorant of the fact that of the nearly 14 million Jews in the world the majority live outside Israel.
Even inside Israel the proportion of Jews is 75% not 100%
Now go away and start learning
Loudly
(2,436 posts)But I think you would agree that most Democrats support the notion of an America in which average people can happily thrive.
As for the majority of Jews living outside Israel, do you think the majority of them oppose Israel's identity as a sanctuary state for Jews or its right to enjoy peaceful coexistence with its neighbors?
Am I supposed to go away and start learning something to invalidate these truths?
intaglio
(8,170 posts)was false?
BTW as you get older you will realise "truth" is a meaningless word
Loudly
(2,436 posts)My experience is that the term doesn't become meaningless.
It is simply enriched by more information.
Tell me. When Jefferson wrote "we hold these truths to be self-evident," was he full of crap?
intaglio
(8,170 posts)Please define "truth" and using the antithesis "false" is not allowed.
As to the "Preamble to the Declaration of Independence"
1) all men are created equal - self-evidently not the case, an infant with brittle bone disease is not physically equal to an infant without.
2) that they are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights - self evidently untrue, aside from the fact there was no creator of man(kind) any such putative creator did not endow humankind with anything.
You mistake poetic political argumentation for reality.
shaayecanaan
(6,068 posts)we've got a real thinker here