Beautiful north turning black (Israel's forests burning)

[Minstrel Boy]

"Beautiful north turning black"

Rockets falling on open territories thought to be good news, but 20,000 dunam of forests and nature reserves have been burned by Hizbullah rockets

by Sharon Rofe-Ofir, July 28

As reports come in from the north on rockets falling in open territories, the country breathes a sigh of relief. But those open territories are actually forests and nature reserves across the north, which have so far absorbed hundreds of Katyusha rockets, severely damaging the health of the north's green countryside.

Over half a million trees have been burned to the ground due to Hizbullah rocket attacks on the north.

"It will take the north tens of years to bounce back and be a green pearl," said Galilee Area and Ramat Hagolan Jewish National Fund (JNF) Manager Michael Weinberger.

...

"We have been living in the Galilee for decades and the color green is part of our lives – today everything is black and it will take many years to bring the green back into sight," he added.

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3282711,00.html

[skids]

1. Lovely...

...both sides wrecking the land. This on top of the massive oil spill from the bombed Lebenase storage facility. Mother nature gets to be a casualty in every war, it seems.

[IndianaGreen]

2. Meanwhile that Nazi tart Condi continues to oppose a ceasefire

Opposing an immediate ceasefire will accomplish only one thing: more deaths and destruction.

[adriennui]

6. condi may be inept

but i resent you calling her a nazi especially if you're comparing her to nasrallah.

[IndianaGreen]

9. The rightwing thinks Condi is inept because we are not at war with Iran

Israel's bombing of Beirut is no different from Germany's bombing of Warsaw, or of Guernica. And Israel may have used incendiary bombs in Lebanon, like the US frequently used in Iraq.

[Tellurian]

14. America is not Bush and Condi. They didn't want a "fake" Peace..

We are America and the majority of us wanted to stop the killing
on both sides from the start.

aside:

"Nazi Tart" thats a keeper!<g>

[lumpy]

25. Nreo is more like it

Playing piano while Mideast burns.

[MsMagnificent]

3. We're supposed to feel sorry for Israel's TREES

When they're slaughtering hundreds of civilians?

[Minstrel Boy]

7. Must it be either/or?

My heart's heaviest for the defenseless innocents of Lebanon, but can't we agree that all of this is a disgrace and a tragedy?

[MrPrax]

11. Ditto...

I'll be honest...the older I get, I tend to like animals and the land over people. If I were Gaia, I would kill off the human.

[ConcernedCanuk]

18. "If I were Gaia, I would kill off the human" - yup, me too - -

.
.
.

I am not proud to be among the population of the creature that has the capability, and apparently the willingness, to destroy any life it feels necessary on this planet

The planet will do quite well without us humans

We have done nothing to improve it IMO

(sigh)

[MrPrax]

20. Yeah...

apparantly we don't want to do anything that might save the higher forms of life on this planet, because it might cost BUSINESS money???

What a wretched fiends we have become...our superior brains have been our downfall and we're too stupid to admit it.

Like the old saying goes--If an animal doesn't know it's ground, it's will either get lost or eaten.

[lumpy]

27. I have more respect for trees than I

do the human animal.

[MsMagnificent]

13. Hardly the same category

The Israeli government knew right from the start that launching its offensive would expose the north of Israel to heavy Katyusha rockets attacks. This was openly discussed at this first government's meeting on Wednesday: "Hezbollah is likely to respond to the Israeli attacks with massive rocket launches at Israel, and in that case, the IDF might move ground forces into Lebanon".<8> One cannot avoid the conclusion that for the Israeli army and government, endangering the lives of residents of northern Israel was a price worth paying in order to justify the planned ground offensive. They started preparing Israelis on that same Wednesday for what may be ahead: "'We may be facing a completely different reality, in which hundreds of thousands of Israelis will, for a short time, find themselves in danger from Hezbollah's! rockets', said a senior defense official. 'These include residents of the center of the country.'" <9> For the Israeli military leadership, not only the Lebanese and the Palestinians, but also the Israelis are just pawns in some big military vision.

http://www.counterpunch.org/reinhart07272006.html

We're all pawns, and it is all a disgrace and tragedy,
but isn't this rather like the adage of having pity on one who murdered his parents because he's now an orphan?
No, I'm all for the environment, but I won't mourn for their virtually self-immolated trees, not when innocent people are dying like that.

[Ragin_mad]

15. What about the defenseless civilians in Israel

Everyone seems to forget about them.

[martymar64]

23. They're pawns in this sick game just like the Lebanese

n/t

[IndianaGreen]

8. If it weren't so painful, I would be laughing at the irony

Once again, America's blocking of ceasefire calls by the world community stands as a shameful episode in an already shameful history of our country under Bush.

The killings must end!

[Tellurian]

12. America wants a cease fire, Bush and Condi are against a "fake" peace!

We are America and the majority of us wanted to stop the killing
on both sides from the start.

aside:

"Nazi Tart" thats a keeper!<g>

[Igel]

17. To be honest, I've had

that question for a couple of years, but usually couched as, "They're worrying about trees when they're trying to slaughter civilians?"

Olive trees have been an issue for some people.

[Scurrilous]

19. Olive Oil is a staple of the Palestinian diet...

...when people complain about the Israeli government bulldozing Palestinian olive groves, it's not just 'worrying about trees,' it's also worrying about people going hungry.

[Igel]

22. Yes, it is.

But then we've stopped talking about the off-quoted injunction showing that destroying trees is immoral per se, and moved to economics.

It's horrible to cut down old trees. And it's portrayed as that in some circles. It's really an economic issue, and that makes it cut both ways: Israel shouldn't destroy their livelihood, and people have a vested interest in protecting their property. If they're proud of their groves harboring snipers or "resistance", then they've signed on to pay the price; if they don't like it and are afraid, then it's Palestinians terrorizing Palestinians that's the real problem.

[lumpy]

26. Some of those Palestinian farmers

have been shot in their own orchards trying to protect their olive orchards/livelihood, by Israelis bulldozing those orchards. Cowardly.

[lumpy]

28. Israel considers any thing & everything a cover

hiding their enemy,whether it is an orchard, a church, a house, a group of civilians or an outhouse.
Israel's enemies do not discriminate where their bombs fall whether it's n orchard or a hospital. The question is, which side has the military power & tactical ability to discriminate between the enemy and the innocent.

[AnOhioan]

29. Neither side, apparently. n/t

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

21. Yes.

And the Buddha statues the Taliban blew up, and the mosque in Iraq the US blew up, and all the churches and museums and cities blown up in WWII, and...

It's not an either or.

[MsMagnificent]

30. I appreciate they're all losses

Terrible losses.

But again, IMO not nearly in the same category

I think the Buddha himself would rather see every shrine destroyed than one single life -- I could be wrong.
And I am cognizant that with some sects, any form of life. Maybe I'm not that evolved yet. Heck, no 'maybes' about it.
I partly wish I were, but then to feel the same grief for every tree, perhaps every monument, as I do for those innocents?
(Which of course takes yet more evolving: to care but not care, to see it all as the inevitable cycle, the trap of life.)

But to feel that same grief?
Unbearable. I can can barely bear this, along with Gaza and Iraq.

(inelegant syntax, but can't put it into better words right now)

[lovuian]

4. War is horrible and it makes no sense!!!

Scarring the countryside and the land!!!

[Gully Foyle]

5. Well

Pyrrhic victory
In more ways than one.

[treestar]

10. Horrible, but at this point the people are more to be pitied

Interesting one for the freepers to try to handle. They don't care about trees over people, do they?

[mike_c]

16. a dose of reality so surreal that it almost seems off topic...

...but forests burn regularly, and recover without difficulty. I did my doctoral work on a southern military base and oddly enough, some of the healthiest forest tracts were on the artillary range-- they were healthy because they burned regularly. Those Galilee fires look like they might be severe enough to replace stands of trees-- we call that forest renewal in the ecology biz.

My reply in this thread seems surreal because of the context....

[lumpy]

24. Palestinian olive orchards destroyed.

http://www.palestinemonitor.org/Special%20Section/Horrors%20of%20Gaza/Olive_branches_lie_buried.htm

Devistation of life and livelihood.

[KamaAina]

31. The forests are the watershed.

Without them, Israel will have to look elsewhere for water -- like grabbing even more from its neighbors. Said neighbors will justifiably be royally P.O.'d, and we're one flight down towards Hell on the spiral staircase...

[daleo]

32. There was a move, The Thin Red Line, that explored this theme

How war assaults the natural environment, as well as humanity:

"A major theme of the film is the contrast between the beauty of nature and the horrors of war: in addition to the contrast between the idyllic life of the natives and the nightmare of battle, the camera often breaks away from bloody action scenes to linger on images such as a reptile on a tree, or a chick being born, or the indigenous foliage of the island like bamboo forests or the grass of Hill 210. The film also explores biblical themes such as the corruption of eden, personified in this case by war and conflict. Naturalist cinematography is used to highlight the eternal beauty of nature which is later infected by the horrors and violence witnessed during the brutal combat scenes."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Thin_Red_Line_(1998_film)