Middle East Crisis

I didn’t think you had the balls. Now I wonder if you have the brains.

With all due respect, hail Miss Manners, etc: Good lord, man, what have you been smoking?

I do not think that anyone here believes that all the problems of the region can be traced to Israel.

I also do not think many rational, informed people believe the actions by Israel have been measured, appropriate or in accordance with international law and the conventions of wartime.

Yes, Hezbollah is a terrorist organization. And they’ve killed a great many Israelis and continue to do so.

But from the beginning of this 22-day-and-counting war the IDF has deliberately destroyed roads, airports and gas stations, preventing civilians from fleeing. They also deliberately targeted and destroyed a UN outpost. The American University of Beirut Medical Center (AUBMC) is running out of fuel. Today they defined everyone left in the area as a de facto terrorist.

Lebanese Casualties: 835, of whom slightly more than a third are children. 800,000 homeless.

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You might wish to take a look at this as well. The War on Children is an illegal, immoral act by a nation which is clearly confident that in the current anti-Islam political climate it will not be sanctioned in any meaningful way, shape, or form.

In this at least they are perfectly right.

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But you’re absolutely correct, Boris, that the war in Iraq is bloodier and even more absurd and futile. What I’m not getting is why you present that as a plus.

We can look at the war in Lebanon objectively. It’s possible. Let’s leave Mel Gibson out of it, though. And perhaps leave the US out of it as well, although they’ll be hurt. Because they’re not actually in it yet, are they?

Now I’m going to make a daring suggestion:

Let’s leave religion and race out of it as well. Because according to Israel this war is a direct response to the actions taken by Hezbollah in conducting a raid and kidnapping soldiers and not about Jewish hatred for Muslims or Muslim hatred against Jews. Or Aussie-American hatred for rationality.

So let’s react to it in that context, as a war by two nations in a political hotspot. Now all the “weep for the persecuted Jews” moralizing makes no more (and no less) sense than “weep for the persecuted Muslims” and we can turn our beady eye to the political and legal actions, consequences, and lessons here.

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Well said Borris. Whilst they are some easy points, people often forget and quite the figers in the hundreds of civilians that mis placed US and IDF bombs have killed. This is a great tragedy and one that means every political avenue must be explored with vigor before commencing armed conflict. However it is a salient that the IDF is an Army acting on behalf of a state in a war, a state that in its short lifetime has been under constant threat of attack and destruction by midnless thugs wanting to spread their own disgusting version of a peaceful and intelligent religion with a lot to offer. However Hezbollah is not an army, either for a state or a religion it is a terrorist organisation, like the IRA is and PLO is – at least the IRA had some form of poliitcal wing that you could converse with. IDF aims its weapons and threats what suports those threats. PLO and Hizbollah destroys cafes and discos on purpose with no regard for human life. IDF has said the bombing of Qana was a mistake. Hezbollah rocketing Hifa is not.

ps Hezbollah ~ Hizbollah ?

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Thanks Boris! I wasn’t sure if you’d have the courage either, I’m glad you did

An excellent post, and “… when Israeli rockets kill civilians, they have missed their targets, and that when Hizbollah rockets kill civilians, they have scored a deliberate hit.” really hits the nail right on the head.

I think it is also important to bear in mind that for the past decade Israel has been unilaterally seeking peace in the region. Unilaterally because the terrorists around are unwilling to talk to them. It has been 6 years since Israel withdrew from Lebanon, and a good while since Israel withdrew from Gaza. Given some time without terrorist attacks on it, Israel would probably have withdrawn from the vast majority of the West Bank too. Israel is not, as many people seem to think, intent on expansion, enslavement, or any of the other accusations levelled at it. It is in fact striving for peace, and the safety of it’s civilians, and those countries who realise this (Egypt, Jordan) demonstrate it in the form of safe and stable borders, and relatively prosperous peaceful economies.

Israel is clearly exercising a disproportionate response to the provocation, however their declared aim does go further, to the disablement of Hizbollah. That is something which only Israel has any chance of doing, and it is something which is clearly needed, as the UN and everyone agrees.

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Well, Jack, we agree that the most important quote here is

it is still true, in principle, that when Israeli rockets kill civilians, they have missed their targets, and that when Hizbollah rockets kill civilians, they have scored a deliberate hit.

What we disagree on is whether or not it is true. Take a look at the aerial photographs of Beirut and tell me whether those residential neighborhoods were completely populated by terrorists or whether Israel deliberately flattened the houses of civilians.

If these really were accidents, if the IDF is really as incompetent as Boris implies, then I really do think it’s time we took the guns away, because this is madness.

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raincoaster, I want to marry you and have your babies.

I will be responding to this article by the idiot in chief (in my own inimitable way) when the rigours of penury permit.

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I’m afraid on this one I’ll have to diverge a bit from you Boris.

When the most recent chapter of this whole mess started Hizbollah kidnapped a couple of Israeli soldiers and killed a few others.

Now this is most certainly a heinous crime, murder and kidnap – however you paint them – are, but the Israel government described the action as an act of war.

Sorry but to my eyes there is no way in hell that the murder of eight soldiers and abduction of two more can be described as an act of war. It was a criminal act, a dirty nasty criminal act purpetrated by a nasty bunch of criminals and needed to be dealt with as such.

Israels response to this was, to all intents and purposes, to declare war on Hizbollah and proceed to drop enough bombs on Southern Lebanon to have to get its personal diplomatic poodle- the US – to speed up the delivery of more high powered bunker-buster bombs. I can only guess that they were running low to require this, with Israels arsenal that’s one hell of a lot of ordinance.

Now I realise that Israel as an entity does not intend to kill civilians, and I know that HIzbollah couldn’t care a monkeys cuss who these rockets fall upon. But honestly did Israel really give the Lebanese government anyything like the time it required to try to solve this crisis? Was time and safe passage provided to the large civilian population? When the UN requested a short cessation to allow this it was denied as unneccesary hours before they accidentally bombed over 50 children off the face of the planet in Qana.

Of course this was not deliberate, but was there really a significant military advantage gained by Israel over Hizbollah by denying the requested 72 hours?

Finally what are the longer term rammifications of this upon the Lebanese government, Israel has effectively castrated them in the eyes of a great many of its own people. The government of the Lebanon desperately needed support and maybe, in time with the right amount of international support and encouragement, Hizbollah would have been disarmed.

Instead the primary income of the Lebanon has once more been devastated and getting close to a million Lebanese have been displaced. What better grounds for recruitment for organisations like Hizbollah than the poor and displaced, the bitter remnants of families killed in the conflict? Could there have been a better outcome of these kidnappings from Hizbollah’s point of view than the past few days, they may have lost ordinance and manpower, but bombs can be reaquired and there will be no shortage to angry youths willing to join them after this debacle.

Such a pity for a place that only months ago looked like it may have been dragging itself away from its past and towards a democratic and wealthy future. It is that future that the Islamists fear most and Israel has it seems to me, provided a great service to the extremists by its actions.

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Boris, we expect you to come up with an oblique view of these things. Here you have surpassed yourself. An excellent piece of commentary.

It’s a gigantic conspiracy, Boris, they say, and it is high time you did something about it. And believe me, if I thought it would make a blind bit of difference, I would.

The world is full of I’m-right-you’re-wrong opinionistas with their tiresome cry that something must be done (MY something, naturally). But some issues – and this is one – are almost too big for us mortals to grasp. I confess to being confused by it, a subject steeped in events going back to the Old Testament. It must be quite literally the longest-running political problem on Earth. What good would Boris do by banging out yet another “solution”, as demanded by some of his correspondents? At least he has the guts to admit it and stick to an admirably honest – if somewhat resigned – overview of the situation. Well done that man.

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“it’s time we took the guns away, because this is madness.” – Yes we could stop selling the IDF arms, at which point is Syria and the others going to stop arming Hezbollah – in short no. Then you leave Isreal open to attack, unless you’d like to send more overstretch NATO troops to not just keep the two sides apart but activly defend Isreal when the unavoidable invasion and ethnic cleansing begins. Yes a wonderful idea if everyone could put down their weapons and chill out – while we’re at it, why don’t we ask Bono to pop by and give everyone a great big hug. Isreal have made active concession after active concession ever since Yitzhak Rabin was murdered over a decade ago. often these concessions have done nothing for political will inside Isreal and have never, ever caused the terrorism to lesson in and around such a beautiful region. I personally remember being so upset when visiting the Wailing wall seeing armed guards there to stop attacks on civillians.

“But honestly did Israel really give the Lebanese government anyything like the time it required to try to solve this crisis?” well they’ve had 21 years to sort out the problem of Hezbollah and they have failed – one the principal declared aims is to fight the Israeli occupation of Southern Lebanon, which ended 6 years ago… rocket attacks and incurrsions havn’t ended for the people of Hifa.

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it is still true, in principle, that when Israeli rockets kill civilians, they have missed their targets, and that when Hizbollah rockets kill civilians, they have scored a deliberate hit. Boris the Bozo

If you believe that Bozzer you’re even more gullible than in my wildest dreams.

So how many terrorists were in the power station then?

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It’s hard to say. Even Hezbollah’s numbers are iffy. Great reading, this Haaretz article, particularly the comments.

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Question: If an aggressor goes into battle with a baby strapped to their chest, and that baby ends up getting killed, is it the moral responsibility of the baby-strapped aggressor, or the baby-killing defender?

Serious question folks, because I think it is the answer to this question that determines where one falls in relation to the terrible events now transpiring. One either feels it is morally excusable to kill innocents in defense of self and state, or, that is is morally unjustified to attack when one knows there is a moderate-to-high chance of killing innocents.

If one takes the morally unjustified position (which I think most people would prefer to take, even if they don’t, i.e. that pragmatism wins out and they defend themselves) – how does one then combat an aggressor who uses such tactics, since they can seemingly attack at will without fear of retribution?

Serious answers please folks, because I’m beginning to feel that unless I can satisfactorily answer the above questions I really don’t have the right to ‘bitch’ about the Israeli tactics.

It is not a clear ethical answer either way as I see it – makes me wish I was back at Uni so as to ask my professors, in their absence I’ll ask the ‘enlightened’ readership of Boris’ blog.

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War is war. Everyone understands that except the people nattering on about how Israel doesn’t kill civilians.

I’m in favour of a ceasefire and UN peacekeepers, and as a Canadian (we do a lot of that sort of thing) I fully realize how difficult and dangerous and possibly doomed this will be.

But it would be better than this, and I have no hesitation whatsoever about saying that.

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What a sad and unexpected article from Boris.

No mention of the Yanks wanting to broker a ceasefire on one side while shovelling in weapons to the Zionists on the other, using British airports as staging posts. No mention of the fact that the UK and the US aren’t prepared to critcise Israel whatever atrocities they perform. What has happerned to you Boris, has the party central office come down like a ton of bricks or are these really your views?

Open your eyes and see that the Israelis are still expecting the sympathy of the whole world for what happened to the Jews in WW2, and using this as an excuse for the most horrendous present-day behaviour.

I fear you’re as much a closet totalitarian as Blair (God help us).

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What Raincoaster said.

Not much to add, really, apart from taking issue with one point. You describe Israel as ‘a country responding, however incompetently, to direct aggression against its own people from a neighbouring failed state.’

Sorry, but my understanding was that Lebanon, having once been a shattered state, was in the process of doing a damn fine job of succeeding again. Virtually from scratch. They’d got themselves out from under Syrian and Israeli influence. They’d established a working democratic state. And within the terms of that democracy they’d started to slowly and painfully deal with the presence of Hezbollah.

Fat chance of that happening now. Hezbollah are sucking in new recruits like wasps to a honey jar. Israel can, and probably will, knock them back strategically – but that’s just dealing with symptoms, not causes. They’ll be back. And they’ll keep coming back until the international community starts to figure out a peaceful solution to the presence of Isael in that part of the world (and the consequent effect on the Palestinians).

You’ve been to Iraq. You’ve seen what violence achieves. Do you really think Israel throwing its weight around to prove it’s the meanest SOB in the region is going to IMPROVE Middle East relations?

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“The darkest places in Hell are reserved for those who maintain their neutrality in times of moral crisis.” –Dante

CNN reports:

As of Tuesday, 557 Lebanese civilians and soldiers have died and 2,128 have been wounded in the conflict, according to Lebanon’s Internal Security Forces.

Israel has reported 54 deaths, including 19 civilians killed by Hezbollah rocket attacks.

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Thanks for those figures Raincoaster, though they’ll make no difference to the vast majority who think that Israel is entitled to do what they like to any other country, whenever they like, knowing that if they get any criticism, their extremely effective propangada machine (it’s certainly fooled Boris) will simply parrot its normal claim that the people complaining are ‘Anti-Semitic’. (Although the majority population of the countries surrounding Israel are also Semitic).

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I feel very sorry for the good Muslims and Christians of Lebanon who were aiming to bring their agricultural nation into the European Economic Area and perhaps eventually the European Union. These projects are all suspended now.

I think there is room for criticism of the Israeli response, though I actually think Blair is handling this quite well.

As for Iraq, at least the allies are in a position to stop Teheran expanding into it’s borders, Saddam would never have been able to protect his people (not that I’m suggesting he cared for his people) from the Ayatollahs. Sixty per cent of Iraqis voting showed some signs of promise, unfortunately some of the men with guns seem to want to become another Iran with no liberation for women.

The FT on Tuesday was saying that Iran have until August 31st (by virtue of a UN resolution) to suspend their Uranium Enrichment. I hope Hizbollah are not allowed to distract the international community from the important work of de-nuking the Ayatollahs.

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One last comment before I actually do some work today:

Blair, I must admit, surprised me, and in a good way. He didn’t actually do anything, but it’s remarkable to hear a world leader rebuking Syria and Iran. And it could never be the US taking on Syria; they have as much invested there as they have in Israel.

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Not one of your best, Boris. You, and other apologists for what the Israel is doing to Arabs, forgets that the State was created by means of its own terrorism. I am old enough to remember what the Irgum Zvei Leumi and the Stern Gang did to the British in the days of the Mandate. They created terror then and have continued with it ever since.
The fact that they have disposed the Palestinians of their land, presumably is matter of no importance in your eyes – but then being of Turkish antecedents, no doubt you think Northern Cyprus is also OK.
But as to Lebanon, perhaps we should arm the Lebanese so that they can protect themselves from the brave flyers of the IDF bombing undefended targets.

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So I assume that when the IRA were blowing Belfast to bits in 1972 and British soldiers were being killed in a 25 year period, you would have said say that London should have blown the Irish Republic and Dublin to pieces ? Think about it….

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Reading some of the above comments, I have to assume some people missed:

“if I thought it would make a blind bit of difference, I would [say something]. I can see that the Israeli strategy seems to be disastrous, and is turning terrorists into martyrs.”

Boris’ position seems pretty sound. In effect, I don’t like what’s happening, but it’s not as bad as Iraq, and I voted for that, so what weight does my opinion carry now?

I think that’s a brave argument from a politician, certainly a refreshing one.

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But the point is he DID say something. Otherwise we’d have nothing to comment on.

I refer you to Dante’s remark.

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Boris…

I’ve been following this blog for what seems like ages, and I can’t remember a single post from you that inspired such a passionate response in the comments column.

Wouldn’t this be a good time to break that rule of yours that stops you replying to the comments?

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S Roberts it tires me when people try and directly compare the IRA and any other 20th / 21st century problem. It was never an IRA stated aim to destroy this country or eradicate the Protestants. Further more the IRA, whilst inexcusable, had a mechanism of coded warnings etc for a reason their target was millitary / paramillitary inferstructures. Yes they did have a habbit of beating / knee caping other paras but not a cafe full of teens having a latte.

Hurd tried this ludicrous comparison over the Balkan conflict – he was as wrong then as you appear to be now. I draw everyones attention to a book called Unfinest Hour by Brendan Simms. The inept handling of that conflict by the EU and in some parts the UK’s handling is culpable, should be on everyones minds now. Thus fiddling about calling for a ceasefire while Rome burns is unforgivable.

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Mark Gammon Wouldn’t this be a good time to break that rule of yours that stops you replying to the comments?

Forget it mate, that’d require a full set of balls and at least half a backbone.

Radio silence will be maintained for the duration of the emergency.

I think it’s a miracle he wrote as much as he did even if it is uninformed bollocks.

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Question: If an aggressor goes into battle with a baby strapped to their chest, and that baby ends up getting killed, is it the moral responsibility of the baby-strapped aggressor, or the baby-killing defender

Chris, it’s a moral responsibility to shoot the c**t in the head as opposed to the Israeli strategy of using a bunker buster/cluster bomb to take out the gook, the baby and the shopping mall they were standing in.

How about a question on football?

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Perhaps things aren’t that bad. At least UK interest rates have gone up by 0.25% today so (as my mortgage is paid off, and I’m looking to move house) my savings will earn a tiny bit more, and perhaps there might even be a fall in house prices (fat chance!).

At least it’s a crumb of cheer to get me away from these ‘Protocols of the Elders of Texas’ or whatever.

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Well a Boris did post a very funny comment on that Haaretz article. But our Boris only talks to Vicus, to Melissa, and to God.

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Slightly less flippant answer.

If you are suggesting that your question is in some way analagous to the Israeli attack on Qana (where the IDF claims H’zBallah hid behind civilians) I’d have to say, that it’s a false analogy.

For want of a better reason only because you can’t claim either side of the Lebanon conflict is an aggressor or defender unless you look at the last 60 years or so which blurs the respective roles a bit. Anyway, in answering your question, let’s drop the aggressor/defender stuff because those are just labels mostly determined by perspective.

So what we have, for the sake of argument, is someone who has strapped a baby to their chest to stop his/her opponents shooting at him/her whilst being able to shoot back with impunity.

The answer to your dilemma in the latter proposition is very simple, the responsibility lies solely with the person who brought the baby INTO the combat area where death is an extremely likely outcome of engagement. This is NOT, however, the case in Lebanon where the ‘baby’ is already in the field of conflict and (using your analogy) strapped to the defender not the aggressor. Both sides, however, STILL have to make a decision about whether to engage or not. Note that engagement is entirely a one sided decision when aerial bombing is involved.

But, I hear your anguished cry, how then is poor Israel to prevent missiles being lobbed over the border if they can’t take out the terrorists with a nice, undiscriminating anti-personnel cluster bomb?!?

Simple, they send in ground troops and engage in the old time honoured fashion. It’s often easy to spot civilians in these circumstances because they are the ones without guns and missiles and are sometimes in nappies.

The problem, from Israel’s viewpoint with this latter approach is that it’s very expensive on military lives (soldiers, you know. the guys that actually get paid for being shot at) So we can come to a simple conclusion, and the reason the Israel deserves our strongest censure, is that Israel values the lives of their military personnel VASTLY more highly than the lives of Lebanese civilians.

To the tune of about 40:1 by my estimate.

And yes, I agree, Britain and the US are JUST as bad as Israel. It is my considered opinion (backed up by the opinion of a number of international lawyers) that Blair and Bush are war criminals in terms of UN and international law.

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PaulD seems to abdicate his moral authority, saying “It’s all too confusin’ for me, guv’ner!”

Nuts. This is possibly the single example of Middle-East conflict that can be taken out of context and debated on its mathematics alone:

8 Israeli soldiers dead + 2 kidnapped = roughly:
500 Lebanese adult civillians
+ 250 Lebanese children (presumed civillians except, one assumes, by the IDF)
+ 100 Hizbullah guerillas
+ 40 Israeli soldiers
+ 20 Israeli civillians

(all dead).

Chris B defends the murder of civillians by saying “they’re just in the way, and it’s Hizbullah’s fault”. The statement that “Hizbullah is hiding in the civillian population” is untrue, and in any case does not relieve the IDF of responsibility for those deaths.

Israel’s stated goal of “stopping Hizbullah” was unattainable from the start. And the continuing slaughter makes it less so with each passing hour. Worse yet, the longer the international community looks away (and I mean here particularly the elements of that community who voted against the UN call for ceasefire) the more Islamist organisations will reap the benefits in recruits and funding.

“They also serve who only stand and wait.”

The victims of the Holocaust knew that.

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i noticed as i skimmed down the comments a few references to the IRA, however i didn’t read them totally so please do forgive me if somebody has already brought up this point, but the current situation is like conducting airstrikes on dublin in retaliation for the canary wharf bombings. it seems to have been forgotten that the lebanon is in fact a SECULAR DEMOCRACY, over half of the cabinet is in fact made up of christians of various denominations, and i don’t see how attacking UN observation posts and villages full of children is dealing with the terrorist element, and remember that those two attacks were after all deliberate. in fact the IDF only stopped shelling Qana because they began seeing news reports from inside the town. also do not forget that the attack on the UN post was certainly deliberate, you don’t stop shelling and then begin shelling the rescue parties “by mistake”. wether or not there is a grand zionist conspiracy, i am not going to speculate, after all there is evidence for both there being one and it all being crap.

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There are essentially two issues in this debate, the first being whether Israel was right to begin attacking Hizbollah/Southern Lebanon, and the second being whether they have gone about it in the right way. I haven’t spoken to a single person who supports the second, although opinions are much more evenly split on the first. I know lots of people who follow the “plight of the oppressed” logic, that the Lebanese are suffering, and so Israel must be in the wrong (very typical I find of Israel/Palestine debates). However on the whole people will take a more balanced approach to the issue.

Either way, it is generally agreed that Israel is conducting this war very poorly. It is worth noting though that this is unusual for Israel. Israel does have one of the most effective intelligence services in the world, along with one of the most effective armies, and usually they are much more discriminant in their targetting. In the recent conflict in Gaza for example, the Economist recently reported that just over 100 people had been killed, slightly more than half of whom were civilians. This means that Israel managed to attain a successful targetting rate of nearly 50%, which is extremely high by anyone’s standards.

I have been variously a supporter of the Palestinian cause or that of the Israelis over the years, but for the last few years I have been fairly consistently in support of Israel. However, the astonishing number of civilians who have been killed, the bombing of civilian infrastructure, the bombing of the UN station, and the reluctance to use ground troups has been surprising. The Israelis are not stupid, and realise I’m sure that this will fuel militant feeling in Lebanon, weaken the favourable government of Lebanon, probably not destroy or disarm Hizbollah, and by killing UN observers damage international opinion. Consequently I suspect there may be a further motive for this military action which we have not seen yet.

For the moment I’m maintaining my position, supportive of Israel’s invasion and right to it, but critical of the means they have used.

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Yes Metro, I also find this ‘Hizbolla hides in civilian areas’ a bit implausible.

Let’s face it most people are pretty sensitive to getting themselves plastered over a few square feet and, even the most rabid base jumpers and extreme sports addicts, are likely to head for the nearest underground car park if they see a missile launcher getting erected in the vicinity. Or do the IDF think we believe the lebanese are so indescribably thick that they’ve failed to associate the launching of missiles with about 400 lbs of high explosive landing on them half an hour later?

The other explanation offered for this curious behaviour is that Hizbolla effectively imprison the local civilian population while they are launching missiles, presumably to attract a lot of irate international criticism of Israeli tactics. Okay, that sounds plausible at first glance; maybe Hizbolla are a bunch of murdering scum who would walk over a pit of newborn babes to achieve their goals.

Seems a bit odd then that Hizbolla spend so much time effort and money in community support and building hospitals etc. It also doesn’t explain why the surviving local population (assuming the IDF don’t get all of ‘em) still keep singing the praises of Hizbolla when all the fuss has died down.

I would have thought they’d be a bit pissed off if they’d really been used as a human sandbag.

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According to Sky News, there’s a ‘masturbate-a-thon’ to raise money for charity and to celebrate, if you can believe it, Channel 4’s ‘national wank week’

Link if you don’t believe me
(http://news.sky.com/skynews/article/0,,30000-1229695,00.html)

Apparently some people are going for records (8 hrs – male record, 6 hrs female record)

With the crap in the opening article Bozzer could win hands down.

Or should it be hands up and down?

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I have to say I’m generally with raincoaster on the Israel conflict.

As for the baby strapped to an agressor – it’s the agressors responsibility. When you have a child you will do ANYTHING to protect it – crawl, beg, and yes even kill or die yourself. But if you’re faced with the prospect of the baby dying anyway, through thirst, starvation or bombs/gunfire then, between a rock and a hard place it’s anyones guess what you’ll do. And you won’t know till you’re there.

Have to disagree with raincoaster when it comes to Boris though. He has/does respond to comments on the blog, when he wants to. Trust me I’ve been around for…. ooh ages. I was here at the birth….. awwwww.

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I’m very disappointed with your article – the casual condemnation of the Palestinians’ elected leaders, the lack of recognition that Hizbollah are fighting on behalf of the downtrodden Palestinians and so on.

Why do Conservative politicians have such a knee jerk pro-American attitude? I’m inclined to think that it’s cowardice stemming from a fear that their careers will be damaged if they choose a different attitude.

As for Mel Gibson, I’m sure that he would get a brilliant reception on the occupied West Bank and in many different parts of the world whether christian, muslim, hindu etc – one has to ask oneself why Israelis are so unpopular?

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@Metro – To be clear, I wasn’t defending the murder of civilians – what I was doing was asking for an answer to an ethical scenario.

Perhaps I didn’t make the second part of my question clear; namely that, if it is morally unjustified to defend oneself where it is highly likely that an innocent might die (which I noted was the preferred position) then how does one defend oneself? I did not mean this as a challenge, rather as a genuine question requiring a pratical answer.

I will trust that your accusation of my defense of civilian murder was precipitated by a misinterpretation of my argument. I was simply asking for the readership’s opinions as to alternative strategies that might be employed that would negate the majority of risk to non-combatants. To ask such a question does not condone, nor support, the position of harming innocents in order to neutralise an aggressor. It is exactly what it is, a question.

The final part of my post was saying not that you don’t have the right to ‘bitch’ about the Israeli tactics, but rather that I feel it negates my moral right to critcise the Israelis when I cannot generate an alternative strategy. (Thus the use of the emphasised I in my post.)

Perhaps the only moral thing to do is for the Israelis to call an immediate cease-fire and then simply suffer the random and indiscriminate murder of innocents within Israel. If they did this then the entire rational community would be agreed on who the ‘bad guy’ was and perhaps the international community would mobilise a peace-keeping force to engage and defeat anyone involved in acts of murder within the area. However, why would the Israelis have any cause to believe such a force would appear when elsewhere in the world, notably in the Sudan presently, there has been a clear programme of genocide that the United Nations has shamefully allowed to be perpetrated. (Rwanda is another ealier example). Hence my own personal reluctance to critic the Israeli actions given this history. And that is without mention of the most terrible of crimes, the Holocaust.

I therefore, honestly and humbly, ask anyone, what can be done?

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Hi ChrisB. My apologies for the misunderstanding. But truthfully, I feel that the chosen analogy is false. Mainly because Israel had a choice. They have freed hostages through negotiation before–what was new in this situation?

Can we agree though, that the moral thing to do, whatever it might actually be, is not to actively target civillians and the UN?

Apparently Hizbullah has asked for a ceasefire, in return for which Nasrullah has promised that they will not target any settlement or city of Israel.

I respectfully suggest that since the avowed objective of the IDF was to stop Hizbullah’s rocket attacks, they should accept.

Or am I crazy?

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I’d like to congratulate Boris for at last strapping on the pads, donning the gloves and the helmet, clasping firmly the bat, and marching out to the wicket to take a swing at all this. Bravo!

I’ve been wondering if the political classes in Britain have simply decided to look away from the Israel-Hezbollah war, in the hope that it would all simply go away. Boris’ article last week – on the Dome, of all things -, certainly seemed part and parcel of this averting of eyes. I was wondering what Boris would write about this week. The threat that bicycles would have to carry licence plates?

But, no, Boris has finally come good. He has looked at the matter squarely in the face, and expressed an opinion about it at last.

But having applauded Boris for going out to bat on a very sticky wicket, I would like to suggest that he took a very wild swing at the first ball. Mel Gibson is irrelevant, except if one wants to somehow tar any critic of Israel as another Mel Gibson. I for one would not like to be associated with the producer of the blood-soaked Passion of the Christ.

But Boris connects with the second ball, and hits it past square leg for a four, when he writes: “I can see that the Israeli strategy seems to be disastrous, and is turning terrorists into martyrs.” It’s done a bit more than that: it’s united Lebanon against Israel:

In an event that would have been unthinkable a few months ago, in this country where politics is locked into religious lines, the Maronite Catholic patriarch — the spiritual leader of the most pro-Western populace — convened a meeting this week of religious leaders of other communities, Shiite and Sunni Muslims and several varieties of Christians . . . Their joint statement, condemning the Israeli “aggression,” hailed “the resistance, mainly led by Hezbollah, which represents one of the sections of society.” (New York Times)

And then Boris blocks the third ball by faux-meekly describing himself as “some obscure Tory spokesman”. Since when has Boris been ‘obscure’, huh? But it perhaps answers the question of why political figures seem so strangely silent on this issue: they don’t think their opinions matter.

I’ll leave it at that for now. I’m really just simply glad Boris went out to bat.

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I think I’ll carry on my commentary.

Boris takes a big swing at the fourth ball, and misses completely.

“The real problem in the region is not Israel, but what it represents to the Islamicists who surround it. The difference between Israel and her neighbours is that Israel is a capitalist democracy, with all the freedom and tawdriness that entails. They don’t give a monkey’s in Teheran about the fate of the poor Palestinians.”

The real problem with the region, I would suggest, is oil. It is for this reason alone that it has suffered the unholy attentions of first the British, and now the Americans, for an entire century. Israel has simply been yet another humiliation. What they hate is not our freedoms, but our guns and our bombs. And it is absurd to suggest that the inhabitants of the region are indifferent to the plight of the Palestinians: what has happened to the Palestinians is quite likely to happen to them, as Lebanon has just found out.

And the fifth ball catches the edge of Boris’ bat, and heads straight for the hands of first slip. At which point Boris trudges back to the pavilion.

“it is still true, in principle, that when Israeli rockets kill civilians, they have missed their targets, and that when Hizbollah rockets kill civilians, they have scored a deliberate hit.”

What Israeli rockets? They’re not firing rockets. They’re dropping laser-guided munitions, which land with pin-point accuracy. Which is why we may know that the destruction of the southern suburbs of Beirut, and the bombing of Red Cross vans, and UN observation posts, was perfectly deliberate.

By contrast, it is the unguided rockets of Hezbollah which are entirely aimless – and consequently far less destructive. Their purpose, if anything, has been to terrify Israelis. And in this at least they have been highly successful.

Boris, by my account, scored only four runs off one ball. And that is in recognizing that the Israeli strategy has been disastrous. In fact, it is not clear to me that there is any strategy, since it seems to change from week to week, if not from day to day.

And a disastrous strategy must imply also disastrous defeat. Whatever happens, this is a victory for Hezbollah and its leader, Sheik Nasrallah, and a defeat for Israel. Israelis have been learning these last few weeks that, for all its tanks and warplanes and laser-guided bombs, the IDF cannot protect them from Hezbollah. It is this that is going to be the primary lesson of this futile war.

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I have just seen figures from Save the Children that 49% of 800 deaths in Lebanon and 33% of wounded are children. It is a relief to hear from Boris Johnson that the Israelis are NOT trying to kill civilians. Let’s hope they don’t change their minds.

The truth is Hizbollah attacked and captured Israeli SOLDIERS who are occupying tracts of land in Lebanon and Syria and half of Palestine. In response, Israel unleased massive air attacks in civilian areas including appartment blocks, bridges, ports,highways with no apparent thought for civilian casualties, all in the name of self defence (even the name IDF reminds one of Orwell’s 1984) and the War on Terror. Hisbollah did not fire any rockets until the Israeli air raids into civilian areas of Beiruit.

Ah yes, the War on Terror, supported wholeheartedly by Mr Johnson and the Conservatives and resulting in an escalation of fear, hatred and terror throughout the ME and beyond. A policy that can never win nor do anything but create ever more division in our society. It is easy to sneer at well meaning people who call for a ceasefire and negotiation as sentimental and naive. Was it not a great deal more sentimental and naive of Mr Johnson and his party to beleive that a quick invasion of Iraq who bring joy and light throughout the ME? Mr Johnson tells us he has not given up hope. Tell that to the mothers of the children playing football in Bahgdad this week.

How deeply depressing that the alternative to Blair is Boris.

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All quiet on the Henley front recently.

Thanks, idlex, for your thought-provoking comments. I, too, am glad Boris stepped up to the plate, but I call what he accomplished there the same way.

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I’ve been thinking this whole issue over for a while now and I’ve come to the conclusion that I don’t care who wins this battle any more; it’s irrelevant.

To explain this position I need to take a step back and look at something Mr. Blair said recently. When asked, by a journalist, how he could sleep at night having killed 100,000 Iraqi civilians, Mr. Blair replied “I think you’ll find it’s closer to 50,000.” To say that my jaw dropped when I read this is inadequate to describe the gamut of emotions which ran through me as I considered this statement. “Is he for real?” I thought! So the proposition we must accept is that 50,000 deaths is “pretty much okay”? What would the upper limit be then? If he’d been accused of killing a million would he have justifying it by saying that he had, in fact, only rubbed out half a million and that this was perfectly acceptable? Were there estimates of this magnitude before he dispatched the army and if not, what went wrong? Surely these are questions which must be put to him. Now, of course, I understand why Blair has been so circumspect in his criticism of Israel. He’s a far more successful mass murderer than in Olmert’s most febrile dreams. All thanks to his Iraqi campaign and his unquestioning support of US foreign policy and military tactics.

We may all have suspected, from time to time, that Israel and Iraq have become ‘cunning’ and convenient diversions which destabilize the Middle East and give the indigents something to gripe about and so distract them while we are nicking all their oil. The question all this begs is simply: Are we so greedy in the West that we support wholesale murder to supply our ‘habits’?

Regardless of all the saber rattling rhetoric about wars on terror, aggressors and defenders, who’s in the right etc., people are getting killed by the truckload daily in this conflict and in many parts of the world for more or less the same reason: the rapacious appetite of the US. It seems, much of this activity occurs with the support (and also the supply of military and strategic equipment) of the West, China and the Russian Federation. I can only conclude, therefore, that there is something fundamentally wrong with us as a species if we, even if only through inaction or apathy, allow this state of affairs to continue. In my view we should all be ashamed of ourselves.

What I find utterly extraordinary is that now, the foremost mass murderers of modern times, Blair and Bush, are goading the most rabidly psychopathic military in the world to new heights in arbitrary civilian mortality simply because they don’t want to admit that, perhaps, they misjudged the situation in invading Iraq.

Suffice to say I have since lost all interest in human ‘civilisation’ (if you’ll excuse the term) and any remaining vestige of faith in human nature; except perhaps where that nature describes a rabid, murderous animal, crazed with fear and greed.

Maybe World War Three would be a good thing; if only to eradicate the dangerous virus infesting the planet.

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@Metro – I hadn’t seen that news item previously, but having seen it I agree with you that it represents the best out so far. Some people would no doubt say, Ah! but to do that one has to ‘trust’ Hezbollah to not violate the cease-fire, well, one has to trust the sides to abide in any cease-fire. I would like to see Israel immediately cease all military operations for a period of 48 hours, that way the world would clearly see whether there is the option of diplomacy. If Hezbollah carried on rocket attacks then you can always go-back to military operations, but I agree with you that if the ‘aggressor’ has offered a cease-fire and one refuses to act upon it, hencefore you become morally responsible for any resultant lose of innocent life, even if they are ‘baby-strapped’. (Of course if the ‘aggressor’ uses this ‘pause’ as an opportunity to attack then the moral impetus immediately switches back.)

Alas, I see on the morning news that Israel has attacked Beriut again, and Hezbollah has continued its rocket attacks. So it seems that this opportunity to halt the violence has passed. It seems that there is to be more death.

Thanks for interesting discussion Metro, I just wish it was a hypothetical ethics debate rather than a real one. Peace.

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Boris seems to have made up his mind so please don’t confuse him with the facts idlex.

I find is passing strange that any politician can say things like “…if I thought it would make a blind bit of difference, I would do. [something about it].”

Don’t you get paid to say inconvenient things to the government? Or is that just a perk when you think you can score a few cheap points? EVERYONE has an obligation to condemn militaristic regimes like Israel (and the US) even when it may attract unwanted criticism and/or cost you a constituency.

Things don’t stop being wrong just because they inconvenience us.

P.S.
I see Jack Ramsey is conspicuous by his absense.

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Well, Boris???????

Come on, old son. You stirred up this hornets’ nest of a comments string. If you’ve got the courage of your convictions, get in here and argue for them.

And don’t bluster about being too busy in the constituency or whatever – we’ve all got jobs to do as well.

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An interesting article here citing the Israeli practice of placing military camps and weapons factories close to population centres. It also discusses the censorship many journalists are operating under as they report from the area, and details the propoganda efforts being made by the Israelis.

http://informationclearinghouse.info/article14349.htm

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When satellite pictures clearly show whole civilian neighbourhoods in Beirut being flattened by the Israeli air force, it becomes nonsensical to argue that Israeli bombs only kill civilians when they miss their targets.

Four civilians were killed today in Jounieh, a Christian city north of Beirut where Hezbollah has no presence whatsoever.

Is this also part of this titanic struggle between the ignorant extremist Arabs and the enlightened Judeo-Christian world?

But then again, we have grown eerily accustomed to dark-skinned, turbaned men, veiled women, and children being slaughtered by soldiers in Western-style military uniform and pilots in sleek American aircraft, haven’t we?

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I think I’ve become too political over the years. Because I look at what everyone above has contributed to the debate and I consider the inaccuracy and wrongness of Boris’ article to have been well established. So I’m dropping that fight for the moment.

What occurs to me now is that we haven’t heard a peep from Cameron; do you think that Boris was given a last meal, a keyboard and a blindfold and told “just go out there and get it over with”?

Is this some kind of Tory trial balloon? Just to test public reaction?

God, I hope so.

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New stuff in the Guardian:

As the full extent of Lebanon’s catastrophe began to emerge yesterday, the US-based watchdog Human Rights Watch accused Israel of war crimes. “In some instances, Israeli forces appear to have deliberately targeted civilians … the failures cannot be dismissed as mere accident and cannot be blamed on wrongful Hizbullah practices. In some cases, these attacks constitute war crimes,” it stated when releasing a study of attacks in Lebanon.

“Israeli forces have fired with war planes and artillery on dozens of civilian vehicles, many flying white flags,” it said.

Israel has sought to justify the deaths by saying Hizbullah fighters hide among civilians to fire rockets. HRW says it believes Hizbullah does violate the laws of war by hiding among civilians during military operations, but “the image promoted of such shielding as the cause of so high a civilian death toll is wrong”.

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And here is the Human Rights Watch report itself.

And here is the summary, in full. Sorry for droning on, but what the hell. Obviously there’s at least one person on this blog who needs to read it.

Summary
This report documents serious violations of international humanitarian law (the laws of war) by Israel Defense Forces (IDF) in Lebanon between July 12 and July 27, 2006, as well as the July 30 attack in Qana. During this period, the IDF killed an estimated 400 people, the vast majority of them civilians, and that number climbed to over 500 by the time this report went to print. The Israeli government claims it is taking all possible measures to minimize civilian harm, but the cases documented here reveal a systematic failure by the IDF to distinguish between combatants and civilians.

Since the start of the conflict, Israeli forces have consistently launched artillery and air attacks with limited or dubious military gain but excessive civilian cost. In dozens of attacks, Israeli forces struck an area with no apparent military target. In some cases, the timing and intensity of the attack, the absence of a military target, as well as return strikes on rescuers, suggest that Israeli forces deliberately targeted civilians.

The Israeli government claims that it targets only Hezbollah, and that fighters from the group are using civilians as human shields, thereby placing them at risk. Human Rights Watch found no cases in which Hezbollah deliberately used civilians as shields to protect them from retaliatory IDF attack. Hezbollah occasionally did store weapons in or near civilian homes and fighters placed rocket launchers within populated areas or near U.N. observers, which are serious violations of the laws of war because they violate the duty to take all feasible precautions to avoid civilian casualties. However, those cases do not justify the IDF’s extensive use of indiscriminate force which has cost so many civilian lives. In none of the cases of civilian deaths documented in this report is there evidence to suggest that Hezbollah forces or weapons were in or near the area that the IDF targeted during or just prior to the attack.

By consistently failing to distinguish between combatants and civilians, Israel has violated one of the most fundamental tenets of the laws of war: the duty to carry out attacks on only military targets. The pattern of attacks during the Israeli offensive in Lebanon suggests that the failures cannot be explained or dismissed as mere accidents; the extent of the pattern and the seriousness of the consequences indicate the commission of war crimes.

This report is based on extensive on-the-ground research in Lebanon. Since the start of hostilities, Human Rights Watch has interviewed victims and witnesses of attacks in one-on-one settings, conducted on-site inspections (when security allowed), and collected information from hospitals, humanitarian groups, and government agencies. Human Rights Watch also conducted research in Israel, inspecting the IDF’s use of weapons and discussing the conduct of forces with IDF officials. The research was extensive, but given the ongoing war and the scope of the bombings, Human Rights Watch does not claim that the findings are comprehensive; further investigation is required to document the war’s complete impact on civilians and to assess the full scope of the IDF’s compliance with and disregard for international humanitarian law.

While not the focus of this report, Human Rights Watch has separately and simultaneously documented violations of international humanitarian law by Hezbollah, including a pattern of attacks that amount to war crimes. Between July 12, when Hezbollah captured two Israeli soldiers and killed eight, and July 27, the group launched a reported 1,300 rockets into predominantly civilian areas in Israel, killing 18 civilians and wounding more than 300. Without guidance systems for accurate targeting, the rockets are inherently indiscriminate when directed toward civilian areas, especially cities, and thus are serious violations of the requirement of international humanitarian law that attackers distinguish at all times between combatants and civilians. Some of these rockets, Human Rights Watch found, are packed with thousands of metal ball-bearings, which spray more than 100 meters from the blast and compound the harm to civilians.

This report analyzes a selection of Israeli air and artillery attacks that together claimed at least 153 civilian lives, or over a third of the reported Lebanese deaths in the conflict’s first two weeks. Of the 153 civilian deaths documented in this report by name, sixty-three of the victims were children under the age of eighteen, and thirty-seven of them were under ten. Israeli air strikes also killed many dual nationals who were vacationing in Lebanon when the fighting began, including Brazilian, Canadian, German, Kuwaiti, and U.S. citizens. The full death toll is certainly higher because medical and recovery teams have been unable to retrieve many bodies due to ongoing fighting and the dire security situation in south Lebanon.

The report breaks civilian deaths into two categories: attacks on civilian homes and attacks on civilian vehicles. In both categories, victims and witnesses interviewed independently and repeatedly said that neither Hezbollah fighters nor Hezbollah weapons were present in the area during or just before the Israeli attack took place. While some individuals, out of fear or sympathy, may have been unwilling to speak about Hezbollah’s military activity, others were quite open about it. In totality, the consistency, detail, and credibility of testimony from a broad array of witnesses who did not speak to each other leave no doubt about the validity of the patterns described in this report. In many cases, witness testimony was corroborated by reports from international journalists and aid workers. During site visits conducted in Qana, Srifa, and Tyre, Human Rights Watch saw no evidence that there had been Hezbollah military activity around the areas targeted by the IDF during or just prior to the attack: no spent ammunition, abandoned weapons or military equipment, trenches, or dead or wounded fighters. Moreover, even if Hezbollah had been in a populated area at the time of an attack, Israel would still be legally obliged to take all feasible precautions to avoid or minimize civilian casualties resulting from its targeting of military objects or personnel. In the cases documented in this report, however, the IDF consistently tolerated a high level of civilian casualties for questionable military gain.

In one case, an Israeli air strike on July 13 destroyed the home of a cleric known to have sympathy for Hezbollah but who was not known to have taken any active part in hostilities. Even if the IDF considered him a legitimate target (and Human Rights Watch has no evidence that he was), the strike killed him, his wife, their ten children, and the family’s Sri Lankan maid.

On July 16, an Israeli airplane fired on a civilian home in the village of Aitaroun, killing eleven members of the al-Akhrass family, among them seven Canadian-Lebanese dual nationals who were vacationing in the village when the war began. Human Rights Watch independently interviewed three villagers who vigorously denied that the family had any connection to Hezbollah. Among the victims were children aged one, three, five, and seven.

Others civilians came under attack in their cars as they attempted to flee the fighting in the South. This report alone documents twenty-seven civilian deaths that resulted from such attacks. The number is surely higher, but at the time the report went to press, ongoing Israeli attacks on the roads made it impossible to retrieve all the bodies.

Starting around July 15, the IDF issued warnings to residents of southern villages to leave, followed by a general warning for all civilians south of the Litani River, which mostly runs about 25 kilometers north of the Israel-Lebanon border, to evacuate immediately. Tens of thousands of Lebanese fled their homes to the city of Tyre (itself south of the Litani and thus within the zone Israel ordered evacuated) or further north to Beirut, many waving white flags. As they left, Israeli forces fired on dozens of vehicles with warplanes and artillery.

Two Israeli air strikes are known to have hit humanitarian aid vehicles. On July 18 the IDF hit a convoy of the Red Crescent Society of the United Arab Emirates, destroying a vehicle with medicines, vegetable oil, sugar and rice, and killing the driver. On July 23, Israeli forces hit two clearly marked Red Cross ambulances in the village of Qana.

As of August 1, tens of thousands of civilians remained in villages south of the Litani River, despite the warnings to leave. Some chose to stay, but the vast majority, Human Rights Watch found, was unable to flee due to destroyed roads, a lack of gasoline, high taxi fares, sick relatives, or ongoing Israeli attacks. Many of the civilians who remained were elderly, sick, or poor.

Israel has justified its attacks on roads by citing the need to clear the transport routes of Hezbollah fighters moving arms. Again, none of the evidence gathered by Human Rights Watch, independent media sources, or Israeli official statements indicate that any of the attacks on vehicles documented in this report resulted in Hezbollah casualties or the destruction of weapons. Rather, the attacks killed and wounded civilians who were fleeing their homes, as the IDF had advised them to do.

In addition to strikes from airplanes, helicopters, and traditional artillery, Israel has used artillery-fired cluster munitions against populated areas, causing civilian casualties. One such attack on the village of Blida on July 19 killed a sixty-year-old woman and wounded at least twelve civilians, including seven children. The wide dispersal pattern of cluster munitions and the high dud rate (ranging from 2 to 14 percent, depending on the type of cluster munition) make the weapons exceedingly dangerous for civilians and, when used in populated areas, a violation of international humanitarian law.

Statements from Israeli government officials and military leaders suggest that, at the very least, the IDF has blurred the distinction between civilian and combatant, and is willing to strike at targets it considers even vaguely connected to the latter. At worst, it considers all people in the area of hostilities open to attack.

On July 17, for example, after IDF strikes on Beirut, the commander of the Israeli Air Force, Eliezer Shkedi, said, “in the center of Beirut there is an area which only terrorists enter into.”1 The next day, the IDF deputy chief of staff, Moshe Kaplinski, when talking about the IDF’s destruction of Beirut’s Dahia neighborhood, said, “the hits were devastating, and this area, which was a Hezbollah symbol, became deserted rubble.”2

On July 27, Israeli Justice Minister Haim Ramon said that the Israeli air force should flatten villages before ground troops move in to prevent casualties among Israeli soldiers fighting Hezbollah. Israel had given civilians ample time to leave southern Lebanon, he claimed, and therefore anyone remaining should be considered a supporter of Hezbollah. “All those now in south Lebanon are terrorists who are related in some way to Hezbollah,” he said.3

International humanitarian law requires effective advance warnings to the civilian population prior to an attack, when conditions permit. But those warnings do not way relieve Israel from its obligation at all times to distinguish between combatants and civilians and to take all feasible precautions to protect civilians from harm. In other words, issuing warnings in no way entitles the Israeli military to treat those civilians who remain in southern Lebanon as combatants who are fair game for attack.

In addition to recommendations to the Israeli government and Hezbollah that they respect international humanitarian law, Human Rights Watch calls on the U.S. government immediately to suspend transfer of all arms that have been documented or credibly alleged to have been used in violation of international humanitarian law in Lebanon, as well as funding or support for such materiel, pending an end to the violations. Human Rights Watch calls upon the Iranian and Syrian governments to do the same with regards to military assistance to Hezbollah.

This report does not address Israeli attacks on Lebanon’s infrastructure or Beirut’s southern suburbs, which is the subject of ongoing Human Rights Watch research. It also does not address Hezbollah’s indiscriminate rocket attacks on Israel, which have been reported on and denounced separately and continues to be the subject of ongoing Human Rights Watch investigations. In addition, Human Rights Watch continues to investigate allegations that Hezbollah is shielding its military personnel and materiel by locating them in civilian homes or areas, and it is deeply concerned by Hezbollah’s placement of certain troops and materiel near civilians, which endangers them and violates the duty to take all feasible precautions to avoid civilian casualties. Human Rights Watch uses the occasion of this report to reiterate Hezbollah’s legal duty never to deliberately use civilians to shield military objects and never to needlessly endanger civilians by conducting military operations, maintaining troops, or storing weapons in their vicinity.

The armed conflict between Israel and Hezbollah is governed by international treaties, as well as the rules of customary international humanitarian law. Article 3 Common to the Geneva Conventions of 1949 sets forth minimum standards for all parties to a conflict between a state party such as Israel and a non-state party such as Hezbollah. Israel has also asserted that it considers itself to be responding to the actions of the sovereign state of Lebanon, not just to those of Hezbollah. Any hostilities between Israeli forces and the forces of Lebanon would fall within the full Geneva Conventions to which both Lebanon and Israel are parties. In either case, the rules governing bombing, shelling, and rocket attacks are effectively the same.

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Oh, and Vicus told me to tell you you’re a silly bugger, Boris.

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When asked, by a journalist, how he could sleep at night having killed 100,000 Iraqi civilians, Mr. Blair replied “I think you’ll find it’s closer to 50,000.” (Wobbly)

I’ll have to see a link to this before I believe it, I’m afraid. It also doesn’t sound like Blair. He’s too quick on his feet. He would have more plausibly replied that the mortality figures were disputed or unknown, and that he regretted any there may have been.

And I can’t say that what’s happening has affected my views on human nature or civilisation at all. My read on events is that a bunch of crazies (and the neocons were called “crazies” during Bush I’s tenure) have taken over the US government, and have been wreaking havoc ever since, both around the world and within the USA. They don’t believe in peace, but in war – or “creative destruction”. They believe in violence as a first resort rather than a last resort. None of them has ever fought in any war, and so it’s easy for them to entertain stupid fantasies about its efficacy. They have undoubtedly been encouraging Israel to use maximum violence. They also want a war with Iran. They believe that the more the region is shaken up, the sooner it will settle into Western-style democracy – hence Condi Rice’s recent infantile “birth pangs” remark.

My only hope is that the world makes it to the end of the Bush idiot presidency without too many more wars, and without too much more totally unnecessary bloodshed.

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I wish people wouldn’t say ‘Judeo-Christian’. Islam and Judeism are the close religions, not Judaism and Christianity. Both Islam and Judaism have a vindictive, capricious tribal god; a mere demiurge, whose most obvious characteristic is an over-reaching jealousy of some other (un-named)God. YHWH/Allah is worthy only of our contempt, and I can only hope that there is some other higher God out there. (One who obviously has other things to do than spread a little peace and light in this world though it seems).

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I’ll have to see a link to this before I believe it idlex

http://www.newstatesman.com/200608070017

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From your link, Wobbly.

At a Downing Street reception not long ago, a guest had the temerity to ask Tony Blair: “How do you sleep at night, knowing that you’ve been responsible for the deaths of 100,000 Iraqis?” The Prime Minister is said to have retorted: “I think you’ll find it’s closer to 50,000.”

So it was a guest, not a reporter, who asked the question. And we only know what Blair is said to have replied. Unless somebody can corroborate the exchange, there appears to be no record of it.

But it is alarming, all the same. It reminds me of something I read a few months back, about how, after Maggie Thatcher’s popularity surged during the Falklands war, the previous Labour PM, James Gallaghan, is reported to have said, “I wish I’d had a war.” Or, as I read it, “I wish a lot have people had been killed and maimed, simply so that I could have remained in office.”

It’s the enormous self-regard of these people that is astonishing. In many ways, Blair is not different form Callaghan or Thatcher. It’s just that his wars have turned into disasters, although he will be the last person to ever admit this.

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I wish people wouldn’t say ‘Judeo-Christian’. Islam and Judeism are the close religions, not Judaism and Christianity. Both Islam and Judaism have a vindictive, capricious tribal god; a mere demiurge, whose most obvious characteristic is an over-reaching jealousy of some other (un-named)God. YHWH/Allah is worthy only of our contempt, and I can only hope that there is some other higher God out there. (One who obviously has other things to do than spread a little peace and light in this world though it seems).

In fact all three of the main monotheistic religions have a great deal in common with each other, and many different pairings can be made if wanted. It is true that Islam and Judaism are both legalistic and law-based religions, whereas Christianity sets broad concepts and allows the individual believer to determine the correct course of action in any instant. (I am of course talking about the religions in their pure form, many Christian churches in the world, notably Catholic and Evangelical ones, have turned Christianity into a legalistic religion).
However, Judaism and Christianity both place a greater emphasis on human ability than Islam does, Judaism having a long tradition of debate even with God, and Christianity putting trust in people to adapt rules to the situation. They also have the same basic mythology from the Old Testament, whereas Islam changes some parts of it.
Likewise, Islam and Christianity are both missionary religions, who are open to anyone who accepts the appropriate theology. Judaism on the other hand is a tribal and racial religion, based on birth to a Jewish mother rather than acceptance of the theology.

With the advent of liberalism all of these pairings are not strictly true anymore, with some denominations within each religion showing features of the others (as you might expect anyway from religions with a common root). As already mentioned some Christians have become very legalistic (pretty much since the day Christ died in fact… so much for that), some Muslims have been questioning their legal structure’s applicability in the modern world, and some liberal Jews have been opening up to people who wish to join the club.

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And Wobbly, I’m afraid I would be slightly dubious of that quote. Even if it is true word-for-word, it sounds like it has been taken out of context and would be the beginning of a reply rather than the entirety. For example I would not be surprised if the reply were something along the lines of:

“I think you’ll find it’s closer to 50,000; but even so, I sleep with the knowledge that we have helped to make the lives of ordinary Iraqis better and toppled a ruthless dictator.”

Or some other self-justifying nonsense. Like idlex I think it is hardly in Blair’s style.

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Yes, I misread it the first time (broken telephone mode) and I’m putting it down to shock (though not much awe).

New Statesman isn’t the most backwater periodical and if these statements are untrue, defamatory or have been misrepresented significantly, I’m sure we’ll hear of it. Alternatively, maybe he was just caught on a bad day.

Incidentally, I think it sounds JUST like Blair. He always dives into statistics if he’s cornered on a point of delinquency and, in this instance, I don’t think he thought it through before reacting with his usual B.S.

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Unlike Hizbollah, Mel, Israel is not trying to kill civilians.
Bald statement, no supporting evidence (anywhere)

Apart from a pint of tequila, I don’t know what got into Mel Gibson when he decided to favour the Los Angeles police with an anti-Semitic rant.
I don’t know what whacko religious convictions inspire the Aussie heart-throb, or whether he genuinely believes that the “f—— Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world”.
But whatever Mel was having the other night was powerful stuff; and, you know what, my impression is that a lot of folks across Britain are secretly having a snifter of the same. Across the country there are sober people who would never dream of calling an LA police officer “sugar tits”, or swinging like an ape from the bars of their cell. Yet these people seem to share the essentials of Mel’s analysis of the Middle East.
Amusing but largely irrelevant.

Come on, Blair! they write from their wisteria-clad redoubts. Come on, Straw, Cameron, Hague, and you, too, Boris Johnson! When are you all going to stop poodling and call a halt to Israeli murder? American-made Israeli helicopters are pounding villages, killing hundreds of women and children – and our politicians do nothing but wring their hands.
Very true, damn good question. Unfortunately it begs an answer which you fail to supply.

Look at Blair, they say with real disgust: out there in Hollywood, touting for his next job while Beirut blazes, and we all know who runs Hollywood, eh, hmmm, know what I mean? It’s a gigantic conspiracy, Boris, they say, and it is high time you did something about it.
And they would be right.

And believe me, if I thought it would make a blind bit of difference, I would. I can see that the Israeli strategy seems to be disastrous, and is turning terrorists into martyrs. But then I don’t live in Haifa, or any of the places rocketed by the Hizbollah maniacs. These are not my relatives being killed, nor the relatives of my angry correspondents; and let us imagine that I did “denounce” Israel in full, free, frank and ferocious terms. Let us suppose that news of this stunning démarche were to reach the ears of some Katyusha victim, or some grime-streaked soldier of the Israeli Defence Force.
Your first sentence is simply a rather lame excuse to cover up the fact that you can’t be bothered or you’re too scared of losing your job. If we all took that view, i.e. not to stand up and be counted if our friends and family aren’t involved, we’d all still be living in caves (mud huts and tents requiring more social organisation and constructive criticism). And what if your words DID “…reach the ears of some Katyusha victim..”? You have adequately demonstrated in the title that you are happy to make unsupported and unjustifiable statements; why change the habits of a lifetime?

Never mind the mild hilarity at discovering that some obscure Tory spokesman had “denounced” Israel. If I were an Israeli, I would be astounded that any member of the British Government or Opposition felt able to criticise Israel at all.
Very good point. As ‘Wobbly’ has suggested, the British government aren’t quite the ‘poster government’ for keeping civilians out of bomb zones. That’s not the point however, the entire country was mislead along with the government by Blair and his spinning Jeremy. The majority of British people weren’t in favour of the invasion anyway. This is not, apparently, the case in Israel where, currently, the ‘vengeance’ enjoys popular support.

This is a country responding, however incompetently, to direct aggression against its own people from a neighbouring failed state. It was only three years ago that we, the goody-goody British, invaded a sovereign country thousands of miles away that presented absolutely no direct threat whatever.
I would REALLY like to be a fly on the wall when you make that ‘failed state’ comment to anyone Lebanese. Beirut has been flattened (by Israel coincidentally) three times now in the last decade and, since the Israeli withdrawal in 2000, pretty much rebuilt their economy and the city. I doubt that Britain could match their industry if the situation was reversed. I’ll let ‘direct aggression’ comment slide for now because I haven’t finished my research on the events which really led up to the Israeli ‘retaliation’.

We, the smug British, have been responsible for what is now a full-scale civil war, and in case there is still some ass out there (such as Blair) who says this is not a civil war, let me point out that Iraqi civilian deaths are now averaging 800 a week, and the monthly casualties for June approached the levels of the American Civil War, one of the bloodiest in history.
Yup, spot on, full marks, I hop you stand up in the Commons and say the same thing one day when you’re a big boy.

Our strategy – Jack Straw’s strategy – for Iraq has proved to be pure carnage, and for him to criticise Israel’s strategy is laughable. All of which, of course, makes my friends even crosser. Yes, they hiss, but then we shouldn’t have gone near Iraq. It was our fault for poodling to the Americans, and we all know why the Americans wanted to invade Iraq, hmmm?
In the circumstances, Mr Straw’s comments are indeed laughable; however, if he were to publicly admit that he had, under orders from Blair, made a terrible error in his handling of Iraq, we might allow this criticism if only because his advice would be derived from legitimate experience. As to why the Americans wanted to invade Iraq, your guess is as good as mine; Maybe Bozo Bush just wanted to impress his Dad.

It was partly about oil, but it was also Israel, wasn’t it? It was the old Jewish lobby, eh? they say, beginning to rev up like Mel in the cell. To which I can only wearily respond that, yes, I suspect that it was a bit about oil, and, yes, I have no doubt that the Israelis were happy to see the back of Saddam Hussein.
Reasonable speculation, bit light on evidence as usual.

But the only reason I supported the war was because I persuaded myself that it would be in the long-term interests of the people of Iraq, and, though that hope now looks pitiful, it has not quite died.
It must be on life support then.

And whatever the frustrated ravings of Mel Gibson and my correspondents, I do not believe that all the problems of the region can be traced to Israel, and nor do I believe that if Britain were to spurn Bush, snub Condi and “denounce” Israel, we would make the slightest difference to the fate of southern Lebanon.
Israel certainly contributes significantly to the problems and is a constant irritant to the local regimes. The US wasn’t very happy about Cuba if you remember the missile crisis. Israel is a FAR greater danger to nearby Middle Eastern countries than Cuba was to the US and that little affair came close to starting WW3. Again, you’re trying to excuse yourself by saying any criticism from you wouldn’t make any difference. How do you know unless you try it? Extremely unconvincing argument I’m afraid.

Of course anti-Americanism wins votes, especially if, like Jack Straw, you have a seat with a lot of Muslims. But show me how it works, this proposed spanking new “independent” British policy on Israel? Presumably we join France and Germany in their vapourings. Presumably we join the European Commission in encouraging the pouring of further squillions down the gullets of the brutal and corrupt Palestinian government.
Now Boris old boy, you really are treading on thin ice. I now challenge you to spend a month in Palestine without a team of Israeli bodyguards to actually see where the brutality and corruption exists. I’ll be happy to go with you. I’m not going to lecture you on this point but the evidence is utterly overwhelming and you’ve either ignored it or you aren’t interested.

Well, let me remind Mel and all his secret British sympathisers of two last differences between Israel and the Islamicists. Whatever the hideous shambles of the past few days, it is still true, in principle, that when Israeli rockets kill civilians, they have missed their targets, and that when Hizbollah rockets kill civilians, they have scored a deliberate hit.
I would sincerely like to see you demonstrate that statement in court. There are a number of excellent links in the comments here which, even if they don’t demolish this argument, certainly cast a very dubious light over it.

That is a moral difference that needs to be dinned into the skull of every saloon-bar strategist currently denouncing Israel. Finally, Mel, if you want to get wasted on tequilas and sheilas, you’re much better off in Tel Aviv than Teheran.
Simply drivel

Boris you are an utter buffoon and it saddens me that someone who comes across as a fairly affable and easy going sort of chap is in fact a right wing prick. It seems Michael Howard had your number after all.

By the way, I’m Jewish (not one of the “self-hating” ones mind you) and I think the Israelis are behaving appallingly as do a number of my friends in Israel.

Good day to you sir, and may the Lord have mercy on the shrivelled husk which is your soul (as you peace loving Christians say).

2/10
See me.

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Well troops, shall we declare victory?

Looks like the opposition has shot their bolt…and fallen well short of hitting any particular target, let alone making an effective strike.

So tell me, does Cameron have a blog?

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Declare victory if you will raincoaster, I’m still with Boris on this one!

There simple fact of the matter is that Hezbollah needed disarming, and nobody else could/did do it. Israel stepped up to the plate and I’m glad.

It is of course agreed, I think by everyone including Boris, that Israel has been conducting the invasion with either extreme ineptitude or highly immoral deliberate targetting.

However, the motives for this invasion were sound, and we should be trying to pursuade Israel to be more humane in their conduct, NOT asking for a complete and unconditional ceasefire.

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‘Stepped up to the plate’?

What do we think this is, Jack Target? A game?

I’ll offer you another ’simple fact of the matter’, since you’re so keen to reduce an incredibly complex situation to saloon-bar table-thumping:

Two wrongs don’t make a right.

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Jack T, I think you have misunderstood both me and Boris.

Check the headline and tell me again how you determine that Boris agrees with the premise that Israel has been conducting the invasion with either extreme ineptitude or highly immoral deliberate targetting. I’m looking, but I’m seeing the opposite, as in this:

it is still true, in principle, that when Israeli rockets kill civilians, they have missed their targets

.

Hezbollah does need disarming, and they’re not the only ones. However, the 200+ strikes on Israel in the past 24 hours indicate that perhaps the approach taken by Israel has been less than effective.

A ceasefire, which Hezbollah itself has called for, would at least have prevented those from falling, as it would have prevented the deaths of the Syrian farm workers north of Beirut and the ongoing deaths in largely Christian central Lebanon.

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There simple fact of the matter is that Hezbollah needed disarming, and nobody else could/did do it. Israel stepped up to the plate and I’m glad. (Jack T)

And has Israel disarmed Hezbollah? Not that I’ve heard.

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Several rockets landed in or near the Israeli city of Hadera on Friday, Israel’s Channel 2 television reported, causing no casualties.

The strikes marked the deepest distance that rockets fired by the Lebanese guerrilla group Hizbollah had landed inside Israel since the start of fighting between Israel and Hizbollah on July 12. Hadera is about 80 km (50 miles) from the Lebanese border. (reuters 4 Aug)

Can Israel disarm Hezbollah? Not that I’ve heard.

I wouldn’t have minded if Israel had actually set out in the first place to disarm Hezbollah, but it didn’t. It started out – and continues – devastating Lebanon, leaving Hezbollah largely intact. Now Christian areas of Lebanon are being bombed. What the hell’s this got to do with disarming Hezbollah?

There are reports of attacks on Christian neighborhoods and major roads and bridges in Beirut on Friday. What is going on with these heightened attacks?

It seems to show that there is an expansion of the air war on the part of the Israelis into the northern part of the nation. What is catching some people off guard is that the targets of these attacks are traditionally Christian areas. (msnbc 4 Aug)

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From Cold Desert yesterday (note that pictures are on the site, so if you want to see it, go to the site. Italics and bolding by raincoaster):

I usually prefer to write my posts at the end of the day; however, today sounds different. I woke up and I was surprised by the news that my Delirious has posted in her blog.

Oh, the joys of finally falling asleep from exhaustion at 5 am to the sound of planes and bombs in the distance only to wake up two hours later to this:

Maameltein highway bombed

Update 7.45: The bridge leading to Casino du Liban was just bombed too.

Casino du Liban and Maameltein are located north of Beirut. Now I wonder why did Israel target the Maameltein highway and Casino du Liban bridge?
Of course, if you ask the IDF, they will tell you that Hezbollah fighters, since the war started, are spending their nights in the casino gambling and watching some sexy night shows before they return early next morning to the Lebanese southern border to resume launching their rockets. Maybe the IDF is right, I mean, when you pass all your night in the Casino, you start your next day full of energy to continue fighting, no? (Of course bold Arabic coffee might be required.)

Any person, with little common sense, can realize from this that Israel is not after “Khezbollah” they are after the Lebanese economy and tourism and Lebanese civilians. It is well known how much Casino du Liban makes money for the Lebanese government. It is well known the Maameltein is an area that attracts tourists. This reminds me of a joke that they once asked a tourist about the capital of Lebanon, and he replied, “Maameltein.” So please, cut this sh** about IDF being after “Khezbollah.”

Below is a post by Lazarus.

Hezbollah poses an existential threat to Israel
It’s really pretty easy to understand.

Hezbollah has killed 500+ Israeli civilians (depending on the sources), while Israel has killed less than 30. Hezbollah has destroyed most of northern Israel – people had to run for their lives and got bombed by Hezbollah while driving away. Hezbollah has shelled buildings and bridges all over Israel, targeted red cross ambulances, various trucks, has created the siege of Israel in which not enough fuel reaches the people and hospitals, and has directly caused over 700,000 displaced israeli civilians.

Oh … wait … something seems wrong in the above.

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I wonder to what extent the present disaster is a consequence of the fact that none of the leaders of America, Britain, and Israel, has a single iota of military experience between them, and yet all of them share a simplistic belief in the efficacy of military action.

Blair has been a consistent advocate of military action. He wanted much more in Kosovo than he got from Clinton, and apart from Iraq, he is reported to have wanted military intervention in Darfur, Zimbabwe, and various other places.

Bush is reported to have been an advocate of an Iraq war since 1999, if not earlier. He felt that his father missed the chance to march on Baghdad in 1991 when Saddam’s army was defeated. And when he went ahead with the Iraq war in 2003, he disregarded military advice that he needed an army at least twice the size of the one he actually used.

Ehud Olmert, equally devoid of military experience, and a novice Israeli Prime Minister, responded to Hamas kidnap raids on June 25 by destroying the infrastructure of Gaza, and has now responded to a similar Hezbollah kidnap raid by destroying the infrastructure of Lebanon.

In every case, these wars have been launched by militarily inexperienced civilians, with an almost religious faith in military power, attempting to demonstrate their ’strength’, very frequently against the advice of their own military.

It therefore seems reasonable to suppose that, if they had some military experience, and some idea of the limitations of military power, or had listened to military advice, most likely none of these wars would have been started.

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What Major Tom said.
In spades.

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As a follow-up to ‘raincoaster’ re Human Rights Watch, here’s Amnesty:

Israel: IDF inquiry into Qana a whitewash

The investigation carried out by the Israeli Defence Force (IDF) into the air-missile attack on Qana was clearly inadequate and reinforces the need for the urgent dispatch of the International Humanitarian Fact-Finding Commission (IHFFC).

“We cannot allow any investigation into the events in Qana to be a whitewash. What is needed here is an independent investigation which can look at all credible reports of serious violations of international humanitarian law taking place in this conflict. Any investigation needs the capacity to cross borders and talk to survivors of the attack as well as to the forces involved,” said Kate Gilmore, Executive Deputy Secretary General of Amnesty International.

“It is not enough that the Israeli army investigates themselves. Israel has a history of either not investigating civilian deaths, or conducting similarly flawed inquiries.”

The results of the IDF investigation state that the IDF “operated according to information that the building was not inhabited by civilians”. Yet survivors of the attack interviewed by Amnesty International researchers in Qana shortly after the bombing, stated that they had been in the building for some two weeks and that their presence must have been known to Israeli forces whose surveillance drones frequently flew over the village.

Amnesty International declared that issuing warnings to the civilian population to leave the area does not absolve Israel of their responsibilities under customary international humanitarian law. Intentionally launching a disproportionate or indiscriminate attack, or intentionally directing attacks at civilians or civilian objects is a war crime. Amnesty International stated that the concept of ‘free-fire’ zones is incompatible with international humanitarian law.

All AI documents on Israel:
http://amnesty-news.c.topica.com/maae2qGabsnGVcjCmTZb/

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Errrm..knock, knock? Boris? Anyone home?

It seems a bit much taking the stance that Hezbollah are a bunch of murdering scumbags when they seem to be the people who are a) winning the battle militarily b) gaining more and more international support for their activities and, most significantly, c) the people offering a ceasefire.

In the spirit of peaceful negotiation and debate therefore, I propose a vote to offer Boris a ceasefire if he promises to have a look at this matter more carefully and so produce another, one hopes, slightly less glib and jingoistic analysis of the situation in the ‘hol(e)y land’.

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I honestly can’t remember a single post in which the comments have been so one-sided. And against Boris, too. This is a real anomaly.

Wobbly, in the spirit of peacekeeping (or -establishing) I shall second your call. But until I hear it from Boris, I’m assuming the flamewar is still on. It may not be flamethrowers, maybe more like a crowd standing on the sidewalk, trying to light up Big Ben with sparklers, but it’s quite a bit more fire than I’ve ever seen ’round these parts. It’s just that we so incredibly polite.

Except me, of course.

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Yes idlex/raincoaster et al, the situation is indeed dire. It is unfortunate that someone with Boris’ oratorical skills has chosen to use these talents in support of an entirely unworthy cause.

What many people have forgotten is that the IDF launched a vicious attack on Hamas (in Gaza) just prior to the start of this whole debacle. They are still in the process of ’subduing’ the population looking for their lost soldier and have cut a swathe of destruction through Gaza in total violation of article 4 of the Geneva Convention. Not that that would bother them very much; I believe Israel still holds the record for ignoring UN resolutions. Saddam Hussein was an amateur by comparison.

Now it’s all very well talking about Hezbollah terrorists but Hamas are a democratically elected government of the Palestinian Authority. Just because the US doesn’t like the victors of a democratic election, it doesn’t stop it being a democracy. In point of fact the Americans are just pissed off because their puppet didn’t get in as they expected.

It is also odd that, when examining ‘who started it’, many ’saloon-bar strategists’ insist it was Hezbollah because they crossed the border into Israel etc etc etc. It seems odd that everyone forgets about the ties between Hamas and Hezbollah whereby their attack on Israel can be seen in a slightly different light, i.e. support for a neighbour and ally under attack from a violent and despotic regime. Let’s not forget that Germany didn’t attack Britain in the Second World War. Germany invaded Poland, with whom we held a treaty of mutual protection, and so Britain felt obliged to declare war on Germany. That doesn’t stop people saying ‘Germany started it’ though.

Anyway Johnson. As a result of your abysmal performance on this last essay I’m giving you lines and some after hours reading. Write out 1000 times “Possunt quia posse vedentur” Also, read the following document before talking about the ‘corrupt and brutal’ Palestinian regime. There are a number of others when you’ve finished reading this.

http://web.amnesty.org/pages/isr-index_2-eng

I would also instruct you to read ‘Politicide’ (By Prof. Baruch Kimmerling (to whom I am distantly related) who is the Professor of Sociology at the Hebrew University, Jerusalem. Like myself he is Jewish and a stalwart opponent of the current militaristic regime in the process of destroying Israel. He is also labeled a ’self-hating Jew’ by his political opponents) If you or your PA would send me a contact address, I will send you a copy. Further reading may also include ‘Zionism, the real enemy of the Jews, Vol. 1′ (Hart)

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To quote Boris

” Well, let me remind Mel and all his secret British sympathisers of two last differences between Israel and the Islamicists. Whatever the hideous shambles of the past few days, it is still true, in principle, that when Israeli rockets kill civilians, they have missed their targets, and that when Hizbollah rockets kill civilians, they have scored a deliberate hit.

That is the moral difference – - – - ”

The UN post wiped out on 24 /07/2006 – with the loss of four UN personel was hit by a laser guided cruise missile .

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Boris Johnson MP
House of Commons
London
SW1A 0AA

Tel: 020 7219 8192

Answerphone: 020 7219 8244

Fax: 020 7219 1885

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Yeah, sure. Have you ever tried writing to an MP? Ninety-nine times out of a hundred you’ll get shrugged off.

I’m hacked off now. This isn’t really a blog at all – it’s a shop window. Real bloggers aren’t afraid of dialogue.

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Thank you raincoaster, I will despatch the aforementioned document in all haste lest the erstwhile Member for Henley loses control of his wisdom once more.

And, may I say Mr Johnson, you have added an entirely unexpected dimension to the office ‘Member of Parliament’.

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And raincoaster adroitly steps into Melissa’s shoes.

Have you ever tried writing to an MP? (Mark Gamon)

Quite frequently. In my experience they will reply fulsomely if they agree with you, but not if they don’t. I think what they then do is take all the letters with which they agree, and show them to the whips, party leaders, media pundits, etc, and say, “Look at all the letters I’ve got agreeing with me about X!” The rest are binned.

In my experience, most MPs don’t regard themselves as representing anybody, but rather as having been elected to voice their own mostly foolish opinions.

Speaking of which, isn’t it good to know that Bush has already gone on holiday, and Blair is only delaying his for a day or two. I wonder who he’s staying with this time. Cliff? Silvio? Augusto?

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“The UN post wiped out on 24 /07/2006 – with the loss of four UN personel was hit by a laser guided cruise missile.”

Made in the USA.

And after an Irish UN officer had contacted the IDF no less than 6 times to say that missiles were falling dangerously near the UN post.

Good god, Boris, where have you been? Under the bed?

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I read all this with rapt attention in the hope of learning more about a subject of which I am largely ignorant. I am neither Jew not Muslim and have no axe to grind except for a loathing of genocide for whatever reason.

Like many of you, I suspect, I have never met an extremist from either faith, let alone visited these war zones. When Metro says I am “abdicating my moral authority” by not wading in with yet another opinion, he fails to understand that some people do not want to pontificate on subjects outside their grasp. The only contributors who have taken a measured view of this terrible business are Idlex (as usual), Raincoaster and Boris himself, who is receiving all the flak. Damned if he does, damned if he doesn’t.

When the discussion turns to a subject on which I have first-hand experience – like how NewLab is irreparably destroying our own country – I will gladly pitch in.

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I take back what I said… It’s becoming ever more obvious to me that even if Israel had the opportunity to use a sound motive for the attack, they are clearly going well beyond the limits of said motive, and intentionally too.

I remain completely baffled as to why they are doing it, but join everyone else now in condemnation of Israel’s actions in Lebanon.

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Looks like there is a bit of a firestorm in the Tory party over this war after all. Details in the Times article.

Lord Kalms, a prominent member of the Jewish community, accused William Hague, the Shadow Foreign Secretary, of behaving like an “ignorant armchair critic” for criticising Israeli attacks on Lebanese army units and public buildings, and the high civilian death toll. He said that Mr Hague’s remarks were not just unhelpful, they were “downright dangerous”.

Dave is still on holiday, as is Boris.

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“Speaking of which, isn’t it good to know that Bush has already gone on holiday, and Blair is only delaying his for a day or two. I wonder who he’s staying with this time. Cliff? Silvio? Augusto?” – idlex

You can probably cross Sharon off the list but I still wouldn’t bet on it.

Isn’t it extraordinary that we actually take comfort in the fact that the leader of our country and that of our most powerful ‘ally’ have gone on leave during a time of international crisis? The implication being that they’ll do less damage if they’re not holding the reins. Can you imagine similar sentiments being expressed about Winston Churchill or even Margaret Thatcher (during the Falklands punch-up)? It’s bizarre.

Time for a no confidence vote soon I guess.

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Errr… Wobbly…

It’s no comfort. If Bush and Blair are on holiday that leaves Cheney and Prescott in charge. You choose.

Margaret Thatcher, on the other hand… If she’d taken a holiday at the right time, we might not have sunk the Belgrano.

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I remain completely baffled as to why they are doing it, but join everyone else now in condemnation of Israel’s actions in Lebanon. (Jack Target)

Welcome to the club, Jack. Maybe even Boris is changing his mind as well.

For myself, I was appalled from day one of this business, as soon as I saw footage of bombs falling on Beirut airport and a road flyover. It seemed absurd then, and it seems absurd now. As did the justification, which was that it ‘exerted pressure on Lebanon to act against Hezbollah’. Quite how Lebanon could have acted against Hezbollah while it was being systematically dismantled was as beyond me then as it is now.

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“It’s no comfort. If Bush and Blair are on holiday that leaves Cheney and Prescott in charge. You choose.” – Mark Gammon,

Fair comment (the stuff of nightmares actually) Sure, I agree; their alternates are even worse, if that’s possible, but that’s my point really, i.e. we should have confidence in our government or, if not, surely we should get rid of them?

Yeah, I know, bit tricky with ‘parliamentary democracy’ but I would like to hear more muttering about votes of no confidence.

I heard this morning that shit-for-brains wants another year in the chair. I just hope it’s connected to the mains.

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By the way, I found this article quite interesting

http://comment.independent.co.uk/commentators/article1215898.ece

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Speaking of trusting the substitutes to be in charge, I personally found this article from 3 weeks ago very amusing:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/5173024.stm

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“Lord Kalms, a prominent member of the Jewish community, accused William Hague, the Shadow Foreign Secretary, of behaving like an “ignorant armchair critic” for criticising Israeli attacks on Lebanese army units and public buildings, and the high civilian death toll. He said that Mr Hague’s remarks were not just unhelpful, they were “downright dangerous”.” (extract from Times article posted by raincoaster)

What I’d like to understand is precisely what does Israel have to do before its supporters in Britain and around the world say “Hang on a mo’, that’s a bit much guys!”? I mean, do they have carte blanche to do anything whatsoever in defense of ‘the fatherland’ without fear of censure or criticism? Where’s the line?

When I argue with the wife, I take the view that I’m right! If I didn’t think I was right I wouldn’t be arguing would I? But, regardless of this monomaniacal perspective, during the ‘post mortem’ I am forced to conclude that it takes two to tango and that no position is 100% incontravertible.

I, unlike some, don’t enjoy angry confrontation and most of the time I’ll go out of my way to avoid it. Unfortunately, for better or worse, sometimes tempers flare and angry words are exchanged. Subsequently our better natures regain control of the situation and, having examined the vehemence underlying one’s position, negotiate some sort of compromise. I generally find that if neither party is entirely satisfied, the settlement is probably fair.

My principle here being that few people actually fight for nothing; there is always some issue of legitimate dispute. The very fact that Israel attracts so much negative attention from its neighbours in the Middle East is surely prima facie evidence that they are doing something to cause these vexatious incidents.

It seems foolish that Britain and the UN allows the US to arrogate all significant decisions and policies pertaining to this region to itself when, demonstrably, these schemes have been utterly ineffectual for decades. If the current situation is representative of the ‘roadmap to peace’ I can only conclude Dubya’s got it the wrong way up.

There’s much more to this conflict than meets the eye and it’s high time that it was investigated properly. I’ve been through a lot of the documentation links posted here and, either everything except the media is seriously biased against Israel or they really do need to answer for some serious violations of international and humanitarian law.

I think it’s important to keep an open mind though.

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This article is also very informative about matters in Lebanon.

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/fisk/article1215967.ece

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‘My only hope is that the world makes it to the end of the Bush idiot presidency without too many more wars’ (Idlex)

Now hang on a minute, forget all the spin and propagander that you get over here. Bush just tells you straight what he’s gonna do – he’s allright in my book.

Before he got elected he siad he was going to run the economy based on tax cuts – he cut taxes after being elected and is still holding to that policy.

After 9/11 he asked every country ‘are you with us or against us’ even Colonel Gadaffi wasn’t stupid enough to say ‘against you’ hence he is not a subject of the War on Terror. Saddam wrote a long letter basically saying ‘up yours’ – now he’s gonna hang. The Iraqi people have democracy and a choice whether they wanna be with us or against us.

I’m not sure what the Ayatollahs said but they became part of the ‘axis of evil’ (see below)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axis_of_evil

American conservative politics seems to have moved beyond spin – remember when Donald Rumsfield was asked why he was dropping cluster bombs in Afghanistan? He replied ‘to kill them’. I’d rather our politicans were to the point like that.

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Stephen L…

‘to kill them (and safeguard the region for some of my shady business interests)’ would surely have been a more accurate answer…

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Wouldn’t it be nice if David Cameron got back from leave and made a statement along the following lines.

“I am not the Prime Minister of Great Britain, but I have high hopes of one day achieving this exalted office. Until that time, whilst I may sway the incumbent government’s policies, I am only able to influence our government and not implement policies of my own. However, even though I do not enjoy governmental pre-eminence, I offer, on behalf of Britain, my deepest condolences and sympathies to the peoples of Lebanon and Palestine. I would like to add that I hope that we can work together in the future to rectify and repair relations between Britain and the Middle East.

Insofar as Britain was the last nation to govern the territory of Israel and Palestine prior to resolution 181 of the United Nations, I consider the difficulties in Israel and Lebanon to lie, to a certain extent, at our doorstep. As a consequence of this historical obligation I feel it behooves any British government to do its utmost to expedite peace in this region; even if such actions may strain our relationship with our allies, the United States and Israel.

To this end I call for impartial international re-assessment of the activities of Israel in the occupied territories of Palestine and a similar examination of its recent military activities in Lebanon. I also recommend that Britain withdraw diplomatic relations with Israel until the leaders of that country comply with all outstanding UN resolutions and rectify any officially recorded abuses of humanitarian rights in the occupied territories and Lebanon.

I recognize that this statement will cause anger and dissent in the ranks of the elected members of my party and those many members of the Conservative Party in the community. I further recognize that this standpoint may cost me the leadership of this party. Regardless of these dangers, I am no longer prepared to stand by and, through inaction, condone the chronic and intolerable abuses being perpetrated in this region. I can no longer, in all honour, sit in silence while such transgressions persist without any word of condemnation or action from the international community.

If this standpoint causes me to lose electoral votes, so be it. The votes it costs are well spent in raising public awareness of the gross violations of international law perpetrated by the Israeli government daily. In the event that sinister influence causes me to lose my leadership and perhaps my seat in the house, I trust that my replacement will take up this issue with the same desire for investigation, reconciliation and, ultimately peace.”

I may even vote for him.

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Mark Gamon,

Grrrrrr my name is spelt with a ‘v’!

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And Mark,

Since when was defence a shady business? Looking at your website you seem to enjoy your freedom, playing music, writing whatever you please. You wouldn’t have all that if Hitler had won the war, if the USA hadn’t stopped Stalin swallowing Europe or under the Taliban, whom I believe banned music. Too damn right we ‘overthrew’ them.

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SteVen L:

Exactly how much research have you done into profits from the weapons/war industry?
And ‘reconstruction’?
And how oil affects what happens in the Middle East?
Or Afghanistan?
Do you know where the Caspian Sea is?
What makes you think that anyone in Afghanistan is ‘overthrown’?
How do the Iraqis have ‘democracy’ when the counry is falling headlong into civil war?
How do the people of Iraq have a choice about anything at the moment?

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There is no War on Terror

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Steven L – sorry for spelling your name wrong. No disprespect intended.

No apology, however, for questioning Rumsfeld’s motives in getting into Iraq. Please do a little digging into his corporate associations before you hail him as a champion of freedom. And please don’t describe invading a foreign country, however base its leadership, as ‘defence’. That’s exactly what the Israelis are doing right now, and it’s doublespeak.

Re Hitler, I hear what you’re saying, to some extent. Hitler had to be stopped, and the Allies did so. However, I seem to remember we waited until his offensive behaviour became intolerable before we went to war.

In the case of Stalin, I’m a bit baffled. Exactly WHEN did the USA fight a war with Stalin?

As for the Taliban, who banned music (and who I incidentally despise for doing so): I never questioned that they were a force for evil. I’ll repeat: it was Rumsfeld’s motives I was worried about. Cheney’s, too, if you’re asking.

When the Germans invaded Poland, we went to war to protect a sovereign people who had been invaded by a fascist state that threatened to overwhelm the whole of mankind. A bit like the FIRST Gulf War, come to that, which I consider a largely just war, despite the Bush connection.

That’s not what we did in Afghanistan or the Second Gulf War. And it’s what we’re singularly failing to do in the case of the Lebanon. In fact if you apply the logic of the Second World War to the current crisis, we should be declaring war on ISRAEL.

I’m not advocating that – merely pointing out that this situation is much much more complicated than we can possibly imagine.

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As for the music, that’ll survive whoever’s running the show. But I’m only pointing that out to grab myself the hundredth comment!

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And I’ll be “Comment 101″.
After all, I’m still learning.

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Even if we accept that Israel does not deliberately target civilians or UN officials, we can surely say that it is deliberately destroying the infrastructure and economy of Lebanon. Those roads and bridges weren’t accidently bombed. It has also told almost 1 million people to leave their homes or accept the consequences. It has also blockaded the ports and airports of an entire country. Are these not crimes?

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“American conservative politics seems to have moved beyond spin” Steven_L

They’ve also moved beyond the limits of justifiable international behaviour.

You should take a proper gander at Hitler’s election promises and propaganda. He kept a surprisingly high number of his pre-election pledges too.

The side effects of his brutal ‘honesty’ were somewhat more unfortunate and not entirely dissimilar to Bush’s.

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Axis of slightly evil

http://www.thispageintentionallyleftblank.net/archives/2003/03/other_axis_of_e.html

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What Susan Thorpe said.

In both posts.

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I’m a bit confused now. I thought the Bushy rules were ‘We don’t negotiate with terrorists’. So how come these draft UN proposals seem to require Hezbollah’s cooperation?

Sounds like the rules have changed to ‘We don’t negotiate with terrorists unless Israel squeals like a stuck pig’

Or perhaps ‘We don’t negotiate with people we call terrorists on TV but quietly recognise that they, incoveniently, have elected officials in the Lebanese government like Hezbollah and Hamas’

Or maybe ‘We don’t negotiate with terrorists but Israel decides who the terrorists are and they’ve changed their mind about Hezbollah because terrorists can’t fight and these guys can’

What was that song the people on the demo were signing yesterday? “Two four six eight, Israel is a terrorist state”

Can we negotiate with them too?

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Hot off the conspiracy presses.

Israel’s military is partially financed by Saudi Arabian oil money. This keeps the House of Saud off the radar with the Saudi population. the Mullahs bang on about Israel’s abuse of the Palestinians and the Saudi royals can carry on snorting, smoking, drinking and whoring (my sources tell me that the House of Saud makes the largest single order for Johnny Walker Blue label in the world).

These investments into Israel are administered through the Bush family and are divested to Israel under the guise of US aid. It’s a very well kept secret but, when Osama discovered this conspiracy, he fell out with his family and took up his current role as liberator.

Ever wondered why the Washington Saudi embassy has American guards and police and why the Saudis (who have a bigger and better equipped military than Israel) have never attacked Isreal?

It’s a big plot which has been set up and perpetuated by the Bush administration dating back to Bush senior.

In return for the ‘investment’ the Saudis have a promise of a bolt hole in the event that the Saudi poulation turns nasty and the US guarantees to protect their assets if they ever have to get out quick.

This is why Israel doen’t want peace. If there’s peace, they lose the ‘investment’ so they have to beat up the Paelestinians every now and again. Didn’t anyone wonder why, just after Hamas basically agreed to recognise Israel, a gun boat blows up a family of Palestinians picnicking on a beach?

If it goes quiet, they lose money!!

Shhh, Keep it quiet.

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Boris,

Imagine that some Islamic terrorists are lurking amid the good people of Henley on Thames. The first thing that Sir. Ian Blair of the Met does is to bomb Henley Bridge. Then he knocks out the power station and craters the road to London. His next move is to drop leaflets over Henley telling all honest people to leave before midnight when the serious bombing will get going. Not everyone manages to meet his deadline – the taxi fares are extortionate. In the morning the people awake and find that several rockets have landed on an apartment block, and that numerous women and children have been killed “by accident.”

How would you feel?

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Good point Hugh, but you forget that Sir Ian also needs to take out the hospital, the police station and any inconvenient UN observers in Henley even if they’re on holiday or have broken down.

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Juan Cole floats another conspiracy theory: it’s all about oil.

One Ring To Rule Them

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And the petrol pumps.
And then bomb Red Cross vehicles right through the red “+” on their roof.

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(that was supposed to follow Wobbly – oops)

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Never mind, impeach_bush.

In brief, Cole’s notion is that this is all part of an attempt to bring the entirety of Middle East oil under direct US control (which is what I personally always thought the Iraq war was all about). Bringing Iran under US control is the next stage. But Iran has these Hezbollah proxies operating in Lebanon, and so these have to be neutralised first. The key line in Cole’s piece is: “Destroy Lebanon, and destroy Hizbullah, and you reduce Iran’s strategic depth.”

If he means that by destroying Lebanon, Hezbollah will also be destroyed, I think he’s got it all wrong. Hezbollah, we are told, is funded by Iran, not Lebanon, and so destroying Lebanon won’t affect Hezbollah. It will just make it a bit uncomfortable. All of which will be offset by the new recruits and money and arms that will pour into Hezbollah’s coffers in response to Israel’s attack on Lebanon. Rather than weakening Hezbollah, the destruction of Lebanon will strengthen it.

They should have learned this from Iraq, where the destruction of Iraq has provided a hotbed for insurgents and terrorists in a way that it never was before. Israel is now in process of recreating another Iraq in Lebanon, and a whole new set of ferocious enemies on their doorstep. It is about to replace a secular, Western-oriented Lebanon with a fundamentalist Muslim Taliban-style state which will make Hezbollah look like pussycats.

Nope. Israel’s war on Lebanon is not going to destroy Hezbollah. It’s going to make it far stronger – increasing rather than decreasing Iran’s ’strategic depth’, and making it all the harder to yoke Iran to the US.

Another dumb neocon plan bites the dust.

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I almost begin to feel sorry for Boris. But not until I hear him take it back (more vigorous phrase replaced here).

We can discuss the US any old time, and as you’re possibly aware, as a Canadian whose ancestors looted and burned the White House I have a great deal to say on that subject, BUT I think the key to this discussion is to remain focused.

I agree it is difficult when the only dissent is coming from the MSM. Here in Canada, most of our media outlets are owned by the Aspers. It is no exaggeration to say that this one, vigorously Jewish and Zionist family owns the national debate, except when it comes to blogs.

Which is one reason I don’t read the papers here, except the Globe and Mail.

I’m actually pleased and surprised to see the orthodoxy and its counterargument have made it into the mainstream media, often in the same outlets. The Times? The Independent? The Guardian? All have reported both the “roll over for glorious Israel” and the “WTF are they doing” positions. This is good news.

Susan, if you’re jobhunting with Cameron you can use me as a reference, although if you’re half as clever as you seem you know better! That is a simply brilliant statement you crafted. How sad that you’re the only one signing it.

Perhaps we should make it more of a general petition? “We, the commentors of the State of Blogosphere…”

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We, the commentors of the State of Blogosphere (raincoaster)

This is one reason why I reject all the notions upthread that Boris should descend and actually post here. Boris’ job is to post up a few stupid ideas, and let us lot shoot them pieces.

It signifies the decline and fall of any blog, when any blogger descends to actually arguing his case, mano a mano with his various contenders.

I speak from experience.

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Hmmm, interesting comment idlex. I disagree, but that’s a discussion for another time and place.

After I finish replying to my comments.

I’d certainly read any blog you wrote, and am now off to check Google Cache for aforesaid.

Now I just want to point up a section of the excellent article in the Independent posted by (too lazy to scroll up, bear with me):

Look at the events leading to the crisis on Israel’s other fighting front, Gaza. Gaza is Palestinian territory, occupied by Israel until last September and still dominated by Israel’s military might. On 25 June, Palestinian fighters crossed into Israel, attacked an army post and returned with their captive Cpl Gilad Shalit.

Like many, Mr Blair sees this as the start of Israel’s (not Palestine’s) “crisis in Gaza”. The action was widely reported in our media as being “an escalation” by Palestinian “militants”, and Israel’s aggressive response was only to be expected. What Mr Blair and other observers will not admit is that the day before Cpl Shalit’s capture, Israeli forces went into Gaza and kidnapped two Palestinians whom Israel claims are Hamas militants.

Tony Blair should put himself in the Palestinians’ place for a moment. Israel kidnaps your citizens from your territory and no one takes a blind bit of notice. A tit-for-tat raid justifies an onslaught that has cost more than 140 Palestinian lives, many of them civilians. Whose “arc of extremism” is in action here?

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Wobbly. It was wobbly. Sorry, shall try not to be so lazy in future.

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Johnson’s a Yank.

Expecting sense out of him is like expecting a vampire to donate blood.

Make a meaningful sentence out of the following words:
Neocon Boris fascist is warmonger a Johnson.

George Bush has been dead for ten years but Death’s too scared to tell him.

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Looks like it’s next stop Iran for warmachine USA.

They’ve got it surrounded, it doesn’t matter if Iran stops its uranium enrichment program, Saddam didn’t have WMDs but it didn’t stop Powell and Blair saying he did. I note Iran are being cited as the cause of the Lebanon issue with increasing regularity because of “I’m a dinner jacket”’s comments about wiping Israel off the map.

I can almost hear the speech now:

“My fellow Americans, the time has come to put a stop to the Iranian terrorist regime sowing discord throughout the Middle East.

They have, through their proxy Hezbollah, attacked our good friend and ally, Israel, and have continued to ignore UN resolutions in stopping their nucular enrichment ambitions.

We, the american people have no option now but to stamp our authoritye on this situation and bomb the bastards flat and grab their oil like ma daddy told me.”

Wonder what the Chinese and the Russian Federation will have to say about it?

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Idlex – I beg to differ. I’ll argue/debate with ANYONE who cares to visit my blog, and have done. I don’t consider myself in decline. Not on that front,anyway…

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Apparently Mel is talking to local Rabbis asking for forgiveness… or more likely his publicist is and Mel is just down the off-ie.

The deliberate killing of unarmed combatants is murder. The deliberate killing of combatants is war.

Wobbly: I don’t hear any head of state other then the Iranian’s calling for the total destruction of another state. Iran also wants to aquire nuclear technology. The what-ifs are unthinkable.

“When the Nazis came for the communists,
I remained silent;
I was not a communist.

When they locked up the social democrats,
I remained silent;
I was not a social democrat.

When they came for the trade unionists,
I did not speak out;
I was not a trade unionist.

When they came for the Jews,
I did not speak out;
I was not a Jew.

When they came for me,
there was no one left to speak out.”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_they_came...

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“Wobbly: I don’t hear any head of state other then the Iranian’s calling for the total destruction of another state. Iran also wants to aquire nuclear technology. The what-ifs are unthinkable.” Lennie Briscoe

Give it a few weeks and we’ll see.

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Someone (impeach_bush I believe) asked me some questions. I’ll try to answer.

Exactly how much research have you done into profits from the weapons/war industry?

None, finance goes over my head, being British though I do know a bit about the history of war and a bit about defence technology. If Iran doesn’t climb down I can see their air force getting ‘raptored’ (see below)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F22

And ‘reconstruction’?

I’m no authority on this, am busy applying for jobs at the moment so will not be reading about it in any detail for a while. Iraq’s oil revenues at current price should provide enough dough to get them sorted out in the next decade though.

And how oil affects what happens in the Middle East?

This is a bit ambigious, I see the world as 6 billion people making decisions, not controlled by underground sludge.

Or Afghanistan?

Look, the Taliban needed taking out they were medieval thugs – look how they treated their women.

Do you know where the Caspian Sea is?

Yes, geography is not usually my strong point but I know where the Caspian sea is, it borders with Russia I believe.

What makes you think that anyone in Afghanistan is ‘overthrown’?

We’ve taken their capital city and installed a new democratically elected government recognised by the UN, sure Russia left with their tale between their legs but the red army are rubbish.

How do the Iraqis have ‘democracy’ when the counry is falling headlong into civil war?

They have a democratically elected government. They could change their gun laws for example and make it a capital crime to have an AK47 or RPG after some sort of amnesty say.

How do the people of Iraq have a choice about anything at the moment?

Fundamentally the insurgents could just put their weapons down and learn to behave like civilized human beings. The good people of Iraq need to decide whether they want to become a functioning democracy, an extention of Iran, a terror state or a war-zone I guess, sometimes you have to fight for freedom, it doesn’t just happen. We live in a globalised community, rogue states that harm the interests of their own people should be subject to regieme change if you ask me. It’s a tough call but I side with the neo-cons on this. In the UK we depend on other countries for some of the things we need to keep our country functioning, other countries depend on us for things. The British people wouldn’t just cut another country off for the sake of it we wouldn’t steal another countries land or resources. Imposing sanctions or going to war is serious business.

What gets me with you lot is the amount of internet tittle-tattle you are all quoting as sources. I don’t pretend to be supersmart or have all the answers but if you want to argue with me can you please at least use proper sources if any. Thank you

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raincoaster/mark gamon. I was speaking from the experience of encountering ’star’ bloggers, not of blogging myself.

Star bloggers usually write excellently and at length in their main blog, but often disappointingly hopelessly in their comments. I think that this is because in their main blog they oratorically declaim, whereas in comments they must converse or argue, and the ability to do one does not always entail an ability to do the other.

Boris can write whole witty declamatory essays at the drop of a hat. Whether he can engage in debate or conversation is unknown (to me at least). And I don’t see that he’s under any obligation to do so.

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Huh.

You mean Raincoaster and I aren’t star bloggers?

In a huff now.

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Steven L…

Start with Naomi Klein. She’s pretty good on why and how we got into Iraq.

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What gets me with you lot is the amount of internet tittle-tattle you are all quoting as sources. (Steven_L)

What, you mean Boris?

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In a huff now. (Mark G)

Ha.

By star bloggers, I’m thinking mostly of American political bloggers like Kos, Josh Marshall, and the like, who get about a gazillion hits a day, and who actually meet up together at conventions like the Yearly Kos, and stuff like that.

I don’t know how many hits Boris gets, but I bet he’s nowhere near those guys.

Perhaps raincoaster and your good self are, unknown to me, up there with the stars – or will be very shortly. I am very far from omniscient.

As for me, raincoaster said today that she’d read a blog of mine. But I don’t think I could write one, because I tend to write in response to things I read. Which makes me more of a commentor than a blogger.

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I should add that I do have a huge sprawling website, but it’s not a blog. It’s a collection of essays about an idea. About once every six months, I get an email from someone about it. And this is quite enough.

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Interesting (in terms of demonstrating Israali stupidity anyway)

The army planned to hit strategic infrastructure targets and symbols of the Lebanese government, Israel’s left-leaning Haaretz newspaper reported.

A senior General Staff officer said: “We will continue hitting everything that moves in Hizbollah – but we will also hit strategic civilian infrastructure.”

http://news.sky.com/skynews/article/0,,30000-1229895,00.html

I though this was a ‘war on terror(ists)’, so how come it’s now a war on Lebanon?

Maybe they need to add a few RPMs to the spin.

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‘the taxi fares are extortionate’ (High Fraser)

It’s called profiteering Mr Fraser, shows you how some people treat their fellow citizens doesn’t it.

As for your ‘Imagine that some Islamic terrorists are lurking amid the good people of Henley on Thames. The first thing that Sir. Ian Blair of the Met does is to bomb Henley Bridge’ comments above think again.

This is why we have a security service and an anti-terrorist squad. We do our best to control the terrorists within our own borders. Some people have drawn the same analogy to the IRA, saying it would be like us bombing Dublin. This is rubbish, the IRA did not fire missiles from the Republic or Ireland into the UK. Everyone knows Syria arm Hezbollah but Israel has not launched an attack on Syria, but on Hezbollah, a terrorist organisation operating from inside Lebanon. If the Lebanese government cannot stop Hezbollah then Israel are perfectly entitled to fight back.

But Like I have said before some criticism of their methods may be well placed.

Interestingly, I was in London when this all kicked off. One night I was queuing up to buy some cigarettes in an Earls Court convenience store, an afro-caribbean woman was arguing with the Asian shop keeper about the war. The afro-caribbean woman was saying ‘it is Iran, it is all Iran’ and the shop keeper was saying ‘no it is Bush, it is Bush’.

One thing I don’t want to happen above all other things is for the war to spread to this country. Lets hope the debate stays democratic.

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Having watched the unspeakable Benjamin Netanyahu on BBC1 Sunday morning justifying Israel’s present actions in the Lebanon by comparing them to the ‘Churchill’s policy’ of area bombing, Dresden, et al, I suddenly found myself beginning to understand Nazi Germany’s policy of the final solution. Most certainly I can now understand and sympathise just how much the Arabs must hate the State of Israel.

In 1939 – 1945 Britain was fighting for its very life. It was bombed, rocketed by a vast industrial nation; and, incidentally, was fighting to save the Jews and others from Nazi atrocities. And, news for you Benjamin, it was not ‘Churchill’s policy’. It was Allied policy. The USAAF (as it then was) also carried out blanket bombing as much as the RAF.

Both British and American flyers fought against a nation which could defend itself. Our flyers fought and died. Not like your cowardly murderers-from-the-sky who are killing people whilst enjoying total safety with their American advanced technology and materiel support.

And the Boris’s of this world and the Blair’s think all of this OK.

Politicians, I s–t them.

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If anyone wants to watch (re-watch?) George Galloway v Sky News (from yesterday) it’s available here.

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Melissa said that Boris gets about ten thousand hits a day, which puts him easily in the “star blogger” category. I have yet to break a thousand.

*sniffles*

I agree that the ability to craft beautiful essays isn’t the same as the ability to make interesting comments, but I don’t think that writing beautiful essays is the same thing as blogging.

At. All.

I don’t really think of this place as a blog; it’s a place for Boris to recycle his essays and get some coverage in the blogosphere and some street cred as a blogger, but it’s not really a blog. Pretty much everything here has been published on paper somewhere else first.

And I do consider it the mark of a good blogger to reply eloquently and promptly to the comments.

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Boris, you are absolutely right. But people will just blame the history of the area. The world is in a mad place right now, millions preferring to die for a cause the rest of the World cannot truly understand. but never mind. when they are all gone the World will still be here. Its in our nature to destroy each other, even when in peace. Just seems sad and pointless at the time. Boris for King.

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I don’t like the war and I disagree with the conduct of the Israeli government and army however Israel is not in the wrong, Palestine and all the other undemocratic shite holes that are around Israel are. If you look at the map you will see how tiny Israel is, why can the Jews not have at least this small piece of land? Why can’t they have at least one nation. There are loads of Islamic nations.

All this ‘Israel is evil’ business is crap. Hell I am a Hippy and a Pacifist but even I know that Israel is in the right but making a few wrong decisions.

I am sick of all the Anti-Semitism…….oh wait I forgot Jews are evil people. We should put them in Death Camps and make Mel Hitler Gibson and his moronic fathers the Führurs of the Western world.

A.

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Mark Gamon

We are more or less shut up for August and it is ghostly quiet in the Commons around this time—- hence the quiet.

Boris has responded briefly to comments before but I cannot pressure him when he is on a well deserved holiday in Central America can I mate?!

Keep on side won’t you, star blogger

Melissa

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“I suddenly found myself beginning to understand Nazi Germany’s policy of the final solution.”

*Cough* Fascist *Cough*

I can’t believe people died fighting for people like you….

I would hate to live in a Communist or Fascist country which people like you make me think this country will become. If so I will be the first in the Revolutionary line………..mind you as it will be a peaceful Revolution I will get shot dead by the Commies or Fascist you agree with.

Oh no wait, you are right we should all exterminate Jews. I know we can round them all up and release one once in a while for a hunt, that would be a good sport.

COME ON EVERYONE LETS BURN SYNOGOGUES!!! JEWS MUST DIE!

What rot! People like you should be ashamed of yourself. How can anyone agree with the Holocaust. You are to put it bluntly, a freak.

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What raincoaster said

>:
August 3, 2006 03:51 PM | permalink

Well a Boris did post a very funny comment on that Haaretz article. But our Boris only talks to Vicus, to Melissa, and to God.

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Vicus, Melissa, God. That’s just two people then.

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My respect for you has risen. Boris ,thank you for speaking out against the mutterings of anti Jews who are not brave enough to come out of the closet.

“An excellent post, and “… when Israeli rockets kill civilians, they have missed their targets, and that when Hizbollah rockets kill civilians, they have scored a deliberate hit.” really hits the nail right on the head.”
I totally concur with the above quote. Hizbollah are willing to use children and women as shields to hide their wickedness. They use homes as a base to fire from. I have friends in Israel who will verify this. After all ,seeming followers of the Koran are willing to send young boys,children as suicide bombers, to blow themselves and others up, with out any thought to the young lives they have corrupted. I also have friends who are decent,good people who are followers of the Islamic faith who believe that Israel has a right to a homeland. Do not forget there are all faiths living there ,not just Jews and they have and can live in harmony. Hizbollah are cowardly murders who do a disservice to Islam in their intent to destroy Israel.

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I can’t decide: Is that incredible egotism, atheism, or the world’s best example of sucking up?

And thank you, Melissa. All compliments gratefully accepted. Does our Boris talk to Haaretz, I wonder?

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Perhaps someone can tell me why one of the world’s minority religions has a right to a state of its own?
Just because people of the same religion lived there 2000 years ago is not a valid reason. How about if a group of modern druids suddenly demanded to seize Wales as a Druid homeland? That’s pretty much what Irgun, Ben-Gurion and his Stern gang terrorists did to form the so-called ‘country’ of Israel.

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Regarding the terrorist origins of the state of Israel, see http://www.britains-smallwars.com/Palestine/kidnap.htm

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Go Boris go…

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Melissa said that Boris gets about ten thousand hits a day, which puts him easily in the “star blogger” category. I have yet to break a thousand. (raincoaster)

Outfits like Kos get 100,000+ hits per day, so if Boris is a star, they must be megastars.

he is on a well deserved holiday in Central America (Melissa)

And I will be on a well deserved holiday myself in a day or two.

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Ah, but among British blogs, he’s way up there. There are very, very few blogs that get over a thousand hits a day; of 50.6 million on Technorati, Boris’ blog is ranked 3,858 (786 links from 472 blogs) not too scruffy.

Kos, IMHO, has been coasting for a good while now.

Although he DID link to me once *swoon*.

I prefer Jesus’ General.

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FYI Daily Kos is the 4th most popular blog in the world:
Rank: 4 (105,667 links from 12,568 blogs)

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As Hizbollah shoot and scoot, thus cleverly drawing Israeli fire down on “innocent civilians”(not to mention UN observers)our chattering classes all shout about war crimes.The BBC has loads of commentators telling us that this will “radicalise moderate muslim opinion”. Can anyone show me any moderate opinions being expressed by muslims? All I can see is any semitic and anti western racism expressed in terms that would result in prison sentence if used by a white Christian or Jew about any other race or creed. Where is any that daft legislation against incitement to religious or racial hatred when it is our democracy and way of life that is under attack? Just listen to what the neo mediaeval nutters are ACTUALLY saying about us. Wake up guys the enemy is at the gates and you are offering them tea and sympathy.

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Sometimes it’s tempting not even to bother telling them “Scroll up and read before posting”.

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‘Not like your cowardly murderers-from-the-sky who are killing people whilst enjoying total safety with their American advanced technology and materiel support’ (Pip)

I understand where the sentiment comes from Pip, but war is war. If a load of crazed kids armed with AK47s, RPGs and Iranian rockets are trying to murder your citizens, or your armed forces and they are in another country the idea of war is that you go and kill them before they get the chance to kill you.

It’s not nice to think about on civy street I know, but it’s how war is. As for the ‘enjoying total safety’ good governments will always try to ensure that they have the defence technology that allows the highest level of safety for their armed forces. After all, think British army, some of my mates are in it, they are prepared to die so that we can blog, drink beer, have a cushy life etc. Don’t we owe them the best defence technology should they have to actually go to war?

No sane person in Europe actually likes going to war, it’s just something that has to happen every so often.

You can’t reason with these terrorists, you just have to kill them.

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Well said Steven_L, although I don’t fully agree with your last sentiment. Whilst appeasement is folly when dealing with terrorists I think that allowing numbers of members of such organisations the possibility of surrender is a policy always worth considering. Don’t make it too easy for the godfathers!

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“You can’t reason with these terrorists, you just have to kill them.”

Like the IRA for example?

You seem to quote Bush non-stop, Steven.
How can you say that you can’t reason with Hezbollah (I assume that’s who you mean?) when they are already part of the parliament and government of Lebanon?

Ah … I see Jack R has arrived and weighed in. This should be fun.

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Steven, how much collateral damage is acceptable? Particularly when it inspires more people to sign up for Hezbollah career paths?

There are moral imperatives here. Do not become the monster to fight the monster.

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Quote from Steven L.
“You can’t reason with these terrorists, you just have to kill them.”

I doubt if you’re a historian, but the leader of the Albigensian crusade against the Cathars in the 14th century made the immortal comment ‘Kill them all, God will know his own”. I thought we’d got above that in 2006.

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We’ve stopped the IRA bombing us and kiling our policemen now. Most people implicate them in that £22m bank robbery and some people describe them as the world best organised criminal organisation.

So I guess killing them would have recruited more IRA terrorists (probably true) keeping them inside would have led to more bombs going off / more sectarian violence (probably true) and now we just let them act as organised criminals (and probably watch them like hawks).

The difference in Lebanon is that Hezbollah are attacking another sovereign state. That sovereign states wants them out of the picture, who can blame them.

As for my last statement, that just sums up what an average infantry man would tell you, that’s how they have to think, that’s war. How do you think Hezbollah’s terrorists think, have you ever heard how these jihadists talk?

The horrible thing about the current conflict is that Lebanon were experiencing good economic growth, were making good progress to becoming part of the European Economic Area in order to develop their exports. Lebanon is not rich in resources, it’s main exports are food and tobacco. It also had a booming tourist trade, even the timeshare touts had moved in (with a bit of luck… no I won’t say it)

Before this conflict they had 18% unemployment nationally, in the poor agricultural areas in the South this would have been higher. So you have masses of unemployed youth being handed rockets by agents of jihadi terror and being taught to hate Israel and the US.

It’s a horrible situation, I’m not saying the Israeli response is doing any good either, but I can understand given their location and history why they are so keen on defending themselves. This type of unemployment cannot be sorted out overnight, Europe were helping, The Iranian and Syrian have basically all but wiped out a young generation in my view all the further their cause; the destruction of Israel and an increase in hatred against the West.

As for collateral damage raincoaster if it was the UK at war I’d answer ‘the minimum necessary to win and minimise our casualties’.

In hindsight maybe the EU should have done more to help Lebanon before this started, but did anyone see this coming? I didn’t.

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What if the UK declares war and wades in? Will you sign up?

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The honest answer is no, I’m too much of a coward.

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http://www.chomsky.info/whatsnew.htm

Open Letter by Noam Chomsky

Lebanon solidarity letter:

The US-backed Israeli assault on Lebanon has left the country numb, smoldering and angry. The massacre in Qana and the loss of life is not simply “disproportionate.” It is, according to existing international laws, a war crime.

The deliberate and systematic destruction of Lebanon’s social infrastructure by the Israeli air force was also a war crime, designed to reduce that country to the status of an Israeli-US protectorate.

The attempt has backfired, as people all over the world watch aghast. In Lebanon itself, 87 percent of the population now support Hezbollah’s resistance, including 80 percent of Christian and Druze and 89 percent of Sunni Muslims, while 8 percent believe the US supports Lebanon.

But these actions will not be tried by any court set up by the “international community” since the United States and its allies that commit or are complicit in these appalling crimes will not permit it.

It has now become clear that the assault on Lebanon to wipe out Hezbollah had been prepared long before. Israel’s crimes had been given a green light by the United States and its ever-loyal British ally, despite the overwhelming opposition to Blair in his own country.

The short peace that Lebanon enjoyed has come to an end, and a paralyzed country is forced to remember a past it had hoped to forget. The state terror inflicted on Lebanon is being repeated in the Gaza ghetto, while the “international community” stands by and watches in silence. Meanwhile the rest of Palestine is annexed and dismantled with the direct participation of the United States and the tacit approval of its allies.

We offer our solidarity and support to the victims of this brutality and to those who mount a resistance against it. For our part, we will use all the means at our disposal to expose the complicity of our governments in these crimes. There will be no peace in the Middle East while the occupations of Palestine and Iraq and the temporarily “paused” bombings of Lebanon continue.

Tariq Ali
Mona Abaza
Matthew Abraham
Gilbert Achcar
Etel Adnan
Aziz el-Azmeh
Nadia Baghdadi
John Berger
Timothy Andres Brennan
Michaelle Browers
Noam Chomsky
Alexander Cockburn
Dan Connell
Mahmoud Darwish
Richard Falk
Eduardo Galeano
Irene Gendzier
Charles Glass
Yassin al Haj Saleh
Emilie Jacir
Assaf Kfoury
Elias Khouri
Yitzhak Laor
Ken Loach
Jennifer Loewenstein
Karma Nabulsi
John Pilger
Harold Pinter
Richard Powers
Tanya Reinhart
Eric Rouleau
Arundhati Roy
Sandra Shattuck
William Thelin
Gore Vidal
Howard Zinn
Stephen Zunes

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“You can’t reason with these terrorists, you just have to kill them.” Steven_L

No doubt Hizbollah and Hamas say exactly the same thing about the Israeli government.

That’s the problem isn’t it really? Seems to me Steven that you are symptomatic of this brutal philosophy.

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A list of all the tunes
Ending with Steven Zunes
Including Harold Pinter
Thought he died last winter
And there’s good old ken Loach
Still chewing on that Roach
I also see John Berger
Still b*****ing the verger?
With that man John Pilger
There’s no one more bilger
And salute Tariq Ali
Of leftist mind ballet
And hairdresser Gore Vidal
So Soon he does bridle
Alexander Cockburn
Port gives me the heartburn
Hi Arundhati Roy
Trifles truth as a toy
There’s aweet Charles Glass
Home stonethrowing must pass

I’m drained! Mac and jaq where are you versificators when I need you?

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What a load of crap.

Got any arguments or is your repertoire entirelylimited jingoistic gainsaying?

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Kos, IMHO, has been coasting for a good while now. Although he DID link to me once *swoon*. I prefer Jesus’ General. (raincoaster)

I think Kos has become like a huge department store where you go in and get lost and can’t find your way out. Jesus’ General is, well, amusing. Billmon is my current favourite, if only because he’s one of the few US bloggers commenting on Lebanon.

And, Jack R, I must say I have much the same response to anything signed by Tariq Ali and John Pilger, even if I happen to agree with much of the statement they have signed. They’re all so insufferably self-important. I really just don’t care what they think. The mere sight of Tariq Ali has my hackles (whatever they are) rising.

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Dr Prion

You dissing me man?

idlex

Chomsky did some good stuff on grammars but otherwise I can’t think of anything good to say about this list, except that fortunately it is in alphabetical order and not ability. Had TA come top even given the underwhelming competition in such a list I would have ended it all, much to Dr P’s delight. Hey Dr P didn’t they ask you to sign it?

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Susan,

You’re right, the main problem in the world is peoples attitudes to each other. Thankfully in the UK Christians, Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Aetheists etc all manage to live in relative peace with each other and debate things diplomatically.

If you read my post below that one you will see the point I was making was that defence is necessary, if for sake arguement Europe had never agreed never again to go to war with each other and a terrorist organisation in France was firing missiles into Kent that the French government was powerless to stop what would your reaction be? Let’s invite them over the channel for a cup of tea and a chat?

Back to people’s attitudes, I saw a documentry (it was either on BBC or ITV) from Palestine (I don’t recall whether it was Gaza or the West Bank) where Palestinian children were being taught that they should aspire to be ‘marytrs’.

How can you justify this kind of attitude coming from a privelidged Western background (I assume)? Israeli children are not taught that the best thing they can do is to kill are they?

This kind of indoctrination of innocent children is evil. It is widely publicised that Hamas, the elected government of Palestine, advocate the destruction of Israel, a soveriegn nation recognised by the UN. The British have done some shameful things in India during our history, but the Indian government do not teach their children to come over here and kill us do they? They educate their children, and many come here as young adults to further their education, to work with us, not against us.

There is no snap solution to the worlds problems, to expect a solution within your lifetime or my lifetime is probably optimistic. All we can do is keep working at it and be civilised to our fellow human beings.

When people become indoctrinated to kill indiscriminatly they cease being human in any meaningful definition of the word.

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Melissa – since you’ve been so sweet about it, I forgive Boris his absence unreservedly. I’m off to Cornwall for five days meself tomorrow.

Of course, when he does get back, he’s going to find a lot of comments to read. I’d be genuinely interested to hear his response.

(Back onside. Is that a cricketing term. Oh no, football. Boris knows a LOT about football I know )

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“We have discovered how to hit the Jews where they are the most vulnerable. The Jews love life, so that is what we shall take away from them. We are going to win because they love life and we love death.”

“If they [the Jews] all gather in Israel, it will save us the trouble of going after them worldwide”

Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah

When are you people going to wake up?

Hizbollah is part of the government of Lebanon, its stated aim is the destruction of the State of Israel, it has attacked Israel on numerous occasions since the pullout. I am surprised Israel has waited this long to root out the manifest threat on its border.

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It’s frightening isn’t it Gabriel. I’m not sure about Hezbollah being part of the Lebanese government. Can you back this up with some evidence?

I though of Hezbollah as a bunch of disillusioned unemployed kids taht had been indoctrinated with hatred; a militant wing of the preachers of hate in Terehan.

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One other quick point. 400,000 (yes 400,000 Never Again? more like Never Mind) black muslims have been killed by arab Muslims over the past 3 years in Darfur. Nothing has been done, Blair’s been on many holidays during the period and I don’t think there’s been an outcry about that.

But the (complete lack of) reaction from Muslims has been most telling. I guess cartoons are enough to keep them occupied until Israel fights a war with genocidal maniacs.

One further further point
“And then bomb Red Cross vehicles right through the red “+” on their roof.”

P.S. Boris, i hop you are a “right wing prick” it would be nice to think not everyone in the tory party is on Komrade Kameron’s wavelength.
Yeah because aerial misslies often create small holes in the roofs of cars with no other damage. The things people will believe in order to demonise Israel, it’s a joke.

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They control two ministries

“Hezbollah is a minority partner in the current Cabinet, holding two (and endorsing a third) cabinet positions[63] [64] in the Lebanese government of July 2005.”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hezbollah#Politics

An attack from a state is an attack by a state.

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Another point (there’s so much stupidity on this thread!) If the U.S. only cared about oil they’d tell Israel to get lost, thus instantly improving their relations with all the oil producing countries. Kind of like what China, Russia and the E.U. do.

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In case anyone’s interest in Hizbollah’s prisoner swap, reearch Samir Kuntar. Ask yourself why would such devout Muslims care about the release of a child murderer? (I mean Mohammed only had sex with kids after all)

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I don’t think you’re doing your cause any favours making bold statements about uncertain mythical / historical events Gabriel.

What interested me in you link was that a stated aim of Hezbollah was Israeli withdrawl from the Golan heights. This is land that is disputed between Syria and Israel is it not? Is what we are seeing then a war by Syria against Israel by proxy. Bush did say in that famous conversation with Blair that ‘they need to get Syria to stop Hezbollah doing this shit’.

Should a UN resolution then not be looking at condemning Syria for passing arms to Hezbollah fighters?

It looks like Iran have no intention of suspending their Uranium enrichment either. I can’t help thinking the real enemies of the people of the middle east are Syria and Iran when I read these things from reliable sources.

I my experience of Muslims in the UK they come here for a better education for their kids, reliable healthcare, better prospects, to escape kangeroo justice by ignorant barbarians and the last thing they want are things like ‘honour killings’ in their new homeland.

Of course these are the integrated good muslims who respect humanity and speak to the indegenuous population.

I think of the introduction of hardcore Sharia justice in part of the muslim world as medieval and barbaric.

It would be like if Israel introdi

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oops

introduced a crime and punishment system as is written exactly in the old testament in the book of Exodus. Interpreted literally this would mean that is an Israeli farmer had a dangerous bull in his field and did not repair a broken fence and a terrible accident occurred and the bull gored someone that the farmer would be put to death.

Of course Israel do nothing of the sort, they are a democracy.

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And while you’ve got my attention Gabriel I would like to refer to your statement ‘it would be nice to think not everyone in the tory party is on Komrade Kameron’s wavelength.’

For someone sounding very pro-israeli and anti-islamic to the point of some distaste I cannot condone your uncouth attack on the leader of Her Majesties Opposition.

We are one of only two countries that are supporting Israels right to defend herself against what you call a ’state attack’. I would be worried if a 39 year old well educated man was not interested in important issues such as the environment. Our country does not exist to blindly support Israel nor does our offical opposition.

Guess what, we don’t actually rely on Israel to defend our naion, our defence is sured up by our defeat of Hitler, our membership of the EU, our excellent security services and our membership of NATO.

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ho hum, more self-righteous Israeli-apologetic mendacious codswallop from Steven Latrine and Jack Rumsfeld,

I assume you are broadly sympathetic to the great Zionist cause and the racist, chauvinistic policies of the government of Israel towards Arabs particularly and non-Jews generally? Israel is everyone’s number 1 scapegoat, you infer. if Israel was dealt with appropriately after having been found guilty in the court of public opinion, it would have completely decayed under the weight of justly imposed sanctions from the world at large.

Israel’s reprehensible behaviour toward Palestinians including collective punishment, imprisonment without trial, torture, targeted assassinations to mention just a few, should have resulted in the kind of sanctions that I am sure you personally were (presumably) happy to see visited on the innocent population of Iraq, resulting in hundreds of thousands of infant deaths. What I find amusing is that you Zionist apologists equate support for the Palestinian cause and the people brutalised by the Zionist experiment, to complete agreement with the methods employed by Hamas and Hezbollah, vis-à-vis, retaliation against the people of Israel on a like-for-like basis, to which you attach the euphemism, “terrorism”. Because terrorism is what “they” do isn’t it?

The mindless murder of a 12-year old Palestinian girl by an IDF Colonel, oh no, he’s one of ours you say and he wears an IDF uniform so whatever he does is justifiable. How about Baruch Goldstein, that inbred-racist that machine gunned dozens of Palestinians to death in a Mosque in Hebron and was only stopped by someone crushing his skull with a fire extinguisher, his actions shouldn’t be construed as terrorism as he was carrying out God’s work. The latter’s miserable grave is visited by thousands of Jews every year and the site was turned into an official cemetery by the town’s Mayor. What about Goldstein’s rabbis and teachers that spewed the religious racism into his head, is that hate speech or is that only when Imams do it?

You and those like you are incapable of separating your admiration for all things Israeli from your responsibility as a human being. You see when I listen to that devious individual Netanyahu, I see him for what he is a Zionist Josef Goebbels. You, on the other hand, swallow his every word without question. Ramsey, I care not for Islam and view it with the contempt that I do Judaism or Christianity, as being pointless monotheistic garbage and I wish that it would all disappear and leave the world to sensible people that have no use for religious racism, bigotry, childish beliefs in real estate bequests from some imaginary fire-breathing tyrants, genital mutilation and thoughts of racial purity.

The day Israel has formally complied with all outstanding UN resolutions starting with 242, come back and talk to me; and, because that won’t happen, the real world should take all Israel’s guns away because it can’t be trusted to behave properly and dismantle the political entity and hand it back to the Arab majority that lie within its borders.

When the Israelis can handle real democracy on a one man- one vote basis instead of the meaningless sham currently in Israel, come back and talk to me.

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idlex, you seem to have a fairly balanced view and appear (unlike Steven L) to have investigated this region’s history to a certain extent.

Please explain to me why these people persist in the view that Israel can do no wrong.

Am I just a couple of wheels short of a bike or is it because they have no clue about what the Israelis do in the name of security?

Have you people read NOTHING about this region or is it the same uninformed, shoot from the hip bullshit you hear from incipient Hitler youth types?

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To cut to the chase Phil, in case you hadn’t realised there is a war on. I’m on our side (i.e. the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland).

After 9/11 Bush said that there was going to be a ‘war on terror’ and asked quite openly which countries were ‘with us or against us’ looks like we picked the right side to be on and much to the detriment of the long suffering people of various hideous governments around the world certain countries decided they were ‘against us’. It’s as simple as that. As for pulling our troops out of Iraq, Afghanistan etc. would you like to be the last unit out? These things are best left to the military, not a load of civilians who like to massage their consciences.

As a young working class Brit a good few of my mates are in the infantry, my loyalty is to them, our boys, no-one else.

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Well, I have taken the time to read this entire page and it’s taken me a little over half an hour.

First I have to say that I’m rather disgusted, yet not surprised, at Boris’s ignorant and narrow-minded views about the current situation in Lebanon and in Israel.

Let me explain why I felt the need to comment. My aunt lives in Israel with her Palestinian husband and her three children, all of whom are above the age of 20 and have dual nationality (Israeli/British) and who describe themselves as Palestinian Israelis. My aunt works for a humanitarian organisation and has spent the best part of 30 years right in the middle of the Israeli/Palestinian difficulties.

Every time I see any of them, I am subjected to the most horrific stories of Israel’s (rarely reported) violence and cruel treatment of anybody it disagrees with. Being of Jewish descent myself I can assure anyone who fancies accusing me of being anything other than a reasonable human being that I care not for race, religion or colour, other than to say that none should be used as a weapon. However, after watching the current situation in Lebanon, I am sad to report that yet again, Israel is being the “Abused Abuser” and “Bullied Bully” and is flaunting it’s position as WW2 “survivor” as a right to persecute and mistreat other peoples. With immunity.

If America is the boisterous puppy with big teeth and no brain and Britain is the once glorious and terrifying but now senile old tyrant, then Israel is the child that was abused over and over and never gained respect for itself or anybody else.

I hope people understand what I am trying to say. I don’t have a great education but I have tried my best to explain how I feel about this. Whatever H’zbollar has done/started/caused, does this give a supposedly “civilised” nation the right to deliberately throw bombs onto innocents?

JEWS IN WW2 WERE INNOCENT…..”99%” OF MUSLIMS ARE INNOCENT…ALL CHILDREN ARE INNOCENT…….ISRAEL IS NOT.

PS..I truly wish for Bush and Yo Blair to be tried for war crimes.

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Steven, how do your friends in the military feel about the situation? I was born and raised on bases and in my experience, it’s the chickenhawks on the sidelines who are always most eager to go to war. The real army spends much of its time saying “what the hell are we doing here?” when aforesaid chickenhawks send them somewhere.

The military advised against engagement in Iraq, too. They will serve, but they serve at the mercy of a government whose priorities do not necessarily include placing human life ahead of political expediency.

I don’t think it’s telling tales out of school to let you know that Metro is ex-army. Scroll up and see what he has to say, or just check his blog here.

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Here is another infantryman’s point of view, this time from Israel.

ANOTHER IDF OBJECTOR JAILED
Lebnanews speaks to the second Israeli refusnik of the 2006 conflict

In 1982, it took over half a year for Israeli officers and soldiers to begin refusing draft and orders to enter into Lebanon. In the beginning of the Al-Aqsa intifada, several months elapsed before the first letter of defiance was handed in. But in 2006, three weeks into the war, First Sergeant Zohar Milchgrub is entering imprisonment today (Sunday) for refusing to be drafted to a reserve force set to enter Lebanon . He is the second Israeli soldier in a week to become a conscientious objector to the new war. We spoke to him after the anti-war rally in Tel Aviv on Saturday.

Our first question would be to which part of the army you belong.

An ordinary infantry combat unit.

When did you first decide to refuse to draft?

I made the decision to refuse further service during my active service in the IDF. It was very clear for me that i won’t be heading back to the Occupied Territories. The decision to refuse to serve in this war was as natural as refusing to serve in the Territories.

Would you say that the approach of the Israeli public to this war is different to its approach to the occupation?

First of all, the pro-war sentiments and the exhilaration in the media have definetly had their effect. Society is following the call without any qualms or reservations. Even people who consider themselves to be on the Left, my own family.

Are people more motivated to serve in Lebanon than in the OPT?

Absolutely. A close friend of mine is in Lebanon with his unit as we speak. You need to remember that the breach of [Israeli] sovereignty, the raid over the border, all this was very problematic. However, we need to be looking at the bigger picture, and the bigger picture is that Lebanon is a country that we should be talking to. If we have even the slightest hope of ending all of this, we need to speak to Lebanon , and we need to speak even to Hezbollah. We really do believe that this is possible – proper Lebanese sovereignity on all Lebanese lands and a peace agreement with Lebanon which, God willing, will be linked somehow to peace agreements with Syria and with the Palestinians.

How is the Left camp in Israël responding to the war?

I don’t want to speak in the name of the entire Left – and, anyway, I think the real Left are the people here, at this rally. Sadly, people on the Israeli Left need to see casualties before they start demonstrating against the war.

Israeli casualties?

Well, I wouldn’t want to say that they don’t care about other casualties, but there is a greater sensitivity to Israeli casualties, which is a great pity. Nevertheless, we see people joining and our numbers growing every week – this is a part of an ongoing war: people are beginning to sober up from their illusions.

How long do you expect to spend in prison?

As less as possible, maybe around a month. If the war won’t be over until then I’ll leave the country. I was planning to commence studies in Germany this year.

Some of our readers would doubtlessly want to write to you, and you will not be able to respond to them from prison. Would you like to say something to them now?

Even before I committed the actual act of refusing to serve, I emailed all my friends all over the world – in Germany , in Italy , in the States and even in Japan. I told them that what I am going to do in the nearest days is thanks to that wonderful support they’ve always given me. Almost immediately I got numerous responses of encouragement and solidarity. This is very important to us: we may like think we can do anything on our own, but the international support is wonderful and I’m deeply grateful to all those who support us.
Dimi Reider, Tel Aviv

Letters to Zohar and his fellow objectors can be posted on http://july2006.forumco.com/topic~TOPIC_ID~38.asp or emailed to alteriamo at gmail.com. All letters will be printed and delivered to prison no.6

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Raincoaster, they are too professional to discuss it with civilians outside of immediate family. I know for a fact that some them have tried to get out of active service and been persuaded to stay to the end of their tour though.

Before the Iraq invasion my feelings were that we should not commit our troops, vote with the US in the Security Council and afford them logistical support.

The day we went in all I can do is support them. Now what I want for them if they are staying to see it through is best kit (many are having to buy their own) and the best air support (i.e. British pilots in the Raptor and Eurofighter).

I think our UK priorities should be to lobby the US to sell us the Raptor and to divert spending from social engineering and pubic sector non-jobs to upgrade the kit levels at at least the level of US soliders.

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Dear My MP,

I must say I was flattered that a letter to you Boris as my MP would produce an article in The Telegraph. Several days later I thought I might respond. I dont have an organ like yours so I am reduced to using my MP’s web page . I thought it was silly of Boris to suggest that the chat in the Waitrose car park in Henley is subliminally anti semitic ( the Mel Gibson stuff ). Perhaps only drunks write to their MPs, perhaps only ….. I was a bit surprised by the bit about it being bonkers to ask an opinion former ( Boris )who writes in the National Press to criticise the government because no one would listen to him and it wouldnt make any difference. Help…, why write an article on the subject then ..to pay the school fees , why be an MP ? But then the article got heavy .If being critical of the government of Israel really makes me an anti semite I plead guilty. Best get that over with quick . Sorry, but if something is wrong then a silly slur about anti semitism even from my esteemed MP wont deflect either me or the truth.

Perhaps I am being touchy but I felt patronised with the insinuation that your constituents arent well informed . In fact my views are entirely supported by my MP’s organ – The Spectator this week . Fascinating,there was a diatribe of venom from Melanie someone supporting Israel – all opinion and not a single fact . But also a simple article full of facts and truth by Fergal Keane. Read it for yourselves and take a view.. and well done Boris for publishing both, I thought both helped the cause . Hopefully we can, in time, get our honourable member get to grip with some facts and even think about things when he reads his own organ . I give him a bit of colour – my friend who lives in Jerusalem tells me what a little of what is going on. A vignette. There is a policy of the Israelis called Greater Jerusalem, this involves ensuring that anyone who leaves the East bank never comes back. How very original! I dont mean they emigrated but then wanted to come home – I mean they visited another part of Palestine even briefly – even a part in Israeli control but then are refused reentry. So Mum is sick in Bethelem, you visit but you can never go home . It doesnt matter if you have children , a sick parent etc. How odd this drip , drip, drip policy has become so rigourous in the last two weeks. It is of course about the lebensraum of the extreme Israelis. It is simply land clearance, a clearance of Palestinians from their land to build greater Israel. Given the policies of Israel I am amazed that in our country any informed person thinks it is odd that the Palestinians voted for Hamas or that as a result of the past two weeks support for Hizbollah has risen hugely even in Christian Lebanon ( source … this week’s Spectator)

I was interested that Boris’s organ the Spectator published some facts today. Ratio of civilian deaths 20:1 Lebanon : Israel. Every death is a tragedy, but are we so wrong in the Waitrose car park when we say we dont like supporting a policy of revenge and intimidation by Israel? |Are we so silly to feel that using Prestwick to reinforce Israel is wrong and we want no part in it ? Are we so silly when we ask our MP to open his eyes ears and brain and then use his voice and pen in defence of what is right?

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You aren’t on my side Steven. You’re a bumptious fool who hasn’t even taken the time to look into this matter except perhaps a perfunctory look at Israeli propaganda.

I’m ashamed to be British right now; it actually makes me feel nauseous when I consider that the world may believe that ALL British people are sabre rattling psychos like you.

Speaking as someone who is waiting for the results of an interview with the Royal Engineers, I am not impressed in the least with ‘your mates in the military’. Whilst following orders is a prerequisite of of a stint in the army, leaving your conscience at the door isn’t. I made my feelings on this issue abundantly clear and these views were not met with criticism in the least.

This is an example of Israeli propaganda:
1) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six_day_war
On the one hand, Israel fired what is considered the first shot “in a pre-emptive attack on Egypt’s airforce” Jordan in turn attacked the Israeli cities of Jerusalem and Netanya. At the war’s end, Israel had gained control of the Gaza Strip, the Sinai Peninsula, the West Bank, and the Golan Heights. The results of the war affect the geopolitics of the region to this day.

2) http://www.science.co.il/Arab-Israeli-conflict.asp
The Arab nations initiated four wars against Israel:

* 1948 War of Independence
* 1956 Sinai War
* 1967 Six Day War
* 1973 Yom Kippur War

Israel defended itself each time and won. After each war Israeli army withdrew from most of the areas it captured (see maps). (see Camp-David Accords). This is unprecedented in World history and shows Israel’s willingness to reach peace even at the risk of fighting for its very existence each time anew.

Where I come from, we call this sort of thing lying. Politicians call it spin.

Unfortunately, halfwits buy into it.

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[Ed: apologies for the delay]

Well Phil, I wish you luck in your application to the Royal Engineers, and give a hearty thanks you haven’t got your heart set on a career in the diplomatic corps.

I tried to post this earlier, but it went poof in some strange internetty fashion, so here goes:

Here is an interview