Fun fact: I said this like, a bajillion times.
Maybe they don’t trust Israel to “do the right thing”?
Still a higher chance of getting the goods there by trusting Israel than by being stopped by a blockade and getting a few people killed whilst revolting.
I think the flotilla’s purpose is two fold: A. If they get the aid through, they feel they can do a better job of getting the aid to the Gazans; and B. to illuminate what Israel is doing to the world at large.
Once again, I feel all parties, including those sending these ships, are in the wrong.
Or Israel just not stopping would have an even higher chance. Seriously, Israel could just let them pass through. There problem solved.
Palestine could also surrender. There, problem solved.
Israel could also surrender. There, problem solved.
Palestine could also nuke Israel. There, problem solved.
Israel could also nuke Palestine. There, problem solved.
If only things were that easy, eh. Especially during wars.
In terms of nuke-scale land, Israel = Palestine.
Exactly. Therefore: problem solved.
Or we all could just ignore the war. Seriously, from the looks of things, it’s probably never going to end. At least not in the way we can all cheere. They probably don’t even know anymore what they are fighting over. At least, they don’t act like it.
So did Israel. But nobody listened to them either. What did you expect, really?
Nice use of that whole “we forgot what we were fighting for” cliche there. Actually the fighting has only intencified in the last 5 or 10 years or so; before that, the PLO-instituted government was reasonably peaceful. They are fighting because Israel took their land and wont give it back; that’s why their fighting. They demonstrate this knowledge because they demand it every time they take Israel to the negotiating table.
Uhhh, what? You don’t think that the blockade was instituted for a reason? It was brought in because Gaza elected a terrorist organisation as their government that kept firing missiles into Israeli settlements and killing innocent civilians. Two wrongs don’t make a right, but its clearly the lesser of two evils.
Fun fact: Israel’s policy is to deny construction aid, which the Freedom Flotilla carried and would not have been delivered, and Israel also denies anything they want at random including canned foods which supposedly can be melted down into bullets or something. Fun fact: Israeli policy is to intentionally restrict aid with the intention of punishing Gazans, which is what the Freedom Flotilla is protesting, so why in the fuck would anyone think its a valid solution for them to give the aid to Israel?
I think this is an important position to highlight. Actually I don’t even think I need to comment on it, it speaks for itself. Naturally there’s a double standard in which countries you think it applies to, but that goes without saying and it’s secondary to the fact that this is actually your stated position.
This is another position that speaks for itself. “Kids who throw rocks at tanks” and civilian voters are equally valid military targets as active Hamas combatants. There was never any doubt this was your position, as you have been defending lethal military action against civilians for the entire thread, and I’ve been encouraging you all along to admit it explicitly.
I think it’s pretty clear why apologists for IDF action against civilians prefer to argue with semantics and nonsense analogies rather than say what their positions actually are, because those positions, as expected, seem to be quite disturbing.
You think a blockade’s gonna stop 'em bombing them? I say they should get their shit together and go to the source of their problem, because they sure seem to have the resources points at the blockade.
I’m not particularly taking a stance, I’m just saying that there’s a blatant double standard being applied here. The US is allowed to implement sanctions willy-nilly but then Israel is criticised when it has a legitimate security interest in doing so?
I believe that I defended lethal military action against political protesters who attack armed soldiers with knives, chains and poles. That’s entirely different to the question of the Gazan civilians. I don’t believe that Israel has the right to kill any Gazan that it finds, but I do believe that it has the right to defend itself against rocket attacks originating in Gaza.
Where someone uses violent force against another they cease to be merely a ‘civilian’; when they do it in the context of society they become a criminal, and when they do it in the context of international relations they become a combatant. If Hurt Locker showed us anything, its that the line between the two is frighteningly thin.
Uhhh…yeah. The “source of the problem” as you call it is that Hamas doesn’t recognise Israel’s right to exist. Ergo, it sees them as invaders and occupiers and orders their immediate removal from Israel. Problem is, Israel can’t do that; that would involve displacing millions of citizens to…somewhere…and that can’t happen. The only solution to the current crisis is for Hamas to accept Israel’s right to exist and/or for Hamas to be voted out at the next election and for Fatah to be elected in its stead.
I read an interesting article on why Egypt is supporting the blockade. They’re core contention is that if they end their part of the blockade, they would be implicitly supporting Hamas, which would cause a direct split between Hamas and Fatah, and would cause irrevocable harm to the Palestinian movement.
if Hamas turned out to be an Israeli puppet I wouldn’t be surprised. like they say “it’s just good business”
That makes about as much sense as 9/11 conspiracy theories.
Yep, the blockade of Gaza is pretty grim. Scratch that: Its very grim. But the way that the blockade worked in the past was that Hamas got more supplies through when they stopped rocket attacks. When they restarted rocket attacks, the blockade was amped up (and Israel invaded). So its hardly entirely Israel’s fault that the Gazan people are suffering.
ATTENTION EVERYONE! Look it’s your best friend Benjamin Netanyahu: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qQ2-nPVWFBc&feature=player_embedded
Are you still trying to defend this guy?
Why did you bump this thread?