Middle East News 2

Here's a new clean thread for our popular ME news!!

Originally Posted by zahratustra:
"Well, to the certain extend, Hizbullah has already learned how to deal with Israeli tanks. During the July war they have managed to destroy 20 of them and damage further 20 or so. While destroyed machines were only a 5% of total number of tanks deployed, the deaths of 30 tank crews came as quite a shock to casualty sensitive Israelis."

Originally Posted by Prime Junta:
"Certainly — but that was playing defense on home ground, after years of digging in and training for just such an eventuality. There's no way the Hizb could survive entering ten meters into Israeli territory."

Of course PJ. My argument wasn't ment to undermine any of yours.

It's not all that often you come across a photo of a war crime in progress:



That's white phosphorus being used in a populated area against human targets. This is unequivocally forbidden by the Geneva conventions.

As I said in the earlier thread, stuff like this is first to go out the window if it's militarily expedient — and it makes all the whining about Hamas's bottle rockets seem just a wee bit hypocritical.

Originally Posted by Prime Junta
It's not all that often you come across a photo of a war crime in progress:



That's white phosphorus being used in a populated area against human targets. This is unequivocally forbidden by the Geneva conventions.

As I said in the earlier thread, stuff like this is first to go out the window if it's militarily expedient — and it makes all the whining about Hamas's bottle rockets seem just a wee bit hypocritical.

I thought you didn't think much of the Geneva conventions ?

And here:
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7…655553,00.html

Clinton Says No

I don't. But the people complaining about Hamas "war crimes" presumably do. Therefore, it's worth pointing out. "À la guerre comme à la guerre," as the French put it.

On my favorite lefty show last night, it was reported that with the inauguration preliminaries now in full swing, Israel is letting a few western reporters into Gaza in limited guided tours, riding around in tanks with Israeli military who have notebooks of talking points which they read as commentary, no extemporaneous remarks, and that pictures taken by the journalists are all viewed and deleted if necessary by Israeli overseers. This is NOT how journalism functions in a democracy—though I understand it's a war zone and all. To me it looks like a blatantly obvious attempt to control the message and the world image of this debacle.


I found this article, which should be hopeful, instead rather chilling:
Israel plans unilateral ceasefire
When people hold beliefs like those expressed here, it seems impossible any permanent peace can come about short of genocide( As someone I can't place atm once said, "Ain't nothin' more peaceful than a dead person," or words to that effect… ):

In Gaza, residents said they would welcome an end to the fighting but expressed skepticism a cease-fire can hold.

"Everybody wants the world to return to what it was. But I think it's empty words," said Ghadir Mohammed, who was forced to flee her Gaza City home because of the fighting. "Let's assume if Hamas fires a rocket, will they be quiet about it? Israel isn't the kind to be quiet."

A resident of the southern Israeli city of Ashkelon, which has been targeted by Hamas rockets, said the army needed to be sure there would be quiet in southern Israel before stopping the fight.

"For eight years, they have been shooting at us," said Yigal Hakmon, manager of a convenience store. "We can't stop in the middle. We have to finish. We have to kill all the Hamas people."

Walp, an Israeli rabbi just said that the fight against Hamas is the fight against Amalek. If you want to know what the Bible says about Amalek, it's in 1 Samuel 15.

Israel plans to halt offensive, while Hamas plans to fight on

And the never-ending cycle of violence will continue.

From Pladio's link:

Hamas has offered a one-year, renewable truce on condition that all Israeli forces leave Gaza within a week and that all the border crossings with Israel and Egypt are opened.

That doesn't really jive with the title of the article.

Because Israel won't open all crossings and I don't think even Egypt will.

Originally Posted by magerette
On my favorite lefty show last night, it was reported that with the inauguration preliminaries now in full swing, Israel is letting a few western reporters into Gaza in limited guided tours, riding around in tanks with Israeli military who have notebooks of talking points which they read as commentary, no extemporaneous remarks, and that pictures taken by the journalists are all viewed and deleted if necessary by Israeli overseers. This is NOT how journalism functions in a democracy—though I understand it's a war zone and all. To me it looks like a blatantly obvious attempt to control the message and the world image of this debacle.

hate to burst any bubbles but they're pretty much using the US army playbook there - don't remember 'embeded reporters' and all those presentations with nice graphics for a five minute news slot? Personally I think everyone in a democracy should be forced to watch the unedited news stright from every war their country is involved in but Israel is hardly exceptional on this one.

There's a ceasefire. I don't think it'll stick.
(1) It's unilateral. Hamas hasn't agreed to it, and indeed there were no negotiations with them.
(2) Israel hasn't withdrawn its troops from Gaza, and says it will only do so at a time of its choosing if Hamas holds fire.
(3) With the inauguration coming, it's in Hamas's interest to drag Israel into a messy war of attrition.

IOW, the only way this *will* stick, even for the short term of a few weeks to a few months, is if Israel has utterly crushed Hamas. This may have happened (by all accounts, the fighting went quite deep into Gaza City, which means that Hamas resistance cannot have been strong or well organized). I don't think so, however; they're about 20,000 strong, and they can't have lost more than a couple of hundred fighters.

Still, it beats fighting. It'll be interesting to see what they make of the aftermath. Not too many signs of the kind of magnanimity in victory it would take to convert a military win into a political gain. If it does stick, the next step are the Israeli elections, as well as seeing how the Palestinians regularize their political situation — Abbas's term just expired, and they're supposed to have elections too. Hamas would probably win those (again), though, so I don't know whether they will.

I came across this post, making a pretty good argument for Israel coming to terms with Hamas, from an Orthodox Jewish Zionist perspective: [ http://themagneszionist.blogspot.com…give-west.html ]

Nothing dramatically new there, but IMO it answers Pladio's earlier question of "how can we make peace with people like this?" pretty well.

Edit: I browsed some more of that blog, and it was highly interesting. I think it would be especially interesting for Jews who are Zionists but unhappy with the way Israel has turned out; it offers pretty fresh perspectives attempting to reconcile what often seems to be the irreconcilable. I'm thinking of you, Pladio.

(For the record, I have no problems whatsoever with the kind of Zionism espoused by this "Jeremiah Haber," even if I don't entirely share his views.)

Edit 2: I read even more of the blog, and damn, I like this guy. Here's a short piece he did on IDF's information warfare regarding that strike on the UN-run school: [ http://themagneszionist.blogspot.com…ombing-of.html ].

Edit 3: Wow, here he even uses almost identical turns of phrase as I did, earlier — and then explains why a gentile like yrs trly is entitled to use them too: [ http://themagneszionist.blogspot.com…for-moral.html ].

I didn't expect this: Hamas announces a ceasefire, gives Israel a week to pull out of Gaza. The IDF must really have put the hurt on them (or they've discovered an unexpected streak of pragmatism).

Good news; let's hope all parties come to their senses and get something going on the political front. Otherwise it *will* fall apart again, sooner rather than later.

I still haven't had time to read that long article. Reading here, but I've been studying and relaxing, so… Once my exams are finished I'll have time to read everything properly again, I think.

Originally Posted by V7
hate to burst any bubbles but they're pretty much using the US army playbook there - don't remember 'embeded reporters' and all those presentations with nice graphics for a five minute news slot? Personally I think everyone in a democracy should be forced to watch the unedited news stright from every war their country is involved in but Israel is hardly exceptional on this one.

Very true, V7. And I agree 100% with the idea that if your country is participating in a war, it should be mandatory that people see what it entails on the ground. I don't know that any government is really prepared to show the unvarnished truth about that, and I didn't mean to imply the US has, especially with Iraq, where the manipulation of fact was legendary.

Originally Posted by Prime Junta
I came across this post, making a pretty good argument for Israel coming to terms with Hamas, from an Orthodox Jewish Zionist perspective: [ http://themagneszionist.blogspot.com…give-west.html ]

Nothing dramatically new there, but IMO it answers Pladio's earlier question of "how can we make peace with people like this?" pretty well.

Edit: I browsed some more of that blog, and it was highly interesting. I think it would be especially interesting for Jews who are Zionists but unhappy with the way Israel has turned out; it offers pretty fresh perspectives attempting to reconcile what often seems to be the irreconcilable. I'm thinking of you, Pladio.

(For the record, I have no problems whatsoever with the kind of Zionism espoused by this "Jeremiah Haber," even if I don't entirely share his views.)

Edit 2: I read even more of the blog, and damn, I like this guy. Here's a short piece he did on IDF's information warfare regarding that strike on the UN-run school: [ http://themagneszionist.blogspot.com…ombing-of.html ].

Edit 3: Wow, here he even uses almost identical turns of phrase as I did, earlier — and then explains why a gentile like yrs trly is entitled to use them too: [ http://themagneszionist.blogspot.com…for-moral.html ].

Are you sure you didn't write that last one? Bookmarked the site—some excellent, clear reasoning and presentation there.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090118/…l_palestinians

Israeli troops start withdrawing.

Originally Posted by magerette
Are you sure you didn't write that last one? Bookmarked the site—some excellent, clear reasoning and presentation there.

If I was good enough to be able to maintain an Internet alter ego like that, I'd take up a career in intelligence. Or something. Yep, he's an impressive character.

PJ, you were right : http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090119/…l_palestinians
Israel stopped the offensive a few days before the inauguration and plans to slowly withdraw.