....trailing only the United States"?

Oh, my. Where do you people come up with this incredible idiocy? The uninformed reader might think that such a blatantly condemnatory statement like the above would be the type of thing a so-called "journalist" would want to back up with some...oh, I don't know...facts, maybe? But if so, then they must not know Salon very well. You guys have never let facts interfere with your bafflingly skewed "commentaries" on Israeli/Palestinian politics.

For a minute I thought I was hallucinating, as the first page of this article was only mildly biased against Israel. Heck, I was even considering subscribing to Salon again. But of course the second page, especially the above-quoted inanity, brought me back to reality. Or rather, back to Salon's reality, where [Israel or America]'s heinousness is only ever exceeded by [Israel or America].

I guess Juan "The Palestinians Wouldn't Hurt a Fly and Israel is the Devil" Cole was unavailable to Salon this week? Maybe he's busy overseas, investigating how the diabolical warmongering Israelis (the ones fiendish enough to have a 20% non-Jewish population with full legal rights, and so devious that they put Arab Israeli citizens on their Supreme Court and Knesset) managed to trick those peace-loving, oppressed Palestinians into once again overwhelmingly supporting a violent fanatical pan-islamist terror organization, one which denies the holocaust, denies the existence of Israel, and denies any human rights for women, children and non-Muslims everywhere? (all explicitly written into the Hamas party charter, by the way, lest anyone think I'm engaging in hyperbole) Make sure you keep us up to date on exactly how Israel was to blame for that one, Salon.

Frankly, I am sick and tired of Israel AND the Palestinians. Time for the US to stop meddling and let them work it out between themselves.

As a resident of Jerusalem, I thought this article was an excellent summary of the results of the Israeli election with one exception. Benn did not address the massive success of Avigdor Lieberman's right-wing Israel Beiteinu party which garnered the third largest amount of votes after Labor and Kadima won more seats than the Likud. The party appears to have succeeded by attracting Russian voters as well as former Likud supporters and is currently being courted by Kadima to possibly become part of the ruling coalition. In the campaign, Lieberman (a Moldovan immigrant, former bouncer, and Netenyahu protoge) advocated the controversial plan of swapping Israeli territory containing large numbers of Arab resdients in exchange for the settelment blocs. An analysis by Benn of how Lieberman and his party will play in the mix and why Lieberman has become so popular would have made his article more complete.

I too am SICK TO DEATH OF ISRAEL. Why does Israel hog the headlines generation after generation. Israel is a cancer on the United States of America so the question is how can we get this disease off our backs.

If Ted Kennedy represented the interests of the people of Ireland rather than those of MA then citizens would be outraged and rightly so.

Israel: Who cares.

The white Jews do not have the same DNA as the Jews of ancient Israel but the PALESTINIAN people and the dark skinned Jews do have that same DNA. Spread the news and thank God for science. The dark skinned Jews and the Palestinians, Christians, Muslims and others have lived in peace on that land for thousands of years. Israel should be given a reality check and jerked into line rather than being the mangey tail that wags the once glorious dog that it is bankrupting and destroying.

The trouble with the middle east is that there are all sorts of staements made that are truthfull in themselves but ignore the larger truth of context. There is always a factual counterargument.

Jews believe that they have a right to live in Israel as their natural homeland. But at the time of the Roman expulsion, half of the world's Jews didn't live in Israel and almost all of todays Jews are decendents from Jews who had voluntarilly emigrated from the Jewid=sh homeland 2000 years ago.

The legal basis of the existance of Israel rests with the authority of the UN, but Israel has ignored the legal authority of the UN ever since.

The Palistinians want a multi-ethnic state of Israel ignoring the fact that most Arab states who support them don't come even close to allowing that in their own countries.

Israel is the only working democracy in the middle east. It is also a theocracy and racist (60% of Jews won't live in a building where Arabs live; 40% would like Arabs expellled from Israel.)

Hamas decries the targetting assasinations of its leaders as illegal under international law, rightly so. But justifies the killing of Jewish civilians as a means to a just cause.

Israel has been deceitful in its policy of the Westbank settlements. It was always creeping annexation despite its statements that everything was open to negotiation. And the Palistineans could never accept the reality that they had little power to stop it.

Israel is trying to settle the problem not by doing what is right, but by using its power to do as much as it thinks it can get away with. And Bush won't stand in their way. The question is whether it will work in the long term.

Note I'm tired of both of them, Israel and the Palestinians. Israel seems perfectly capable of handling her own affairs, it is strong economically and the U.S. could use the financial aid currently spent on Israel to other countries that are actually in need of it. It's too early to say what the outcome of Hamas victory will be, but the hyperventilating about it in the media isn't helping. Both peoples are preoccupied with blood and soil, apprently in the delusion that "God" is acting their Supreme Real Estate Agent. Enough.

By the way, a not insignificant number of Palestinians are christian

The phrase "union boss" was coined by the far right to undermine workers rights. It's a nasty, despicible slur, and it's totally unacceptable for use in polite conversation. The idea that Salon, a progressive magazine, would use this disgusting language is pretty upsetting.