Letters to the Editor
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hiding behind children
Perhaps there have been other cultures in history which glorified hiding behind children (while trying to kill your opponent's children) as somehow brave and glorious, but I have never heard of them. I find it disgusting.
I think this shows that the concept of a Palestinian state is dead. I used to believe in the 2 state solution until Arafat turned down Barak's generous offer. I can't see how you can give a country to a people with such a nihilistic culture. Instead we need to recognize that the residents of Gaza are simply war refugees from the 1948 and 1967 Arab Israeli wars and reattach Gaza to Egypt from where it came. The same needs to be done with the majority of the West Bank and Jordan.
The Palestinians have proven that they can't govern themselves.
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Not 12, 16 it says quite clearly 16
Anyway, Africa is rife with 12 year olds with machine guns who would kill you for kicks anyway. I fail to see how one accidental death is particularly more horrifying than any other. I understand that Salon intentionally politicizes this and barely 2 or 3 days goes by any more without a pity the poor poor Palestinians article as if we had to all take our own pulses to measure our liberal street cred. So perhaps you should take that up with them and not the LW's. Thanks.
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A Question for the Zionists:
I would like to hear from the unabashed Israel-supporters (you know who you are) on the topic of demographics. Specifically, the fact that the non-Jewish population of combined Israeli/Palestinian territory will soon outnumber that of the Jewish population.
What vision for the future do you have in light of this fact, and what solutions do you propose for the time when you will be a minority in your own land? I know that there is plenty of apprehension in this country (US) about the hispanic/minority polulation overtaking the caucasians here. I would assume then, seeing as the only conflict we have here is about roadsigns and jobs, that in Israel where there is a very real and continuing conflict, that there would be some serious apprehension and discussion about the swelling Arab population?
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Let's parse that gleefull call for destruction
Ok Palestinians make up about 19% of all Israelis. So even if they continue to have 'massive families' say 5-9 kids each it would still take a while. Of course this ignores the fact that there are more Palestinians in Israel than there are in the entire Arab/Persian world combined and it ignores the fact that the state goal of the Palestinians is not to have 8 or 9% of the population of the West Bank be Jewish, as it is today, not 5%, not 1%, but zero. So let's turn that around, and you tell me about the gushing stream of freedom and consumer goods that will rain down on the Palestinians once they purge themselves of every last Jew and they now erect an absolutely pure racist society? Compare to say, the rest of the Arab world which clearly has done so well economically, politically and socially being all Jew-free all of the time. How do you envision that working out for them?
Secondly, which is really your question, what do think will happen when some happy day the Palestinians simply overwhelm Israel and go on a happy rioting/pogrom spree like they have in 1908, 1921, 1929, 1939, 1941, 1947-9, 1951? Well I suppose we can....what? Leave I guess. Maybe come to your hometown.
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thought provoking posts
first Mister Buck, who translated my post to LeCastor from the abstract to the concrete. amazing! even used different words ("metaphor" instead of "symbol") while keeping the exact meaning intact. RealName noted that people think in terms of "groups". the most striking example of this was in the war in yugoslavia when an ill-mapped cruise missile hit the chinese embassy in belgrade and killed three chinese. there was *obviously* no intent but the chinese carried on as if the Wall were coming down! when 20 million died in the Great Leap Forward, no comment, or if that is going back too far, an ordinary week nowadays where thieves are shot for the sale of spare parts. then verelse remarks on the same thing - but from a different viewpoint. 140 million of us humans die in any given year. they all are tragedies for their loved ones. the fact that Nahid didn't die in the U.S. of leukemia meant that he wasn't going to be used as an advertisement for St. Luke's. instead he's used as a symbol of a threat to *our* group, in other words, to *us*. as for "There is nothing more personally devastating to a family than the loss of a child." one would really think that is true, yet hamas and the islamic propaganda would lead us to believe that they *cherish* the martyrdom of a shahid. that Namid's father would *sell* his martyrdom to hamas (when it was actually accidental) shows a certain callousness. perhaps necessary, but still present. he only thinks of his own family (his two wives, no money and nine children, are those children and wives replaceable parts(of his family)?). after all the point is to *stop* islamic jihad (read hamas) from setting off rockets there - not inflame the situation to cause *more*. and what do those mothers feel? they are *shown* rejoicing.
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yes, misaac, that is the only sensible solution
reattach gaza and the west bank to egypt and jordan. but they don't want to - both were *offered* it but the Arab League refused. why? so they can used them and their hate (bottled up in refugee camps) as a weapon in the (whatever you call the "reconquista" in arabic). the only "hope" for reattachment is the development of an iranian shiite bomb that induces the sunni nations to cooperate with israel. that we have to go to such lengths shows how intractable they are. what is the source of this intractability? part of it is hating the jews for showing them up, but i think the greater part is land greed - that refusal to accept loss of even an inch of land. the reason hitler lost to the russians is that he refused to retreat. once conquered any territory was to remain firmly within the third reich forever. ktwdawg, you don't read my posts. fine. that's your right. but if you did, you'd realize that the Author is wrong ["The author tries to illustrate the differences between those Absolutists and Hamas- an organization whose approach is more humanitarian and internally diplomatic."] hamas and islamic jihad are the SAME THING, like the sinn fein and the ira. iran controls both, from founding to funding.