Letters to the Editor
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by the way, folks
david sugarman is my real fucking name, how about having the courage to give a SCREEN name? (so i know how to differentiate you)
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Xanthro, nice try
but ANUS won't be convinced by anything short of the second coming (his or jesus')
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And the Lord did harden Pharaoh's heart
(and there comes two subordinate clauses, depending on the verse in Exodus) "and he did not hearken unto Moses" and "so he could lay his hand on Egypt". and lay His hand He did. the end of the religion; the end of the language; the end of the culture; the end, even, of the genetics - being raped up and down by ishmael for a thousand years till they are the ugliest people save the saudis, in the world. how do they live? on beggary. on tourism for what they were. fuck with us and God Hates You. He takes His time (what is Time to God?) but you will get it. Leave Us Alone!
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this is the people, omooex and Fer Servadu
you decided to shit on. one day, the lottery will be done, and you will be found to have trashed your tickets.
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Iran?
Well on 5 separate occasions either the President or the most senior Ayatollah has stated publically and then repeated for clarity in case no one hear it correctly: We will erase Israel from the face of the planet with nuclear weapons when that becomes possible to do. I tend to take offical policy statements like that at face value? Do you? Or are you of they "Oh those wacky Muslims, they're ALWAYS messing around" school of thought.
Because honestly in downtown Tehran there's a huge fountain that runs red commemorating the almost half million dead unarmed children they forced into charging tanks and chemical weapons in their war against Iraq in the 80's. That's what they think of human life. Perhaps you do too. Maybe you applaud it. I don't know, that's an issue between you and your concience. In any case, that's just reality. If you ignore then your're just being stupid.
Is that a reflection of the "Iranian People"? To be honest, I don't care if it is or it isn't. I don't worry about them. I worry about you or people like you if you champion that world view.
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Reply to A former Republican
"It looks like Israel initially tried to claim Pollard's operation was unauthorized, a rogue operation. Here's why I said that for two years Israel didn't admit Pollard was their spy: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/91260.stm"
That article is a bit misleading. Israeli never denied that Pollard was working for them. What Israel denied is that it was authorized at the appropriate level. This is in fact true, it wasn't authorized at the appropriate level.
In 1998 Isreal granted Pollard citizenship, and in an attempt to gain his release accepted a higher level of responsibilty for Pollard's action.
This is because of internal Israeli politics more than anything else. Israel is far too willing to latch on to "friends" that seem willing to aid the nation. There's an unreasonable demand in certain segments of Isreali society for Pollard's release.
"Thank you for the reference to Israel's apology. I note that it is worded in such a way that it doesn't admit the spying took place."
National apologies never refer to specifics, that's par for the course.
"Not much of an apology!"
Still, it was made within a month, and it's a standard apology.
"The fact of the matter is that Israel recruited Pollard to spy on America for Israel. From a so-called ally, a lot more sincere apology would have been appropriate."
No, Pollard approached Israel and wasn't recruited. His information should never have been accepted. After contact his handler requested more information, but Pollard initiated contact.
"I don't think you, I, or anyone else can reach a confident conclusion on what happened with the Liberty just by reading public documents."
Of course we can, that's what historians do. We make confident conclusions based on primary sources. The Liberty incident is no different in this regard than any other historical moment.
"If you weren't there, documents can take you only so far."
I suppose you don't think the American Revolution happened, or the Alamo, or the Mexican American War, because you weren't there?
I highly doubt you think events that predate your life are somehow in question simply because you were not personally there. So why is the Liberty incident held to a different standard?
"Some of the American sailors who *were* there and survived are very clear about what happened."
I've read there accounts, and it's partially because of these accounts and how they interact with other sources that I confidently conclude that Israel didn't know it was an American ship.
Go to http://www.ussliberty.com/g/libertyd13a.jpg.
Ussliberty.com is a site devoted to proving that Israel knew it was an American ship. It's run mostly by former crew members. This is their picture showing the flag that was flying during the air attack. Tell me how long it takes you to find the flag, and this is a picture taken when the Liberty was under steam.
The simple fact is the Liberty, according to her own logs, was in a calm wind, moving slowly, flying a tiny American flag. Then the this Flag was destroyed by the first aircraft attacks.
Unfortunately, the pilots didn't see this small flag and having been told it was an Egyptian ship attacked.
"Based on what I've read, it looks like the Israelis knew the Liberty was American, but I don't have much confidence I'm right."
You admit to not having read much on the issue, nor do you have much confidence in your conclusion. Having read many books, and primary sources, advocating both sides, I'm beyond confident that it was a case of mistaken identity.
"You claim that if the Liberty incident was deliberate, then the Vincennes incident was also. Hardly. It depends on the actual facts, which could be similar or utterly different in the two cases. Suppose Israel deliberately attacked the Liberty, knowing it was an American intelligence ship. How would it follow that the Vincennes deliberately shot down an Iranian airliner? Or suppose that the Vincennes deliberately shot down the airliner. Would it follow that the Israelis deliberately attacked an American ship and killed American sailors?"
If those facts are subject to the same standard of proof or evidence, the conclusion would have to be the same. There is no standard of evidence where you can legitimately conclude that Israel knew it was an American ship, without that standard requiring the Vincennes knowing it was a civilian airliner.
Almost all the relatives of those killed by the Vincennes believe the US deliberatly shot down a civilian airliner, just as the survivors of the Liberty insist Israel had to know it was an American ship. This is common. It's very hard to internally accept that you've lost relatives or members of your crew to what amounts to bad luck.
In both cases, a number of compound errors led to a tragic misidentification of the target, and the results were horrific. That said, in neither case was the attack one of malice against what the target really was, it was simple mistaken identify.