The attitudes to their enemies of Israelis and Palestinians are identical. Each side explicitly denies that the concept of an innocent member of the other side exists. For the Israelis, all Palestinians are guilty and deserving of being splattered over the landscape by a 1000kg bomb even 4 year old children and for the Palestinians all Israelis, even civilians and children deserve to be blown up by suicide vest or Katusha rocket.

The only important difference between the two sides is that the Israelis with US help are more efficient at killing.

"I'm sorry, are you guys both saying I'm a liar about omooex? There are multiple instances from yesterday, I'll put a permalink to the first one at my signature."

So, are you guys speechless? Or do you only care about a Jew lying about a Palestinian but not a Palestinian knocking a Jew's teeth out?

There's another post of his at my signature.

But it wasn't a good idea at the time.

(Forget for a second the need to clarify the more indirect chain of how the US' recruitment of an army of Islamic fundamentalist drug dealing warlords in Afghanistan spawned Al Qa'ida.)

That's the point.

The idiot militarists who assure you each and every time that only "they" can keep you / us / Israel safe are wrong. They're not only wrong, their goals are different.

The Israeli militarists weren't helping found Hamas because they wanted to make Israelis or Palestinians "safe". They were doing it because it was part of their militarist game, to "undermine" the Enemy, to make sure there was no outbreak of peace to ruin the long-term game they knew they were right about.

They weren't right. It was a terrible idea. It was another way of avoiding any sane settlement and it was backed by the same bullsh*t militarist ideology that justifies any militarist policy.

And really, does it sound like a good idea, "at the time"? Really? No. It doesn't. It didn't sound like a "good idea" at the time, and any jackass that thought it did was an idiot and suffered from the same blinkered judgment that lots of self-confident, boasting fools throughout history have exhibited.

A bunch of morons and jackasses who thought that what Israel needed was for the Palestinian community to be wrought with splits over religious fundamentalism in order to break up the power of secular organizations.

Yeah. That's real "pro-Israel". That's really boldly in favor of "Israeli security."

I think I've already told you what I think yesterday, but ok...

Again, what would you have Israel do to stop the mortar fire? Ask more nicely?

I don't care. I'm not an Israeli, I just pay for it.

What should Israel do? You think for yourself, so you claim. You tell me.

I don't care. I'm not an Israeli, I just pay for it.

I care about perceptions, not about tactics. It is all very simple. Giving weapons to people and building bases all over the world while claiming to be a Force for Universal Good pisses people off. Preaching about the things that made America great while not practicing them pisses people off.

Your attitude is exactly what the likes of OBL love. OBL and friends love people like you. You, WinSmith, are exactly what AQ loves about America's relationship with Israel. Whenever a pissed off person in the ME meets OBL and the gang, they can point to America's relationship with Israel to undermine American Principles. AQ couldn't have asked for a better recruiting tool than America's relationship with the ME.

And guess what? OBL and the gang say the same thing about the Saudis, and the Egyptians, and all the other states you point your finger at saying, "but what about these guys". They all use American support for recruiting tools.

Israel is responding, as they did in 2003, to a direct attack from terrorists. Understanding this is not "pro-war."

Don't you ever get tired of being dishonest in how you frame things? It gets tedious explaining the same things over and over and over again just to establish context.

I oppose any war on Iran. I oppose Bush's entire doctrine of pre-emptive war.

Good.

I will never oppose the right of a civilization to respond to mortar fire. I will, however, support you in critiquing Israel when they respond indiscriminately, and I hope journalists will be let into Gaza soon so the world can make an honest determination (and not rely on Glenn Greenwald's YouTube links).

So you need "journalists" to tell you that dropping bombs from the air on the most densely packed area in the world is going to indiscriminately kill civilians? How disingenuous of you.

Your friend Zenwick gave me his solution: Star Wars.

What is yours? Besides playing apologist for Israel until it tells you what the solution is supposed to be.

Again, what would you have Israel do to stop the mortar fire? Ask more nicely?

Negotiate.

According to the New York Times' Ethan Bronner (today, Jan 4),

“If the war ends in a draw, as expected, and Israel refrains from re-occupying Gaza, Hamas will gain diplomatic recognition,” wrote Aluf Benn, a political analyst, in the newspaper Haaretz on Friday. “No matter what you call it,” he added, “Hamas will obtain legitimacy.”

In addition, any potential truce deal would probably include an increase in commercial traffic from Israel and Egypt into Gaza, which is Hamas’s central demand: to end the economic boycott and border closing it has been facing. To build up the Gaza economy under Hamas, Israeli leaders say, would be to build up Hamas. Yet withholding the commerce would continue to leave 1.5 million Gazans living in despair.

Implicit in Mr. Benn’s argument, however, is that the only way to stop Hamas from gaining legitimacy is for Israel to fully occupy Gaza again, more than three years after removing its soldiers and settlers. That is a prospect practically no one in Israel or abroad is advocating.

We've been hearing arguments from the war mongers on the Israeli side for years, they are always about 'legitimacy'. That's why the whole thing has the look and feel of a dehumanizing campaign by the Israelis. Human rights will legitimize, Geneva Conventions will legitimize, allowing any commerce will legitimize, letting people live like human beings will legitimize. Sorry, but I've been hearing that 'legitimize' crap all my life from Israel, and I'm not young. Rabin talked another tune and they shot him.

When Israelis take negotiations seriously, people take their complaints seriously. When they treat other people (Palestinians, Persians, Lebanese, you name it, even South African blacks, given the economic ties Israel had with the Apartheid government there) as if they are less than human, the world criticizes.