Israel's Gaza Pullout: Caving to Terrorists?

[Army_Brat84]

Does anyone else feel that the Israeli pullout of Gaza is foolish and misguided? I really do not think that this will bring about peace. Also, if Israel wants to return the "Occupied Territories" then Gaza should go back to Egypt, the West Bank to Jordan, etc. Also, I hear so much about the oppression of the Palestinians, but has anyone considered that they have more rights in Israel and have actually been oppressed by their own leaders. Israel's caving to terrorism, by our insistence, will only lead to more trouble. The only thing that will satisfy the terrorists in that region is the complete and total destruction of Israel.

[Arrow]

Agree completely with your post and your signature quote of President Reagan. Welcome to the site. What shall we call you?

Arrow>>>>

[Seascamp]

Agreed with the points made for the greater part. The dirty little secret in that neighborhood is that Lebanon is absolutely brutal towards Palestinians and things like schooling, jobs, medical attention, etc., are out of the question.

As to Gaza, presumably the Israeli pullout is part of the peace process, or allegedly so. The bet on the table is that the Palestinian Authority will hold and take charge. Maybe, and it would be a positive thing if they can and will, we?ll see. The thing to watch for is who shows up in Gaza and for what purpose and if a nasty civil war breaks out. If Gaza becomes the ?New Kabul? terrorist haven and regional training center then the whole deal is a bust and a real bad situation goes to totally and absolutely dangerous before the Palestinian Authority corpses are buried. I really don?t think the Israelis will accept a terrorist haven situation in Gaza and the cycle will repeat, one more time.

Scamp

[Army_Brat84]

The one thing that may be positive about the whole situation is that if the attacks by terrorists do not stop, or something else bad happens, that Israel can just level the whole area without the risk to her own citizens. Yes that would draw flack from the UN, but when has Israel not drawn heat from them. As for the world reaction to such a scenario, I would remind them of the many wars of agression against Israel by the "peaceful" Arab neighbors.

[BLUEHAWK]

Originally posted by Army_Brat84 The one thing that may be positive about the whole situation is that if the attacks by terrorists do not stop, or something else bad happens, that Israel can just level the whole area without the risk to her own citizens. Yes that would draw flack from the UN, but when has Israel not drawn heat from them. As for the world reaction to such a scenario, I would remind them of the many wars of agression against Israel by the "peaceful" Arab neighbors.

Well and good... but people need also to be reminded that Britain and others hit the deck when the stuff hit the fan a few decades back, and basically created the better part of this problem by being perceived to have "given" that region to Israel. Even Hitler's criminal government, "duly elected", sought refuge space for the Jews he knew Germany was on the verge of exterminating, to NO avail. America herself, amongst several other nations, refused to grant asylum to the USS St. Louis refugee vessel. Ronald Reagon was a nice guy, who did what he was told to do, and is given credit for doing what others accomplished.

Like 'em or hate 'em, the so-called Palestianians were ALSO forced out of the homes THEY had occupied in what is now Israel... and, if stories are true, many of those families carry the keys to their former homes to this day.

I believe Arafat was the single greatest barrier to a resolution of this matter. I also believe that there are and have been "terrorists" on BOTH sides of that conflict. I further believe that Sharon's intentionally taking that little stroll at Temple Mount a few years back was a deliberate provocation. I also accept the idea as expressed by so many for so long from that area that unless and until the "Palestinian question" is resolved, there will never be any peaceful coexistence there. I have learned from particular experience that the process of TAKING steps; small ones, big ones, sequential ones, purposeful ones, and meaningful ones goes the furthest way toward serenity and right living.

I minimally sympathize with the Gaza settlers who have resisted being moved out... had their government not been so arrogant in permitting those settlements in the first place, and had the settlers not themselves been SO eager to gain personal property, against all better advice coming from everywhere AND against UN resolutions, then none of them would be in this situation. Nobody anywhere wants to have their home forcibly taken from them... especially when under the authority of one's own elected government one was encouraged to settle and build a life.

Additionally, I wish to express a sense of something amounting to deep respect for the Israeli military and law enforcement who are carrying out the orders of their government at this unimaginably difficult time in their history. Were I to be in their shoes, being commanded to physically remove ANY American from their home of years, were there ever to have been a justification for personal psychological trauma then that would probably qualify. I believe those military are behaving with dignity in an almost impossibly challenging circumstance.

On another point, I (for once and only once) must express admiration for the decision Mr. Sharon made about Gaza, and for his determination to carry out this attempt. How he managed to come full circle on this is virtually miraculous. The man who collaborated in allowing the catastrophe of Sabra and Shatilla found it within himself, or was compelled somehow, to reverse stance. That took courage if not common sense, and I hope it will not cost him his life... certain Israeli partisans are not above murdering one another to make a point either, as has been noticed over the decades.

While I would always find it morally correct, necessary and universally desirable to ensure the safety and sovereignty of Israel and Jews, I have seldom ever approved of American duplicity or complicity in the earthier arcana of our alliance with Israeli governments and Zionists. Having said that, I also have zero doubt that had America NOT stood beside/behind Israel, then their existence would have been considerably different, if at all extant, in times gone by. At times it is not difficult to surmise that American policy favoring Israel was more motivated by "our" determination to defeat the Soviets than it was by any truly sincere alliance with Israel. This fact has, doubtless, not gone unnoticed by Israel nor anyone else.

I am optimistic, and hopeful, that this heartwrenching step in Gaza will be met with acceptance, and that it will lead to a formal and secure establishment of homeland for they who call themselves Palestinians and Israelis, that both sides will never do anything of this kind again, and that the shibboleth of this conflict will, finally and forever, be taken OFF the table of grievances Muslims and Arabs have waged against America or our allies.

No, terrorist attacks will NOT cease, at this late hour, solely due to a shift in Gaza strip real estate. 30 years ago a cessation of terror might have realized a truce, but that seminal moment was squandered for the sake of selfishness. And here is where OIF/OEF are proven the best policy... nothing diplomatic has yet succeeded in destroying, nor even slowing, a sadistic murderous fundamentalist suicidal enemy bent on world domination every BIT as much as had been the Third Reich or world Communism. The enemy persists in using weapons suitable only to a field of battle, against his/her own citizens and anyone disagreeing with them. And, yet today, we hear American citizens declaring that is is WE who are doing the killing of innocents.

"Chaos Theory", as such, contains much to recommend itself to us all. Certain extremely complex systems have in-built failure solely by virtue of their complexity.

Radical elements in the Muslim and Arab world know full well that we have been used to exorcise a small sore of their choosing. They did that on purpose, just as the Soviets and Red Chinese have and did and... just as the American government has done, and might still , do.

Israel will not, "... just level the whole area", if for no other reason than that they might have designs about sending their citizens there again in their "best interests."

THE issue, is Jerusalem. That remaining matter IS readily resolvable, by the simple expedient of a neutral zone interdependently "governed" by all pre-existing factions. The philosopher Gurdjieff, if memory serves, regarded Jerusalem as being one of the "seven rays of creation." Evidently, the Qu'ran, Talmud (or whatever) and Holy Bible also regard Jerusalem with some sort of special divinity. I don't think the Upanishads and Bhagavadgita or the I Ching or the Tao Teh Ching did so.

I myself regard the American Ozarks as being divine. Jerusalem is, to me, irrelevant. Somebody once said, "All politics is local."

To seriously contemplate that this all is NOT being cast as a "religious war" is to deny the traverse of human civilization as it has taken place from earliest times to the present... in witness whereof, Sir Blue submits the speciously claimed "separation of church and state."

Somewhere, someday extremists will, and MUST, be stopped... or else we ALL shall cease to exist, Darwinianly... by and by.

What say you, all?

[Seascamp]

I?d say that the two countries that have the largest ownership in the creation of Israel as it is today are remarkably disinterested and uninvolved in the inevitable results. Germany and Russia, for eons, drove, beat, killed and bullied the Jews from pillar to post. As I recall the Russians called the process a ?Progrom?. Both the NAZIs and Communists amplified on this theme greatly and bad went too much worse. Was anybody aware that Marx was a virulent anti-Semitic and riled against them continuously? Or that Marx was himself a Jew? Curious bit of double about-facing I?d say.

And a bit of French nasty laundry goes along with this as well, the buggers were up to their pointed heads in flushing out French Jews for the NAZI killing machine, big time. So WWII finishes up, and we have a bunch of battle hardened, feisty, tough, long-suffering DP, homeless, European Jews with nothing left to loose but their very lives and no longer willing to give those up so easily or without a furious fight to the death.

No one in the west was willing to go up against them and perpetuate the slaughter and by sheer will, guts, determination, guile and bravery they withstood the combined force of five Arab Armies at once in order to win their own country. Of their original three principal European antagonists only France maintains an unofficial but very visible anti Semitic posture. Germany and Russia appear to have just washed their hands of it all but will sell all the killing equipment to the Arabs they want or can afford. Maybe the rules of unintended consequences plays out somewhere and maybe the arrogant, aloof Germans have a stake in this situation as well. Forget the Russians, they live and breathe unintended consequences of their own making and every generation gets a bigger stack to deal with. I wish I had more empathy or sympathy for the Palestinians that lost out and it would be a fitting gesture if Germany and Russia were to compensate them for whatever losses they may have incurred. But on the other hand, the Germans and Russians never gave a bit of compensation for the lands, property and lives they stole the European Jews.

Mighty tough world, and people will find a way to survive and who is to say what is fair and right when a people are driven to sure and near extinction and fight back furiously and against all odds.

Scamp