A New Thread fot the Current Israel/Palestine/Lebanon mess

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Just in, Israel says it expects to damage but not destroy Hezbollah (it says that would not be possible), and it wants 10-14 more days to do it. Lebanese death toll is already well into the 200s.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/739372.html

― Abbadavid Berman (Hurting), Wednesday, 19 July 2006 03:43 (seventeen years ago) link

xposty

I would love to see a timeline on this stuff again. Stratfor says that the real "event" here were the missile attacks on Haifa, not the seizing of the soldiers. So what "provoked" the Hezbollah rockets? Wasn't it Israeli attacks into Lebanon. And if so, doesn't that mean - according to Starfor's logic - that Israel itself provoked the crisis? (I'm using Stratfor's semantics - the kidnappings were a "serious problem" but not a true "crisis.") This begs the question: did Israel intend to cause a crisis, or did they overreact?

― i'll mitya halfway (mitya), Wednesday, 19 July 2006 06:15 (seventeen years ago) link

http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,,1824039,00.html

fuckin ell.

― Roughage Crew (Enrique), Wednesday, 19 July 2006 10:28 (seventeen years ago) link

some background to that picture.

http://adloyada.typepad.com/adloyada/2006/07/how_to_demonize.html

― Pete W (peterw), Wednesday, 19 July 2006 10:54 (seventeen years ago) link

I think that picture and that response are kinda beside the point ultimately. I mean if you talk to enough different Israelis, eventually you're going to run into one or two that will say horrible, racist, callous things: "We should finish the job" "The Arabs are not human" etc. I've heard these things from people's mouths, both in person and in news interviews. It doesn't mean everyone or even a majority of Israelis think that way. But neither does a picture of a young Palestinian marching with fake explosives prove that the Palestinians "don't value their children" or something like that.

― Abbadavid Berman (Hurting), Wednesday, 19 July 2006 11:19 (seventeen years ago) link

yeah tbh i don't see how the failure of 12-yr-old kids to realize the seriousness of what those missiles are going to do has much to do with anything.

― Roughage Crew (Enrique), Wednesday, 19 July 2006 11:23 (seventeen years ago) link

it would be nice if israel could sort of, like, stop murdering people now

― Tracey Hand (tracerhand), Wednesday, 19 July 2006 11:26 (seventeen years ago) link

NPR ran a longish interview with New Yorker Washington correspondent Jeffrey Goldberg, who interviewed Hezbollah leaders a couple of years ago.

The live broadcast is ending in a few minutes but you can stream it in a couple of hours at http://www.npr.org/templates/rundowns/rundown.php?prgId=13

Nothing incredibly illuminating, but interesting nonetheless.

― i'll mitya halfway (mitya), Wednesday, 19 July 2006 15:55 (seventeen years ago) link

I caught the end of that. Tracer, you might want to check it out if you don't buy the idea that Hezbollah has some rather questionable stances about Jews.

― Abbadavid Berman (Hurting), Wednesday, 19 July 2006 19:54 (seventeen years ago) link

i don't doubt it; my only point is that whatever hezbollah's stance, whatever hamas' charter, neither have the firepower to inflict what israel already has done in just one short week - i.e. "oh Israelpaws"

― Tracey Hand (tracerhand), Wednesday, 19 July 2006 20:00 (seventeen years ago) link

Jerusalem Post has this headline with no apparent further explanation:
"IDF engaged on 3 fronts: Gaza, Nablus, Lebanon"

(Nablus is in the West Bank, btw)

I think the Israeli army invades Nablus every ten minutes.

― DV (dirtyvicar), Wednesday, 19 July 2006 20:06 (seventeen years ago) link

BTW, my initial conclusion was that Iran and/or Syria obviously must have been behind the Hezbollah and Hamas attacks and that they must have been planned together. But I've heard a few people suggest that that's only speculation and I'm just wondering if anyone has a good argument.

I mean the Hamas attack was obviously planned for a while (involved digging tunnels and such), and the Hezbollah attack came shortly after, but I haven't heard as much about whether the Hezbollah attack was also planned for a long time. If the two were planned for the same time, that makes it seem much more likely that someone else was giving the orders. But if the Hezbollah attack was just a thrown-together operation after the Gaza strikes, it's harder to say.

― Abbadavid Berman (Hurting), Wednesday, 19 July 2006 21:24 (seventeen years ago) link

iolence on Wednesday sprawled over both sides of the border, even killing two Israeli Arab brothers, ages 3 and 9, as they played outside in Nazareth, the Galilee town where Jesus spent his boyhood, hit by one of roughly 120 rockets Hezbollah launched into Israel.

― a name means a lot just by itself (lfam), Thursday, 20 July 2006 02:44 (seventeen years ago) link

jesus was hit by a missle?

(inappropriate)

― gbx (skowly), Thursday, 20 July 2006 02:47 (seventeen years ago) link

well, i am ashamed that i fucked up that post

― a name means a lot just by itself (lfam), Thursday, 20 July 2006 02:50 (seventeen years ago) link

FIX IT I BEG YOU

― a name means a lot just by itself (lfam), Thursday, 20 July 2006 02:51 (seventeen years ago) link

wow

― hstencil (hstencil), Thursday, 20 July 2006 05:52 (seventeen years ago) link

As music / art / political comment / humanist statement, that's incredible. For those who don't follow links, Mazen Kerbaj, a cartoonist and improvisational trumpet player recorded a piece from his balcony in Beirut, while shelling goes on in the background. Chilling.

http://www.muniak.com/mazenkerbaj.html
http://blogfiles.wfmu.org/mazen_kerbaj-starry_night.mp3

An Israeli could've just as easily recorded this; it just really hammers home the fact that there are human beings on the other ends of these bombs and missle strikes...

― Edward III (edward iii), Thursday, 20 July 2006 13:23 (seventeen years ago) link

his drawings are worth checking out, too!

― hstencil (hstencil), Thursday, 20 July 2006 13:25 (seventeen years ago) link

so it's kind of an actual invasion now; much more frequent incursions. when is it going to be called one?

people don't declare war, these days.

― Roughage Crew (Enrique), Thursday, 20 July 2006 13:30 (seventeen years ago) link

Well, technically they don't need to, Israel and Lebanon have been at war since 1949.

― DV (dirtyvicar), Thursday, 20 July 2006 14:11 (seventeen years ago) link

DUDE, forget Tariq Ali and check out Newt Gingrich: http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/newt_gingrich/2006/07/the_third_world_war_has_begun.html

he kind of implies that it is the Lebanese government which is blowing up Lebanon, in order to crush Hezbollah. Maybe he actually believes this. What a guy!

― DV (dirtyvicar), Thursday, 20 July 2006 14:29 (seventeen years ago) link

The NRO folks were reporting some claim earlier yesterday that the Lebanese government is pleased as punch that Israel is attacking Hezbollah but they can't say so. Of course.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 20 July 2006 14:32 (seventeen years ago) link

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060720/ap_on_go_co/us_mideast

(my favorite bit is this line:)
Snow described previous diplomatic sessions with Syria as meetings where U.S. officials drank tea and sat for "five, six, 10 hours listening to polite, but long discourses on greater Syria and at the end of that having gotten nothing."

(Western power unable to grasp or exploit the subtleties of Arab methods of discourse shockah)

― Shakey Mo Collier (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, 20 July 2006 16:17 (seventeen years ago) link

The problem with well-paid hystericists like Gingrich is that the speck of truth in his arguments requires a disproportionate amount of bombast for the sake of his TV audience (although even Matt Lauer frowned skeptically when Gingrich reminded him of the "intercontinental ballistic missile capable of hitting the West coast of the continental United States" shot by North Korea).

Well, NRO World likes swagger. Maybe that's why Newt is an "ideas man."

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn (Alfred Soto), Thursday, 20 July 2006 16:30 (seventeen years ago) link

he's certainly not an "action" man - his track record as a legislator is pathetic.

― Shakey Mo Collier (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, 20 July 2006 16:32 (seventeen years ago) link

gingrich is aware that things he says are reported in newspapers and read, and i am 100% positive the things he says are, while wacky, intended to send a message to someone in particular (no idea who exactly, but it would be interesting to find out)

― Tracey Hand (tracerhand), Thursday, 20 July 2006 16:38 (seventeen years ago) link

kind of, take the sixth letter in each sentence and reverse type stuff?

― Roughage Crew (Enrique), Thursday, 20 July 2006 16:48 (seventeen years ago) link

haha NRQ it has become clear to me on these middle east threads that you think world leaders and national resistance movements just kind of, like, do stuff cause it's whatever came to mind that day.

― Tracey Hand (tracerhand), Thursday, 20 July 2006 16:51 (seventeen years ago) link

(Western power unable to grasp or exploit the subtleties of Arab methods of discourse shockah)

I have much sympathy for this, to tell you the truth

― i'll mitya halfway (mitya), Thursday, 20 July 2006 16:59 (seventeen years ago) link

Arab tactics of debate and negotiation are older than ours - from what I can tell it requires a level of subtletly and deftness that our "official representative of elected gov't presenting a checklist of demands" method rather sorely lacks.

― Shakey Mo Collier (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, 20 July 2006 17:07 (seventeen years ago) link

WHERE'S AL HAIG??

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn (Alfred Soto), Thursday, 20 July 2006 17:32 (seventeen years ago) link

Ah, here we are:

http://digitalwarfighter.com/wp-content/photos/alhaig.jpg

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn (Alfred Soto), Thursday, 20 July 2006 17:33 (seventeen years ago) link

haha NRQ it has become clear to me on these middle east threads that you think world leaders and national resistance movements just kind of, like, do stuff cause it's whatever came to mind that day.
-- Tracey Hand (tracerhan...), July 20th, 2006.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beggaring_the_question

― Roughage Crew (Enrique), Thursday, 20 July 2006 17:40 (seventeen years ago) link

poor Darwin, always being taken to court.

― Shakey Mo Collier (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, 20 July 2006 17:41 (seventeen years ago) link

This says more about the Russian media than anything else, I admit, but in case anyone is wondering how these events are being portrayed/perceived in other countries -

Russian wire services are now reporting that Lebanese hospitals are receiving strange corpses with no signs of physical trauma other than strangely blackened (but not burned) skin. No cuts, no bruises, just dead. And doctors are speculating that some kind of chemical weapons are being used.

― i'll mitya halfway (mitya), Thursday, 20 July 2006 17:47 (seventeen years ago) link

Do you think this is true, or just propaganda?

― Jessie the Monster (scarymonsterrr), Thursday, 20 July 2006 17:53 (seventeen years ago) link

Reagan would chuckle benignly and say, "It's Red agitprop."

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn (Alfred Soto), Thursday, 20 July 2006 17:57 (seventeen years ago) link

feel v sick just reading that.

― Roughage Crew (Enrique), Thursday, 20 July 2006 18:13 (seventeen years ago) link

seems kinda unlikely (and unnecessary) to me. also Russian wire services aren't the most reliable, in my experience. On the other hand I don't think Israel would actually have any moral qualms about using chemical weapons if they felt it would help their cause.

― Shakey Mo Collier (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, 20 July 2006 18:16 (seventeen years ago) link

In other news, the US is claiming Iranians were present at N. Korea's missile test.

http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/07/20/korea.north.usa.reut/index.html

― Edward III (edward iii), Thursday, 20 July 2006 18:23 (seventeen years ago) link

a bit like the pre-credits sequence of 'naked gun', that.

― Roughage Crew (Enrique), Thursday, 20 July 2006 18:26 (seventeen years ago) link

Boy, they're sure into reforging the axis of evil all of a sudden.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 20 July 2006 18:27 (seventeen years ago) link

Wouldn't it be ironic if they'd cozied up together 'cause they'd been lumped together by Bush?

― M. White (Miguelito), Thursday, 20 July 2006 18:35 (seventeen years ago) link

If by "ironic" you mean "pretty fucking likely." What's the point in not doing it if you've already been labeled "evil"?

― Jessie the Monster (scarymonsterrr), Thursday, 20 July 2006 18:37 (seventeen years ago) link

And you've been labeled so by the most powerful country in the world... and said country has already taken out one of your evil compatriots...

― Edward III (edward iii), Thursday, 20 July 2006 18:47 (seventeen years ago) link

I do like this bit on the bellicose fucks currently running around and running things, that they're operating in more of a mode of "we need a glorious war and national narrative to believe in". Like we need Great Enemies, or otherwise we can't be Great Heroes in a struggle of Great Times.

― kingfish cyclopean ice cream (kingfish 2.0), Thursday, 20 July 2006 19:50 (seventeen years ago) link

For the end-times perspective, Harper's has a few responses from Rapture enthusiasts.

http://harpers.org/rapture-ready-20060718001.html

― Stephen X (Stephen X), Thursday, 20 July 2006 19:56 (seventeen years ago) link

yeah, they're fun folks. i think the link i posted to their original thread that drew all the attention is still upthread, but they might have killed the link.

― kingfish cyclopean ice cream (kingfish 2.0), Thursday, 20 July 2006 20:02 (seventeen years ago) link

"how can anyone doubt the authenticity of God's word these days?"

― Shakey Mo Collier (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, 20 July 2006 20:04 (seventeen years ago) link

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