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Originally Posted by Urbane Guerrilla
(Post 333899)
They aren't, though the Arabs will incessantly tell you they are -- but again, you can't convincingly claim you're the victim when you're so busy killing Jews in bunches. Arab propaganda sways you, but not me. I'll say this just once: the Arabs are the ones indulging in genocidal ideas for Israel; the Israelis are not indulging in genocidal ideas towards any Arabs. Understandably.
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First, what propaganda? The media takes a pro-Israel side and I don't really read far left newspapers so I don't know what propaganda you are talking about. Israel wants every Arab out of their homeland and will kill them to do it. By your standards, the US never committed genocide on the Native Americans.
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Oh really. For your information, Israel is a democracy, and there is not a single democracy among Israel's foes. I choose to support a democracy, and the undemocracies can all go hang, for all of me. Neither race nor religion enters into this. You're attempting to find fairness in neutrality, but between these two ways, I'll pick the better one -- according to my experience of which way is the better. Remember that I've had both. Too, if you're unable to make a value judgement, you're largely unable to really live -- because you don't count for anything. I should think not counting for anything would at least offend your ego.
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Your blinded by the thought that democracies are all good and all non-democracies are bad. Israel is the most violent country in the world right now followed closely by America. They are both democracies in your opinion, which doesn't fit with your "democracies = good" childish thought. Democracies tend to be more moral than non-democratic countries but that isn't a guarantee, and America and Israel is the exception right now.
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I think it has everything to do with it; see the remark on value judgments above. I am calling for choosing the best, and nondemocracy isn't it. The neocons you rave against (ever so ignorantly, I think) have one idea that is so right, so magnificent, so transcendental, that nothing can stand against it morally: democratic republics prosper best in a world full of other democratic republics. (Was it not PNAC that gave this idea expression?) When these republics prosper, the peoples prosper. You prosper. I prosper. Who would speak against prosperity?
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I will speak against prosperity when these democratic countries keep other countries in dictatorship and poverty to take advantage of them. If we are trying to spread democracy, then why did we take away Iran's democracy in the 50's, or why are we trying to take away Venezuela’s right now? Why do we trade with non-democratic countries? Why are we allies with Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, the two most oppressive regimes in the Middle East? Shouldn't we be fighting them since they are not democracies?
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Then I'll be blunt: you're a fascist sympathizer, and I'm not. Your own words condemn you, and they hang you up, all right -- nailed to the cross.
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Ummmm....how?
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Let's see if I have this straight: the Arabs have been screaming genocide and reading Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion, in translation, under the impression it's nonfiction. They've launched war after war after war, and lost every one of them, without paying very much of a penalty in territory or anything else that can't be rebuilt or replaced.
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That is because the Israelites have been committing genocide on the Arabs. They have kicked them out of their home and left them to starve. It isn't a holocaust or a Darfur, but it is still genocide.
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I see in this that the weed of bigotry is bearing toxic fruit, and it's keeping the failing states of Araby in a condition of social wreckage.
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No, we are keeping the failing states of "Araby" in a condition of social wreckage by taking their resources. Why do you think we attacked Iran when they decided to nationalize the oil fields in the 50's? We obviously never put any effort into helping the Arabs so you can not say that they are not able to keep a strong economy because there are too many outside conditions to make an accurate judgment.
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And you call Israel's defensive efforts to deal with this menace one of the closest things to fascism we have now? Boy -- you're less than half my age and of far less experience of this world -- are you quite certain you know anything at all of fascism?
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I see Israel expanding their borders which goes with Fascism. I see Israel attacking countries for no legitimate reason (Lebanon). I see Israel considering their citizens better than the Arabs that once lived there. I see Israel building walls to keep the people that once lived there out of Israel, keeping them in poverty and then complaining when they fight back.
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This would be defensible were all else being equal. Unfortunately for this we have one side full of enthusiasts for genocide, and another side that suffered genocide and is quite allergic to it. Which side is then on the higher moral plane? And if they're on the higher moral plane, wouldn't I like them better? You see, I make value judgments confidently: eschew moral relativism; it's popular with the young (and the careless) but it's a snare and a delusion.
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Give proof that Israel is on a higher moral plane. Everything the Arabs have done is out of retaliation from what Israel has done.
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The supremacy is more than a feeling: it's engendered by winning all the wars, not by assembling the Zionists. They've done that both without and with our aid, remember. We're a mighty ally and nice to have, but Israel doesn't necessarily need us to keep itself propped up: the Jews have turned tough and they've turned heroic. In the face of their enemies who know no restraint, the Jews keep such restraint as they can. When the Arabs cease their genocidal madnesses, the Jews will take no revenge upon them. Such is their character, and you are most reluctant to admit it. Now picture yourself surrounded by chronically murderous foes. Are you going to like these peoples? Let's just understand that any attitude the Israelis cop is pretty understandable.
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Please, you refuse to see that the Israelites have started everything in this conflict. If the Arabs start committing genocide on the Jews, then I will quickly switch sides but right now, it isn't that way. Both sides are prejudice against each other, but Israel is the one with the power so they are committing the genocide.
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In this case, it is not we who must learn to deal, but they. The Israelis were always willing to deal. The Arabs: conspicuously not. Read Israel's history, particularly in its early days.
Who could be sympathetic to the unwilling ones? I sure can't.
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I have. They did not go to Uruguay when they were told that the Middle East would cause major problems. They did not deal with the Palestinians living there, they kicked them out. They are not compromising with the Palestinians now, they are building a wall to keep them out of the country. They are refusing to give up the Gaza Strip and West Bank which was not given to them in 1948. I don't think it is me that is blind, but you.
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I can't be anywhere near so sure until I do hear from them. They've had sixty-nine years to speak up, and in Israel they actually could. As for the other, one state -- or perhaps three states. But we can both think of how either solution could collapse into yet another war -- the one-state into a civil war, the three-state into a general war.
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Yes, there will be conflict no matter what solution we use but even the though the one-state will probably have the most initial violence, it will hopefully go away after a generation or two. If we have a two-state solution, then the rivalry will stay with them for how ever long they are rivals.
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You're blaming the wrong party here: Jordan could have resettled every displaced person, either in Jordan or elsewhere, AND helped them to prosperity. There is absolutely no effort by any Arab state, far or near, to succor their displaced coreligionists, either by government programs or private charitable ones. Zero. Zip. Nada. They'd rather have their cats-paw to fight proxy wars with. The Arabs are the warmongers, and my sympathy for these warmongers is, well, scant. Yours is too great.
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You can expect Jordan to take care of all the people that don’t live there. The United States can house all the Mexicans but you seem reluctant to do that. Israel can also house all the Arabs. You are making a double standard by forcing Jordan to take the Palestinians when Israel can. Why don’t you want Israel to take the Palestinians?
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The Israelis started without us, and they can continue on their own initiative. They are not the American economy's sock puppet, you know. The Arabs never showed the same degree of initiative. Our foreign aid to Egypt, for one example, is of the same order of magnitude as our foreign aid to Israel. It is less, yes, but two billion dollars annually isn't pocket change.
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They steal resources from the Palestinians and I find it hard to believe that they aren’t the western economy’s sock puppet. Outside forces, lack of education, etc, are likely to be most of the cause of this lack of initiative.