On 11 Sep 2001, at 9:51, Russell Chapman wrote:
Okay, some comments:
I'm Jewish. I'm strongly Zionist. I am, however, to the left of isralie
politics in my view. And I believe that Sharon is a war criminal due
to certain incidents involving allowing christian extremeists into
Muslem refugee camps, where they commited genocide.
> Interestingly, last night I watched a documentary on Lebanon and the
> rise of Hezbollah, which focused fairly heavily on events surrounding
> the marine base bombing and the hostages. The thrust of the show was
> that the size and passion of Hezbollah and the independent terrorist
> cells, as well as the anger and support of the people, was largely
> attributable to Israel's seige of Beirut. The implication was that
Beirut was the center of the foward thinking, progressive arab
world. A center for the interlectuals and thinkers. Then, when we
invaded, we swept across Lebanon and sacked Beirut. After
Sharon, who was in charge of the army, ASSURED the Knesset
that no such thing would take place.
> only a small percentage of the people cared very much about the
> westerner's influence until the Israeli invasion, but then all the
> Shi'ites were motivated by the death and destruction in their city. I
Not so much death - most people had fled - but the fact that we'd
struck at the heart of a flourishing Muslem country, and not truly in
self defence - the border zone, maybe, but sacking Beirut was
inexcuseable!
> learnt nothing from Lebanon, and will watch Palestine go through the
> same painful experiences while they search for answers.
Not quite the same situation.
> I do wonder, however, if perhaps Israel feels that the Palestinian
> police and leadership are in fact not doing anything to stop the
> terrorism (possibly aiding it),
Possibly? Who released all the Hamas terrorists from jails in
Palestian Authority terratory? Arafat. He knows that's going on. He
refused the offer of Barak, which was basically EVERYTHING he
wanted, he refused...and he KNEW they'd be a backlash against
the Palestians!
> and so Israel feels they should be
> punished for their failure to act?? For all we know, these could be
> just big kids with serious toys who can't resist the urge to use them
The Isralie government, the idiots, feel that lobbing missiles into
palestian teratories is a good PR exercise. For some unknown
reason.
*sighs*
Sharon and Arafat are BOTH War Criminals...
Andy
Dawn Falcon
