WHAT IS IT GOING TO TAKE TO JOLT THE CONSCIENCE OF ISRAEL?!
IDF killings continue. Soldiers are being given “free-fire-zone” license!
Meet this weekend, SUN, Jan 18 at 1PM, Acacia Park, at the torii gate, a traditional site for antiwar protest.
The Shinto arch at Nevada Ave and Bijou Street commemorates our sister city of Fuji-yoshida, Japan. The plaque reads: “the purpose of the sister city relationship is to promote understanding between the people of our two countries and cities”
I spent a few moments on your website and while I saw articles criticizing Israel, as an Arab American, I wonder why you provide no criticisms of Hamas’s conduct. You either are ignorant of what’s been going on in Gaza or you refuse to discuss that Hamas is the real problem for the Palestinians. Hamas do not care about a Palestinian state nor do they care about Palestinians. Hamas are destroying the lives of the Palestinians and we will not have a future until Hamas’s head is cut off. With all due respect, your blog has its head in the sand.
Good for you, David, you say that you are an Arab American for Zionism. Would that mean that you come from a Right Wing Lebanese immigrant background? These are the same Lebanese world supporters of Israel that themselves have created many a pogrom against Palestinian refugees while helping out the Israelis.
Most Arab Americans are immigrants from the often times Right Wing Christian Lebanese community and now an actual minority community within Lebanon itself. They run political disinformation programs on behalf of the Zionist program inside the US posing themselves as the ‘good Arabs’ instead of the supposedly bad ones. YES, there are even pro war Zionist Lebanese Americans out there, and so what?
The world Arab community is huge and spans many nations and many different sub groups, but the actual Arab supporters of Zionism and US foreign policy of State terrorism are very few. Maybe, David is one of them, and maybe he’s just an internet poser? We can only guess about you, David? You want us to think that this conflict is about Hamas, but it is you that is trying to put other peoples hands in the sand, and not us that has them there.
I spent some time on your blog and just some constructive feedback that I think your blog would have more credibility if you did less Israel-bashing and address issues affecting the Middle East which go beyond just Israel.
You have not written anything about the oppression Hamas is forcing upon the Palestinians and the rejectionist stance of Hamas vis a vis Israel that is roadblocking progress in Israeli and Palestinian negotiations for a state.
You also have written nothing about how the Palestinians have been used as political pawns by the oil-rich Arab countries who give little or no money to help support their Arab brethren in Gaza. Palestinians are not even allowed citizenship to other Arab countries. Arab countries occupy 99.9 percent of the land mass in the Middle East, Israel merely one-tenth of one percent the land, yet, one would think the opposite based on the hatred and venom directed toward Israel by the Arabs and by people like yourself.
Your blog lacks credibility because of a lack of academic integrity and balance. Not all of the problems in the Middle East are caused by a nation the size of New Jersey, as you suggest. It’s nothing more than an Israel hate site and there’s too much hatred in the world already.
‘Your blog lacks credibility because of a lack of academic integrity and balance.’
Oh Brother! Marc, we are not an academic blog with professors and all. So very sorry, Marc, since I know that is really what you’re looking for …NOT.
And just what is an ‘Israel hate site’? Would that be a site where people don’t automatically support a ‘Jewish State’, a ‘Christian State, nor a ‘Muslim State’? Do you support a ‘Christian State’ here in the US, Marc?
I know, I know… You and all the Zionist apologists think that other Arab countries owe it to the ‘Jewish State’ to absorb the people whose land and property they took. And why are those Native Americans complaining about the treatment people like your ancestors (perhaps?) dished out to them here in North America? Shouldn’t they just be granted citizenship in Guatemala or Peru, the damn savages? That would be your final ‘solution’ perhaps for that problem?
As a matter of fact we do write about all sorts of Middle East issues besides the most recent flare up of ‘Jewish State aggression backed up by US ‘Christian State’ aggression against ALL Palestinians who are only part affiliated with the Muslim Hamas. So where do you get off other than through your own personal illiteracy stating this following nonsense?
…’your blog would have more credibility if you did less Israel-bashing and address issues affecting the Middle East which go beyond just Israel.’
I just don’t know? Maybe it’s because you spent all of 2 minutes reading what this blog has been writing about? Like, DUH???, maybe you might read another 2 or 3 minutes of material here before spouting off your ignorance?
Wow, your hatred for Israel is based on nothing but stale mythology, not facts. Read Joseph Farah’s article, below, who is Arab. Israel never stole anyone’s land. I don’t think the UN would have conspired with the Jews to steal land, do you?
That land was actually “owned” by the Turks. The region that comprises Israel was inhabited at the time by a loose combination of Jews, Arabs and Christians. Much of the land was uninhabitable because it was basically desert and malaria swamps. The Palestinians had no legal rights to that land. That region was never “owned” by Palestinians or governed by any Palestinian body.
The fact is, the UN allocated land for a Palestinian homeland in 1948, along with Israel, but they turned it down and, instead, went to war with the nascent Israel. That war caused the original Palestinian refugee problem in the West Bank and Gaza. Had they not fled from Israel, they’d all be living in Israel today.
So, you see, your hatred for Israel is irrational and not based on reality nor history. You have invented your own narrative.
http://www.sullivan-county.com/id4/farrah_jews.htm
Read the findings of the Peel Commission, or, re-read them in case you have forgotten them. The Peel Commission found no evidence of Jews “stealing” Arab land. They did find, however, that absentee Arab landowners were selling their land to the Israelis, which is perfectly legal. Do a blog on this.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peel_Commission
‘Much of the land was uninhabitable because it was basically desert and malaria swamps. The Palestinians had no legal rights to that land. That region was never “owned” by Palestinians or governed by any Palestinian body.’
Ooh, you speak with such authority, Marc! Almost like a lawyer even. This knowlege you demonstrate is so very special and ever so original. I don’t think I had ever heard this disinformation before you filled us in? Thank you so very much.
The Peel Commission report was ten years before the formation of Israel, and foresaw, as Ben-Gurion put it, “The compulsory transfer of the Arabs from the valleys of the proposed Jewish state.”
Why are you overlooking the 1948 AL-NAQBA, when five million non-Jewish inhabitants were displaced and 500 towns/villages were wiped from the map?
I have no hatred for Israel. Let it thrive and encompass all of Palestine. Let it emancipate its Arab and Christian populations and allow everyone to have equal civil rights. End apartheid.
I just found your blog and read comments about Israel stealing the Palestinians’ land. My family has long ties to the Middle East dating back a few hundred years and so I have knowledge of historical events.
Firstly, when you talk about Jews “stealing” Palestinian land to establish Israel, the Palestinians did not “own” most of the land. As I see it, from a legal standpoint and moral standpoint, that which you don’t own cannot be stolen from you. In New York, people live in Central Park, however, they do not own the land comprising the park. Much of the land at the time was not inhabitable because it was merely desert and disease-infested swamps. Other land was owned by Arabs living in Egypt and elsewhere that was purchased by Jews who moved to the area.
Members of my family were early inhabitants in the area in the 1930s and numerous accounts of the time stated that, ironically, only after the Zionist pioneers started moving to Israel and creating businesses and, eventually, a viable economy did many more Arabs move to the area, too, to take advantage of prosperous economic conditions. So, your contenton that the Zionists stole land from the Arabs is factually, legally and morally wrong.
Secondly, I don’t see any outrage on your part regarding the fact that it is virtually impossible for Palestinians to gain citizenship in most other Arab nations, forcing Palestinians to live under oppressive conditions. Oil-rich Arab nations have unlimited wealth for their palaces and jewels, but, not one dime to help their Arab brethren in Gaza. This is a true shame. And, prior to the 1967 War, the Gaza and West Bank were occupied by other Arab countries and there were no cries for a Palestinian homeland.
Don’t misunderstand me, I do find fault with Israel and Israel policy is imperfect. But, you and your audience would be better served to have a more balanced view of the Middle East and not place the blame for all the Arabs problems on a few million Jews living in a tiny little area.
Here is Marc’s nonsense ..’ Much of the land was uninhabitable because it was basically desert and malaria swamps.’
Now here you come along 2 seconds later, Ken, with the same comic drivel .. ‘Much of the land at the time was not inhabitable because it was merely desert and disease-infested swamps.’
Are you supposedly 2 different people here? You come off as clones, robots, or some sort of recorded message here? You don’t know how unknowledgeable and silly you sound with this phrase learned through Zionist rote and brain washing denial. Might I ask how land can be both ‘swamp’ and ‘desert’ at the same time? How can it be like Louisiana and Arizona both at one and the same time?
You spout off this nonsense because it is your way of calling Arab Palestinians lazy and worthless, which betrays your essentially racist rant against them. You, Ken and Marc, are the lazy and worthless types with this sort of racist and cultural nastiness and prejudice, and not the people whose claim to land you want to deny.
You have said that the Palestinians didn’t own the land. Bullshit! They inhabited the land and that was their claim to it and rightly so, and they owned buildings, houses, properties of all sorts, equipment, farms, and so on. And now you worthless Zionists want to claim that their claim was nothing of the sort, and that these lazy people lived in a big swamp that was only turned into ‘honey’ by Jewish European settlers let over by the British.
You think that most Americans will be as stupid as you are to buy this snot? Wrong. Not all of us are dopes, Dudes. You wouldn’t dare talk about Africa having been one big dark swamp and desert but you think that you can talk about Arab Palestinians and their lands in this manner, don’t you? Shitheads.
It’s sad, Tony, that you can’t make a point without resorting to name-calling and open scorn. It diminishes your credibility, and that of the blog, enormously.
Thank you Marc and Ken for attempting to engage in a dialog about the Middle East. I, for one, am interested in hearing your perspectives.
I’m as polite to these folk as I would be to the Klan, Marie. There’s no dialog here with this type of ‘argument’ that they engaged in, and I see that you are still aghast at notmytribe being a Left leaning Blog. You might think that it is OK to spout racist nonsense like these two do and not have it forcefully dealt with, but others might well disagree with that POV.
nonsense, comic, drivel, clones, robots, unknowledgeable, silly, lazy, worthless, bullshit, stupid, snot, dopes, shitheads — all in one comment!
Tony, are these words part of your forceful refutation of egregious untruths? They seem more like spit wads to me.
You have valid points to make, so make them. Be as left-leaning as you’d like, but don’t engage in name-calling. Seriously, Tony, stop deriding people and showing disrespect to those who disagree with you. Please stop.
I notice that you are always concerned about where I place commas, exclamation points, and question marks, but never address any political points being made me, Marie. Why is that?
Your concern over politeness to drive-by Right Wingers is quite touching, too. For your sake I will try to address them in the future with the total respect that they are fully deserving, never mind that most all of them would happily skin you or me alive if given half the chance. I’ll taser them with my trademark courtesy in the future, I swear I will.
That being said, Marc/Ken, I apologize for any offense given personally by me to you nice people. Please feel free to post your material here once again.
Thank you!
These visitors are circulating the same talking points, even similarly composed. It’s interesting they’re out in force now, as if suddenly mobilized to address the US front. One of their themes is to solicit articles critical of Palestinians, for a more “balanced view.”
Let’s take their suggestion, let’s write something positive about Israel. We’ve already covered the Israelis protesting the IDF invasion of Gaza. We’ll need help obviously: what’s one good thing we can say about Israel?
That’s easy enough to do. Despite its racist …We Are The Supreme Race/ We Are The Supreme God’s Chosen People… ideology of Zionism, the country of Israel has become just like the US itself, a place of refuge for the Jewish people from the antiJewish prejudice that even today is still found in many parts of the world.
However at the same time, none of the cultural and racial views of supposed Jewish supremacy are necessary to be that refuge for Jewish people. In fact, Zionism destroys that refuge for them by destroying anything that might be good about traditional Jewish culture.
Two people can live in one land peacefully, and it is done around the world in many places. Zionism says it can’t be done because the Jewish people are supposedly so distinct and different (read superior) to all other peoples. That is their Big Lie to the Jewish population itself. Not even their fellow American Christian Zionists egging them on to be the world’s Bad Ass country believe that mythology about their culture. They believe that Christian America is God’s county instead.
give them hell tony, that’s what they deserve!
Thank you, Andy. They do deserve hell. My ‘rudeness’ to this crew comes from experience with Zionists and their bad habits, and was strictly to make the point to them that here they won’t get off lightly with their usual antics.
They seem to have several bad vices as a group of advocates for the Jewish Apartheid State.
One tendency often times tries to deliberately misrepresent themselves as being Arabs and/or Muslims while using fictitious names that sound like such. They then go on to make some deliberately assinine and antiJewish comments to try to falsely discredit their supposed enemies as being louts and ghouls.
Another sub group of Zionist bloggers are deliberately and directly crude and hateful. They act like some Rush Limbug type in spades, multiplied a thousand times worse than that rat even. Imus would look like Ms Manners compared to many of them..
And then there is the sub type of Zionist posters we seem to just have dealt with, who specialize in acting out a supreficial and pedantic ‘teaching’ style, while often times are into misrepresnting themselves as being full of some super experience or knowlege fund. These types are often total fanatics who live and breathe Zionist mythology details down to the smallest minutae of memorization, whcih they then try to pawn off as being super educated on the Mid East. They will often claim to be like
Ken was doing, in his claims that ‘My family has long ties to the Middle East dating back a few hundred years and so I have knowledge of historical events.’ Yeah right, Ken…
Personally I could make the same claim but that would be a totally misleading claim on my part. Misleading people though is what Zionists like Ken seem to love to specialize in. He continued in this mode…
‘only after the Zionist pioneers started moving to Israel and creating businesses and, eventually, a viable economy did many more Arabs move to the area, too, to take advantage of prosperous economic conditions. So, your contention that the Zionists stole land from the Arabs is factually, legally and morally wrong.’
Due to his pretentious claim to have several hundred years of family background on the matter, we’re just to accept this bald and dishonest assertion of his as fact, I suppose? What if I had claimed like this ‘Ken’, that my family had hundreds of year of background in the Middle East. I could have done exactly such if I was as dishonest as Ken is simply because technically it actually is true, though that in no fact gives me the right to speak out as some sort of super authority to other Americans who do not have family as I do who immigrated from that area.
I just can’t stomach people like Ken who try to con others in such manner. It would be like my wife claiming to be an authority on all that is Mexico because she has family roots going back hundreds of years there. What a total pile!
we see the pepole daed in gaza all day
Shosh, did you spell your name right? I think this is just another Zionist spamming the site… pretending to be an illiterate Arab instead of an illiterate Jew.
I doubt if the comment comes from either Arab or Jew. It seems completely fake to me.
I thought the mistakes were typos, meaning at least this wasn’t copy and pasted, maybe. The IP: (91.144.8.13 , 91.144.8.13) with email: bashar-abd
You have to understand, Marie, that Israel and its supporters deliberately spam crap all over the internet in the most cynical and dishonest manner as part of a total disinformation media method. Here is this miserable Zionist bum once again…
‘we see the pepole daed in gaza all day’
The intent is to make people think that the spammer is from inside Gaza, but you have to ask yourself who in Gaza is using a computer these days? Nobody. So what was the real intent other than to pretend to be a supposed Arab in Gaza who is some sort of inarticulate Barbarian illiterate?
The message is… Arabs are barely able to speak, almost Neanderthal subhumans, spout stupid and doubtful propaganda inarticulately… Get it? This is what somebody going through the blog quickly and innocently will most probably have the mistaken impression of ‘shosh’ being, if they do not think about it more than a sec or two. But ‘shosh’ is not from Gaza sitting at a desk with a computer on it, much as an Israeli or American might do. People are starving to death there, not playing on their Game Boys.
Now look at the other Zionist spammer Comment from Ken Rubenstein Time: January 14, 2009, 10:21 am, who uses a different method of spamming the AntiZionist blogs. He uses the proZionist pedantic style of cynical and deliberate miscommunication and dishonest disinformation.
‘Members of my family were early inhabitants in the area in the 1930s’
but here he is again in the very same comment he made…
‘I just found your blog and read comments about Israel stealing the Palestinians’ land. My family has long ties to the Middle East dating back a few hundred years and so I have knowledge of historical events.’
Sure you do “ken’! lol.. and say Hello to Barbie from me, will you?
This Zionist spammer can’t even keep his lie straight through his single comment! Was his family ‘early inhabitants there from the 1930s’ or were they there from ‘dating back a few hundred years’? Or the third and absolutely most probable reality, is simply neither? There is no family of his from that region and the spammer might even work for the IDF as reason for constructing his nonsensical lies?
He says 2 different things as part of his one single lie, simply because it is a lie and he was paying little attention to how he constructed it. He took us to be gullible enough to just accept him and his words as being authentic automatically on faith. Sorry, ‘Ken’, we just won’t do that for you, SHITHEAD.
You get away with this stuff too often as it is!
I imagine you were equally, if not more, outraged at the carpetbombing of Dresden and the US dropping the bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Israel did neither to the Palestinians. I don’t think the US dropped leaflets to warn the Japanese about the bomb, as Israel warned the Palestinians. Let’s have some balance to your moral outrage
Interesting, Mary. But wasn’t it the United States allied forces that bombed Dresden, used atomic weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, PLUS supplied the White Phosphorus to Israel to use on Gaza?
I have written about this already and as to balance about my outrage?, I am much more outraged at the US for Gaza, Afghanistan, Somalia, Pakistan, Iraq, SE Asia, Latin America and elsewhere than I am about The Jewish State’s murders of much smaller numbers of Palestinians with total US government help and complicity.
Marie,
Your assessment is spot-on. The rejectionist narrative is divorced from the historical realities of the region. It relies on exaggerated emotional appeals that have no basis in concrete fact. It seeks to deprive the region’s Jewish people of their historical legitimacy which is demonstrated in archaeological evidence, historical works, and even the findings of genetic research that show a Middle Eastern origin for Ashkenazi Jews. It denies the Jewish people of an equal right of self-determination.
In general, when a narrative or ideology lacks a factual basis, its proponents are left to resort to hollow personal attacks and ill-informed charges. That one witnesses such responses highlights the bankrupt nature of the rejectionist ideology being advanced in this piece and other similar pieces on this blog.
“Interesting, Mary. But wasn’t it the United States allied forces that bombed Dresden, used atomic weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, PLUS supplied the White Phosphorus to Israel to use on Gaza? ”
Your references to the suppliing of and use of white phosphorous are merely a red herring. There is no prohibition on the use of WP during military conflict, which has been used since WW II, provided it is not used as weaponry. Granted, accusations are flying about Israel using WP against civiilians, but, until anything conclusive emerges from a reliable body, accusing Israel of war crimes is irresponsible and libelous. If Israel has been found to have used WP illegally, then I support those doing so to be held fully accountable. I don’t convict miitary personnel based on accusations.
Tony Logan, Israel is protecting itself. I lived in Israel the past few months, and as I lived in the south, a few times a day I had to run into a shelter to the sound of a blaring alarm to escape the missles flying toward me. Then I would have to wait for the explosion, hoping, hoping it would not be too close.. Hamas is trying to kill innocent people, and Israel is not. Unfortunately, there are casualties when the insensitive people of Hamas use children as human shields, and hide in familes’ houses. It is saddening to me that you know so little and yet spout so much.. You can be against the war, of course. Many Jews are as well! But it would be nice to know the facts before you took such a strong opposition. I am not FOR the war, but I see that it is a neccessary evil. Unless you think Israel should just let people continue killing innocents? Not just Jews, but their own people, too. Also, I wonder where your hate comes from. But I am glad to see that you are “much more outraged at the US for Gaza… than I am about the Jewish State’s murders..”
‘Hamas is trying to kill innocent people, and Israel is not.’
Both have tried killing innocent people, it’s just that the government organized Jews in Israel do it much better with US supplied weaponry and US political support than the Palestinians can do with the pennies that people like you have left them to live upon as refugees.
Tony Logan wrote:
Both have tried killing innocent people.
Par for the course, no credible evidence for the wild allegation was furnished. The reality is that Israel did not seek to harm Gaza’s civilians. Furthermore, the IDF took measures to try to assist Gaza’s civilians.
Some examples from the IDF’s summaries:
December 31, 2008: Summary of humanitarian aid efforts:
A total of 93 trucks transporting provisions, medical equipment and medicine entered Gaza via the Kerem Shalom crossing. Five ambulances also crossed into the Strip.
12 Palestinians, including two children, were transferred to Israeli hospitals.
January 1, 2009: The IDF announced: From Thursday the Home Front Command reserve forces trained in search and rescue will be stationed in southern Israel to assist the civilian population.
January 2, 2009: 64 trucks loaded with humanitarian aid were transferred into the Gaza Strip today.
January 4, 2009: Also today (Jan.4), 80 trucks with humanitarian aid were transferred into the Gaza Strip via the Kerem Shalom crossing.
January 7, 2009: Today, the IDF opened the Humanitarian Affairs Coordination Center (HACC) in Tel-Aviv.
The center’s aim is to coordinate between the different organizations operating in the Gaza Strip and the involved IDF factors and will not replace existing structures. The center will place highest priority to the evacuation of foreign nationals and to coordinating the flow of food, fuel and supplies of goods to the humanitarian organizations.
Organizations represented include the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), the World Food Programme (WFP), the European Commission, the United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process (UNSCO), UNRWA, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, as well as Israeli governmental agencies and IDF departments.
In contrast, Hamas engaged in human shielding. The January 10, 2009 edition of The New York Times reported:
Hamas, with training from Iran and Hezbollah, has used the last two years to turn Gaza into a deadly maze of tunnels, booby traps and sophisticated roadside bombs. Weapons are hidden in mosques, schoolyards and civilian houses, and the leadership’s war room is a bunker beneath Gaza’s largest hospital, Israeli intelligence officials say…
A new Israeli weapon, meanwhile, is tailored to the Hamas tactic of asking civilians to stand on the roofs of buildings so Israeli pilots will not bomb. The Israelis are countering with a missile designed, paradoxically, not to explode. They aim the missiles at empty areas of the roofs to frighten residents into leaving the buildings, a tactic called “a knock on the roof.”
…even Israel’s critics agree that Hamas’s regular use of rockets to fire at civilians in Israel, and its use of civilians as shields in Gaza, are also violations of the rules of war.
The January 30, 2009 issue of The Jerusalem Post reported, “Members of a Gaza family whose farm was turned into a ‘fortress’ by Hamas fighters have reported that they were helpless to stop Hamas from using them as human shields.”
By placing its facilities, weapons, and operatives in civilian areas, Hamas exposed Gaza’s civilians to harm. Hamas bears responsibility for the consquences of its human shielding.