Part 3: Israeli-Palestinian conflict

[AndHarry]

New thread as part 2 is nearly full.

Part 1 is here.

Part 1 was started when 3 Israeli boys were found murdered.

Part 2 is here.

In part 2 we mainly discussed the legality and human consequences of Operation Protective Edge.

I also think that children's literature is going some way to counter things too- if we could get them to read books!! I liked William Sutcliffe's The Wall which was on the Carnegie shortlist-it starts out reading like dystopian fiction- why is the place the protagonist lives in so weird? Why is there a giant wall there? And takes the reader on a journey into Palestine, via a 'terror tunnel'.
Also Alan Gibbons' An Act Of Love is a goodish read about a friendship between two boys who take very different paths.
The internet has been amazing these last few weeks. More news and views on twitter (from both sides) than anywhere in the press or on the BBC. And it's so much more up to date too.
And Zayn Malik from One Direction has tweeted #freepalestine !! Despite his boss Simon Cowell donating to the IDF. That's a fair few teenage girls who might start to read up!

right i have to go deal with my sociopathic mother who would probably happily sit here and spout all of this racist, apologist, inhuman bullshit we've been reading and then some given the chance. thank god i don't see them anymore usually.

i'm sorry if i've posted too much this morning and i'm aware it's all personal perspective. but life is personal. and people's of nations are not clones, muslims aren't clones of each other either, nor are jews. this is about powerful brutal elites punishing ordinary people, not giving a fuck about right or wrong or compassion or honesty or integrity or whatever other shit you believed the world was all about. it's power versus life. it really is that simple.

oh god you made me post again - exactly springheeled but LOOK how fucking keen your man gov was to exact his force onto the english literature curriculum. that is no coincidence. you can't have kids reading 'to kill a mockingbird' if you need them to be dumb witnesses to the slaughter of others and eventually to their own.

it may be more subtle and slower here but facism is on the creep everywhere as they get ready to protect their systems.

Yes honeybadger, 'we are all Palestinian' was my favourite chant on the march- it gave me hope of some common human thread running through.

One of the best and most terrifying books I've read recently was The Shock Doctrine by Naomi Klein. It details the way that people and places are destabilised into submission from Chile and Argebtina in the 70s through to Poland, South Africa, Russia, in the cause of neoliberalism.

neoliberalism - re: we'll get you all thinking you are individuals in meritocracies and there's no such thing as class or group anymore so you can't organise or help each other whilst we ruthlessly continue acting very much as a class who works together to protect our own interests at any cost. the epic in divide and rule.

i don't know if i dare read it that book! anyway must must go - got my own sociopathic despot to go confront.

'In our millions in our billions'

WE ARE ALL PALESTINIANS

1%, palestinians, whatever you want to call us.

sorry for more detour but i keep playing laura marlings 'rambling man' at the moment and singing out the line, 'but if i sit here and weep, i'll be blown over by the slightest of breeze'.

we're right. whatever the wiggly snakey it's complicated people say we ARE right. of course it is utterly fucking wrong to murder innocent children in their hospital beds in the name of power games. just take strength in knowing we are right and we haven't become like them despite all the bloody investment in making us buy this shit.

I'm not sure that's true.

If you live in Russia, for example, and are fed on state-controlled news that bears no relation to media in the outside world, you will end up with beliefs and will often find it impossible to believe the "lies" told by foreigners who "hate Russia"

If you live in a place where the entire society, the institutions and the laws are based on racial or ethnic criteria, for example Apartheid South Africa, or modern Israel, then what you consider "normal" and "right" is bound to be influenced by your environment.

Simon Cowell donates to the Israel Army? WTF I suppose conteol freaks attract control freaks

sorry that was meant to be a response to TheHoneyBadger Mon 28-Jul-14 11:51:50

Well if you wish to argue with a British army expert then that is your prerogative.

Anyway you have your opinion which I am unable to change.

Good luck supporting terrorists. If you think they will stop at the Jews and Israel then you are extremely naive.

Add message | Report | Message poster KareninsGirl Mon 28-Jul-14 14:13:58
Well if you wish to argue with a British army expert then that is your prerogative.
-

Who is this "expert"

It was the British General whose name escapes me who testified to the UN on Operation Cast Lead.

TheHoneyBadger if you have time later I'd be very interested to hear from you on Egypt. I'm not at all precious and would welcome the opportunity to know more about their relationship with the Palestinians :)

Going back to the British general's testimony, the problem I'm finding is that there are two very different narratives of the IDF. I don't buy that every soldier in the IDF is a heartless sadist on a level with the Nazis or that they're all heroes who are heartbroken about the civilian casualties and would sacrifice themselves to save civilians. There m

Phone again, sorry.

There might be representatives at both ends of the spectrum but what isn't clear to me is what the average IDF soldier in the middle thinks.

FrontierPsychiatrist:
Grief is grief no matter the matter the numbers is disingenuous.
Oh no it isn't.
Grief is grief and death is death.
The dead on one side are as dead as those on the other.
By your sick 'logic' German women raped in the last days of WW2 should have accepted that quietly because after all, there was disproportionate blame on Germany for the suffering and death of WW2 and what right did they have to their anger, or their grief.

The point was that the media is biased, to emphasize Israeli suffering, thus downplaying Palestinian suffering.
The media is biased right up to the point where it agrees with you and Springheeled, et al, and at that point you fall on your knees before whatever oracle reinforces your prejudice.

We call that cognitive dissonance.

Sherazade, in light of your excellent reportage from Gaza, land of ATMs and sweets for Eid, would you say that Israel was perhaps one of the world's least successful genocidal Frankensteins ever?

Would anyone care to contradict Sherazade and tell her the truth -- that a thousand people lie dead, that countless more lie in the ruins, that homes, hospitals, schools, roads, infrastructure, etc. are utterly devastated.

It is very clear from her description of the continued functioning of the economy, including ATMs that have electricity, and sources of sweets still in business (and charging for their wares despite the dire situation -- now how shameless is that?) that she is an apologist for Israel.

What possible motive could she have for including in her description of today's events in Gaza the implication that Palestinian shopkeepers would charge their fellow suffering Palestinians for sweets for Eid in these circumstances?

Somewheresafe:
They've stocked up on essentials as they generally make a killing during eid.

Your flippant phrase is beyond the fucking pale.

Thanks Harry!

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Kemp

its real hard in here to keep track of who is replying to who and about what if things are not quoted but if Kareningirl you were talking to ME and saying good luck supporting terrorists, well firstly Id say get stuffed, no one here supports terrorism and its a crying shame you have to sink so low and ignorant because your arguments have no solidity or because you dont like others posts...FACE it Israel has killed over a thousand people and injured over 7000 with masses of children in that count and few "militants"....whereby ZERO people were killed in Israel from these "rockets"

thats REAL fair and precision striking

and secondly....oh, never mind

AndHarry I think it was Richard Kemp.

Emma can you also get your facts right? Three civilians have been killed in Israel by Hamas rockets - a Bedouin girl, a Thai farm worker and a man delivering food to soldiers.

yeah so sorry cofee, three...I was taking my info from a news convo on tv today, must have been an old repeat before events, still 3 to 8000 dead/afflicted is a total joke and the proportionality accusations are dead on however it is spun.....

Whatever Emma777.

I wasn't talking just to you but never mind.

You people are so brainwashed by what you are fed on the TV and Internet.

But you carry on cheering and shouting support for a regime which values their own civilians lives so much that they tell them to stay in buildings about to be bombed; who rape, torture and be head those who dare to speak out against them (Hamas) and who are sworn to the destruction of a whole race of people. And it will not just stop at the Jews.