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Now that Benjamin Netanyahu has selected Avigdor Lieberman as foreign minister for his new government, it looks like the die has been cast. While talks could result in a last-minute power-sharing arrangement with the Kadima Party's Tzipi Livni--which would, presumably, exclude or sharply demote Lieberman and his ilk--it looks increasingly likely that the new Israeli government will range from the hard right of Netanyahu's Likud to the extremist, openly racist right of Lieberman's Yisrael Beiteinu (Israel Is Our Home) and the even more right-wing, Kahane-inspired National Union, along with smaller parties like the Orthodox Shas.
Why have talks between Livni and Netanyahu run aground? Livni knows that if Netanyahu is forced to rely only on the far right, his ruling Knesset majority will be razor thin, susceptible to the demands of smaller coalition partners and thus highly unstable. Such a government would also be held at arm's length by the international community--including, probably, the indispensable ally, Washington. After all, Netanyahu spent much of his previous prime ministership (1996-99) feuding with the Clinton administration, which detested his stonewalling vis-a-vis the Oslo peace process. Netanyahu now openly opposes a two-state solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict, the only game in town in the eyes of the international diplomatic community. This augurs frosty relations with the Obama administration. For all these reasons, Livni has been driving a hard bargain in her talks with Bibi. Since both know that he needs her a lot more than she needs him, it makes sense for her to reject anything less than a full power-sharing arrangement, with rotating prime ministerships (and possibly the participation of Ehud Barak's Labor Party).
If Netanyahu does wind up forming an exclusively far-right government, a Rubicon of sorts will have been crossed. Israel has been moving steadily to the right for some time now, with this last election confirming the ugly national mood. From where I sit now, in the southern Israeli city of Beer-Sheva (I'm on leave from The Nation, having just begun a three-month fellowship courtesy of the gracious hospitality of the Chaim Herzog Center for Middle East Studies & Diplomacy at Ben-Gurion University), I see troubling indicators all around. It's not just that the third-largest party in the country has talked of demanding a loyalty oath from the country's Palestinians, now roughly 20 percent of the population, or that it talks of unilaterally abrogating their citizenship in a future settlement involving population transfers, with the goal being creation of an ethnically pure Jewish state. Nor was it the overwhelming public support for the recent brutal Gaza campaign, an assault on a mostly defenseless population disguised as war and self-defense.
Another disturbing election result was the decline of the left, with Meretz now having become a minor party with only 3 percent of the vote. Everyone I've talked to here tells me that Israel's media--generally considered by veteran US readers of Ha'aretz, myself included, to be refreshingly more open, and certainly more informative, than the US media on issues relating to the conflict--have been a significant factor in stoking the national mood of vengeance and obscuring basic facts about the occupation and relations with the Palestinians. I don't know how much the media is responsible for it, but one can see a new, far more intolerant generation on the rise: in most high schools across the country, Lieberman's party was the favorite in the elections. And while brutality toward Palestinians is hardly new in Israel, the recent unprovoked shooting of ISM activist Tristan Anderson is of a piece with unprecedented police repression of peaceful Jewish demonstrators during the Gaza campaign, both here in Beer-Sheva and elsewhere, about which I'll be writing more in the future.
Certainly there's something to be said for letting a far-right government show its true colors, and thus hang itself in short order, without Kadima or Labor having soiled themselves by joining. And no trend in politics is irreversible. But one does get the ominous sense that fateful red lines are being crossed, that the center in Israel may not hold.
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Why can't the Iranians smuggle food and fuel into Gaza, instead of just rockets and mortars? Why can't the Gazans dig bomb shelters, like the Israelis in Ashkelon and Sderot have done, instead of just tunnels for smuggling?
Posted by Mistral at 03/17/2009 @ 11:01am
The new warrior, openly racist Israeli govt will have its commands faithfully executed in the US by AIPAC, and via that front, call the ME shots for the US govt.
This will lead to utter disaster in the ME & for US foreign policy.
Posted by sloper at 03/17/2009 @ 11:23am
'The Israelis have been warning you that this was coming if you continued your cross-border rocket attacks. Egypt has been imploring you to stop firing rockets into Israel, but you ignored our words. We have been urging you to renew the ceasefire with Israel, but you refused. You have brought this upon yourselves. You are responsible for what is happening to the people of Gaza.' -- Egyptian foreign Minster Ahmed Aboul Gheit -- http:// www.timesonline.co.uk/ tol/comment/letters/ article5408091.ece
Posted by HonestLiberal at 03/17/2009 @ 11:25am
posted by honestliberal
Hey girl, where have you been? This website is such a desert. Can you believe the guy who thinks that Askelon and Sderot are settlements?
Posted by Mistral at 03/17/2009 @ 11:36am
Posted by snowball666 at 03/17/2009 @ 11:28am
Somehow I didn't figure you to be part of the "Protocals of the Elders of Zion" style racists that have permeated this site in the past few months.
Actually it's the Israelis who have asked whether you would prefer that they just take a bullet and get out of the way.
Posted by antisocialist at 03/17/2009 @ 11:39am
posted by mistral
Geography is always a problem. It's like the people who think Yasir Arafat was a Palestinian, when he was born in Cairo.
Posted by HonestLiberal at 03/17/2009 @ 11:42am
posted by honestliberal
Or when Obama thought that the AIG bailout money would only go to Americans, when AIG is a multinational corporation.
heheh
Posted by Mistral at 03/17/2009 @ 11:52am
posted by mistral
Please don't say "heheh"
Posted by HonestLiberal at 03/17/2009 @ 11:59am
Would that "hard right," be replaced by a more mature, accurate, and truthful term;
Fascist.
Posted by V at 03/17/2009 @ 12:01pm
posted by honestliberal
Sorry
Posted by Mistral at 03/17/2009 @ 12:03pm
This could be Netanyahu's "Bush post-2004" moment.
He wins the election...loses the country. Like Bush on Social Security privitization, he pushes too hard for an agenda that he THINKS is "mandated" from his victory...but opposed by most of the country...thus alienating him and starting a free-fall in his slight popularity.
He loses by winning. Paradoxical, but it has happened...here, as a matter of fact.
Posted by Mask at 03/17/2009 @ 12:12pm
We have been urging you to renew the ceasefire with Israel, but you refused. You have brought this upon yourselves. You are responsible for what is happening to the people of Gaza.' -- Egyptian foreign Minster Ahmed Aboul Gheit -- http:// www.timesonline.co.uk/ tol/comment/letters/ article5408091.ece
Posted by HonestLiberal at 03/17/2009 @ 11:25am
So an Arab diplomat lies, too. So what?
Posted by cka2nd at 03/17/2009 @ 12:20pm
He wins the election...loses the country. Like Bush on Social Security privitization, he pushes too hard for an agenda that he THINKS is "mandated" from his victory...but opposed by most of the country...thus alienating him and starting a free-fall in his slight popularity.
He loses by winning. Paradoxical, but it has happened...here, as a matter of fact.
Posted by Mask at 03/17/2009 @ 12:12pm
but Netenyahu is leading because his views represent the vast majority of Israeli citizens. So how does that work against him?
Posted by antisocialist at 03/17/2009 @ 12:22pm
I'm not sure that Israel is changing except that certain terrible aspects of the nation are becoming more visible. The regime there has been dominated by brutes and war criminals going back through and then well before General Sharon.
Posted by syfriendly at 03/17/2009 @ 1:14pm
For Christ's sake, the first prime minister of Israel had an overt policy of "transfer" being the ultimate solution the Israeli regime had towards the "Arab problem". The quoted terms I use were ben Gurion's words, and the words of Israeli officials, not mine. Israel has proceeded with the slow expropriation of West Bank lands and the subjugation of the Palestinian people despite any party having control in its regime since 1967.
Posted by syfriendly at 03/17/2009 @ 1:16pm
Posted by antisocialist at 03/17/2009 @ 12:22pm
And Bush beat Kerry.
How'd that turn out for him and HIS Right?
Posted by Mask at 03/17/2009 @ 1:22pm
>>>Certainly there's something to be said for letting a far-right government show its true colors, and thus hang itself in short order, without Kadima or Labor having soiled themselves by joining.<<<
That's the plan - let them self-destruct and never be trusted by Israelis to ever lead again!
Let's just hope the average Israeli does not have to suffer too much before they understand that the right wing in Israel is incapable of leading their nation in a positive direction.
Creating a "racially pure" Jewish state, and excluding all others sounds so much like Hitler that it is simply unbelievable that the Israeli right wing can utter such nonsense and be taken seriously by any Jew anywhere.
Posted by Metteyya at 03/17/2009 @ 1:28pm
And Bush beat Kerry.
How'd that turn out for him and HIS Right?
Posted by Mask at 03/17/2009 @ 1:22pm
We are far more divided than Israel is on the issue of survival.
Most of you leftists don't care whether we survive or not, especially if there is an opportunity to be remade as a "demcratic socialist" nation in the European model.
But most Israelis do care about living. they face the death threats daily.
Posted by antisocialist at 03/17/2009 @ 1:35pm
"New Face of Israel": the new head of the Israeli National Security Council has been refused a visa to the US since 2007 on the grounds that he is a "security risk", that is, a figure strongly suspected in espionage against the US.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1071726.html
Israel is such a close ally of ours that they actively promote figures who commit espionage against us into the highest levels of their defense establishment.
Why do I have to turn to Israeli media to learn of this? Why isn't Ethan Bronner at the New York Times telling me about it? (Those of you familiar with Bronner's dubious "reporting" during the Gaza slaughter - in which he essentially remained in Israel and regurgitated press releases from the Israeli Foreign Ministry and "Defense" Forces - understand why I ask that question).
Posted by syfriendly at 03/17/2009 @ 2:19pm
Posted by antisocialist at 03/17/2009 @ 1:35pm
So if Israel is more united, then you'd have had no problem if Kadima or Labour had won....
uh, right?
Posted by Mask at 03/17/2009 @ 2:20pm
Has anyone noticed the avalanche of TV commercials recently on CNBC and PBS (maybe more for all I know) about what a lovely land Israel is to travel to? Clearly there is a monumental P.R. problem for Israel and they are now spending billions (of American taxpayer money)in damage control.They should have thought of that before they committed international war crimes,and Interpol already has notified 180 countries of the arrest warrants of 15 top Israeli officials. The ICC is also working on the same charges as we speak. The world and the US in particular is awakening. Russia too is alerting the US not to cause trouble with Iran.
Posted by mystic7 at 03/17/2009 @ 3:14pm
So if Israel is more united, then you'd have had no problem if Kadima or Labour had won....
uh, right?
Posted by Mask at 03/17/2009 @ 2:20pm
What kind of question is that. Because the right is the majority in Israel, it would make no difference to me if the left won?
That's just a nonsensical question.
Both the opinion polls and the elections have a super majority on the right.
Posted by antisocialist at 03/17/2009 @ 3:18pm
It may be worth noting again that NO treaty of alliance exists between the US & Israel, not withstanding that Israel -- which is not a developing nation -- has been the top receiver of US foreign aid for decades.
LBJ offered Israel an alliance treaty weeks after the June '67 war, but Israel declined, because ALL alliance treaties require that all signatories declare their fixed borders & any single signatory must notify all other signatores before initiating military action against another nation. Israel would not adhere to these 2 basic requirements of an alliance treaty.
Posted by sloper at 03/17/2009 @ 3:23pm
Remember this. In effect (for all intents and purposes) Israel cannot attack Iran without American, if not approval, then knowlege (and in a very real sense, complicity).
This will be more blowback on us.
Because, much/most of the Arab/Mulsim world sees Israel as an extension of American foreign policy. (Ironic, since the opposite is basically true).
Posted by FDR43 at 03/17/2009 @ 3:27pm
As Israel has our balls in its pocket.
Posted by FDR43 at 03/17/2009 @ 3:28pm
Posted by antisocialist at 03/17/2009 @ 3:18pm
Well, what does "We're more divided than the Israelis" mean, Larry?
Is Kadima "right wing" to you?
Posted by Mask at 03/17/2009 @ 3:41pm
Well, what does "We're more divided than the Israelis" mean, Larry?
Is Kadima "right wing" to you?
Posted by Mask at 03/17/2009 @ 3:41pm
Kadima itself is mostly center-right. However Livni despite the rants of the anti-semites like Sy and Crip is a center-left politician.
I think a lot of members of Kadima would like to join a unity govt. We'll see how much longer Livni is able to negotiate for Kadima.
Posted by antisocialist at 03/17/2009 @ 3:49pm
Posted by antisocialist at 03/17/2009 @ 3:49pm | ignore this person | warn this person
I don't know who the hell you think you are to casually characterize me as an "anti-Semite" ie Jew-hating bigot. That's absolutely crazed and more than just a bit obnoxious. Nobody in the world is required to agree with your own (pathetically brutal and callous) worldview or be deemed a bigot. You're just a creepy as "Mask", the two of you together spend more time applying labels to people on these pages whom you never have and never will meet than articulating any sort of sensible or fact-based thinking or judgement on these issues.
All I've ever written about Livni here, and I stand by those words, is that she is a horrible or monstrous figure, and she is. She stood up in front of reporters, a year or more into an absolutely brutal economic blockade of Gaza, and two weeks into a brutally violent and morally indefensible bombing of the people of Gaza, and declared "There is no humanitarian crisis in Gaza". She is furthermore part of a circle in Israeli politics that attempted to initiate the slaughter in Gaza late last year in a depraved attempt to enhance her chances in the February election in Israel. These are the words and acts of a monster, and I stand by what I've said, which is no more "anti-Semitic" than it is "anti-Zoroastrian".
Posted by syfriendly at 03/17/2009 @ 4:05pm
Posted by syfriendly at 03/17/2009 @ 4:05pm
What BS. Who do you think you're fooling?
Your posts here have read like a Aryan Nations meeting.
Posted by antisocialist at 03/17/2009 @ 4:07pm
Posted by antisocialist at 03/17/2009 @ 4:07pm | ignore this person | warn this person
I can only suppose that you must have attended an Aryan Nations meeting yourself, to make such a (bent) claim.
(Your cracked accusations of bigotry are pretty silly, in particular, given that you know absolutely nothing about me personally.)
Posted by syfriendly at 03/17/2009 @ 4:20pm
Posted by antisocialist at 03/17/2009 @ 4:07pm | ignore this person | warn this person
Besides, aren't you the one who claims that "there is no such thing as a Palestinian"? That isn't Holocaust denial, but it sure is Nakba denial. The difference between you and a Holocaust denier is that your (crazed) worldview is actually tolerated in higher places in the US because it is convenient to the interests of a foreign regime that wants the highest levels of US political and societal power to hold absolutely unbalanced and warped views of Arabs and towards Palestinians in general.
Posted by syfriendly at 03/17/2009 @ 4:22pm
Posted by sloper at 03/17/2009 @ 3:23pm
Great recall, SLOPER!
Posted by Metteyya at 03/17/2009 @ 4:31pm
Besides, aren't you the one who claims that "there is no such thing as a Palestinian"? That isn't Holocaust denial, but it sure is Nakba denial. The difference between you and a Holocaust denier is that your (crazed) worldview is actually tolerated in higher places in the US because it is convenient to the interests of a foreign regime that wants the highest levels of US political and societal power to hold absolutely unbalanced and warped views of Arabs and towards Palestinians in general.
Posted by syfriendly at 03/17/2009 @ 4:22pm Great recall, SLOPER!
Posted by Metteyya at 03/17/2009 @ 4:31pm
You think I'm warped for indicating the fact that there is no such thing as the Palestinian Arab nation in history?
Why don't you tell me what it's capital was?
Who were it's great leaders? or any leader?
Who did they have treaties or alliances with?
Why did the Arabs there instead call themselves prior to 1947 part of Bilad al-Sham (usually translated as Syria or Greater Syria)?
Zuheir Mohsein, Member of the Supreme Council of the PLO:
"There are no differences between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. We are all part of one nation. It is only for political reasons that we carefully underline our Palestinian identity, because it is in the interest of the Arabs to encourage a separate Palestinian identity in contrast to Zionism. Yes, the existence of a separate Palestinian identity is there only for tactical reasons. The establishment of a Palestinian state is a new expedient to continue the fight against Zionism and for Arab unity"
Statement by Auni Bey Abdul-Hadi to the Pell Commission in 1937
"There is no such country as 'Palestine'; 'Palestine' is a term the Zionists invented!"
Posted by antisocialist at 03/17/2009 @ 4:42pm
Posted by antisocialist at 03/17/2009 @ 4:42pm | ignore this person | warn this person
Your previous statements go to the tune of "There is no such thing as a Palestinian, they are all Jordanians, and Jordan should accept them all." In other words, you are an overt proponent of ethnic cleansing. Who tries to accuse others of racism.
Enough of babysitting you now.
Posted by syfriendly at 03/17/2009 @ 4:56pm
Your previous statements go to the tune of "There is no such thing as a Palestinian, they are all Jordanians, and Jordan should accept them all." In other words, you are an overt proponent of ethnic cleansing. Who tries to accuse others of racism.
Enough of babysitting you now.
Posted by syfriendly at 03/17/2009 @ 4:56pm
So, you prefer to ignore history and the statements of the Arabs prior to the 1967 War?
Ethnic cleansing, no that is your proposal along with other racists like Cripthink. You are the ones calling for the destruction of Israel.
Posted by antisocialist at 03/17/2009 @ 5:21pm
Getting back to the topic ("New Face of Israel") I maintain that ascent of Netanyahu and the odious Avigdor Lieberman - disgusting figures who have claimed power in Israel with broad public support, in particular amongst young people, where racial hatred of Arabs and the supremacist view of Israelis has really taken hold - is not anything truly new. More overt, yes; but Israel has always had a regime with heads of state and political leaders who are brutes and war criminals. One doesn't have to go back in history far to see this - look at what Olmert directed - slaughters of innocents in wars of aggression intended to rally the Israeli public around him and to demonstrate how violent Israel is to its neighbors.
And before that, there was General Sharon. This man happily smiled as thousands of Palestinian refugees were murdered in Sabrila and Shatila. And that was just one of his crimes. General Sharon was popular with Israelis just because of his brutal history.
And before that, West Bank expropriation continued under Barak.
And before that, it was Netanyahu again.
Israel as a nation has been brutally racist and violent, and prone to the illegal and wrongful acts of a rogue nation, going back to its first Prime Minister David Ben Gurion.
There is no "new face", just a little less of a mask over the same old face.
Posted by syfriendly at 03/17/2009 @ 6:35pm
Posted by antisocialist at 03/17/2009 @ 3:49pm
So a Kadima/Labor government would have to be fine with you. Throw in the more left-wing parties and you could have a majority government.
Particularly since we have HAD Labor governments in Israel and they have offered to negotiate with the Palestinians.
Regardless of the failure of those negotiations, your view of the "views of united Israel"...are baseless BY YOUR OWN STANDARD, which is "All of the West Bank and Gaza must return to Israel, because that's the ONLY thing that 'guarentees' Israel's survival!"
Which again returns to my point on Netanyahu and how this may become his "Bush post-2004" era....winning the election, going too far Right, and losing not only HIS support, but Likud's.
Ironic to see that happen TWICE with two guys you consider nearly messianic.
Posted by Mask at 03/17/2009 @ 7:23pm
Posted by syfriendly at 03/17/2009 @ 6:35pm
As noted many times before, you're just the mirror-image of antisoc.
When honest, you'll admit your "peace plan" is an embargo and sanctions on Israel until they cave to Hamas (not even Fatah, who isn't pure enough for you ...ergo you don't even support ALL of the Palestinians, just the most radicals).
So YOUR plan isn't going to be implemented any more than Larry's "Move 'em all back to Jordan"....two fringers whose counterparts in the Middle East merely exascerbate the problem, not reduce it.
Posted by Mask at 03/17/2009 @ 7:27pm
Posted by Mask at 03/17/2009 @ 7:27pm | ignore this person | warn this person
You silly little person, I've never attempted to articulate any "peace plan" or lack thereof in front of you, and, again, I find you both creepy and vapid. You seem to thrive on trying to label other posters or provoke fights in order to get attention for yourself. Would you please desist in this stupidity?
I don't have any "peace plan", I am not Jimmy Carter or Khofi Annan or Ban Ki-Moon. I personally feel there is (sadly) little hope for improvement in the terrible problems this sad little piece of turf faces, and I think that it is hugely clear, the sources of the problem. I have articulated such in the form of fact-based criticism and condemnation of the colonialist, apartheid regime that calls itself "Israel". They have all the guns and power and it would appear no moral framework or perhaps a bizarre, colossal self-pity complex. In any case, this is more of an actual viewpoint than you have actually articulated yourself. Again, you only seem to exist to snipe at or characterize, or mischaracterize other posters. This seems to be your end, and it is a sad one.
Posted by syfriendly at 03/17/2009 @ 8:40pm
It is not possible to comprehend how pointing out that most of the heads of state of Israel have been war criminals or similar, and that Israel has largely engaged in rogue behavior since its inception, makes me a "fringer". This is stupid, and silly, and seems to have more to do with "Mask" typing ridiculous mischaracterizations at people with more fully informed perceptions of the events and situations we discuss than he does, in order to either provoke angry responses and badly needed attention, or simply convince "Mask" that he has a viewpoint when he doesn't, really.
Posted by syfriendly at 03/17/2009 @ 8:42pm
YEAH! Let's kill those Palestinians! Look at how well it has worked so far!
Gah. When will people learn that you don't get people on your side by blowing their family and friends up. Let em kill each other because that's what it's all going to boil down to. If Israel full on invades Pakistan look for Israel to be overrun by pissed off Arabs.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 03/17/2009 @ 9:10pm
syfriendly
Actually you DID propose a "peace plan", that involved an embargo on Israel.
As for your "fringer" status, I'd say anybody who says that ALL Israelis are "savage, brutish people" in direct contradiction to a number of peace-minded Israelis, is atleast a bigot.
And certainly anybody who discounts Fatah and thinks that ONLY Hamas is the representative of Palestinians, thereby discounting nearly half of the elected leadership of the Palestinians, has isolated himself to one EDGE of the spectrum.
And I don't HAVE to "provoke you to make angry responses", since you do that automatically on ANY thread about Israel, way before I even post sometimes.
BTW, note: Unlike sntisoc, I don't call you an "anti-Semite"...you hate all Israelis, but have so far presented little evidence of hating all Jews. There ARE anti-Semites on your side and you would be "cozy" with them (as is CripThink), but your bigotry though vile, is focused.
Posted by Mask at 03/17/2009 @ 9:17pm
Posted by Mask at 03/17/2009 @ 9:17pm | ignore this person | warn this person
I think I have you figured out - all you know in the world about these issues is a subset of what you've read in the comments sections of The Nation Magazine web site.
In (brief) response to your (typically idiotic and mischaracterizing) statements, I do maintain that MOST Israelis are completely brutish. That is how these evil regimes get voted into power, repeatedly, in Israel. That's how these evil wars that Israel wages against largely defenseless populations get so much support from the broad Israeli public. The people there, mostly, are dumb and brutish and the sort who are proud to hear that their military is in action against a largely defenseless people they've subjugated for decades.
I don't "hate all Israelis" either, this is another hysterical and defamatory claim you make. You seem unable to refrain from twisting what others write into totalistic statements. This is how you provoke the angry responses you need to turn the comments section into a mechanism to generate attention for yourself.
You don't know anything about me, you are not qualified to characterize my positions, as you have not articulated any knowledge yourself of the history, geography, language, culture, religion, economics, or moral issues at play in the Israel/Palestine catastrophe.
Now, I don't need to justify myself to you, that seems to be the little game you need to play, get people on the comments thread at the web site to pay attention to you and justify themselves to you and respond to you. In case you haven't noticed, I find you ignorant and obnoxious both.
Try learning something about these issues. Some people - people you know nothing about, whom you never have and never will meet - may have.
Posted by syfriendly at 03/17/2009 @ 9:27pm
I do maintain that MOST Israelis are completely brutish. That is how these evil regimes get voted into power, repeatedly, in Israel. That's how these evil wars that Israel wages against largely defenseless populations get so much support from the broad Israeli public. The people there, mostly, are dumb and brutish and the sort who are proud to hear that their military is in action against a largely defenseless people they've subjugated for decades. Posted by syfriendly at 03/17/2009 @ 9:27pm
You make it sound like the Israelis (all of them) believe THEMSELVES that they are evil - that they KNOW they are evil, and in fact, are proud of it! This is demonizing your opponent - not are Israeli actions evil (I actually agree they are, some of them), but the way you talk about them - you brook no possibility that they are perhaps misguided or mistaken, or that out of genuine concerns (such as fear for their lives at the hands of terrorists), that those fears (and prejudices) result in or drive them to take actions that (due to those fears and prejudices) they are not able to see (though they be) evil. Further, you always paint with the broadest possible brush - as Mask states, there ARE groups in Israel that totally oppose the settlement movement for example. What about Rabin? He gave his life trying to attain peace.
But you talk about ALL Israelis like they are unrequited Nazis. That's where you go off the deep end. Isn't this what the left (which I think you consider yourself a part of?) complained about with George Bush! That he is simplistic, black and white, in his assessment of the motivations of what he called the "evil-doers."
Posted by FDR43 at 03/17/2009 @ 9:43pm
Posted by FDR43 at 03/17/2009 @ 9:43pm | ignore this person | warn this person
Sorry, 60 years of brutal subjugation and frequent festivals of butchery don't get explained away with "ooh but they're 'misguided'". The great majority of Israelis have been, are, and will be participants in a brutal, racist colonialist enterprise. Many of them are overtly aware of this and quite pleased with it. There is no possible apology. I don't have to make nice sounds at such people, any more than I have to make apologies for Serbian proponents of Slobodan Milosevic and what he stood for.
Posted by syfriendly at 03/17/2009 @ 9:53pm
Posted by FDR43 at 03/17/2009 @ 9:43pm | ignore this person | warn this person
And no, I am not "off the deep end" except in a cultural environment dominated by a media in which any viewpoint but a specific and unbalanced viewpoint preferred by the foreign regime in question and its de facto agents here is censored and scrubbed and condemned.
Posted by syfriendly at 03/17/2009 @ 9:54pm
Ok, I don't want to argue anymore. I would like to say I consider myself sane and reasonable on the Israeli-Palestinian question, moderately to (at times strongly) critical of israel and its policies. I favor a two-state solution. I'm against the occupation of, and settlements in, the West Bank. But I don't see the Israelis (as do you) as equivilent to Nazis (the greatest criminals in history).
I agree generally that in the American media, things are heavily biased in favor of Israel. In other countries, nowhere as much. But I also to some extent see this as reflective of American views, rather than the other way around - that is, American political culture is heavily biased towards Israel, and the news media simply reflects this.
Posted by FDR43 at 03/17/2009 @ 10:20pm
On a different tone to this issue, I have a friend who is Palestinian who says as soon as he and his wife have kids, he is moving back to Galilee to raise them because it is better for raising a family. Which is interesting, but I see his point that if you actually value your family beyond the folks in your house, he'd rather be there. And I know Galilee is not Gaza.
Whatever, interesting.
Posted by onthehelm at 03/17/2009 @ 11:10pm
Onthehelm,
With the demagraphics, Arabs will someday be nearly as many inside Israel as Jews. Is it possible they could live together in peace? Obviously your friend thinks so. I hope he is right; for the Jews and the Arabs, the entire region, and the whole world.
Does anyone ever feel like they just get sick of it all? Who just wishes they'd refrain, for just one minute, from killing each other?
Posted by FDR43 at 03/17/2009 @ 11:40pm
Fuck politics - just stop killing each other.
Posted by FDR43 at 03/17/2009 @ 11:41pm
And don't THEY ever get sick of it? How can they stand it?
Posted by FDR43 at 03/17/2009 @ 11:42pm
"I do maintain that MOST Israelis are completely brutish......
....I don't "hate all Israelis" either, this is another hysterical and defamatory claim you make."----Posted by syfriendly at 03/17/2009 @ 9:27pm
?????...little contradictory, there, huh?
BTW, see the word "most" in either of these two comments?
"The brutish and dumb Israeli population is ever cheered by the prospect of slaughtering Palestinians. Barak, Livni, etc., will easily be elected on February 10.----Posted by syfriendly at 01/15/2009 @ 1:51pm
"The Israelis don't want peace. Look at what happens when they commit atrocities: the brutish population cheers in great numbers, and the "leaders" who direct the atrocities are lionized and elected. This is not a peaceful people. This is a savage people."-----Posted by syfriendly at 01/15/2009 @ 2:39pm
Posted by Mask at 03/18/2009 @ 08:49am
"Nazis (the greatest criminals in history). "
How so?
"But I also to some extent see this as reflective of American views, rather than the other way around - that is, American political culture is heavily biased towards Israel, and the news media simply reflects this."
FDR, lol ... it is entirely possible, that you might just be in the wrong place for someone not wanting to argue, anymore.
In any case I assume that does not mean you wish to abrogate the elucidation of the above point(s) of view to others.
Posted by FDR43 at 03/17/2009 @ 10:20pm
But the point I really wish to make is that the differences between Avigdor Lieberman, and the Palestinians is not "political."
Far, in my humble opinion, from it.
Posted by V at 03/18/2009 @ 10:47am
Both the opinion polls and the elections have a super majority on the right.
Posted by antisocialist at 03/17/2009 @ 3:18pm | ignore this person | warn this person
Not even close. Likud and Yisrael Beiteinu combined got 33.31% of the vote (one-third). The remaining rightist parties (Shas, United Torah Judaism, National Union and The Jewish Home) got 17.09%. That's a combined total of 50.4%. If that's a super-majority, what would you call 60%, a super-duper-to-infinity majority?
Further, those parties don't constitute a rightist consensus on all the issues. Yisrael Beiteinu is certainly rightist on the Palestinian issue, but it is also a secularist party that favors a Keynesian economic approach. Its secularism places distinguishes it from the other four parties I mentioned. Likud, especially led by Netanyahu, is the most "hands-off" of all the parties on economic issues.
Posted by brunowe at 03/18/2009 @ 11:03am
Posted by brunowe at 03/18/2009 @ 11:03am
Kind of a "faith-based super majority".
(BTW, now Larry will backpedal and claim "Okay, but it's still a majority. So I'm still right!"...razor-thin, contradicting his earlier claims, but "still right"!...heheh)
Posted by Mask at 03/18/2009 @ 12:05pm
V you don't see the Nazis as the greatest criminals in history? I think most would agree (including myself) they are.
Posted by FDR43 at 03/18/2009 @ 12:05pm
I hope this isn't Bizarro world.
Where a basic belief such as "Nazis were evil" has to be explained and justified.
Please tell me it isn't.
Posted by FDR43 at 03/18/2009 @ 12:07pm
I used to come to the Nation Blog about 5 years ago. Back then there weren't as many right-wingers, and there were more extreme leftists. I can't remember what my screenname was then. I remember MASK was around then too, and a few other names sound familiar (such as LuvLiberty). I stopped coming because I got bogged down in arguments with (as I see it) crazy lefties, not righties. (I'm merely a "liberal" as opposed to an outright "leftist.")
Anyway, what finally drove me from these environs were two arguments that the radical lefties were making, which I tried arguing with, and which just finally wore me down. One was that the September 11th terrorist attacks were a conspiracy by the U.S. (and possibly Israeli) government. Not just pre-knowlege and allowing it to hapen mind you, but actually planned and executed BY the U.S. govt). The second was that the U.S. govt is NOW, literally, a fascist state. (Not just moving towards such, or quasi, or whatever, but literally a fascist state, as much as Nazi Germany was). And it wasn't just a few of them - there were actually several left-wing loonies in here who strongly argued those positions (as if they were serious points of views with credibility). I finally got to a point I couldn't stand it anymore. Now, about 5 years later, there doesn't seem to be anywhere as many of the Twilight Zone radical leftist types in here. (Though, interestingly, there seem to be many more right-wingers.)
In any case, when someone just said to me, "in what way were the Nazis evil"? it set off all my alarm bells.
If I actually am going to have spend time arguing the positio that the Nazis were evil, then I'm leaving the Nation Blogs for another five years.
Posted by FDR43 at 03/18/2009 @ 12:17pm
The epithet "anti-Semite" for any critic of Israel has to be defanged. Here are TWO members of British parliament: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTEFUIZ4FcI http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VEFw2tD2ySg&NR=1 All I can say is that if being a Jew means incinerating hundreds of Gazan children to death with white phosphorus, then I proclaim loud and clear: I AM PROUD TO BE AN ANTI-SEMITE. The slogan "Never Again" rings hollow because it has really come to mean "Never Again For Jews Only" (The Talmud proudly sanctions murdering non-Jews).
Posted by mystic7 at 03/18/2009 @ 12:17pm
"..the first prime minister of Israel had an overt policy of "transfer" being the ultimate solution the Israeli regime had towards the "Arab problem". The quoted terms I use were ben Gurion's words" (syfriendly)
Not only is that true,but former Israel P.M., Yitzhak Rabin, said in an uncensored version of his memoirs, published by the NYT on October 23, 1979: "We walked outside. Ben-Gurion accompanied us. Allon repeated his question - "What is to be done with the Palestinian population?" Ben-Gurion waved his hand in a gesture which said "Drive them out" (or "Get rid of them")(my analysis)
Posted by mystic7 at 03/18/2009 @ 12:37pm
Posted by mystic7 at 03/18/2009 @ 12:17pm
True, being a critic of Israel is not being an "anti-Semite"...
but what of when it slips into definitive anti-Jewish religion stuff like...
"(The Talmud proudly sanctions murdering non-Jews)."
Which leaps beyond the Israel-Palestine question and into part of the Jewish religious texts?
Posted by Mask at 03/18/2009 @ 1:19pm
Mask,
Even if it says that (its probably, like most of these things, open to interpretation), Im sure the overwhelming majority of Jews either condemn it or say it is not meant to be taken literally, etc. Just as "killing the infidels" of the Koran or "pluck your eyebrows out if you have lust in your heart" of the Christian Bible can't be taken literally.
Are there many Jews going around killing people for no other reason than BECAUSE they aren't Jews? Of course not. And I agree to imply that is the case is anti-Semetic drivel.
Posted by FDR43 at 03/18/2009 @ 2:09pm
I wouldn't be so sure about an "international community" backlash if Herr Lieberman became Israel's new face. The international community has been putting up with all sorts of nasty fanatics and horrible policies that successive Israeli governments have been producing for decades now. The last time the US exerted any meaninful pressure on Israel in favor of international law and peace was when it co-sponsored Resolution 242 of the Security Council (42 years ago!). From then on, US Middle East policy has bee dictated from Jerusalem and the AIPAC bunch. The "international community" will be only concerned and hysterical about a possible national unity government in the Palestinian Authority, which would of course include the political wing of Hamas (the winners of the 2006 elections). Hamas will be vetoed again by the US, while Herr Lieberman will be pictured as "controversial" or "outspoken".
P.S. HonestLiberal: Arafat was of course Palestinian. He was born in Cairo because his Palestinian parents had temporarily moved to the Egyptian capital. All his family roots were in Gaza and Jerusalem.
Mistral: 1) Ashkelon is not a settlement; it's a Jewish city built in 1948 over the ruins of the ethnically cleansed and destroyed al-Majdal; 2) Sderot is not a settlement either; it's a city built by Israel over the ruins of ethnically cleansed and destroyed Najd. Al-Majdal and Najd are two of the approximately 420 Palestininan rural villages that were taken by the Hagana and the Israeli Army in 1948. The people were kicked out and turned into refugees. There's plenty of Israeli and Jewish scholarship backing up these facts.
Posted by Onca at 03/18/2009 @ 2:19pm
The nation should quit worrying about the decline in readership. It is obvious that with the dedication of their virilant anti-semitic factions they can continue to clean up just with the consistent focus on Israel! How many threads have center on this just in 2009?
Posted by comancheamerican at 03/18/2009 @ 11:18pm
Geography is always a problem. It's like the people who think Yasir Arafat was a Palestinian, when he was born in Cairo.
Posted by HonestLiberal at 03/17/2009 @ 11:42am
Maybe he should have exercised his "right of return" and gone back there!
Seriously, I was reading a book on the First World War, and thinking about geography. The position of the Arabs in 1948 looks like the position of the Kaiser's Germany in 1914. They had everything: the Germans had the coal fields and iron mines, the Arabs (and Persians) had the oil. Their territory was the largest it would ever be and they had enormous population advantages over their enemies. The Germans were respected and honored - the atrocities of the '30s and 40's were in the future. The Arabs were shaking off the influences of Ottoman, French and British colonialism and taking their places as respected sovereign nations in the United Nations. The Germans had a great intellectual and artistic reputation, from Einstein to Wagner (OK the parqllel is not perfect).
Sixty years later their territory was trimmed and they were split into two separate nations. Their moral standing was shredded from the invasion of neutral Belgium in 1914 to the discovery of the gas chambers of Poland in 1945. Even the V2 rockets they fired at London and Antwerp at the end of their last defeat are like the katyushas Hamas and Hezbollah are firing now.
Posted by Mistral at 03/19/2009 @ 09:03am
Posted by mistral
And Arafat in his compound in Ramallah was like Hitler in his bunker at the end.
Actually I was thinking they're more like AIG in 1998 at the top of the market.
Posted by HonestLiberal at 03/19/2009 @ 09:36am
to FDR:
I can assure you that the Talmud does not sanction the murder of non-Jews. It is not just a matter of interpretation or discretionary implementation. It is another form of blood libel. Mask is either incredibly ignorant, incredibly gullible or incredibly anti-semitic. yes, I know there are websites which list alleged statements from the talmud that are vile, hateful and racist. The same or similar websites will also provide you with texts from the Elders of Zion protocol and swear they are true.
This site is for entertainment only, not serious discussion. Too many loonies running around for it to be otherwise.
Posted by gren at 03/19/2009 @ 1:13pm
Roane Carey wrote: "Netanyahu now openly opposes a two-state solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict..."
This has no basis whatsoever. "Likud chairman Binyamin Netanyahu and three quarters of the Likud's candidates declined to sign a loyalty oath ruling out a Palestinian state that was distributed to all the parties on the Right.
The oath, distributed by the Matot Arim organization, included a vow not to lend a hand to the formation of a Palestinian state."
It is well known on the Right, Netanyahu is very weak and easily capitulates to immoral American pressure the likes of which we saw from Bill Clinton at Wye River. Clinton actively interfered in Israel's internal elections, openly campaigning for Ehud Barak. He sent Carville and others over to Israel to work in the Barak campaign. This is incredibly immoral. How would Americans feel if Israel openly advocated and campaigned for John McCain in the last election.
Posted by exiled at 03/19/2009 @ 1:24pm
To Mask
Mea culpa. I misread your comment. I see you were citing to someone else's comment re: the Talmud libel. Please accept my apologies.
Posted by gren at 03/19/2009 @ 1:41pm
We're sorry about Tristan Anderson's injury and hope he makes a complete recovery. But get your facts straight: "unprovoked shooting of ISM activist Tristan Anderson" means only one thing: he was shot; i.e. with a bullet or bullets. He was not shot, but hit accidentally by a tear gas canister -- a device that cannot be aimed precisely to hit a particular target when fired. And please don't ignore the fact that Anderson knowingly put himself in harm's way by demonstrating. Free speech sometimes does entail a price.
Posted by sansimon at 03/19/2009 @ 3:06pm
How can anyone of conscience defend the barbarious Israeli attacks on Gaza? Israel has 645 check points in Gaza, denying Gazans food, fuel, and medicine then calls itself a democratic state!!
Essentially, their plan is to squeeze the people of Gaza to such an extent that they are forced to retaliate to survive--thus giving Israel the excuse to bomb them to hell.
Israel is usiing the same fascist methods on the people of Gaza that they have been lamenting over the decades were used against them!!!
Jews are better than that---but zionists are not---this is their fascist method of expelling the Palestinians from their homeland---but it is not going to work. It did not work for Hitler, for the Jews are in Germany, and it will not work for the zionist Lieberman and Netanyahus.
Those who do not study history are condemned to repeat it---so sayeth a wiseman.
Posted by nanadosky at 03/19/2009 @ 4:00pm
The attitude evidenced by Golda Meir's statement that Israelis could forgive the Arabs for killing our children, but we cannot forgive the Arabs for forcing us to kill their children, seems to me the best one. Giving its due to a wish for peace and the need for self defense. If we leave this position too far, we will become what we abhor.
Posted by oldgymrat63 at 03/19/2009 @ 4:17pm
How can anyone of conscience defend the barbarious Israeli attacks on Gaza? Israel has 645 check points in Gaza, denying Gazans food, fuel, and medicine then calls itself a democratic state!!
Posted by nanadosky at 03/19/2009
I can. Were there a small state or country lobing rockets into American cities, the American people would demand the military level the country. Israel withdrew and leveled all her Gaza settlements; unfortunately. Israel withdrew all her troops and were met by rockets on her southern cities by these savages! Look what Americans did to the Germans and the Japanese when they crossed them. Americans leveled Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Americans firebombed (terror bombed) German and Japanese civilian cities. Look what Americans did to the America's "savages," the Indians or Native Americans. Massacred, ethnically cleansed, expelled them and took their land. Same thing with Texas and California from Mexico. You do not know your history. Go back to school. I am so weary of ill-informed posters like you. Go read. Learn.
Posted by exiled at 03/19/2009 @ 4:55pm
Israelis are filth from the sewer.
Posted by rykart at 03/20/2009 @ 1:37pm
This isn't that new of a face, but it is a more pronounced face to be sure. Israel's apartheid has been defended and obscured by the US for decades, generally the sole voice. The people who support Israel either don't know entirely what's going on or, in their most honest moments, admit the obvious: Arabs and Muslims are the enemy since 9/11, ALL OF THEM, and the Palestinians, regardless of their lack of involvement in 9/11 or Al Qaeda, are easy targets. Like shooting fish in a barrel. Blame them for being intransigent when they protest, blame for being terrorists for resisting Israel, blame them for Israel's land grab as if it is justified due to the local population's means of resistance. Or simply say it's the fruits of war. Forgetting that Israel's history is filled with aggression against the locals from day one and its own history of terrorism before it had a state and could conduct military acts under the guise of 'national defense'. The extreme right coalition might wake-up some Israelis, but as the Egyptians showed when they shocked them in '73, it appears that the Israelis are the ones who only understand force. Otherwise, they'll beat up on a largely defenseless population and perhaps order Israeli Arabs to wear crescent moons on their chests. Who with a straight face can say that Israel is not like South Africa during apartheid. 2nd class status for non-Jews and occupation and annexation of territory of 'others'. And now the election of a fascist bloc to boot. With Obama and company still biased towards the Israeli side, we can expect the Israelis to continue business as usual. Seize territory that isn't theirs, blame the Palestinians for resisting and 'starting' problems.
Posted by nukemind at 03/20/2009 @ 8:00pm
The mainstream Israeli populace has justly woken up to the fact that the left-wing party in Israel, Meretz, has been blind to the racist rants of the Islamists in Hamas who seek to wipe Israel off the map. Accordingly, the mainstream has given support to a center/right coalition that believes that Israel has to do what it takes to survive when it is threatened by Hezbollah in the North, Hamas in the South, and Iran far to the East. Contrary to the author's suggestion, Avigdor Lieberman is not a racist. Rather, he he is realist who listens to what Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran say each and every day. I regret to say that the Islamists facists are not interested in a so-called two state solution. They are interested in building an Islamic Caliphate on the ruins of Israel. They do not celebrate diversity. As true progressives, we should not support reactionary Islamic regimes that do not respect the rights of women, gays, intellectuals, and Jews.
Posted by MassLiberal at 03/20/2009 @ 11:28pm
The photograph in Haaretz today silences every single person who defends Israeli monsters like Ehud Barak who scream out to those who would charge him and the IDF as war criminals, that the IDF is the most "moral" army in the world:
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1072466.html
This is an unspeakable war crime. The new low is for these Israeli Nazis to use T-shirts to BOAST that they murdered a Palestinian baby today. Not even the Nazis boasted of killing babies, not even at Nuremberg when the jig was up. The world WILL have its Numemberg, and the Israeli barbarians who are proud of slaughtering innocent babies and children should hang by their fingernails.This photograph in an Israeli newspaper will be more effective than any words in ensuring that Israel pays dearly for these sub-human acts of barbarism.
Posted by mystic7 at 03/21/2009 @ 2:00pm
I'm concerned! I tend to be comtemptuous of thiefs and land grabbers. I confess I hate racists of all denominations. Not only that; I despice Fascists and Nazis what ever the name of their party. Could I be an Anti-semite?!
Posted by goranbockman at 03/21/2009 @ 2:37pm
it's like flypaper for antisemites. which makes it kind of distasteful to try to pick out the rational posts on either "side" among the nuggets of filth.
Posted by gzuckier at 03/21/2009 @ 10:11pm
I'm concerned! I tend to be comtemptuous of thiefs and land grabbers. I confess I hate racists of all denominations. Not only that; I despice Fascists and Nazis what ever the name of their party. Could I be an Anti-semite?!
Posted by goranbockman
Where do you live? What country?
Posted by exiled at 03/22/2009 @ 07:44am