Monday, November 19, 2012

Gaza

I have much to say, but perhaps these cartoons say it better. A couple of them were recommended by Glenne Greenwald in his excellent piece. Others were published some time ago, but remain relevant.










Greenwald:

But pretending that the US - and the Obama administration - bear no responsibility for what is taking place is sheer self-delusion, total fiction. It has long been the case that the central enabling fact in Israeli lawlessness and aggression is blind US support, and that continues, more than ever, to be the case under the presidency of the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize winner.

The US is not some neutral, uninvolved party. Whatever side of this conflict you want to defend - or if you're one of those people who love to announce that you just wish the whole thing would go away - it's still necessary to take responsibility for the key role played by the American government and this administration in enabling everything that is taking place.
According to Haaretz, Israel's Interior Minister, Eli Yishai, said this about Israel's attacks on Gaza: "The goal of the operation is to send Gaza back to the Middle Ages." Let me know if any of the US Sunday talk shows mention that tomorrow during their discussions of this "operation".
Gilad Sharon, the son of former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, has an Op-Ed in today's Jerusalem Post in which, among other things, he writes [emphasis added]:
"We need to flatten entire neighborhoods in Gaza. Flatten all of Gaza. The Americans didn't stop with Hiroshima – the Japanese weren't surrendering fast enough, so they hit Nagasaki, too.

"There should be no electricity in Gaza, no gasoline or moving vehicles, nothing."
Obama has said that "Israel has a right to defend itself." So Yishai and Sharon speak of a defense?

Who has the greater right to mount a defense: The occupied or the occupier? I would argue that an occupying power -- and I'm not just speaking of Israel here; I speak generally -- has no rights whatsoever. What "rights" did Napoleon possess in Russia, beyond the right to walk home in the snow? What right did America have to invade Iraq? By what right did the Germans conquer Poland?

By what right has Israel turned Gaza into the world's largest open-air prison?

The oppressed always have a right to fight back. The oppressors may commit acts of violence, but I will never concede their right to violence.

15 comments:

Propertius said...

I would say that a nation that elected the Droner in Chief has precious little room to criticize anyone for anything.

Joshua Laudermilk said...

Even if, IF, Barack Obama was not interested in appeasing the predominant faction of Right Wing politics and Christendom that is insanely and unnervingly pro-Israel (so much so that they view anyone not as pro-Israel as they are to be unfit of not just public office, not just unfit to have an opinion, but as anarchist muslim sympathizers who are unfit to live), you seem to have temporarily forgotten something. Obama is very, very pro-violence and pro-war. He's still waging clandestine wars and stealth wars with robots that generate massive civilian casualties. Obama has a kill list that is larger than the entire operation of Dick Cheney's secret joint special operations execution squad. As others have pointed out before, Dick Cheney wishes he was Obama when it comes to wielding these kinds of powers. I don't mean to attack Obama, I'm pro-Obama all the way, but let's not forget that Obama does not shy away from the use of violence or taking advantage of executive orders that allow unlimited extrajudicial killing. Aside from that, another awesome post. I love the political comics, those are dead on. A constant reminder that this really is a war of Jews/Christians vs Muslims.

prowlerzee said...

Oh please, here we go. As expected. YOU not only voted for a drone bomber but spent the entire election season MOOOOOOANIING and fretting and whining and bedwetting over it, as if Obomba was going to lose to a Mormon and a Catholic double damned ticket, as I TOLD you had NO chance to win the Southern vote.

Why don't you worry about AMERICA "defending" itself from the brown people who have NO chance to hurt us so long as neocons, AND neolibs like YOUR Obomba, keep looking for an excuse to look the other way in order to drum up a reason to "defend" ourselves from attack?

You think that bandaid on the finger is a clever cartoon depicting an unreasonable reason to respond in "self defense?" As IF Israel has LESS of a reason than WE do???

Be candid, Joseph. How are you not a hypocrite in this arena? Be fair, also. You muzzled those of us who predicted all this and think just because you are king here, we can't ever speak truth to power as if THAT is what your bedrock "values" are?

Of course you will carry on, regardless, but I am curious how you reconcile this?

Stephen Morgan said...

The best form of defence is a good genocide.

cracker said...

What is happening in Gaza today has been going on in Afghanistan for 11 years. It includes but is not limited to fascism, illegal occupation, racism, religious intolerance, and genocide, or if you prefer, ethnic cleansing. And lest we forget, the three billion dollars the US sends Israel every year along with billions more dollars in free "surplus" military equipment is the means by which the hateful fascists that rule Israel kill, oppress, torture, and otherwise abuse the original inhabitants of the nation formerly known as Palestine. Since the US has become a colony of the apartheid Zionist regime, it isn't likely that anything will change in the immediate future. Have a nice day.

Anonymous said...

prowlerzee, apparently you were mistaken, as surely the RR ticket won the entire real south, minus Florida. Why would you boast you were right they couldn't win the southern vote when they swept the southern states?

Joe, thank you for your courage in this posting. Sometimes telling the truth is a revolutionary act. We could use more of this on this subject as a nation.

XI

Dancing Opossum said...

If you voted for Obama (or for that matter Romney), you voted for this horror show. You voted for genocide, mass murder, and the state-ordered slaughter of children. You own this.

I think JSF put it at its stark best with these images. And if you're "pro-Obama all the way" you should be pro- looking at these pictures:

http://jewssansfrontieres.blogspot.com/2012/11/up-to-14-members-of-single-family-al.html

cracker said...

Joseph: your link to the excellent Glenn Greenwald piece should be required reading on this topic. I also recommend Justin Raimondo's article titled "Why Gaza?" at antiwar.com. In it he explains why blowing up Palestinian families and murdering a 13 year old boy for playing football in his own yard is just another facet of Israeli politics.

Joshua Laudermilk said...

@Dancing Oppossum,

Hey pal, fuck you. You cannot and should not hold me responsible for whomever Barack Obama/Benjamin Netanyahu/State of Israel or the IDF murder. I am not responsible for everything Obama does just because I support him. Nor am I responsible for anything the CIA does just because I involuntarily support them through taxes. Nor am I responsible for anything the DOD/Pentagon or US military does even though I help sponsor and support them and pay for them to exist, albeit involuntarily. So fuck you. If you live in the United States and pay taxes, then you are supporting the CIA and US military, like it or not. But I am not fucking responsible for what they do or don't do. And stop attacking Obama, wanna attack someone? Attack me.

Joseph Cannon said...

Josh, everyone else -- please tone it down. I like it best when I'm the only uncouth bastard loudmouth prima donna on these pages.

Look, I never liked Obama. And right now I'm very concerned with how he'll respond.

That said, I think it is clear that Romney would have been worse. The fact that the Likudniks favored Mitt so heavily should tell us something.

So far, Obama has said very little. We don't know what's going on behind the scenes.

I'm annoyed with Hillary too -- but let's hope that she's working on a way to end the death and destruction.

Propertius said...

Joseph,

You may not have "liked" Obama, but you explicitly and knowingly endorsed his policies of unrestricted drone warfare and civil liberties violations when you voted for him. If you merely wanted to vote against Romney, there were plenty of ways to do that without rubber-stamping Obama's agenda. That's why it's called a "protest vote".

DanInAlabama said...

A vote for Obama was not a vote for Killer Drones and civil liberties violations unless one knows for a fact that if elected Romney would have put a stop to the use of "Killer Drones" and civil liberties violations.
If we had voted in Jesus Christ Himself the arc of US Foreign policy and civil liberties violations would not change one whit because no President can reverse the path the Fascists .1% have put us on. The last President who tried to change the status quo got his head blown off in Dealey Plaza.

Anonymous said...

"Hey pal, fuck you. You cannot and should not hold me responsible for whomever Barack Obama/Benjamin Netanyahu/State of Israel or the IDF murder. I am not responsible for everything Obama does just because I support him. "

Replace the proper noun "Obama" with Adolf Hitler and see if it still makes sense.

Gus said...

Whether one voted for Obama or not (I did not), one must still pay taxes that fund all the horrible things listed in the previous comments. Assuming you are US citizen, of course. We the people pay for drone wars, for indefinite detention, for CIA black ops, etc., etc. Doesn't matter who you voted for.

snug.bug said...

Danin, if you truly believe your defeatist statements we are powerless and there's no point in voting at all.

If Obama is afraid of getting his head blown off, he had no business running for Senate, let alone President. If the President, the Vice President, and the Speaker of the House all need to stand up to get their heads blown off to show the American people what we're living under, then they'd better start standing up. Government by cowards is useless. There was a time when leaders were expected to show some physical courage.