Free speech and the spirit of dissent are still alive -- down under. "Nick Possum," one of the oldest friends of this blog, has covered a large demonstration in Sydney, directed against the atrocities in Lebanon.Israel's supporters have become so wrapped up in their preconceptions, so unable to see matters from any point of view other than their own, that they will automatically presume that all of these people must be anti-Semites. Was opposition to (say) the Soviet invasion of Hungary based on anti-Slavism, or was it based on a desire for justice?
The Kurds recently killed ten Turkish soldiers. By Israeli logic, Turkey now has the right to invade and to destroy Kurdish Iraq -- and anyone who says otherwise must be anti-Turk.Every nation that has ever invaded another has always fastened upon a seemingly-credible pretext. Napoleon used a broken treaty to justify the invasion of Russia -- and his complaint was, in fact, well-founded. Yet few today know of that complaint, while War and Peace keeps alive the memory of Moscow's occupation.
Our president maintains that this is battle between the forces of democracy and those who would destroy it. But Israel is not a true democracy; racism determines citizenship, and the Israeli government controls the lives of many non-Jews who lack basic freedoms. Lebanese democracy -- however young, however faulted, however haunted by civil war and occupation -- is (was?) superior to the Israeli variety. The Israeli occupation will almost certainly end this promising democratic experiment.
I wish Americans could manage a demonstration of this sort.
4 comments:
I honestly think the Israelis have gone off the deep end this time. Nobody is fooled by the assertion that they have a right to defend themselves. Not this time. They earned a lot of admiration in the past for the lightning responses of their vaunted military. But this looks entirely different. And now they've bombed a UN post. They may claim it was accidental, but it sure looks like a response to Kofi's demand for a cease-fire.
I don't think it's just Aussies who see the attack on Lebanon as a war of aggression. I think the Israelis have lost their minds, and the whole world, except for the Fox audience, is horrified.
On top of everything else, it appears the Israeli attack on the UN observation post was indeed deliberate.
"But the shelling started in the morning and went on until after 7pm. You cannot imagine the anguish of the unarmed men and women peacekeepers who were there."
According to a detailed timeline of the incident provided by an unidentified UN officer and reported by CNN, the first bomb exploded around 200 metres from the post at 1.20pm (11.20am BST) yesterday.
Unifil observers then telephoned their designated contact with the Israeli military, who assured them the attacks would stop. In the following hours, nine more bombs fell close to the post, each one followed by a call to the Israeli military, the UN officer said.
The main Unifil base in the town of Naqoura lost contact with the post at 7.40pm, seemingly the time when the post received a direct hit.
Which should prove to any sane individual that Israel has without doubt lost it's mind. They seem to be confident that they can get away with saying it was an accident, and therefore will not suffer any negative publicity, and they could be right, but here on the internet, this incident is another nail in the coffin of whatever sympathy some people may have felt for them.
"In November 2004, a UN panel described terrorism as any act: "intended to cause death or serious bodily harm to civilians or non-combatants with the purpose of intimidating a population or compelling a government or an international organization to do or abstain from doing any act." [4]" Wikipedia.
Miss P.
It is amazing the steadfastness of supporters of Israel in the face of all the evidence. The only way I can explain it is a fear of having your basic beliefs shaken. I heard something a while back that has stayed with me.
No change will accure, untill the discomfort of status quo becomes greater than the discomfort of change. or something to that effect. I wonder what God aweful event has to happen before the status quo becomes too vile and unacceptable for them.
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