Sharon is a war criminal

[breaksny]

[kramadas]

Yup! One is a war criminial, the other a terrorist! Not the ideal leaders for a peace process!

[crobra]

Originally posted by breaksny

why are you being a trouble maker!! lol

Stop causing trouble carl!!

Are you going to Baktun tonight for hyper?

[breaksny]

Yep. U gonna b there Chris? It should b good.

And as to the thread, I can't help it Sharon is Bin Laden's excuse and look what he's doing? It's just infuriating to me. This issue more than any other is the motivation that freaks who attack our cities use as the justification for their actions. And until there's an equitable political settlement, that will continue to be the case.

And btw, Arafat's not a terrorist. He may be a quasi autocrat but alot of people doing making these attax aren't under his control. That's the problem. The thing Sharon doesn't get is destroying the palestinian gov't won't change that. But sharon is too thickheaded to understand that.

[tribal]

this thread should be called Sharon a war criminal, Arafat a lying terrorist shit.

whats your point breaksny?

heres an interesting article, looks like Arab-Israeli war #4 is about to begin, scary shit.

------------------------------

Unusual Military Movements in Arab Countries – Despite Israeli Assurances

29 March: Israel’s extended military offensive against Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat’s Ramallah stronghold, launched Friday morning, March 29, quickly took on a wider regional context. By afternoon, DEBKAfile’s military sources began to pick up signs of unusual military movements in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and Egypt.

They may reflect the growing nervousness among Arab leaders over Israel’s announced partial call-up of reservists and preparations for a full mobilization, despite the Passover holiday. The first announcement of 20,000 reservists to be called up was stepped up later to 30,000. Arab governments were already put on edge by the upheavals attendant on US preparations for its campaign against Iraq,

At the same, Arab political and military chiefs refuse to tolerate any Israeli move that might physically harm Arafat or isolate him, a tactic they regard as tantamount to taking the Palestinian leader prisoner or placing him under house arrest.

Anticipating this sensitivity, Israel conveyed its assurance to Washington in good time for relay to concerned Arab governments that the IDF call-up was solely aimed against Arafat and his terrorist apparatus and had no wider goals.

In a further series of messages conveyed through Washington, Israeli provided additional clarification of its Ramallah operation.

The military operation was vital, Israel explained, not only to isolate Arafat and cut off his terror machine, but to uncover the vast stores of secret weapons he has amassed in violation of the Oslo Framework Accords he signed with Israel in 1993. Israel intelligence had learned that Arafat hid these forbidden depots beneath Palestinian Administration buildings in the government compound in Ramallah. As Israeli tanks and bulldozers advanced through the compound during the day, huge tunnels came to light containing an array of weaponry, including anti-tank and anti-air missiles – apparently only one section of a many-branched storage system.

Under the headquarters of Col. Tawfiq Tirawi’s Palestinian General Security Service, Israeli elite units turned up a large bunker in which were stacked hundreds of M-72 LAWS (Light Anti-Tank Weapons). A similarly packed store was concealed under the Palestinian Authority prison, also captured by Israel forces.

Bunkers under Arafat’s offices were found to contain electronic surveillance devices for tracking Israeli military movements, as well as detailed diagrams of the bases and movements of senior Israeli officers stationed in the Ramallah region, with notes on the security details guarding them and their routines. Also found were aerial maps of at least one Israel air base.

Israel’s military and intelligence command ordered military bulldozers to systematically break through suspect buildings in the compound for two purposes: To uncover the illicit weapons stores and to leave Arafat isolated in his undamaged office and living quarters amid the ruins of his compound.

Israel’s assurance meant to calm, had the opposite effect. Sharon’s declaration that the military operation could last weeks did not help soothe edgy Arab nerves either.

Moderate Arab leaders are additionally concerned lest Saddam Hussein or the Lebanese Hizballah opt for opening a second front against Israel to ease the pressure on Arafat. The Iraqi ruler is capable of shooting missiles or suicide aircraft over Israel’s main cities, while the Hizballah’s newly-supplied rockets can cover most of northern Israel up to a point south of Haifa – and area with a population of nearly a million.

If either attack came to be, Israeli would strike back against Iraq and Hizballah bases in the Lebanese Beqaa Valley.

Faced with this potential scenario – not to speak of the complications of an American attack against Baghdad - Arab leaders do not want to be caught unprepared militarily. Hence the military movements.

The nature of the American response to these developments is anyone’s guess. Would Washington lend Israel’s military moves full or partial support? How would it react to an Iraqi or Hizballah attack on Israel and how far would the Americans go to integrate this unfolding Middle East chapter into the broad US global war on terrorism?

DEBKAfile ’s military and political experts say it is too soon to offer definitive answers to these questions. The highest authorities in the US, Israel and Arab governments may be called upon to make such decisions at very short notice - within days or hours. In view of these uncertainties, Israel’s action against Arafat and the Palestinian Authority already has an impact on world financial and oil markets. The dollar is strengthening and oil prices, which have been rising slowly and steadily for the past several weeks are continuing to climb.

[sonicinfusion]

tribal arent you sick of replying to such posts ..

Cmon man ..

[tribal]

yea i know sonicinf, its just that it gets personal for me. i got family living in south jerusalem, my cuz is in the army, been there in 95. i pisses the shit out of me when the liberals start painting a biased and distorted picture. yea fuck it youre right, im gona go smoke a cig.

[johnnyrevs]

they need to get rid of those 2 jackasses over there

one is a trigger happy motherfucker and the other is a terrorist piece of shit :blown: :blown:

[breaksny]

It gets personal for u. Haha and it doesn't for people on the other side? Maybe that wasn't yer implication, but nonetheless those of us disagreeing with u take it plenty personally. What's my point? Sharon's the problem. That's my point. Arafat's not the terrorist...sharon is. I'm sorry yer family may be suffering tribal, but it's more due to sharon's occupation (that of yer family's country) than it is to the palestinians. Sorry but that's how I and most of the world sees it. If americans don't, I never really cared anyway since most of our foreign policy has been so screwed up in the region 4 so long. And frankly, living in the city that got attacked, I do take this personally as well b/c I'm tired of freaks like bin laden having sharon as an excuse to attack our cities...till this issue is solved equitably (a word not in likud's foreign policy vocabulary), bin laden and those like him, still have that excuse. Whether u like to admit or not, the 2 r intrinsically linked. No palestinian state in the territories, no end to global terrorism. I wish things were different, but they're not. That's why sharon has to go. And fortunately his days are numbered till his government collapses. It's only a matter of time.

[breaksny]

from thursday's financial times. This is what many call state terrorism.:

Curbs leave Palestinian economy 'near collapse'

By Alan Beattie in Washington

Published: March 27 2002 18:59 | Last Updated: March 27 2002 23:16

Restrictions on the movement of goods and people in Israel and the occupied territories in response to the 18-month old intifada have brought the Palestinian economy close to collapse, according to a new report by the World Bank.

The report, produced for donors who are keeping the West Bank and Gaza economies afloat with nearly a billion dollars a year, said that the continued closure of border points would cause irreparable damage.

"If closures persist or intensify, the economy will eventually unravel," said Nigel Roberts, World Bank director for the West Bank and Gaza. "Public services will break down, helplessness, deprivation and hatred will increase, and this unique chance for reconciliation will pass."

The study detailed how internal closures and checkpoints within the West Bank and Gaza, and border restrictions on entering Israel, Egypt and Jordan had led to a tripling of journey times and a reduction of up to four-fifths in the number of Palestinian workers able to cross into Israel. "Even on days of partial closure, these checkpoints have created a life of roundabout routes, interminable delays and frequent harassment," it said.

Research conducted by the World Bank suggested that the average journey time and cost of travel to access public services for West Bank residents had doubled as a result of the closures, with many well-publicised cases of sick and elderly Palestinians dying because of delays in reaching hospital.

"Any significant recovery of the Palestinian economy requires that the system of internal checkpoints be dismantled and border restrictions eased," the report said. The economic damage from these closures far outweighed the direct effect of armed confrontation, it said.

The bank said unemployment had tripled to nearly 30 per cent of the Palestine labour force, with almost half of the population living below the $2-a-day poverty line.

Despite relatively good financial management by the Palestinian Authority, the report said it was "effectively bankrupt", with tax revenues one-fifth of previous levels, partly because of Israel's suspension of the revenue previously collected on the authority's behalf.

Donor funding rose sharply last year, to more than $900m, compared with $482m before the intifada broke out, particularly from the Arab League and the European Union.

The report said households had now largely exhausted their savings, while the Palestinian Authority had built up $430m in budget arrears, and estimated that gross domestic product in the West Bank and Gaza fell by 12 per cent last year.

[wahoo]

I think someone said it best when they said this is last remnants of modern colonialism and everything that is inherently wrong with it.

Don't know if you saw the article last week on CNN about the 2 kids who were arrested in israel, knew them back in school, my best friends are palestinians, and so on...I have had a constant headache because of the crap over there....I just can't remember such an overt attempt on overthrowing a government/person...shit like that happened in the middle ages...cp was a nice little escape from the news...

It's sad when 16 year old girls strap bombs to themselves because they believe they can make things better...or sadly enough because they may believe that death is better than life....

I know this is not the 80% noise being made by 20% of the people..this a friggin nation suffering...

Now I am all fricking depressed sat. morning....

[alfuckingcapone]

Occupation is terrorism

occupation is terrorism

i repeat occupation is terrorism.

Sharon will be the cause of World war 3!

He will do what he always does, attack Arafat and his police then call on him to arrest terrorist after he just finished demolishing another headquater of Arafat and his police. Even if Arafat makes arrest, where will he put them? Does Sharon think his tactics will stop the sucide bombers? No, he does not think they will, in fact he knows there will be more and thats what he wants.

An excuse to kill more pals! It's funny how the UN ,almost all of Europe, almost the whole world knows what Israel is doing is wrong, but people in this country have no clue, but it is not there fault that are media is so one sided that all they see when they open the tv is how many israelies died today! Here is a fact in the last 18 months, close to 1,200 pals have died and close to 400 israelies have died.

You guys can do the math.

[malone]

Occupation is terrorism

occupation is terrorism

i repeat occupation is terrorism.

Sharon will be the cause of World war 3!

He will do what he always does, attack Arafat and his police then call on him to arrest terrorist after he just finished demolishing another headquater of Arafat and his police. Even if Arafat makes arrest, where will he put them? Does Sharon think his tactics will stop the sucide bombers? No, he does not think they will, in fact he knows there will be more and thats what he wants.

An excuse to kill more pals! It's funny how the UN ,almost all of Europe, almost the whole world knows what Israel is doing is wrong, but people in this country have no clue, but it is not there fault that are media is so one sided that all they see when they open the tv is how many israelies died today! Here is a fact in the last 18 months, close to 1,200 pals have died and close to 400 israelies have died.

You guys can do the math.

Report this post to a moderator | IP

Well at last!! Finally someone figured out what's really going on. Now it's a math problem. And as soon as the Palestinians manage to equalize the death toll, everything will be hunky-dory. And of course you're right: Sharon definitely wants more suicide bombers killing innocent Israeli civillians. Why wouldn't he?? I bet he's the envy of the Western world. Imagine having men, women and children blown to pieces by these terrorists on an almost daily basis. Oh what a thrill that must be!

And then the Palestinians, they know everytime they do this, the Israelis are going to respond the way they do. Thats why they do it, right? To get the Israelis to lash out, destroy their homes, kill their women and children, dismantle their infrastructure, and then they have an excuse to attack the Israelis, and on and on. They know the Israelis aren't going to stop, and thats how they want it, right? What a wonderfully simplified world we're living in-Israeli bad, Palestinian good. Glad we had you here to clarify it for us.

[malone]

Originally posted by breaksny

It gets personal for u. Haha and it doesn't for people on the other side? Maybe that wasn't yer implication, but nonetheless those of us disagreeing with u take it plenty personally. What's my point? Sharon's the problem. That's my point. Arafat's not the terrorist...sharon is. I'm sorry yer family may be suffering tribal, but it's more due to sharon's occupation (that of yer family's country) than it is to the palestinians. Sorry but that's how I and most of the world sees it. If americans don't, I never really cared anyway since most of our foreign policy has been so screwed up in the region 4 so long. And frankly, living in the city that got attacked, I do take this personally as well b/c I'm tired of freaks like bin laden having sharon as an excuse to attack our cities...till this issue is solved equitably (a word not in likud's foreign policy vocabulary), bin laden and those like him, still have that excuse. Whether u like to admit or not, the 2 r intrinsically linked. No palestinian state in the territories, no end to global terrorism. I wish things were different, but they're not. That's why sharon has to go. And fortunately his days are numbered till his government collapses. It's only a matter of time.

Wonderfully insightful, as usual.

God oh God, so Sharon started the problem. Alright, now I've got to clear out a whole shelf of history books as they've been deemed worthless in one sentence. Those damn historians, they never did know what they're talking about. Not even a stone thrown while Ehud Barak was in office. And Arafat, definitely no terrorist. A modern day Ghandi, I would say. A Martin Luther King, with a headscarf. Forget his minor youthful transgressions. Forget the fact that he was attacking Israel long before the 1967 war and the occupation of the so called West Bank. Forget the fact that on umpteen occasions he has stated clearly his intentions to destroy the Israeli State. Not remove the Israelis from the West Bank, mind you, but destroy the Israeli State. He was a member of the Egyptian radical Islamic outfit, the Muslim Brotherhood. He was hijacking airplanes, back in the 60's and 70's, deliberately targeting American civilians and Jews. And that's not terrorism!

His underlings in the Al-Aqsa Martyrs brigade have been responsible for the great bulk of recent suicide bombings, all of which are directed at civilians. And he's not a terrorist.

And how the fuck do YOU know what most of the world thinks? Did you take your anti-American ass all over the globe and poll these people?

And here you go again with your "everyone agrees with me" bullshit. What is it with this nonsense about "everyone agrees with me"? What IS that? Do you need validation from the outside world so badly?

And as to your circuitous attempt to justify 9/11, because of what was happening to the Palestinians, it's just more of the same bogus claptrap that we've come to expect from you at every turn. Bin Laden denied responsibility for 9/11. Therefore, he could not be using the Palestinian "cause" to justify this incident, now could he? But you, on the other hand, in your shameless anti Americanism, have no problem using it as an excuse/justification. Bin Laden has been clear for many years about his anti-Americanism. Apart from the obvious jealousy that so many of these people have toward the West, there's the little business of dirty, filthy American infidel troops on the holy, precious, sacrosanct soil of Saudi Arabia. But Bin Laden is not a freak. He's not even a terrorist. He's a noble man, with a noble mission. Because, following your logic, if 9/11 had its genesis in Israeli transgressions against the Palestinians, and if blowing up people at a Passover seder has its genesis in Israeli transgressions against the Palestinians, and Arafat is not a terrorist, then Osama Bin Laden must not be a terrorist either.

It's probably time now for you to put your brain through the spin cycle, as it's spent way too much time in the wash cycle.

[malone]

The History and Meaning of "Palestine" and "Palestinians"

"There is no such thing as a Palestinian Arab nation . . . Palestine is a name the Romans gave to Eretz Yisrael with the express purpose of infuriating the Jews . . . . Why should we use the spiteful name meant to humiliate us?

"The British chose to call the land they mandated Palestine, and the Arabs picked it up as their nation's supposed ancient name, though they couldn't even pronounce it correctly and turned it into Falastin a fictional entity."

---- Golda Meir quoted by Sarah Honig, Jerusalem Post, 25 November 1995

Palestine has never existed . . . as an autonomous entity. There is no language known as Palestinian. There is no distinct Palestinian culture. There has never been a land known as Palestine governed by Palestinians. Palestinians are Arabs, indistinguishable from Jordanians (another recent invention), Syrians, Lebanese, Iraqis, etc.

Keep in mind that the Arabs control 99.9 percent of the Middle East lands. Israel represents one-tenth of one percent of the landmass. But that's too much for the Arabs. They want it all. And that is ultimately what the fighting in Israel is about today . . . No matter how many land concessions the Israelis make, it will never be enough.

-- from "Myths of the Middle East", Joseph Farah, Arab-American editor and journalist, WorldNetDaily, 11 October 2000

From the end of the Jewish state in antiquity to the beginning of British rule, the area now designated by the name Palestine was not a country and had no frontiers, only administrative boundaries . . . .

-- Professor Bernard Lewis, Commentary Magazine, January 1975

Talk and writing about Israel and the Middle East feature the nouns "Palestine" and Palestinian", and the phrases "Palestinian territory" and even "Israeli-occupied Palestinian territory". All too often, these terms are used with regard to their historical or geographical meaning, so that the usage creates illusions rather than clarifies reality.

WHAT DOES "PALESTINE" MEAN?

It has never been the name of a nation or state. It is a geographical term, used to designate the region at those times in history when there is no nation or state there.

The word itself derives from "Peleshet", a name that appears frequently in the Bible and has come into English as "Philistine". The name began to be used in the Thirteenth Century BCE, for a wave of migrant "Sea Peoples" who came from the area of the Aegean Sea and the Greek Islands and settled on the southern coast of the land of Canaan. There they established five independent city-states (including Gaza) on a narrow strip of land known as Philistia. The Greeks and Romans called it "Palastina".

The Philistines were not Arabs, they were not Semites. They had no connection, ethnic, linguistic or historical with Arabia or Arabs. The name "Falastin" that Arabs today use for "Palestine" is not an Arabic name. It is the Arab pronunciation of the Greco-Roman "Palastina" derived from the Peleshet.

HOW DID THE LAND OF ISRAEL BECOME "PALESTINE"?

In the First Century CE, the Romans crushed the independent kingdom of Judea. After the failed rebellion of Bar Kokhba in the Second Century CE, the Roman Emperor Hadrian determined to wipe out the identity of Israel-Judah-Judea. Therefore, he took the name Palastina and imposed it on all the Land of Israel. At the same time, he changed the name of Jerusalem to Aelia Capitolina.

The Romans killed many Jews and sold many more in slavery. Some of those who survived still alive and free left the devastated country, but there was never a complete abandonment of the Land. There was never a time when there were not Jews and Jewish communities, though the size and conditions of those communities fluctuated greatly.

THE HISTORY OF PALESTINE

Thousands of years before the Romans invented "Palastina" the land had been known as "Canaan". The Canaanites had many tiny city-states, each one at times independent and at times a vassal of an Egyptian or Hittite king. The Canaanites never united into a state.

After the Exodus from Egypt probably in the Thirteenth Century BCE but perhaps earlier -- , the Children of Israel settled in the land of Canaan. There they formed first a tribal confederation, and then the biblical kingdoms of Israel and Judah, and the post-biblical kingdom of Judea. From the beginning of history to this day, Israel-Judah-Judea has the only united, independent, sovereign nation-state that ever existed in "Palestine" west of the Jordan River. (In biblical times, Ammon, Moab and Edom as well as Israel had land east of the Jordan, but they disappeared in antiquity and no other nation took their place until the British invented Trans-Jordan in the 1920s.)

After the Roman conquest of Judea, "Palastina" became a province of the pagan Roman Empire and then of the Christian Byzantine Empire, and very briefly of the Zoroastrian Persian Empire. In 638 CE, an Arab-Muslim Caliph took Palastina away from the Byzantine Empire and made it part of an Arab-Muslim Empire. The Arabs, who had no name of their own for this region, adopted the Greco-Roman name Palastina, that they pronounced "Falastin".

In that period, much of the mixed population of Palastina converted to Islam and adopted the Arabic language. They were subjects of a distant Caliph who ruled them from his capital, that was first in Damascus and later in Baghdad. They did not become a nation or an independent state, or develop a distinct society or culture.

In 1099, Christian Crusaders from Europe conquered Palestina-Falastin. After 1099, it was never again under Arab rule. The Christian Crusader kingdom was politically independent, but never developed a national identity. It remained a military outpost of Christian Europe, and lasted less than 100 years. Thereafter, Palestine was joined to Syria as a subject province first of the Mameluks, ethnically mixed slave-warriors whose center was in Egypt, and then of the Ottoman Turks, whose capital was in Istanbul.

During the First World War, the British took Palestine from the Ottoman Turks. At the end of the war, the Ottoman Empire collapsed and among its subject provinces "Palestine" was assigned to the British, to govern temporarily as a mandate from the League of Nations.

THE JEWISH NATIONAL HOME

Travellers to Palestine from the Western world left records of what they saw there. The theme throughout their reports is dismal:

The land was empty, neglected, abandoned, desolate, fallen into ruins. Nothing there [Jerusalem] to be seen but a little of the old walls which is yet remaining and all the rest is grass, moss and weeds.

-- English pilgrim in 1590

The country is in a considerable degree empty of inhabitants and therefore its greatest need is of a body of population"

-- British consul in 1857

There is not a solitary village throughout its whole extent [valley of Jezreel] -- not for 30 miles in either direction. . . . One may ride 10 miles hereabouts and not see 10 human beings.

For the sort of solitude to make one dreary, come to Galilee... Nazareth is forlorn... Jericho lies a moldering ruin... Bethlehem and Bethany, in their poverty and humiliation... untenanted by any living creature... A desolate country whose soil is rich enough, but is given over wholly to weeds... a silent, mournful expanse... a desolation... We never saw a human being on the whole route... Hardly a tree or shrub anywhere. Even the olive tree and the cactus, those fast friends of a worthless soil, had almost deserted the country... Palestine sits in sackcloth and ashes... desolate and unlovely...

-- Mark Twain, The Innocents Abroad, 1867

The restoration of the "desolate and unlovely" land began in the latter half of the Nineteenth Century with the first Jewish pioneers. Their labors created newer and better conditions and opportunities, which in turn attracted migrants from many parts of the Middle East, both Arabs and others. The Balfour Declaration of 1917, confirmed by the League of Nations Mandate, commited the British Government to the principle that "His Majesty's government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a Jewish National Home, and will use their best endeavors to facilitate the achievement of this object... " It was specified both that this area be open to "close Jewish settlement" and that the rights of all inhabitants already in the country be preserved and protected.

Mandate Palestine originally included all of what is now Jordan, as well as all of what is now Israel, and the territories between them. However, when Great Britain's protégé Emir Abdullah was forced to leave the ancestral Hashemite domain in Arabia, the British created a realm for him that included all of Manfate Palestine east of the Jordan River. There was no traditional or historic Arab name for this land, so it was called after the river: first Trans-Jordan and later Jordan.

By this political act, that violated the conditions of the Balfour Declaration and the Mandate, the British cut more than 75 percent out of the Jewish National Home. No Jew has ever been permitted to reside in Trans-Jordan/Jordan.

Less than 25 percent then remained of Mandate Palestine, and even in this remnant, the British violated the Balfour and Mandate requirements for a "Jewish National Home" and for "close Jewish settlement". They progressively restricted where Jews could buy land, where they could live, build, farm or work.

After the Six-Day War in 1967, Israel was finally able to settle some small part of those lands from which the Jews had been debarred by the British. Successive British governments regularly condemn their settlement as "illegal". In truth, it was the British who had acted illegally in banning Jews from these parts of the Jewish National Home.

WHO IS A PALESTINIAN?

During the period of the Mandate, it was the Jewish population that was known as "Palestinians" including those who served in the British Army in World War II.

British policy was to curtail their numbers and progressively limit Jewish immigration. By 1939, the White Paper virtually put an end to admission of Jews to Palestine. This policy was imposed the most stringently at the very time this Home was most desperately needed -- after the rise of Nazi power in Europe. Jews who might have developed the empty lands of Palestine and left progeny there, instead died in the gas chambers of Europe or in the seas they were trying to cross to the Promised Land.

At the same time that the British slammed the gates on Jews, they permitted or ignored massive illegal immigration into Western Palestine from Arab countries Jordan, Syria, Egypt, North Africa. In 1939, Winston Churchill noted that "So far from being persecuted, the Arabs have crowded into the country and multiplied . . . ." Exact population statistics may be problematic, but it seems that by 1947 the number of Arabs west of the Jordan River was approximately triple of what it had been in 1900.

The current myth is that these Arabs were long established in Palestine, until the Jews came and "displaced" them. The fact is, that recent Arab immigration into Palestine "displaced" the Jews. That the massive increase in Arab population was very recent is attested by the ruling of the United Nations: That any Arab who had lived in Palestine for two years and then left in 1948 qualifies as a "Palestinian refugees".

Casual use of population statistics for Jews and Arabs in Palestine rarely consider how the proportions came to be. One factor was the British policy of keeping out Jews while bringing in Arabs. Another factor was the violence used to kill or drive out Jews even where they had been long established. For one example: The Jewish connection with Hebron goes back to Abraham, and there has been an Israelite/Jewish community there since Joshua long before it was King David's first capital. In 1929, Arab rioters with the passive consent of the British -- killed or drove out virtually the entire Jewish community.

For another example: In 1948, Trans-Jordan seized much of Judea and Samaria (which they called The West Bank) and East Jerusalem and the Old City. They killed or drove out every Jew.

It is now often proposed as a principle of international law and morality that all places that the British and the Arabs rendered Judenrein must forever remain so. In contrast, Israel eventually allotted 17 percent of Mandate Palestine has a large and growing population of Arab citizens.

FROM PALESTINE TO ISRAEL

What was to become of "Palestine" after the Mandate? This question was taken up by various British and international commissions and other bodies, culminating with the United Nations in 1947. During the various deliberations, Arab officials, spokesmen and writers expressed their views on "Palestine".

"There is no such country as Palestine. 'Palestine' is a term the Zionists invented. . . . Our country was for centuries part of Syria. 'Palestine' is alien to us. It is the Zionists who introduced it."

-- Local Arab leader to British Peel Commission, 1937

"There is no such thing as Palestine in history, absolutely not"

-- Professor Philip Hitti, Arab historian to Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry, 1946

"It is common knowledge that Palestine is nothing but southern Syria."

-- Ahmed Shukairy, United Nations Security Council, 1956

By 1948, the Arabs had still not yet discovered their ancient nation of Falastin. When they were offered half of Palestine west of the Jordan River for a state, the offer was violently rejected. Six Arab states launched a war of annihilation against the nascent State of Israel. Their purpose was not to establish an independent Falastin. Their aim was to partition western Palestine amongst themselves.

They did not succeed in killing Israel, but Trans-Jordan succeeded in taking Judea and Samaria (West Bank) and East Jerusalem, killing or driving out all the Jews who had lived in those places, and banning Jews of all nations from Jewish holy places. Egypt succeeded in taking the Gaza Strip. These two Arab states held these lands until 1967. Then they launched another war of annihilation against Israel, and in consequence lost the lands they had taken by war in 1948.

During those 19 years, 1948-1967, Jordan and Egypt never offered to surrendar those lands to make up an independent state of Falastin. The "Palestinians" never sought it. Nobody in the world ever suggested it, much less demanded it. Finally, in 1964, the Palestine Liberation Movement was founded. Ahmed Shukairy, who less than 10 years earlier had denied the existence of Palestine, was its first chairman. Its charter proclaimed its sole purpose to be the destruction of Israel. To that end it helped to precipitate the Arab attack on Israel in 1967.

The outcome of that attack then inspired an alteration in public rhetoric. As propaganda, it sounds better to speak of the liberation of Falastin than of the destruction of Israel. Much of the world, governments and media and public opinion, accept virtually without question of serious analysis the new-sprung myth of an Arab nation of Falastin, whose territory is unlawfully occupied by the Jews.

Since the end of World War I, the Arabs of the Middle East and North Africa have been given independent states in 99.5 percent of the land they claimed. Lord Balfour once expressed his hope that when the Arabs had been given so much, they would "not begrudge" the Jews the "little notch" promised to them.

[Note: Some of the material cited above is drawn from the book From Time Immemorial by Joan Peters.]

[breaksny]

The part of this on brooklyn, probably represents alot of what's goin on my neighborhood, that's 4 sure. Though I dunno if it'd be balanced if I went 15 blox from here to borough park.

www.nytimes.com

March 31, 2002

THE REACTION

In New York, Arabs and Jews Share Many Concerns

By SUSAN SAULNY

For as long as he can remember, Cole Hays, a 22-year-old television producer who attends services at Temple Emanu-El on New York's Upper East Side, has kept abreast of news from the Middle East with much attention and concern. But now, he says, he has decided to tune out the daily developments because he is sickened and fatigued by the constant replay of suicide bombings and machine-gun fire, peace plans born and broken.

"I've gotten to be numb to it because it never ends," he said.

But if Mr. Hays's feelings have been deadened, the violence, failing truce hopes and the storming of Yasir Arafat's compound on Friday has left many others interviewed around New York — Arabs and Jews alike — incensed. Some expressed helplessness or a lack of hope. Some were angry with the United States government, while others said they perceived the country more than ever as a worthy exemplar of religious and ethnic tolerance. But almost all agreed that the prospects for peace were grim, even as almost all said they desperately wanted it.

"Sometimes I wish everybody could be neutral, you see, the way everybody gets along here in the city," said Amy Botello, 24, as she was leaving evening services Friday at Temple Emanu-El. "It hurts so much to read about what's going on in the Middle East, it's frustrating. People are blowing things up, and they have got to stop doing that."

As the conflict intensified, it cast a pall on Passover and made prayers for peace seem all the more urgent.

In Brooklyn, where Arabs and Jews live side by side, residents expressed a common frustration about American foreign policy. Arabs and Jews said the United States was not doing enough to stop the violence.

"In the aftermath of the attack on the towers, the United States acted decisively to stop aggression abroad," said Juha Salman, a Palestinian vendor whose family fled Ramallah, in the West Bank, when he was an infant 30 years ago. "Why in this case don't they act? Why don't they come in, slap them in the face, and make them sit down?"

Mr. Salman also said he thought Congress was beholden to the "powerful Israeli lobby," a complaint that was voiced again and again by Arab-Americans, and that the United States government was content to maintain the status quo.

"There's only one power in the world that can create peace," Mr. Salman said. "It's America. If they wanted to stop the violence, they could stop it tomorrow."

Some Jews expressed similar views about American determination to end the violence. They said the United States was hypocritical in moving to wipe out terrorism when it hit home but calling for restraint when it happened in Israel.

"Can you imagine what would happen if a bomber walked into a school in New York and blew himself up, killing the teacher and kids?" asked Farhad Yeroshalmi, 28, an Iranian Jew who lives in Crown Heights. "It would be condemned and military action would be taken immediately."

Henoch Junik, a 16-year-old member of the Lubavitch community in Crown Heights, said: "Bush needs to look at his own words. He's asking Israel to sit down for peace. And at the same time, he's asking everyone to join the fight against terrorism."

When asked what he thought about the Arab states' recent peace proposal, Mr. Yeroshalmi responded with a story. When he was a child during Iran's war with Iraq, he said, he had a neighbor who was ostracized by the community because her son returned from the battlefront three times.

"The mother told her son: `You are embarrassing us. You are bringing us shame because you are not dead. I want you to be a martyr.' These are the kind of people we are dealing with," he said. "I don't think peace is possible."

Abdul Bargouth, a 43-year-old Palestinian, said he came to the United States from his home just outside Ramallah in the West Bank in 1991 to seek better opportunities for his family. He said he was sick of the death of children, both Israeli and Palestinian. Mr. Bargouth, like Mr. Salman, is a member of The Dialogue Project, a group of Jews and Arabs who meet in Bayridge and Park Slope, Brooklyn, to discuss political and religious differences.

Both men said they were frustrated that the headway the two groups achieved in their neighborhoods here seemed out of reach back home.

Some of the Palestinians interviewed in Brooklyn on Friday and Saturday blamed poverty for the violence in the Middle East.

Mohmed Shareef, 40, an immigrant from Yemen, said, "When you're poor, you don't care about tomorrow."

Mr. Bargouth said that what was happening in his homeland might now as well be old news repeated every day. "Tomorrow will be the same thing," he said. "Tomorrow will always be worse than today."

[malone]

THE ARAB/ MUSLIM NAZI CONNECTION

Arab leaders and media outlets have long been addicted to comparing Israel to the Nazi regime, while at the same time demeaning the extent of the Holocaust. This obsession with defaming and antagonizing the Jewish people and state was on full display in recent months and reached a crescendo – or rather nadir – the day before Pope John Paul II visited the Temple Mount during his Holy Land pilgrimage. The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Sheikh Ekrima Sabri, just hours before hosting the Pope, gave a series of press interviews, first telling the AP: "The figure of 6 million Jews killed during the Holocaust is exaggerated and is used by the Israelis to gain international support… It's not my problem. Muslims didn't do anything on this issue. It's the doing of Hitler who hated the Jews," asserted the acid-tongued Mufti – a figure appointed by Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. "Six million? It was a lot less," Sabri repeated for an Italian newspaper. "It's not my fault if Hitler hated the Jews. Anyway, they hate them just about everywhere." The Mufti finished the day with Reuters, charging, "We denounce all massacres, but I don't see why a certain massacre should be used for political gain and blackmail." However, as a matter of record, there was a well-documented, thriving relationship between the Arab/Muslim world and Nazi Germany, with perhaps the most significant figure linking Hitler to the Middle East being none other Sabri's very own predecessor, Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Haj Amin el-Husseini. Here is a brief review of that dark, overlooked chapter in history.

The Führer's Mufti: After World War I, the Great Powers of Europe jockeyed for influence in the Middle East's oil fields and trade routes, with France and Britain holding mandates throughout most of the region. In the 1930s, the fascist regimes that arose in Italy and Germany sought greater stakes in the area, and began courting Arab leaders to revolt against their British and French custodians. Among their many willing accomplices was Jerusalem Mufti Haj Amin el-Husseini, who fled Palestine after agitating against the British during the Arab Revolt of 1936-39. He found refuge in Iraq – another of Her Majesty's mandates – where he again topped the British most wanted list after helping pull the strings behind the Iraqi coup of 1941. The revolt in Baghdad was orchestrated by Hitler as part of a strategy to squeeze the region between the pincers of Rommel's troops in North Africa, German forces in the Caucuses and pro-Nazi forces in Iraq. However, in June 1941 British troops put down the rebellion and the Mufti escaped via Tehran to Italy and eventually to Berlin.

Once in Berlin, the Mufti received an enthusiastic reception by the "Islamische Zentralinstitut" and the whole Islamic community of Germany, which welcomed him as the "Führer of the Arabic world." In an introductory speech, he called the Jews the "most fierce enemies of the Muslims" and an "ever corruptive element" in the world. Husseini soon became an honored guest of the Nazi leadership and met on several occasions with Hitler. He personally lobbied the Führer against the plan to let Jews leave Hungary, fearing they would immigrate to Palestine. He also strongly intervened when Adolf Eichman tried to cut a deal with the British government to exchange German POWs for 5000 Jewish children who also could have fled to Palestine. The Mufti's protests with the SS were successful, as the children were sent to death camps in Poland instead. One German officer noted in his journals that the Mufti would liked to have seen the Jews "preferably all killed." On a visit to Auschwitz, he reportedly admonished the guards running the gas chambers to work more diligently. Throughout the war, he appeared regularly on German radio broadcasts to the Middle East, preaching his pro-Nazi, anti-Semitic message to the Arab masses back home.

To show gratitude towards his hosts, in 1943 the Mufti travelled several times to Bosnia, where on orders of the SS he recruited the notorious "Hanjar troopers," a special Bosnian Waffen SS company which slaugh-tered 90% of Bosnia's Jews and burned countless Serbian churches and villages. These Bosnian Muslim recruits rapidly found favor with SS chief Heinrich Himmler, who established a special Mullah Military school in Dresden.

The only condition the Mufti set for his help was that after Hitler won the war, the entire Jewish population in Palestine should be liquidated. After the war, Husseini fled to Switzerland and from there escaped via France to Cairo, were he was warmly received. The Mufti used funds received earlier from the Hilter regime to finance the Nazi-inspired Arab Liberation Army that terrorized Jews in Palestine.

The Arab Embrace of Nazism: Husseini represents the prevalent pro-Nazi posture among the Arab/Muslim world before, during and even after the Holocaust. The Nazi-Arab connection existed even when Adolf Hitler first seized power in Germany in 1933. News of the Nazi takeover was welcomed by the Arab masses with great enthusiasm, as the first congratulatory telegrams Hitler received upon being appointed Chancellor came from the German Consul in Jerusalem, followed by those from several Arab capitals. Soon afterwards, parties that imitated the National Socialists were founded in many Arab lands, like the "Hisb-el-qaumi-el-suri" (PPS) or Social Nationalist Party in Syria. Its leader, Anton Sa'ada, styled himself the Führer of the Syrian nation, and Hitler became known as "Abu Ali" (In Egypt his name was "Muhammed Haidar"). The banner of the PPS displayed the swastika on a black-white background. Later, a Lebanese branch of the PPS – which still receives its orders from Damascus – was involved in the assassination of Lebanese President Pierre Gemayel.

The most influential party that emulated the Nazis was "Young Egypt," which was founded in October 1933. They had storm troopers, torch processions, and literal translations of Nazi slogans – like "One folk, One party, One leader." Nazi anti-Semitism was replicated, with calls to boycott Jewish businesses and physical attacks on Jews. Britain had a bitter experience with this pro-German mood in Egypt, when the official Egyptian government failed to declare war on the Wehrmacht as German troops were about to conquer Alexandria.

After the war, a member of Young Egypt named Gamal Abdul Nasser was among the officers who led the July 1952 revolution in Egypt. Their first act – following in Hitler's footsteps – was to outlaw all other parties. Nasser's Egypt became a safe haven for Nazi war criminals, among them the SS General in charge of the murder of Ukrainian Jewry; he became Nasser's bodyguard and close comrade. Alois Brunner, another senior Nazi war criminal, found shelter in Damascus, where he served for many years as senior adviser to the Syrian general staff and still resides today.

Sami al-Joundi, one of the founders of the ruling Syrian Ba'ath Party, recalls: "We were racists. We admired the Nazis. We were immersed in reading Nazi literature and books... We were the first who thought of a translation of Mein Kampf. Anyone who lived in Damascus at that time was witness to the Arab inclination toward Nazism."

These leanings never completely ceased. Hitler's Mein Kampf currently ranks sixth on the best-seller list among Palestinian Arabs. Luis Al-Haj, translator of the Arabic edition, writes glowingly in the preface about how Hitler's "ideology" and his "theories of nationalism, dictatorship and race… are advancing especially within our Arabic States." When Palestinian police first greeted Arafat in the self-rule areas, they offered the infamous Nazi salute - the right arm raised straight and upward.

The PLO and notably Arafat himself do not make a secret of their source of inspiration. The Grand Mufti el-Husseini is venerated as a hero by the PLO. It should be noted, that the PLO's top figure in east Jerusalem today, Faisal Husseini, is the grandson to the Führer's Mufti. Arafat also considers the Grand Mufti a respected educator and leader, and in 1985 declared it an honor to follow in his footsteps. Little wonder. In 1951, a close relative of the Mufti named Rahman Abdul Rauf el-Qudwa el-Husseini matriculated to the University of Cairo. The student decided to conceal his true identity and enlisted as "Yasser Arafat."

[breaksny]

The only one acting like hitler right now is sitting in the israeli pm's office right now. Beating and arresting the head of the palestinian red crescent is acceptable practice? His organization is calling this the worst conditions they're seen in 30 years. Israel is acting barbarically. This isn't the action of a democracy...it's the action of an apartheidistic ethnic state. Not only do they not give a damn for international law, they don't understand the concept of human decency. Obviously the UN needs to send in a peacemaking force, peacekeeping won't get the job done!

[somuchmass]

I thought the isralies were angels but now after watching the news it looks like they are brutal criminalsm, that president sharon looks like the hunchback of notredam and needs to be shot, hes def a war criminal, the jewish people are gonna cause another world war, i dont y they cause all this shit, and getting the US into this,,,, fucking idiots

[johnnyrevs]

i'm not taking sides....neither side is innocent :rolleyes:

[tribal]

somuch mass, you are a fucking anti semite, so shut your trap. the issue here is both sides are aggravating the problem. to call sharon a criminal and arafat an innocent is plain incorrect, arafat has a proven connection to know terror groups, the very same ones that blew up kids at Pacha, pizzerias, restaruants and all the rest. what has to be done is for sharon and arafat to be replaced as Solana has suggested. they have a bitter feud going back to the lebanon war. once again, i propose my ganja solution.

[nycmuzik]

Sharon's not nice

Arafat's not too nice either

We need some happy people to take over their positions and things might get alittle better....

Thats about as much as I could muster regarding current world events. I'm starting to give up with these political debates because they turn into name calling very quickly......

[sonicinfusion]

what if that region goes into WAR !!!

oops

that will be baddd!

[nycmuzik]

Originally posted by sonicinfusion

what if that region goes into WAR !!!

oops

that will be baddd!

Yeah I have this crazy idea there might be trouble.....And its gonna be on CNN alot....

[malone]

The only one acting like hitler right now is sitting in the israeli pm's office right now. Beating and arresting the head of the palestinian red crescent is acceptable practice? His organization is calling this the worst conditions they're seen in 30 years. Israel is acting barbarically. This isn't the action of a democracy...it's the action of an apartheidistic ethnic state. Not only do they not give a damn for international law, they don't understand the concept of human decency. Obviously the UN needs to send in a peacemaking force, peacekeeping won't get the job done

Well as usual you've sought to air-brush the Palestinian violence completely out of the picture. I have not seen one post yet, not one, where you did not say that the problem was the result of Israeli action, or more specifically, the fault of Sharon. You'd think the Palestinians were still hurling stones here. I realize that it is quite difficult to convince civilized people that WILLFULLY killing as many Jewish civilians as possible is part of some great cause. You, therefore, have managed to completely ignore the nasty matter, and proceed to pretend that the Israeli's are back in the "West Bank" simply out of badness. But this self- delusion only serves to expose your perfideous agenda. Either that or you are completely vacuous. And don't talk nonsense about International law. Must every law go unenforced except the ones that apply to Israel?? Who in the "international" community has had to endure wave after wave of suicide attacks on their civilian population?? France?? I don't think so. But when France had a problem in Algeria, or more accurately when the Algerians had a problem with France, the French were less than concerned with the niceties of International law. And the same can be said of the British and all the rest. So we can take it all with a grain of salt. It's all very fine playing by the book when both sides have the same rule book. It's a little different when a Passover sedar is considered a "legitimate target." If Israeli forces are acting barbarically, as you say, then are we entitled to conclude that you don't feel the actions of the Palestinians are also barbaric?? When Israeli civilians are deliberately targeted for suicide bombings, as the Palestinians have undeniably done, and someone discussing this situation cannot even bring himself to condemn these deeds, nay, even mention them, I don't feel too compelled to treat that person as a someone other than a completely biased individual, with absolutely no insight beyond that mandated by his rigorous ideological bent. Your convoluted reference to an "apartheidistic ethnic state" was to Jordan or Iraq?? Or was that Saudi Arabia or Syria or Iran or Egypt or kuwait?? You have to be a little more clear with your derogations when there are just so many States in the region to choose from. A democracy, on the other hand, you know, where the people have an opportunity to decide whom they wish to represent them, has but one flag bearer in the entire region. And even you breaksny, ought to know who that is. And this democracy, surrounded as it is on all sides by countries who never wanted, or accepted its presence, is now in a fight for its very existence. The US government supports that existence which no doubt bothers some people, but nobody whom we should care too much for. And when the US itself was threatened it responded much more harshly than Israel currently is responding to a similar threat. It went to Afganistan and dropped bombs by the plane load and removed the despicable Taliban from that country. No doubt the success of the US in this matter bothered you and others, but given your barely-concealed contempt for this country, that's hardly surprising or indeed relevant. Nor is your contempt for Israel's right to defend itself. Your concern is for those who would, given the chance, destroy Israel. And indeed, for that matter, those who would destroy this country. If memory serves me correctly, several weeks ago you were harping on about what you perceived as injustice against the prisoners in cuba. No, not the ones held by Castro, mind you, as they're housed in five star accomodation, and don't merit any concern, but the ones under the care of the savage Americans. Sometimes you've just gotta pity the left. How mightily they have fallen. Now they've been reduced to pleading the cause of a bunch of suicidal fanatics, tyrants and rogue operators, where once they ran entire Continents.