Steissd, occupation is expensive. If money were the only factor Isreal would stop spening money trying to expand their territory. Protecting settlements on someone else's land costs money as well.
By "flexibility" I derise the recent Israeli targeting that does not deal with those who are involved in terror.
Israelis are often of the opinion that most Palestinians are terrorists. Whether that is true or not I will not even bother to tackle, what I will say is that Isreal can't assasinate them all.
And with that in mind, I think assasinations should only be used to neutralize a security threat. Myself and the US administration, which you call the most favorable toward Isreal in recent memory, are both of the opinion that Isreal's recent assasinations do not improve their security.
I am of the opinion that they are insipid and largely wrought of a desire to reciprocate, even if justified targets are not available.
And it is this kind of assasination that gives Ireal it's bad opinion (which of couse you just call "Anti-Semetism").
Assasination is a poor policy, when the targets are not always justified then it is a mockery of civility.
Again, Isreal's assasination policy is daft as it is without expanding their targeting to persons not involved in terror.
Yes, not involved. Killing a symbolic figure is no security. It is just an escalation, especially when you consider that the assasination attempt is almost certain to kill more innocent civilians.
That is what I meant by increasing flexibility.
Bush and the US government are proisralie. Everyone on the face of the planet knows this. The only way there will ever be peace in the middle east is if a colitation of various countries that arnt for either the palistinians or the Isralies puts a large enough force in there to enforce a cease fire. The best thing Bush could do is to but out and look to the US problems.
CdK, who of the assassinated Palestinians was not involved in terror? I do not mean collateral damage now, I mean people that were the target. Abed el-Aziz Rantissi that was close to death, is one of the most prominent Hamas leaders. I hope, you do not have doubts that Hamas is a terroristic organization. U.S. criticism, IMO, referred to bad timing, and I agree with this. Rantissi should be killed in the middle of the terror war, in 2002, and not in process of negotiations.
Not just bad timing. Hamas is not just a terroist organization. They complicate the matter by providing hospitals, schools etc.
I personaly think it's one of the factors that makes Hamas so dangerous.
The symbolic leaders rarely have direct involvement in terror logistics. They support terror of course and are part of a terrorist organization but let me clarify it this way:
If a plane is on it's way to deliver a kamikaze attack you shoot it down. If people are planning to hijack a plane you arrest them.
Isreal justifies its assasinations by saying that they are protecting their security and killing "ticking time bombs". This is often untrue. They often assasinate people who are symbolic and not directly involved in the logistics of terror.
I am not in any way defending these men, they are usually despicable. But what I am saying is that a policy of assasination is already a policy that should be on shaky ground. I have illustrated many times that Isreal often assasinates people that could have been arrested (for example the assasinations that show that the target has been followed ON FOOT for weeks). Isreal compounds this by using methods that they know will kill civilians (the disconnect of logic is sometimes so blatant that I think some people actually want the collateral damage). This is further exacerbated by Isreal's willingness to save a few guys for retaliatory assasinations. Also added to this insane policy is bad timing.
My biggest complaint: use of assasination as a policy. Assasination should be reserved for cases in which arrest is impossible and assasination needed to DIRECTLY protect life.
My secondary compalint: BAD timing. Sometimes it seems intentional, in order to break pressure on them to make peace.
Furthermore:
A) choice of targets. Most of the time the people are safe enough to track and keep alive and then Isreal uses them to make a point in a retaliatory strike.
B) choice of methods. Firing rockets into a crowded market is obsenely daft. No country on Earth would like their citizenry to live with that and I posit that any nation would produce terrrorists under those conditions. This does not in any way mean I blame terrorism on Isreali missteps but it does mean I find Isreal's methods either stupid beyond belief or intentionally overhanded.
But to answer your question my qualm is about Isreal's policy of assasinations and what that does to Isreal's moral high ground. The lesser the standards Isreal uses in determining targets the less I am able to comprehend the necessity for such a policy. I support many Israeli initiatives taht are illegal in the US. I applaud their use of racial profiling because it is simply stupid for them not to do so under these circumstances.
I disagree with most of the assasinations as I feel they cede moreal high ground. Isreal assasinates at will with no respect for the surrounding civilians and no respect for due process. That's bad enough but when the logic is flawed (i.e. the assasination does nothing to help security and only incites) and the timing horrid I am angered.
If Isreal did not use these methods criticism of Isreal would be greatly lessened.
My major qualms with Isreal are few (2).
Expantionism (in the form of military conquest and settlement).
State terrorism through a policy of assasination (shooting missles into a crowd is terrorism in some circumstances, no matter how bad the bad guy was).
If you are unable to understand why I oppose the use of a policy of assasination (as opposed to sporadic assasinations meant to stop looming attack) think of it this way:
If the Palestinians only targeted people who they claim were plotting to kill Palestinians (like IDF) and apologized about any "collateral damage" after murdering innocents in a pizza parlour would you accept it? If Palestinain attacks only came in retaliation for Israeli killings and only targeted IDF (while killing innocent civilians) would you accept it? Not even if they really looked sincere and said that the people they targeted were "plotting" to attack Palestinians?
It's hard to make a comparison because in so many areas Isreal does indeed stand on moral highground.
I bemoan when they step down and use tactics that show as little respect for life and peace in the mideast as the terrorists.
The Palestinains have terrorists. Isreal has a government willing to kill more Palestinians through a policy of assasination.
I want to see the end of incitement. On both sides. Many Israeli attacks are meant to be a retalatory show of force. And most of the time they serve only to incite hatred while failing to add to Israeli security.
I agree with Craven; the trick in having a military advantage is not using it. It's not only that Israel has the military power, but they must stop developing new settlements. Otherwise, there will never be peace. c.i.
I have no problem with the military advantage. I have a problem with inordinate use of assasination and assasination with poor methods and timing.
Revenge will always result in another revenge. It never ends. c.i.
The Israeli Government has confiscated large swaths of Palestinian land in the West Bank this week - for the purpose, Palestinians allege, of building settlements - in flagrant breach of commitments under the US-led road map to peace.
On Wednesday an Israeli official and soldiers were marking out olive groves and other ground outside the villages of Beit Eksa and Beit Souriq, north of Jerusalem.
"State land. Entry prohibited," read a sign erected on village land in the name of the Civil Administration of Judea and Samaria, the Israeli body that oversees military rule in the West Bank. The Palestinians say the Israelis plan to build settlements to link two Jewish towns built on land seized from the Arab villages in the 1980s. The accusation would fit with Israeli plans for a "greater Jerusalem".
The new land seizure came on the day Israel handed back the West Bank city of Bethlehem to Palestinian police.
If the Israelis had their way Israel would stretch from Cairo to Baghdad with Arabs confined to Sudan and Yemen.
better start a new Poll: Does Israel wants peace?
How hard is it to keep to your promises. A Truce is only valid when ALL violence is halted. But on the second day of the first step to peace the IDF find it necesary to kill a local leader! And with the same bullet the scentenced some more Israeli to a certain death!
On the other side, the release of prisoners is a major step forward. But we still have to wait if those released prisoners dont get shot by the IDF in the next days or so.
