ISRAEL - IRAN - SYRIA - HAMAS - HEZBOLLAH - WWWIII?

Would you feel better if those missiles were just as effective?
Should we give the Pals the missiles that would be more effective, just to make it fair?

mysteryman wrote:

Would you feel better if those missiles were just as effective?
Should we give the Pals the missiles that would be more effective, just to make it fair?

That might be a good start. We have been providing substantial military aid to the Israelis for decades.

US Aid: The Facts

- Israel and the US have a long-established special relationship. The US was the first country to recognise the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948.
- Israel is considered America’s closest non-NATO ally in the Middle East, a region that is geopolitically crucial to the US.
- The close relationship between the two states is reflected in the volume of aid Israel receives from the US. Since World War II Israel has been the largest overall recipient of US aid: from 1949-2006 Israel received more than $156 billion of direct US aid.
- Until 2003, Israel received approximately one-third of the annual US foreign aid budget. In 2005, the US gave Israel more than $2.6 billion in aid, a budget exceeded only by US aid to Iraq. By comparison, Jordan received $683.6 million, Rwanda received $77 million, and the Occupied Palestinian Territories received $348.2 million.
- In the past, a majority of the direct US aid to Israel was via US Economic Support Funds (ESF). The US publicly states that ESF are given in order to support stability in areas strategic to the US. However, the recipient government completely controls how it spends these funds.
- The US also lends money to Israel, but these loans are frequently waived before any repayments are made. The Washington Report on Middle East Affairs has estimated that from 1974-2003 Israel benefited from more than $45 billion in waived loans from the US.
- Direct US aid to Israel has significantly diminished since 1996 in order to reduce Israeli financial dependence on the US. Speaking to the US Congress in July 1996, Former Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu declared, “We will begin the long-term process of gradually reducing the level of your generous economic assistance to Israel.”

US aid to Israel violates US laws

- US aid to Israel, and the way in which this aid is used, frequently violates US law, policy and interests.
- Under US policy, financial aid to Israel should not be spent by Israel in the Occupied Territories. But Israel spends US aid with impunity.
- The US has a number of laws regulating foreign military aid and weapons’ exports. The 1961 Foreign Assistance Act (FAA) states that “No assistance [ought to be given] to countries that violate human rights”. But Israel systematically violates human rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.
- The 1976 US Arms Export Control Act (AECA) states that “Weapons purchased from the US should only be used for legitimate self-defense”. But since September 2000 the Israeli military has killed more than 3,354 Palestinian civilians (as of 8 August 2007).

Questioning History

A Hamas spiritual leader says teaching Palestinian children about the Holocaust amounts to a war crime.

Cleric Younis al-Astal rejects a reported U.N. proposal to include in Gaza's school curriculum information about the Nazi killing of 6 million Jews during World War II: "I do not exaggerate when I say this issue is a war crime," adding that the Holocaust teaching would be "marketing a lie and spreading it."

A senior Israeli official says such statements should make the West think twice about ending its boycott of Hamas.

-- foxnews.com

Anybody with any understanding of logic knows that trying to refute the holocaust only comes from the extremists. Seems Advocate loves to peddle extremist's views.

The problem is not "Holocaust Denial," in my opinion, but "Holocaust Trivialization," meaning the Holocaust was such a long time ago, in the opinion of some pro-Palestinean folk, that Jews do not need a homeland.

The problem is not "Holocaust Denial," in my opinion, but "Holocaust Trivialization," meaning the Holocaust was such a long time ago, in the opinion of some pro-Palestinean folk, that Jews do not need a homeland.

they had the ability to seize and defend their lands.

Peace, U.S. Military Aid and Israel
Why we urge the U.S. government to suspend military aid to Israel until it ends its 37-year occupation of the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, and East Jerusalem.

U.S. military aid to Israel has a dramatic effect on Israel's policies towards the Palestinians. It has increasingly been used not to pay for defense but to finance the Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands. It keeps Israel from facing the difficult but necessary challenges of building a more democratic society, and encourages solving deep-rooted problems by military rather than peaceful and more effective means.

The U.S. funding that pays for the guns and ammunition, F-16 bombers, and Apache helicopters that are used to carry out Israel's occupation of Palestinian land and people serves neither Israelis, Palestinians, nor Americans.

In short, Israel cannot build a society based on the principles of democracy, human rights, and compliance with international law while brutally occupying another people and their land. The United States is currently paying for that occupation with its annual aid. That's why Jewish Voice for Peace urges the U.S. government to suspend military aid to Israel until Israel ends its 37-year occupation of the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, and East Jerusalem.

Top Five Things You Should Know About U.S. Military Aid to Israel

1. Harm to Palestinian civilians
A large part of U.S. military aid to Israel goes to purchase tanks, helicopter gunships, machine guns, and bullets that are used against Palestinian civilians. Our tax dollars have been used to destroy homes; uproot trees and crops; seize land from its lawful owners; close all access to food, medicine, and the outside world for small towns in the West Bank and Gaza; staff checkpoints that cut off ambulances and other civilian traffic; and carry out assassinations that kill children in addition to summarily executing political leaders. When Palestinian doctors remove bullets from the bodies of Palestinian children, the bullets are typically stamped ?Made in the U.S.A.?

Israel has used its U.S.-financed arsenal against unarmed Palestinian civilians, including children. Amnesty International reports that in 2002 alone, ?At least 1,000 Palestinians were killed by the Israeli army, most of them unlawfully. They included some 150 children and at least 35 individuals killed in targeted assassinations.

http://www.jewishvoiceforpeace.org/publish/article_17.shtml