Another way of looking at it...
Look at the nations which have reasons recent and long past for hating America and Americans; that would have to include China, Japan, Mexico, Cuba, Germany, Serbia, and a few others at least.
Why aren't people from any of those places conducting suicide bombings, flying airplanes into buildings, blowing up buses, or concocting elaborate plans for blowing up large numbers of commercial aircraft?
Stumped you say? I'll tell you the reason and it isn't complicated. Nobody does things like that for any sort of a cause. People do that sort of thing because they're f***ed-up people.
Yes, and what has me stumped, is why not be happy and do something productive? What is this, telling your kids to strap a bomb on and go blow yourself up. Weird to whacko to bazaar to evil, plain and simple. One screwed up culture thats for sure.
French foreign minister calls for Israel to end military blockade of Lebanon
By The Associated Press
BEIRUT, Lebanon - The French foreign minister on Wednesday called for Israel to lift is air, naval and land blockade of Lebanon, saying it was unnecessary with the UN cease-fire plan holding.
"The blockade imposed on the airport and Lebanese ports should be lifted. We ask Israeli authorities to lift the land and sea siege on Lebanon. And we ask the Lebanese government to strengthen monitoring" of points of entry to insure Hezbollah weapons are banned, said Philippe Douste-Blazy.
"There is no longer a reason for Israel to continue the blockade," he said.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/751323.html
"They" have every right to be as screwed up as they wish so long as they are screwed up in their own miserable angry little world. But when they start trying to screw everybody else up too, and most especially when they hurt their own kids as well as doing everything they can to intentionally scare, maim, or kill other people's kids, then enough is enough. And anybody who doesn't think that is hateful, irrational, unjustifiable, unconscionable, and intolerable I think is just as screwed up as they are.
But who gets the most criticism on this thread? None other than Israel who was doing their damndest to stop them from scaring, maiming, and/or killing innocent people that are hurting nobody and just want to be left in peace to live their lives. And also the USA who backs Israel. Sure there's room to criticize Israel and the USA, but you don't see 1/10th the anger, criticism, or condemnation heaped on the terrorists as you see heaped on Israel and the USA.
Puts 'screwed up' in a whole new light doesn't it?
Foxfyre, Bushie and Olmert and Blair, a real axis of evil if ever there was one, have bombed 3 nations to bits. Nations with no air force or navy. 3 cowardly campaigns to say the least. And yet you want to call the victims terrorists. One thing we have learned is these nations could not prevent the blitkreig but the mad bombers could win the submission they sought. Such arrogance to say those you bombed would shower your soldiers with rose petals.
Foxfyre, Okie and Gungasnake. I respectfully ask you to research the ideas behind the Twelfth Imam and his possible "reoccurance"
Briefly--The Twelfth Imam will re-appear after some kind of Apocalypse( nuclear?) and then the world will be united under Islam!!
The radical fringe of Islam--the murderous fanatics--do believe that Allah commands them to destroy unbelievers to restore the Caliphate. If they do this, even by turning themselves into human bombs, they will go to paradise.
There is little that can be done about fanatics like this. They have the same mindset that the Japanese Kamakazi had in World War II.
Solution---Encourage the new generations in Iran, Iraq, etc. which may be more moderate and kill as many of the others- the fanatic bastards-- as we and our allies possibly can!
I look for an Israeli raid on Iran before they acquire a Nuclear Device. Israel cannot allow Iran, which is pledged to its destruction to obtain a nuclear device.
The Iranian Political/Religious system in power now would, I am sure not shrink from murdering thousands of Arabs who live and work in Israel along with Israelis. They are fanatical!!!
blueflame1 wrote:Foxfyre, Bushie and Olmert and Blair, a real axis of evil if ever there was one, have bombed 3 nations to bits. Nations with no air force or navy. 3 cowardly campaigns to say the least. And yet you want to call the victims terrorists. One thing we have learned is these nations could not prevent the blitkreig but the mad bombers could win the submission they sought. Such arrogance to say those you bombed would shower your soldiers with rose petals.
Then Blueflame1, it is reasonably safe to assume you are 100% behind Hezbollah and their Syrian and Iranian benefactors and sponsors, and have little or no problem with their behavior, tactics, motives,or methods?
BernardR, paranoia is a normal sensation for those who bomb nations that were no threat to them. Pre-emptive war is the Bushie Doctrine. With all the threats about bombing Iran even with nukes there may come a time when Iran starts believing they should take pre-emptive action. Iran's nuclear program is legal under international law. Yet Bushie has bullied the Security Council into threatening sanctions despite that legality. If the UN is irrelevent as Bushie says it aint because they're scared to stand up to Iran but because they're powerless against the world's only Superpower and her Madman in Chief.
Most of the people who were killed in Lebanon were not terrorists.
Few people, indeed, are.
But the operation in Lebanon surely added to their number.
The President of Iran has his own website, spotlighted in yesterday's Guardian
www.ahmadinejad.ir
The server seems to be too busy at the moment to reveal any details.
McTag wrote:Most of the people who were killed in Lebanon were not terrorists.
Few people, indeed, are.
But the operation in Lebanon surely added to their number.
As Blueflame1 does not appear willing to answer a direct question, I'll ask it of you McTag. Do you support and/or justify Hezbollah and/or Syria and Iran in their motives, methods, tactics?
Foxfyre wrote:McTag wrote:Most of the people who were killed in Lebanon were not terrorists.
Few people, indeed, are.
But the operation in Lebanon surely added to their number.
As Blueflame1 does not appear willing to answer a direct question, I'll ask it of you McTag. Do you support and/or justify Hezbollah and/or Syria and Iran in their motives, methods, tactics?
No.
But I'm fed up with the Israel=victim line you guys are constantly peddling.
Quote:An initial spirit of unity among the Israeli public evaporated in the last days of the war as hawkish generals, including the former defence minister Shaul Mofaz, castigated the government for not launching a more aggressive invasion sooner.
source
Other than just sending a nuke to Lebanon, I don't see how they could have gotten more aggressive; at least towards Lebanese civilians and infrastructure. I would hate to see how it all would have ended up if they were really got aggressive.
Quote:At least 1,110 Lebanese have been killed in the war, the majority of them civilians. The conflict has killed 157 Israelis, 40 of them civilians.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,,1851501,00.html
Quote:Israel's army has killed hundreds of people, mostly Lebanese civilians; damaged infrastructure across Lebanon, displaced more than a million Lebanese, and disrupted normal life across all of Lebanon.
http://www.answers.com/topic/2006-israel-lebanon-crisis
McTag wrote:Foxfyre wrote:McTag wrote:Most of the people who were killed in Lebanon were not terrorists.
Few people, indeed, are.
But the operation in Lebanon surely added to their number.
As Blueflame1 does not appear willing to answer a direct question, I'll ask it of you McTag. Do you support and/or justify Hezbollah and/or Syria and Iran in their motives, methods, tactics?
No.
But I'm fed up with the Israel=victim line you guys are constantly peddling.
So okay. How should Israel respond when its citizens and soldiers are kidnapped or killed? Should it just take Iranian/Syrian furnished rockets fired into its countryside and cities and not retaliate?
Seriously, I'm not trying to be argumentative here. What should Israel do? If it is not a victim, what is it? I can't come up with a better word except maybe target. So what would you recommend to your government if its your town being shelled? How do they deal with that?
McTag wrote:Foxfyre wrote:McTag wrote:Most of the people who were killed in Lebanon were not terrorists.
Few people, indeed, are.
But the operation in Lebanon surely added to their number.
As Blueflame1 does not appear willing to answer a direct question, I'll ask it of you McTag. Do you support and/or justify Hezbollah and/or Syria and Iran in their motives, methods, tactics?
No.
But I'm fed up with the Israel=victim line you guys are constantly peddling.
Then you see no victims at all in the ME? Just a bunch of non-victims?
Foxfyre, hahaha. I guess it makes you feel like a tough guy if you pretend anyone would be scared to answer your question. To me Hezbollah is resistence born out of the Israeli occupation of the 80s. They are nothing more than a bunch of Lebanese defending their homeland and their homes. That is their right according to international law. I suspect that the coming days and weeks most likely will bring about a prisoner exchange and the handing over by Israel of a map showing the locations of landmines they planted and a settlement of the Sheba Farms issue. So what did Israel gain but death and the destruction of Lebanon's infrastructure? They lost a great deal and Olmert should be brought up on charges of crimes against humanity.
If you read about what Israel has actually been doing to and with its neighbours for the last 30 years or so, and you probably won't find this published in the USA, you may conclude that the palestinians have got a teensy-weensie but legitimate grievance.
Sharon was on the track of a solution when he decided to give back the West Bank and Golan Heights as bargaining counters, but now Olmert's limited success/failure has made that plan probably impossible to sell, and so we are back to a viscious, uneasy, unstable stalemate.
The answer to your question? Israel should bargain with land, ideally from a position of strength of course, and stop treating the Palestinians as untermenschen. Then, backed by the US it has a chance of turning public opinion in Syria and Iran.
blueflame1 wrote:Foxfyre, hahaha. I guess it makes you feel like a tough guy if you pretend anyone would be scared to answer your question. To me Hezbollah is resistence born out of the Israeli occupation of the 80s. They are nothing more than a bunch of Lebanese defending their homeland and their homes. That is their right according to international law. I suspect that the coming days and weeks most likely will bring about a prisoner exchange and the handing over by Israel of a map showing the locations of landmines they planted and a settlement of the Sheba Farms issue. So what did Israel gain but death and the destruction of Lebanon's infrastructure? They lost a great deal and Olmert should be brought up on charges of crimes against humanity.
That wasn't the question. Want to take a stab at answering the question? (I will accept that you are 100% behind the Hezbollah as 'just Lebanese defending their homeland'. That was an answer of sorts.) But I would appreciate your answering the rest too.
In 1598 Gov. Juan de Oñate and 70 of his men retaliated for the killing of 13 Spanish soldiers by the Acomas when they tried to take grain from the pueblo storehouses in 1598. That is to say the Acoma Pueblo people defended their storage of food stuffs from the Spanish Army and in doing so killed 13 of the govenors' men. The govenor had been insisting that the Acoma people submit to slavery has had been done by the other surrounding pueblo peoples. the Acoma peoples rejected the idea and resisted enslavement. The govenor sent his army to subdue the Acoma pueblo and after 3 days of fighting managed to militarily defeat the Acoma. to teach the Acoma a leason in power politics he had every male of the pueble have one hand and one foot cut off and all the women sent to mexico city to become slaves of the Spanish Colonialists. by 1680 the various pueblos of new mexico had enough of encomienda, which resembled slavery, Popé a medicine man from the pueblo of San Juan south of Taos pueblo, they assaulted several Spanish settlements in August 1680 and achieved overwhelming success thanks to superior numbers - more than 8,000 warriors against fewer than 200 armed settlers. Despite different dialects, they coordinated their attack to occur everywhere at once. They killed 21 Franciscan friars and more than 400 Spaniards. One thousand survivors fled to the governor's palace in Sante Fe, where the Indians laid siege. Deprived of water for several days, the Spaniards managed to escape to El Paso del Norte (now El Paso, Texas). Popé became the ruler of New Mexico.
The dynamic leader had engineered the most successful Indian uprising in the history of the West. The Pueblo Indians remained independent for a dozen years and during that time, Popé ordered the eradication of almost every vestige of the Roman Catholic Church. He also penalized Spanish language use and discouraged surnames - and even preached against using the plow, a Spanish tool.
Less than a year after Popé's death in 1692, soldiers under Diego de Vargas easily reconquered New Mexico for Spain. But the Spanish had learned a lesson, when they treated the native americans as slaves without humanity sooner or later those slaves without humanity will return the favor and not all that kindly.
