What have Palestinians done?!

[Cityboy]

I was raised Southern Baptists.. I just have to say that some of the comments here show the lack of knowledge of the "true" Southern Baptists faith.. and some are just plain offensive.

It is not lack of knowledge. It is pure disdain for anything not leftist in its philosophy. I cannot once recall any documentation where Jesus commanded his followers to kill non-believers. Many of those who make statements like that hate christians for some reason and continually take the side of the terrorists. I cannot for the life of me understand their reasoning or lack thereof. Might I suggest a one-way ticket to "Palestine"? (Which by the way does not exist) or perhaps Iran so that these terrorist apologists may live among these "peaceful" Muslim revolutionary's they so adamatly defend?

 

[Melensdad]

What option do they have but to give them the benefit of the doubt - to some extent? Should you go in and take them out before they commit any aggresion? Oh yeah, I guess you would.

Israel has a history of doing exactly this. They took out nuclear production facilities with air strikes.

 

[Dargo]

Israel has a history of doing exactly this. They took out nuclear production facilities with air strikes.

And, you know they have Iran's nuclear plants right on top front center of their radar screens. You don't think they wouldn't do the same again if they felt threatened...?

 

[Melensdad]

And, you know they have Iran's nuclear plants right on top front center of their radar screens. You don't think they wouldn't do the same again if they felt threatened...?

Actually I'm about 1/2 surprised they have not flown over and destroyed it already. However, I suspect this Iranian facility is well bunkered with much more modern bunkering technology purchased from Russia. It may actually take a tactical nuke to take it out!

 

[Snowcat Operations]

BOB you are correct! AS far as what have the Palestinians done? They are doing what they have always done. They are after all IDIOTS! We have dumped almost a BILLION dollars to help them. And this is of course is what we get in return! I say no more money. Matter of fact I demand we stop sending them money. As far as I am concerned they are a country (no matter what you say, they are a country) that is supporting and backing terrorist! Ans as Bush said if you support, back or harbor terrorist then you are a terrorist. I would cut off all diplomatic ties, funding and any support we are giving them. I would also demand an immediate payment of all loans. Then I would seize any and all assests we can! The Bastards.

 

[beds]

I lived in Kuwait for a year in 1989 surrounded by Palestinians who knew that I was Christian. I am surprisingly alive! And as you say, Palestine does not exist because it was taken from them.

Last time I checked, Saudi Arabia was more fundamentalist Muslim than Iraq. Why aren't they on the hit list? It's also far from the "democracy" of Iraq or the closest democratic Arab state - Egypt. For that matter, last time I checked the new Emir was still at the head of state in Kuwait with all of its slavery-like employment conditions where the servant-class maids are routinely sexually exploited.

 

[Dargo]

Well gee whiz, check this out http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,183010,00.html

We figured this one out a couple of days ago. The news agencies are a bit behind!

 

[kensfarm]

It is not lack of knowledge. It is pure disdain for anything not leftist in its philosophy. I cannot once recall any documentation where Jesus commanded his followers to kill non-believers. Many of those who make statements like that hate christians for some reason and continually take the side of the terrorists. I cannot for the life of me understand their reasoning or lack thereof. Might I suggest a one-way ticket to "Palestine"? (Which by the way does not exist) or perhaps Iran so that these terrorist apologists may live among these "peaceful" Muslim revolutionary's they so adamatly defend?

Cityboy.. my post was directed at the derogatory comments/comparisons made about the Southern Baptists faith.

 

[XeVfTEUtaAqJHTqq]

I lived in Kuwait for a year in 1989 surrounded by Palestinians who knew that I was Christian. I am surprisingly alive! And as you say, Palestine does not exist because it was taken from them.

Last time I checked, Saudi Arabia was more fundamentalist Muslim than Iraq. Why aren't they on the hit list? It's also far from the "democracy" of Iraq or the closest democratic Arab state - Egypt. For that matter, last time I checked the new Emir was still at the head of state in Kuwait with all of its slavery-like employment conditions where the servant-class maids are routinely sexually exploited.

Let's see:

Is Saudi Arabia a threat to the USA? It doesn't appear to be.
Is Kuwait a threat to the USA? No way.
Is Palestine a threat to the USA? No way.

However, they are all a potential threat to Israel and I support Israel in their right to pre-emptively defend themselves against any of their neighboring (neighbouring for you beds) countries.

Palestine doesn't exist because they chose to attack Israel along with a few of their neighbors and lost badly. Get it - they lost. So why should anyone who wins a defensive war have to give up anything that they won. Seems like a good lesson for anyone else in the world that is considering attacking someone else.

The only country in the middle east that is in anyway friendly to the US (or the west in general) is Israel. I think that is why we refer to it as the middle east "problem".

 

[Cityboy]

Cityboy.. my post was directed at the derogatory comments/comparisons made about the Southern Baptists faith.

I understood that, Ken. These same people that deride Southern Baptists tend to deride Christians in general and also tend to come down on the side of America's enemies, hence, my comments.

 

[Melensdad]

Palestine doesn't exist because they chose to attack Israel along with a few of their neighbors and lost badly. Get it - they lost. So why should anyone who wins a defensive war have to give up anything that they won. Seems like a good lesson for anyone else in the world that is considering attacking someone else.

PB, let me follow your logic in a more personal way. I am walking down a street and someone attacks me. They have a knife. I pull out a trusty Colt .45ACP to defend myself and demand that they disarm and give me their knife. They comply. I continue on with my life, and their knife.

They then cry to the world that I took their knife and that I was unjustified in doing so. And that I should be destroyed. They get all their thug buddies to band against me. But I have a gun and know how to use it. They have knives and they can hurt me, but I'm a pretty good shot and am not afraid to pick them off when they show up in the bushes or on my front stoop.

Does that reasonably describe the logic here? If so, then I tend to agree that they guy with the gun is the one who should have my support. No I don't necessarily harbor malice toward the guy who lost his knife, but he sure can't expect me to support his logic.

 

[XeVfTEUtaAqJHTqq]

PB, let me follow your logic in a more personal way. I am walking down a street and someone attacks me. They have a knife. I pull out a trusty Colt .45ACP to defend myself and demand that they disarm and give me their knife. They comply. I continue on with my life, and their knife.

They then cry to the world that I took their knife and that I was unjustified in doing so. And that I should be destroyed. They get all their thug buddies to band against me. But I have a gun and know how to use it. They have knives and they can hurt me, but I'm a pretty good shot and am not afraid to pick them off when they show up in the bushes or on my front stoop.

Does that reasonably describe the logic here? If so, then I tend to agree that they guy with the gun is the one who should have my support. No I don't necessarily harbor malice toward the guy who lost his knife, but he sure can't expect me to support his logic.

Yup Bob, I think you hit it right on.

Reminds me of a guy who stole a friend of mine's wallet and passport (he was british) in a bar in Vancouver, BC. He was nice enough to call and tell my friend that he could have his passport and stuff for $100. After we met up with him and he pulled a knife on me I took everything that guy had, his knife, his money, some blood - even his glasses. I think I still have his knife somewhere.

It's one of the lessons I learned in high school. If you show compassion it is more than likely to come back to haunt you. I let a guy who picked a fight with me (and lost)get off easily only to later get jumped by his four friends. Some lessons are harder to learn than others.

There's one thing that stops bullies/assh*les/terrorists and that is to give them a worse beating than they were planning on giving you.

 

[bczoom]

There's one thing that stops bullies/assh*les/terrorists and that is to give them a worse beating than they were planning on giving you.

Where's Dargo when you need him

 

[jdwilson44]

Do they believe that anyone who doesn't believe the same as they do, either need to convert or be killed? They (fundamentalist Christians) may be fanatical, but not to the point of "convert or die."

Well they aren't like that lately but a lot of the Nazi belief system stole rituals and beliefs from their Christian heritage and a few hundred years ago there were plenty of "Christians" who were willing to kill the unbelievers. The Inquisition and the killing of native peoples in the Americas come to mind as a couple of examples. The Muslims these days appear to be in one of those historical cycles where they use their religion as an excuse to go after everybody else.

My personal opinion is the religion itself is the problem - not the answer. When I was a kid one of the juvenile thoughts that came into my mind was that with all of the religions in the world not everybody can be "right". If one of them is "right" then all the rest are "wrong" - but how do you know which one is the right one? As I got older and watched how human organizations function, flourish, and survive I realized that starting a religion is just a matter of getting enough people to believe what you are saying and then making sure those people have a lot of kids. The Catholic church and a lot of the fundamentalist Christians in this country really promote the idea of having big families - because it is the best way to propagate their beliefs. Look at the Mormons - why do you think they took multiple wives? The Muslims have obviously done a good job at this because in sheer numbers they are one of the largest if not the largest religion in the world.

The other thing I see people getting confused about is the belief in a God and the belief in religion. Frankly I don't see how one has much to do with the other. Believing in God means you think there is a higher power - even though you may not know what it is - how you are supposed to act about it - or what the grand purpose is. Religion is a belief system that you are taught - it can be the belief in one god or the belief Rover the Dogman, it really doesn't matter. It all boils down to just because somebody said so doesn't make it true.

For an interesting read try this: http://news.yahoo.com/s/huffpost/20060102/cm_huffpost/013153

Frankly I think the only way mankind will truly find out if there is a god and if there is one what or who he/she is and who we are in relation to all of this is to try to find the truth - the real truth - about the universe. So far religion has been dragged kicking and screaming by science every step of the way towards our modern understanding of the way the world is. Only when bludgeoned over the head with the preponderance of evidence does religion finally give and say ' well I guess you were right'. Did religion come up with the idea of evolution, did religion bring us all of the modern medicines, electronics, biotechnology, space travel, etc. that we have enjoyed over the last century or so? No that was science - the one "belief system" if you will that actually does search for the truth. Religion basically says this is how the world is and this is what you need to believe. Science says I don't know how the world works - but I am going to find out.

The current situation in the Muslim world could be interpreted also as a last stand of their beliefs against the onslaught of truth coming from the science employed by the Western World. There has been much press about how their is no literature, no scientific discovery, no medical advances, no economic innovation, etc. coming out of the Muslim world. While their numbers and militant belligerence might not show it, Islam is a dying philosophy - just as religion is in many Western countries. America is a great grinder of belief systems - it takes what you believe and puts it to the acid test of ideas - if what you believe is crap, sooner or later you will pay the price for your ignorance because the better idea will have a chance to prove itself. The Muslim world is fighting a rearguard action against the scientific based belief systems coming out of the Western world that threaten all the ignorance they have believed in for two millenia. We keep proving them wrong by having higher living standards, more medical advances, going to the moon, etc.

 

[jdwilson44]

You have got to be kidding! The Continental Army was a terrorist group? Brilliant leftist reasoning, Don. That you would utter the name of Hamas in the same sentence with our Founding Fathers is beyond all logic and sense. I don’t recall any similarity between Hamas leaders and George Washington or Samuel Adams. I do not recall anyone of our Founding Fathers calling for the annihilation of all British Citizens as Hamas is calling for the annihilation of all Jews.

This is one of the major problems I have with the political Left in America. They are terrorist apologists. This is unbelievable and unforgivable. Give them the benefit of the doubt until they prove otherwise???? What have they proven up until now? You hate Bush, our own president but you are willing to give a known and proven terrorist organization the benefit of the doubt”? Typical Modern Liberal logic these days, I suppose. I should not be surprised, but it is still shocking to hear this type of rhetoric from a "fellow" American.

I don't think OkeeDon was being a terrorist apologist - he was just saying that from the British point of view at the time the American rebels were labeled as insurrectionists, traitors, terrorists, etc. by the British. Read David McCulloughs latest book for some good insight into the thinking at the time:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0743226712/002-2766115-5164003?v=glance&n=283155

Americans of the Revolutionary War time did not call for annihilation of the British - because most of them were British by heritage. And the early fighting at the time was done not by the Continental Army but by state militias who were little more than farmers with their own weapons in many cases. One of the things that led to the Revolution was that the people of the time felt like they were getting screwed because the Royal Govt. would not treat them as "real" British. Colonials were treated as something less than a full fledged British citizen - George Washington for example could not get a commision in the British Army as a full fledged British officer. Finally they had enough of getting screwed as second rate citizens by the British and decided they wanted out.

The story with the American colonists and the Indians was another story however - there were many calls for annihilation of Indians and pushing them out of the lands where they lived. There is a documentary on some PBS channels now called "The War that made America" that has very interesting insight into the battles going on at the time.
http://www.thewarthatmadeamerica.com/

As far as comparing the rhetoric of the 1700's vs the rhetoric of today I think you will find some parallels - it might not have been the Americans saying they wanted to annihilate the British but there was a lot of "get rid of the Indians" or "get rid of the French" type talk going on. The American revolution had the second highest death toll in proportion to population of all the American wars - the Civil War was #1. You don't get that many dead people without a lot of indiscrimate killing.

 

[Viking]

According to what I've heard, Hamas has built up an enviable record of domestic activities and support. Yes, they have supported terrorism. Yes, they have had an armed wing of their party. But then, according to that definition, the Continental Congress and their Continental Army were a radical terrorist government, also, at least in the eyes of the British.

The former Palestinian government was corrupt and ineffectual. The people chose the Hamas representatives in a democratic election. Some time in the recent past, President Bush stated that democractic elections were what was important, and sometimes the results are not what we would like.

Several observers have stated that Hamas will, like almost all other revolutionary governments, do away with their armed wing and their radical activities now that they have achieved leadership. If we are serious about promoting peace in the Middle East, I suggest it would be wise to give them the benefit of the doubt until they prove otherwise.

{Edit} Once again, Bob and I were typing at the same time. And, once again, we're closer together than we are split apart. Interesting.

Don

"Enviable record of domestic activities and support"

Yes they have Don, terrorist activities and support for them. Hamas is no more than a population of terrorists, and terrorists in training. What the hell have you been smoking?? They wouldn't think twice about killing you and your family with a suicide bomber if you would happen to be in a market, at a restaurant or maybe on a bus in Israel. They're no better than Osama and his crew of killers.

Your post is quite thoughtful/slick but to give Hamas the benefit of the doubt is a ridiculous statement to say the least. Unbelievable.....

This is the only thing Hamas understands...

 

[Melensdad]

I belive what Don was referring to is the fact that Hamas has a record of positive action within the Palestinian neighborhoods of fixing real problems. They act in much the way Al Capone and the Mafia acted in the neighborhoods that they controlled. If garbage needed to be picked up, or a sidewalk needed to be repaired, and you were a friend of Capone, he would get it fixed. Of course, what it took to be a friend of his made for a dubious relationship. But Hamas works in a similar way and they are very effective in the neighborhoods they control. Things get fixed, things get taken care of. . . and oh yes, you send your son off to wear a bomb vest to kill innocents in trade.

 

[Cityboy]

I don't think OkeeDon was being a terrorist apologist

Whether it was intentional or not, the result is the same. Hamas is, was and always will be a terrorist organization. It is a mistake to recognize or legitimize them.

Americans of the Revolutionary War time did not call for annihilation of the British - because most of them were British by heritage. And the early fighting at the time was done not by the Continental Army but by state militias who were little more than farmers with their own weapons in many cases. One of the things that led to the Revolution was that the people of the time felt like they were getting screwed because the Royal Govt. would not treat them as "real" British. Colonials were treated as something less than a full fledged British citizen - George Washington for example could not get a commision in the British Army as a full fledged British officer. Finally they had enough of getting screwed as second rate citizens by the British and decided they wanted out.

Agreed, however to compare America's founders to the terrorist orginization Hamas is asinine and utterly ridiculous. You can rationalize anything, but the reality in this case is that rationalizing any comparison of Hamas and the Continental Army is simply a "rational-lie". The colonists were not religous zealots and were in fact against state sponsored religion. There simply is zero logical or reasonable comparison here.

The story with the American colonists and the Indians was another story however - there were many calls for annihilation of Indians and pushing them out of the lands where they lived.

Agreed again, but the difference here is that in hind sight, Americans regret the brutalilty against the Indians. Do you believe the leaders of Hamas regret the death of Israelies or Americans for even one second? This young nation has made many mistakes, and is far from perfect. Using the Indian history as a guit trip to justify and legitimize Hamas or any radical Muslim group is a serious mistake. We, as Americans have learned from our past and continue moving forward. The Muslim extremists are idling in the 7th century, bound to religous zealotry and the belief that Allah commands them to rule the world. Compromise is not a part of their lexicon.

As far as comparing the rhetoric of the 1700's vs the rhetoric of today I think you will find some parallels

Again, this goes back to rationalization. There are parallels that could be made between good and evil, Christ and Satan and any number of issues and ideals, but are these comparisons realistic? The colonists wanted simply freedom and liberty, they did not want to conquer and dominate Britan or any other nation. On the other hand, Hamas and other Muslim extremist groups do indeed want to conquer and dominate the world and believe it is their divine right, granted by Allah to do so. The bottom line is that there is no legitimate comparison here.

 

[Melensdad]

Well it looks like the Palestinian government is going to have some serious money problems.

The new Chancellor of Germany not only REFUSED to meet with members of Hamas when she was visiting the middle East, she met with the members of the Fatah party, and she said that the European Union will cut off all aid to the Palestinains if Hamas does not disband and disarm its militant wing AND if Hamas does not change its charter to formally recognize the legitimate right for the nation of Israel to exist.

The US has taken the same position.

My questions are will the wealthy Arab nations who control the oil step up and openly fund the Palestinian's if the Western nations pull back their funding? And then what will this do to relations?

 

[XeVfTEUtaAqJHTqq]

My questions are will the wealthy Arab nations who control the oil step up and openly fund the Palestinian's if the Western nations pull back their funding? And then what will this do to relations?

They're already getting money openly from Iran. I'm sure Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and others are giving them money discretely. I'm not sure the other countries really have that much extra to give but that doesn't stop their private citizens from holding their "Death to Israel" telethons on al-jazeera.