RickWhite
Well-Known Member
It is interesting that you ask if there anything someone can legitimately criticize Israel for without being an anti-Semite and then follow it up with anti-Semitic hyperbole. How exactly am I supposed to respond? Case in point - the term "settlers" is a weasel word that is designed to undermine their credibility. The word implies that they are there temporarily and without justification. What if we just said, "those building apartments in the West Bank" instead? The truth doesn't have quite the same impact does it?Rick...in your book, is there anything someone can legitimately criticize Israel for without being an anti-Semite? The policy with regard to the settlers, the disproportionate response to hamas and their toy rockets and turning gaza into an open air prison are all things I have serious reservations about. Even if it's the Palestinians who create a lot of the problems that have turned the peace process upside down, the crazy israeli right-wingers are just as big of an obstacle to peace. Sharon was the only with the gravitas and the testicles to confront them and I'm afraid that unless he wakes from his coma or someone else picks up where he left off, there really isn't going to be much progress....
And what about the "disproportionate response." That is another deceitful term. The Palestinians for years have indiscriminately launched very real and very dangerous rockets into civilian neighborhoods. Fortunately, they can not reach densely populated areas where they would be much more dangerous. What about the suicide bombers that wear bombs filled with nails in order to increase carnage that walk into places where young people congregate and blow themselves up? If the people from the neighboring city sent these guys to a mall where your 13 year old daughter was and sent nails flying in her face, what would your response be?
The Palestinians live in slums, not in "open air prisons." They live there due to their own choices. We have given them enough money so that they could all be living in luxury apartments and driving exotic sports cars. The money has been diverted into the pockets of their Arab leaders and toward arms purchases. Look at Gaza. Gaza was a beautiful piece of land with luxury ocean side homes. Israel gave it to the Arabs unilaterally and they made no effort to develop it choosing instead to use it as a base from which to launch more rockets. Gaza, which you call and "open air prison" proves more than anything that the Arabs don't want peace and any rational person can see this. The fact that you choose to see something that is the polar opposite of reality hardly suggests that you are being objective.
The Palestinians are in the position they are in because their Arab leaders have chosen to use them as canon fodder and they are so blinded by their hatred that they can't figure it out.
Now, if you were to ask if the Israelis should consider not building new apartments so close to the Palestinian neighborhoods knowing it might bring more violence, I would agree that this is something they should be thinking about. However, this raises a lot of questions.
In the end, we have a situation in which one group of people just wants to live a peaceful existence and the other group wishes to destroy them. It really is as simple as that and the evidence of this is overwhelming.