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I don’t think the media criticise those using their own civilians as human shields enough. Having said that, in Gazza the towns are very cramped and it must be difficult to seperate civilian from Muilitary.
I am though, sympathetic to the Palestians. We have turned a blind eye to Israel disregarding UN resolutions for long enough.
The Holocaust was the worst thing ever to happen to a people, but I do think Israel has got away with things no other country would, because of the Holocaust.
Mark
Value Is EverythingThere is truth in all that each of you posters have said. I accept that there’s propaganda on both sides, however my feeling is that the Israeli’s propaganda comes out second best.
I rather agree with Grasshopper’s satement that:-As far as media manipulation is concerned, I personally refuse to listen to platitudes about ‘limiting civilian casualties’, ‘smart bombs’ and ‘collateral damage’. I would prefer people to say "Fu*ck ’em – they were there and we took ’em out. Tough sh*it about the casualties" because it’s more honest.
At least that way, we would all know where we stand. Let’s not kid ourselves that media manipulation is the sole preserve of one side in this conflict.Whatever the rights and wrongs of the Gaza/Hamas/Israeli conflict (and no side is without guilt), the point of my original post was that the media are quick enough to splash the news of an Isaeli bomb hitting a school, but when it turns out that this was false, don’t seem quite so keen to correct their earlier misrepresentation. Take Julian Manyon (c4 I think,) he was going into histrionics about all this; any word from him now? Not f^^^^^ing likely.
Fair enough, the Israeli’s didn’t help themselves by banning journos from entering Gaza, ensuring that only those journos that Hamas viewed as sympathetic to their cause (or gullible enough to swallow their propaganda) were allowed to report on the bombing.
By the way Grasshopper, you may not like Melanie Phillips or her opinions, but that doesn’t mean everything she writes about is incorrect. I don’t like Gordon Brown but accept that occasionally he be ritght about something.No whining from the mass media about journalists being barred from Sri Lankan military operations for the past month.
Complete silence from Mr Charisma (more secretary than general) Ban Ki Moon on the plight of 250,000 civilians currently trapped in a war zone.
Resistance is everywhere it seems, especially if your a black fellow in the jungles "down there".
By the way Grasshopper, you may not like Melanie Phillips or her opinions, but that doesn’t mean everything she writes about is incorrect. I don’t like Gordon Brown but accept that occasionally he be ritght about something.
Undoubtedly true, insomniac, and I acknowledged this in the Anne Frank thread…….or at least I didn’t challenge everything in the piece that clivex quoted from her. What I do take issue with, is her more hysterical and unsubstantiated outburts.
In this thread, she is quoted as stating that the reporting of the alleged school bombing:
“whip(ped) up an eruption of hatred and violence towards Israel”.
My question to her is: What "violence" do you refer to, Ms Philips?
I don’t recall any retaliatory "violence" against Israel, other than that committed by Hamas, and that was nothing to do with the school incident.
Is this the same melanie wotsits that writes for the jewish chronicle and is bleating on about jewish children in english schools getting bullied about the gaza situation, did’nt see her defending muslim kids being bullied after 911.
If you are going to quote a journalist at least try and pick one who is a little more unbiased in her prose.A completely fatuous argument, insomniac, and one I’m very surprised you think is valid.
If a Manchester United supporter who was also a sports journalist reported that Manchester Untied won the Champions League, would you disbelieve it?
Melanie Phillips is a well known anti Islamist(extremist Islamists that is), pro Israeli. She writes for the Daily Mail , Telegraph and The Spectator (a great read by the way and one that does to try to give all sides to an argument), but does that automatically mean that whatever she writes on the subject is wrong?
Of course it doesn’t. And just to dismiss her report on the basis that she is pro-Israei is as childish as to dismiss reports that Man Utd won the Champions League because the reporter was a Man Utd fan.. By all means be aware of where a journo is "coming from", but to dismiss their reports (whether pro-Hamas or Israeli) is nonsense.insomniac – try reading my posts on this thread again, and those regarding Ms Philips’ writings in the Anne Frank thread.
I repeat once more – I
do not
disregard everything that she says by defualt………….but I
do
take issue with the more hysterical and unsubstantiated statements she frequently makes; to wit, her claim that the reporting of the ‘bombed’ Gaza school:
"whip(ped) up an eruption of hatred and
violence
against Israel"
Once again I ask: to what ‘violence’ does Ms Philips refer?
Did any of the Gulf Arab states conduct aggression towards the State of Israel, on the back of this report? Indeed, did
any
State conduct aggression towards Israel on the back of this?
To cut to the chase – was there
any
violence against Israel, on the back of this, as Ms Philips claims?
If there was, you can be sure we would have heard about if from somewhere, but the simple fact is that there was no such violence against Israel.
Ms Philips plays fast-and-loose with words when it comes to this particular subject; passing off as fact things which she simply cannot substantiate on any level.
To all intents and purposes it is lying, more than simply being frugal with the
actualite
, or voicing an opinion.
That is my issue as regards Ms Philips. She simply cannot be trusted to always reflect the truth when it comes to reporting on this subject, because she has tunnel-vision, and an all-too-frequent tendency to revert to hyperbole, in favour of reporting
facts
.
To use your own analogy, it is akin to your Manchester United fan reporting that they beat Real Madrid 6-0 in the Champions League final, with Jean-Paul Sartre and Clive Dunn both getting hatricks for the Red Devils…………….when I already know for a fact that the final score was 2-0, and Sartre came off after only ten minutes with a pulled hamstring.
I think the fact that 1500 or so civilians were reported killed during the conflice compared with about 15 Israelis (and around the same number of the latter killed from Hamas rockets in the year preceding the invasion). So quibbling about the facts surrounding one single incident when a couple of children are alleged to have died is rather pointless in my book. War is bad and lets hope Obama starts to put pressure on the Israeli state to use more diplomacy rather than arms to settle problems. Already the Iranian’s are making positive noises about him, and hopefully that in turn will result in a behind the scenes chain reaction where Iranian backed groups in the middle east adopt a more conciliatory stance too. This killing has to stop sometime you would hope.
All terrorists are civilians if you catch them at the right time, and everyone is innocent when propaganda is employed against a bigger power (the oppressor), look at bloody sunday FFS.
IMO Israel have had to put up with palestinian muslim extremists for longer than they really care for. War is nasty, but sometimes (and very much in this case) necessary. It is the nature of terrorism that you are an innocent civilian when you want to be and a terrorist when you think is most suitable.
You cannot fight terrorism with diplomacy, it just doesnt work. By attempting to you will be exploited at every opportunity Hopefully Hamas will learn from the error of their ways and peace will move on in gaza, if not then round two should give them food for thought.
It is pointless comparing body counts as attacks against israel are spontaneous and continuous, and have been for years. Not only that but money is also a huge factor. More than 3,000 people were killed in the northern ireland troubles and a hell of a lot more injured. Yet it was money that actually won the war for the IRA as the Canary Wharf bomb, which led to a temporary closure of the british stock exchange and a huge financial loss during this time, made appeasing them top of the government’s priorities.
The deaths of innocent people are a side effect of terrorism, but the moral high ground counts for nothing in a war against it. Israel are in the lucky position however that their enemies are largely confined to Gaza and so they can just declare war on hamas in the face of attacks, and it gives them an opportunity to take out targets which their intelligence will have been building up over a long period of time. Israel have an advanced and fairly powerful miliatry, and it is fairly naive to believe that they are just firing indiscriminately into gaza.
There will always be woodstock fall-out liberals the world over, rushing to condemn military re-actions but they have no solutions, but their approach of "turn a blind eye, and try to win by diplomacy" is what fuels the success of terrorism and makes it the favoured style of warfare in the modern era.
I am in no hurry to condemn israel as I would like to see where it goes.
There will always be woodstock fall-out liberals the world over, rushing to condemn military re-actions but they have no solutions, but their approach of "turn a blind eye, and try to win by diplomacy" is what fuels the success of terrorism and makes it the favoured style of warfare in the modern era.
I am in no hurry to condemn israel as I would like to see where it goes.
With respect, Bulwark, this is cobblers.
The peace brokered in Northern Ireland was brought about by diplomacy conducted over a number of years, for the very reason that the UK Government realised that there was
no
military solution to end it.
Indeed, there can never be a military solution to ‘terrorism’, for the very reasons you describe, because there is no uniformed opponent to engage, and no hostile ‘state’ to overwhelm.
As Cavelino Rampante outlined in a separate thread, the Palestinians came withing touching-distance of agreeing a peaceable outcome with Israel, during the Clinton Administration. It was diplomacy that brought both sides to the negotiating table, and it will be diplomacy that brings Hamas (or whoever fills the void when they self-destruct) to the next round of negotiations.
All military action (on both sides of any equation) does, is perpetuate the status quo. It might feel good in the short-term to conduct such action, and it may have some tactical benefit (e.g. reduced rocket fire from inside Gaza), but it does not advance either sides strategic aims. To suggest that a military solution can be found is erroneous, imo. Whether they like it or not, if a lasting peace is to be achieved in Israel/Palestine, both sides will eventually need to check their shooters at the cloakroom, and get round a table to talk. It is that simple.
All military action (on both sides of any equation) does, is perpetuate the status quo. It might feel good in the short-term to conduct such action, and it may have some tactical benefit (e.g. reduced rocket fire from inside Gaza), but it does not advance either sides strategic aims. To suggest that a military solution can be found is erroneous, imo. Whether they like it or not, if a lasting peace is to be achieved in Israel/Palestine, both sides will eventually need to check their shooters at the cloakroom, and get round a table to talk. It is that simple.
Spot on imo.
I would strongly disagree Grassy, terrorism won because of attempts at diplomacy in NI, and because the of the goverments unwillingness to engage the paramilitaries in a military capacity. Troops were put on the streets as a visual deterrent but were just made targets.
The police here knew every terrorist going, not just nationalists, loyalist murder squads too, but had to let them walk free time and time again, because of legal technicalities, accomplice evidence etc, etc, etc.
The good friday agreement wasnt an agreement, it was an unconditional surrender, and completely one sided.
The good friday agreement has seen the SDLP (nationalist) and Ulster Unioist Party (unionist) parties, who had been the biggest two parties and very sensible in their appraoch, drop away in favour of the much more extreme Sinn Fein (the political wing of the IRA) and Ian Paisley’s DUP as now the two biggest parties in NI.
Martin McGuiness told people in his area to bring family members out of hiding and they would be safe, befiore taking them off to be murdered, he’s now those people’s MP ffs.
At least 20 of the lads that I grew up with have had punishment beatings from loyalist paramilitaries, since the turn of the millenium, some of which were absolutely hurrendous (fellas from the abbotoir coming down to pull bones out of people with claw hammers etc), and nationalists punishment beatings have resulted in few people being beaten to death.
The current situation here is one where paramilitaries are allowed to run amock here, and a blind eye is turned as long as they sit in government dont attack the mainland. Tony Blair is very quick to hail himself a peace broker the world over, and it is looked upon a success story by almost everyone that doesnt live here.
Its easy to negotiate an apparent peace if your willing to deal at any cost. Israel dont really have the same options to trade as Tony B had.
IMO if your intelligence is good and you accept that there will be innocent casualties involved regardless of military action, and you would rather they were on the opposite side than your own, then you will win eventually.
If Israel are hitting legitimate targets on a ragular basis then they will be taking out weapons dumps, ring leaders and known terrorists (all of whom are painted as innocent civilians when they are dead). As the strength of Hamas dwindles and the death count on their side mounts up, people will start to question how much they actually support hamas’s actions and their response and there will eventually be peace at a high price to gaza (something I doubt Israel are overly concered about).
I would suggest the events of 9/11 played a far bigger de facto role in the resultant peace in NI than any other factor.
The one thing you can say about Adams and McGuiness is they ain’t draft.
I would suggest the events of 9/11 played a far bigger de facto role in the resultant peace in NI than any other factor.
The one thing you can say about Adams and McGuiness is they ain’t draft.
Would definitely agree with that Pompete, and Bushes stance on terrorism also, he cancelled their visas as soon as got into office, prior to 9/11.
…need to get myself off to bed I think 
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