Israel Mourns Teenagers, Strikes Hamas In Gaza

[finnbow]

Originally Posted by merrylander

I am afraid there will not be any more peace talks since Abbas joined with Hamas and Hamas has not renounced their policies.

The other side of this coin is that Israel can't achieve a separate piece with one of two Palestinian factions. We openly lobbied for and supported a free and fair election in the Gaza Strip and Hamas won (unfortunately for us). In some sort of perverted way, you gotta give Mahmoud Abbas credit for unifying the Palestinians, notwithstanding the fact that the Hamas faction is more militant than we would like them to be.

Unless and until you've spent time in the West Bank, among the (illegal) Jewish settlements and next to the border wall between Israel and the West Bank, you have little clue what life in the West Bank is all about. For the most part, the Palestinians are a proud, educated and peaceful people. However, when faced with injustices they face daily (supported and largely financed by us, BTW), some of them crack and strike out with force. We openly celebrate (and have financed) such "freedom fighters" when they're engaged in proxy wars against our enemies. Now the shoe is on the other foot.

[merrylander]

Originally Posted by finnbow

The other side of this coin is that Israel can't achieve a separate piece with one of two Palestinian factions. We openly lobbied for and supported a free and fair election in the Gaza Strip and Hamas won (unfortunately for us). In some sort of perverted way, you gotta give Mahmoud Abbas credit for unifying the Palestinians, notwithstanding the fact that the Hamas faction is more militant than we would like them to be.

Unless and until you've spent time in the West Bank, among the (illegal) Jewish settlements and next to the border wall between Israel and the West Bank, you have little clue what life in the West Bank is all about. For the most part, the Palestinians are a proud, educated and peaceful people. However, when faced with injustices they face daily (supported and largely financed by us, BTW), some of them crack and strike out with force. We openly celebrate (and have financed) such "freedom fighters" when they're engaged in proxy wars against our enemies. Now the shoe is on the other foot.

Met with both while I was there, my Jewish hosts took me dining in several restaurants one just happened to be Palestinian, the perogies in the Polish one were super. The funnest was a Chinese one right downtown.

On a more sad and sober note apparently a Palestinian teen has been killed, no more details than than, So everyone is now on the merry-go-round looking for the brass ring. Dear God where will it end. Let your children develop their own prejudices and hatreds, don't teach them yours.

[finnbow]

This excerpt from Roger Cohen's NYTimes op-ed piece pretty much nails the dynamic in Israel. I highly recommend this piece for anyone wanting a glimpse into what's going on in the West Bank:

Still, it must be said that Israel, a state of laws within the pre-1967 lines, is not a state of law beyond them in the occupied West Bank, where Israeli dominion over millions of Palestinians, now almost a half-century old, involves routine coercion, humiliation and abuse to which most Israelis have grown increasingly oblivious.

What goes on beyond a long-forgotten Green Line tends only to impinge on Israeli consciousness when violence flares. Otherwise it is over the wall or barrier (choose the word that suits your politics) in places best not dwelled upon.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/04/op...palestine.html

Having just spent three weeks there, I can tell you that Tel Aviv is a complete bubble in the midst of all this craziness. People there even joke about how much of a bubble they live in with all the great restaurants, cafes, nightclubs, beaches, etc . You could just as well be in Barcelona or some European Mediterranean city.

[merrylander]

On the news last night the only sane voice was the father of one of the murdered Jewish teens, he said (from memory) "This is wrong, the Book says thou shall not murder. It does not say thou shall not murder a Jew, or thou shall not murder a Palestinian, or thou shall not murder a Christian. It simply says thou shall not murder."