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Reluctant Hero

Israel Declares A Unilateral Ceasefire

How magnanimous of them  Rolling Eyes

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/7835794.stm

Israel declares ceasefire in Gaza

Israel is to halt its three-week military offensive against Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has said.

He said Israel had achieved its aims and the unilateral ceasefire would start at 0200 (2400 GMT). But he said troops would remain in Gaza for now.

A Hamas spokesman said it would not accept one Israeli soldier in Gaza.

Nearly 1,200 Palestinians have been killed since the violence began on 27 December. Thirteen Israelis have died.

Minutes before Mr Olmert was due to speak, a rocket was fired from Gaza, a BBC producer in Gaza said.

'Goals achieved'

The Israeli prime minister's announcement came in a televised address following a late-night cabinet meeting.  

Israel's "goals have been achieved, and even more", Mr Olmert said, with Hamas badly damaged both militarily and in terms of infrastructure.

But the success of the ceasefire depended on Hamas, he said.

Troops would remain in Gaza for the time being and if militant rocket fire into Israel continued, Israel would respond with force, he said.

A Hamas spokesman, Fawzi Barhum, said the group could not "accept the presence of a single [Israeli] soldier in Gaza".

Israel must withdraw completely, lift its economic blockade of Gaza and open border crossings, he said.

Hamas representatives have been taking part in talks in Cairo, brokered by Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, aimed at reaching a bilateral truce.
jamesieboy

Israelis/Gaza/Palestinians

Consider the facts. A few years ago Gaza was Israeli-controlled. They pulled out and forcibly removed the Jewish settlers who illegally occupied part of that territory. It may not have been much but it was a start and could have led to bigger things. True, they still controlled the border crossings but, had there been a lasting ceasefire and peace, more could have been achieved.
Some time went by, Hamas staged a bloody coup against their main rivals, Fatah and then began to lob rockets into Israel. True to form the Israelis eventually started to hit back. They made incursions into Gaza and then, true to form, made a full-scale invasion which took a terrible toll not only on the Hamas activists but on members of the public. Hamas knew fine well what they were doing as Israel is nothing if not predictable.
The PC lobby have tried to portray the whole thing as the fault of Israel. It is not as simple as that. Ask yourself some questions to get a better understanding of the situation.
* why was the (Fatah-controlled) west bank left unscathed? Something about rockets, or lack of them, landing on Israel?
* why did the Arab world turn their back on Gaza? Was it because, in Egypt's case, Hamas were persona non grata, being Islamists (Islamic Fascists) and allies to the Muslim Brotherhood, an Egyptian-based terrorist group and sworn enemies of the pro-Western government in Cairo?
People should not be naive when talking about the situation in the Middle East. They should know that the Islamists have sworn to drive israel into the sea. Their ideology is avowedly racist and anti-semitic. Their social policies would disgust most. Mysogynist and anti-democratic, if these people ever got into power there would be no things we take for granted, like free press and freedom of speech and dress. It is almost beyond belief that some people like George galloway, who laughably describe themselves as 'leftist' cosy up to people who would, if they got power, wipe out all traces of secularism and socialism. Think Iran. Think taliban-controlled Afghanistan.
As Lenin once labelled them, useful fools. The only way that Palestine can achieve full status as an independent state is to adopt to peaceful and conciliatory means. And with a new president in the White House there has never been a better time.
Dave Coull

Re: Israelis/Gaza/Palestinians

jamesieboy wrote:
Consider the facts. A few years ago Gaza was Israeli-controlled. They pulled out and forcibly removed the Jewish settlers who illegally occupied part of that territory. It may not have been much but it was a start and could have led to bigger things. True, they still controlled the border crossings but, had there been a lasting ceasefire and peace, more could have been achieved.
Some time went by, Hamas staged a bloody coup against their main rivals, Fatah
That is the opposite of the truth. There were democratic elections, for the Palestinian territories as a whole, both the West bank and Gaza, which Hamas won fair and square. Israel, the USA, and the UK all refused to accept the democratic decision of the Palestinian people, did everything they could to make life worse for the ordinary Palestinian, and, when Fatah staged a bloody coup to reverse the democratic decision of the election, they promptly recognised the coup leaders as the "legitimate" government of the Palestinians. However, in Gaza, the coup ultimately failed.
jamesieboy wrote:
and then began to lob rockets into Israel.
The total Israeli blockade of Gaza, refusing even to allow essential medical supplies through, was causing huge suffering for children, women, and men. Some folk were bound to strike back. Hamas couldn't have stopped them from doing so even if they tried.  
jamesieboy wrote:
True to form the Israelis eventually started to hit back.
What was true to form was that Israel was the aggressor.
jamesieboy wrote:
People should not be naive when talking about the situation in the Middle East. They should know that the Islamists have sworn to drive israel into the sea.
That is simply not true where many people in Hamas are concerned. They are perfectly willing to accept a "two states" solution, but it has to be a just one. By the way, abolishing the state of Israel is not the same things as "driving Israelis into the sea". I am in favour of abolishing the United Kingdom, but I have no desire to drive anybody into the sea. Anyway, even most of those who keep up the rhetoric about getting rid of Israel do so as a bargaining tactic; they are prepared to soften this stance when they see some real desire for peace with justice on the part of Israel.
jamesieboy wrote:
Their ideology is avowedly racist and anti-semitic.
Who says so? Answer, Israeli propoganda says so.
jamesieboy wrote:
Their social policies would disgust most.
Yes, the social policies of most Islamists are mysogynist etc. That means their social policies are wrong. It doesn't mean they are wrong about Israel's responsibility for the way things are, and it doesn't absolve the UK and the USA of blame for having helped to create the situation.
jamesieboy wrote:
It is almost beyond belief that some people like George galloway, who laughably describe themselves as 'leftist' cosy up to people who would, if they got power, wipe out all traces of secularism and socialism.
I think George Galloway did a great job when he appeared before a committee of the US Senate and laid into them. But I have never trusted him and I don't trust some of those he is associated with.
jamesieboy wrote:
Think Iran. Think taliban-controlled Afghanistan.
Now you are showing your ignorance. It makes about as much sense as saying "Think Ian Paisley. Think James McMillan." Both bigots, true, but bigots who are utterly opposed to each other, just as the Shia muslims of Iran and the Sunni extremists of the Taliban hate each others' guts.
jamesieboy

Too many people at the moment are being fooled by Hamas. They should do the proper research on the internet and ask themselves - who are Hamas? What do they stand for? The answer is islamists. Also known by some political analysts as islamofascists, they are as extreme right-wing as you could possibly get. Enslave women is one of their avowed aims.
Islamists are a contagion on the face of the earth. Like their European namesakes of the 1930's and 1940's their hearts are full of hatred, their whole philosophy repulsive and they embody the vile cause of martyrdom.
I take it your comparison to Ian Paisley and James McMillan was made in a light-hearted way. There is no comparison in the modern world between their actions and weasly words and what the Islamists do, that is strap high-explosives to pre-pubescent children, tell them they will be martyrs and them send them in to blow up as many civilians, some of them children, as they possibly can.
For all their faults, and there are many, the Palestinian Authority under Mahmoud Abbas are the best bet for peace. Yes, Israel will have to reign in the Zionists and the settlers and clamp down on their actions. Yes, Israel's over-reactions and seemingly wanton destruction have only helped the extremists of Hamas and Hizbollah to gain more sympathy. But what can they achieve????
My message is simple and straightforward. You will never beat the Jews! You will never overcome the state of Israel! They are too powerful, too smart, too rich. Some have tried and some have died. Negotiate, be reasonable, despite everything that has happened. Unite under one moderate, reasonable Arab banner and you will have the support of the EU, the Asian states, the Russians and above all, the Americans. And an independent Palestinian state will become a reality and the extremists on both sides will become consigned to history.
agentmancuso

jamesieboy wrote:
They should do the proper research on the internet


Shocked
Dave Coull

jamesieboy wrote:
do the proper research on the internet
Strange as this may seem, some folk have taken the trouble to extend their research beyond the limits of the internet.
jamesieboy wrote:
Like their European namesakes of the 1930's and 1940's
"Namesake" means "having the same name as". You are a namesake of Jamesie Cotter in the Rab C. Nesbitt series. But the mere fact that YOU refer to those of whom you disapprove as "islamofascists" does not make them the "namesakes" of the followers of Il Duce.
jamesieboy wrote:
I take it your comparison to Ian Paisley and James McMillan was made in a light-hearted way.
No, it wasn't. YOU linked the ayatollahs of Shia Islam to the Sunni fanatics of the Taliban. That is like linking a Free Presbyterian such as Paisley to a Papist fanatic such as McMilan.. They may both call themselves "Christian", but they hate each others' guts. Similarly, the Ayatollahs and the Taliban may both call themselves Islamic, but they each want to exterminate the other.
jamesieboy wrote:
My message is simple and straightforward.
It is an over-simplification.
jamesieboy wrote:
Negotiate, be reasonable
Tell the Israelis that. They are the ones who have refused to negotiate without pre-condition.
Rinty

Jimmy MacMillan is not a papist fanatic.  He is a devout catholic but hardly a conservative within his church.
jamesieboy

Paisley and McMillan are small fry and in no way can be compared to the islamists who cause mass death and destruction all round.
They don't organise suicide bombings. They don't believe in the cult of martyrdom. They don't brainwash impressionable women and teenagers and then send them into crowded markets to maim and kill as many innocent people as they can. How can you possibly equate them and the sick deeds they do with some nonentities like the individuals you just mentioned?
Salafists. Wahhabis. The grand caliphate harks back to an islamic  'golden' era in medieval times which was unbelievably cruel. Why are the left even entertaining these barbarians????????????????
Rinty

The use of words like 'barbarians' and references to random selective points in history are ridiculous.

I dont that the left do entertain barbarians or anyone lese you would dearly love to link them with.

If you do have such anger at violence, why is it contained to such a small part of those who committ atrocities.

Is it a case of violence by any muslim=bad and violence against muslim=justifiable because there are some bad muslims?

Given that you are now going all the way back to the middle ages for your selective evidence I am sure that dave now has a wider range of 'christians' to use in comparison.
Dave Coull

Regarding Christian extremists of various kinds,
jamesieboy wrote:
They don't organise suicide bombings
well, OF  COURSE  THEY  DON'T! Jamesie, it seems you don't know much more about Christianity than you know about Islam. Christianity most certainly does believe in martyrdom. But suicide is a SIN. Suicide is the ULTIMATE SIN. The Bible teaches that EVERYTHING can be forgiven  - except suicide. "Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow" Isiah, Chapter One, Verse 18. Suicide is the reason we can state confidently that, from a Christian point of view, Adolf Hitler is in Hell. If he had repented, his other sins could have been forgiven; but he died in the act of committing the sin of suicide, therefore, he is in Hell.
Rinty wrote:
Given that you are now going all the way back to the middle ages for your selective evidence I am sure that dave now has a wider range of 'christians' to use in comparison.
Channel Four has recently been showing a series called "Christianity: A History". One of the episodes in that series was about the Crusades. That programme showed the Crusades were a period of almost unbelievable horror, all of which was committed by dedicated Christians, with Muslims amongst the main victims. When the Crusaders captured Jerusalem, they killed both the Jewish and the Muslim inhabitants. When the Crusaders captured another Muslim city after a long siege, they not only killed all the inhabitants, they ate quite a lot of them. Large numbers of Christians turned cannibal and ate considerable numbers of Muslims. Babies were roasted over fires on the tips of spears, then eaten.  These events were recorded at the time.  But, you might think,  maybe it was just Muslim propoganda?  Maybe it was something to do with the Muslims regarding the mass, with its "this is my body", as a kind of cannibalism? Unfortunately, no.  It wasn't just Muslim historians who said this happened.  Some of the Crusaders who took part in these events themselves wrote about them afterwards, stating matter-of-factly  "we did eat them".  They weren't confessing, they were writing in celebration of their glorious victory in the name of Christ. Mind you, they were very hungry. It wasn't just the folk on the inside who ran short of food during the siege, so did the Crusaders outside the city walls. But despite being hungry, what made it acceptable was that they had been told that ANYTHING they did against the Muslims was justified, that ALL of their sins would be forgiven, and they would be gauranteed a place in Heaven.
Holebender

Isn't religion wonderful?

We could have been exploring the outer reaches of our galaxy by now, but for the curse of religion.
Scott2006

Holebender wrote:
Isn't religion wonderful?

We could have been exploring the outer reaches of our galaxy by now, but for the curse of religion.


An accurate historical interpretation with which I am in complete agreement.
jamesieboy

Of course horrible things were done during the crusades. massacres were committed by BOTH the Crusaders and Saladins forces who were equally cruel.
When I talk about violence and cruelty I refer to events nowadays, not thousands of years ago when people were generally less, shall we say, charitable to one another.
Lets talk only about the facts here. Why is it, with certain religions, you see a lot more intolerance and cruelty than you do with others?
If we look at a lot of the world's troublespots a pattern seems to emerge.
I teach Social Subjects and the kids often ask me about this. Obviously, there are a lot of factors to take into account, but when I get asked by pupils 'why are no buddhist suicide bombers' I ask kids to make their own conclusions.
Is Buddhism more peaceful and tolerant than, say, Islam. Do Buddhist monks value human life (and insect life) more than the redical Islamic preachers?
These are questions that we should be asking ourselves.
Holebender

You teach? I would have thought a teacher would have been required to know the basics of grammar and spelling.
agentmancuso

Holebender wrote:
You teach? I would have thought a teacher would have been required to know the basics of grammar and spelling.


You'd be surprised. The ideological vandalism in education has now proceeded to such an extent that many teachers themselves are products of a system specifically designed to crush academic excellence.
Dave Coull

jamesieboy wrote:
The grand caliphate harks back to an islamic  'golden' era in medieval times which was unbelievably cruel
Rinty wrote:
Given that you are now going all the way back to the middle ages for your selective evidence I am sure that dave now has a wider range of 'christians' to use in comparison.
jamesieboy wrote:
When I talk about violence and cruelty I refer to events nowadays, not thousands of years ago
The middle ages weren't "thousands of years ago", Jamesie, just a few hundred, that's all. And anyway, as Rinty pointed out, it was YOU that chose to go back that far. To the limited extent that people in the West think about the Crusades at all, they tend to think of them as something kinda noble. But many Muslims certainly do know about the Crusades, in all their stomach-churning horror, and in the Middle East it can seem as if they happened yesterday. So when President George W. Bush called the American-led action in Iraq a "Crusade", this set alarm bells ringing for EVERY Muslim. And if you want to talk about violence and cruelty nowadays, Jamesie, well then, let's talk about George Bush and Tony Blair, both of them born-again Christians who believed in "Onward Christian Soldiers". Let's talk about Guantanamo Bay, where Muslims, a few of them probably "enemy combatants", but also a lot of them probably not, have been tortured, day after day, month after month, year after year, by Christians.
jamesieboy

Dear Bendyhole,

I have only been on this list for a day or so and have posted nearly 20 posts (some a bit long-winded), so please excuse me for dropping the odd
apostrophe.

Now back to the original point - why are there no Buddhist suicide bombers? Why are many of the exponents of some religions more violent and tolerant than those who practise others?

And the crusades were certainly not just a few hundred years ago. The great Scottish enlightenment was a few hundred years ago. Why don't people here celebrate that a lot more. There is a lot to celebrate.
Dave Coull

jamesieboy wrote:
The grand caliphate harks back to an islamic  'golden' era in medieval times which was unbelievably cruel
jamesieboy wrote:
When I talk about violence and cruelty I refer to events nowadays, not thousands of years ago
I wrote:
The middle ages weren't "thousands of years ago"
jamesieboy wrote:
the crusades were certainly not just a few hundred years ago.
You said you're a teacher, Jamesie? On the basis of what you have said, there are THREE subjects you might have difficulty teaching. The three subjects are English, Mathematics, and History.

First, English. You used the term "thousands of years ago". "Thousands" is what is known as a "plural". By adding the "s" on the end, you are saying "at least two". By saying "thousands of years ago", you were saying "at least two thousand years ago". Yet you appear not to understand that.

Second, Mathematics. Admittedly, "a few" is not a precise mathematical term, but if we are dealing in the CONTRAST with "thousandS of years ago", then anything less than one thousand years ago can certainly be described as "a few hundred", simply on the grounds that it is numbered in hundreds, and not in thousands. The very first Crusade started in 1095AD. That was 914  years ago. 914 is less than one thousand.

Thirdly, History. As already mentioned, the First Crusade began less than 914 years ago. It ended nine hundred and ten years ago. But that first crusade was followed by a Second, and a Third, and so on. In fact, even if we don't count George Bush describing the invasion of Iraq which he ordered as a Crusade, there were at least nine or ten crusades during medieval times. Crusading went on well into the Fifteenth century, less than six hundred years ago. I realise nowadays the learning of dates is somewhat unfashionable, but any teacher who fails to grasp the time-scales of history will be ill-equipped to teach the subject.
jamesieboy

The problem with Islam and the Arabs is they HAD great civilisations. Look at Spain and the area around Cordoba and Granada in particular.

The Crusades were indeed 900-odd years ago. In history they teach time lines and that is still a very long time ago.

Look at the Arab civilisations, both pre and post Islamic. Look at Mesopotamia, Assyria, not forgetting the Egyptians and Babylon. Look at the origins of mathematics, though the Greeks had a big input there.

The prophet Mohammed conquered largely by the sword. Did Christ? Or Buddha? All these ancient civilations had their moments but none of them followed the principles behind the Human Rights Charter. Massacres were commonplace, genocide took place throughout history. Why do western liberals single out the Crusaders? It happened all over the place. Tamerlane - one of the greatest butchers in history. Not forgetting Genghis Khan, of course.

The main point is the Arabs have been in decline throughout the modern age. Currently, and this is an argument made by many intellectuals within the Arab world (by those brave enough to raise their heads above the parapet) and that is, it is in a sorry state, both intellectually and morally.

When's the next election in Syria? Or Libya? Or Saudi Arabia? Even in countries regarded as fairly moderate, like Egypt, women intellectuals and writers really have to keep their heads down. Iraq, under Saddam?
Sudan, a hell-hole of a country where 2 wars are being fought at the moment and whose president, Omar Bashir, has been indicted by the UN for crimes of genocide. I could go on. Algeria? Civil War. Islamist massacres, brutal reprisals by the military up till very recently.

Most of the Arab world is ruled by despots, absolute monarchs, dictators, the lot. The great civilisations are a thing of the distant past and if I was asked where i would rather live out of all the countries in the Middle East, with a fairly western-style of life it would be Israel. Allahuakbar! Shalom!
Dave Coull

jamesieboy wrote:
The Crusades were indeed 900-odd years ago.
No, that's when they STARTED. They continued for hundreds of years after that. Anyway, you were one hundred percent wrong about "thousands of years ago".
jamesieboy wrote:
The prophet Mohammed conquered largely by the sword. Did Christ?
Yes. "I come not  to bring peace, but a sword"   -   The Gospel according to Saint Mathew,  Chapter 10, Verse 34. Jesus's followers put that biblical instruction into effect from the very first opportunity. The Emperor Constantine established Christianity as the favoured religion of the Roman Empire. His successors set about stamping out all other religions by force. When the Christians defeated the Muslim kingdoms of Spain, they set up the Spanish Inquisition to deal with Muslims, Jews, and, later on, Protestants. In the same year as the Muslims were finally defeated in Spain, 1492, Christopher Columbus carried the Spanish Inquisition to the New World, where the native Americans were "converted" to Christianity using swords, guns, and torture.
jamesieboy

I'm talking about the Modern Age. The Christian world has generally moved on and become more democratic, more prosperous, more free. It is simplistic just to denounce all the wrongs in the world as being the fault of religion. Hitler and Stalin's regimes were largely secular.

The inquisition in Spain was indeed cruel. I could also mention the massacres of (Christian) Armenians carried out by the Ottoman Turks just before the Second World when millions of men, women and children were executed.

Do you accept the criticisms made by the many intellectuals and writers that the Arab/Muslim world has been in long-term decline and is now littered by not very nice states that regularly abuse human rights?

The Arabs really have to get their houses in order. How long it will take I don't know, I wont hold my breath.

Incidentally, go into the Independent website today and see the article about jew haters by Howard jacobsen. Interesting stuff.
Dave Coull

jamesieboy wrote:
Do you accept the criticisms made by the many intellectuals and writers that the Arab/Muslim world has been in long-term decline and is now littered by not very nice states that regularly abuse human rights?
That "long-term decline" bit sounds like a very odd way of putting things. As for "not very nice states"   -   from my point of view, that's like saying "canine dogs" or "wet water". The adjective is superfluous.
jamesieboy wrote:
The Arabs really have to get their houses in order
First you talk about "long term decline", now you give instructions to "the Arabs". Sounds a bit racist to me.
jamesieboy wrote:
go into the Independent website today and see the article about jew haters by Howard jacobsen
The state of Israel and its propagandists regularly attempt to smear all critics of that racist state as "Jew Haters". Jew Haters like Noam Chomsky for instance? Jew Haters like the veteran Labour Member of Parliament Gerald Kaufman, whose grandmother was ill in bed when the Nazis came for her? The state of Israel was formed by Zionists. Some Zionist Jews actively collaborated with the Nazis because they both agreed on wanting the Jews out of Europe. Neither the state of Israel nor its apologists occupy any moral high ground from which they can lecture the rest of us. My children are Jewish on their mother's side, they have relatives who died in the Holocaust, my stepson Sam (Samuel Mordecai......) is Jewish on both sides, and you won't find a more active critic of Israel anywhere than Sam. And, unlike you, he has actually been to Israel, and to Palestine, quite a few times, and seen for himself what is happening.
jamesieboy wrote:
I'm talking about the Modern Age
When it happens to suit you to do so. When it suits you to go back hundreds of years where Muslims are concerned, that's what you do. It was YOU that brought up the history of hundreds of years ago in the first place.
jamesieboy wrote:
The Christian world has generally moved on
To some extent, and only by becoming less Christian.
jamesieboy wrote:
more democratic, more prosperous, more free
Like I said, less Christian.
jamesieboy wrote:
It is simplistic just to denounce all the wrongs in the world as being the fault of religion
True
jamesieboy wrote:
Hitler and Stalin's regimes were largely secular
False. Or rather, false where Hitler's regime is concerned. Adolf Hitler was raised as a Catholic. Although he himself later wandered away from the faith of his childhood, for a mystical mish-mash of belief in "Destiny" and Aryan/Nordic mythology, he never officially ceased to be a Catholic, and he was never excommunicated. As for his friends, many of his closest colleagues were practicing Catholics. The men who planned and carried out the "Final Solution" to the "Jewish Problem" attended mass regularly, and went to confession regularly, where the priest would tell them to say a dozen Hail Marys. None of them were ever turned away from receiving communion, none of them were ever told that they were doing anything particularly naughty. Pope Pius was closely linked to the German church and to leading Nazis. In Croatia, Catholic priests actively participated in Nazi atrocities. Hitler's decision to attack the Godless Communists of the USSR was welcomed by the Catholic church, and Generallissimo Francisco Bahamunde Franco of Spain recruited eager Christian volunteers for a Spanish "Blue Division" to join their German friends in the Crusade against the Commies in the east. It is a myth that Hitler's regime was "largely secular".
Holebender

Ditto for Stalin. Although officially atheist, the Soviet Communist Party and the cult of the leader bore all the hallmarks of a religion. The same can be said for modern North Korea.
Rinty

I dont think there is any point in this developing any further, jamesie has a very warped and selective view of history and religion, he also thinks it is Ok to float between terms like 'arab' and 'muslim' freely, as if they are the same thing.  His logic is that any situation in an 'arab' country is because of islam.  Any evidence will do, whether it is actually anything to do with Islaam.

To say that historians single out the crusades for criticism is just nonsense, throughout history and culture the crusades are largely portrayed as a good thing with the crusaders the good guys.

Debating history with someone with a biased and 'googled' knowledge is pointless.

Using Israel as a comparisaon at the same time as pointing to UN condemnation of others misses the point as Israel cannot be sanctioned by the UN as the US and others will block any attempt to do so.  Israel have recently announced that any IDF soldiers gilty of war crimes during the recent invasion of Gaza will not be prosecuted.  Your Western style democracy dictates that war crimes are OK if committed against Gazans.
agentmancuso

jamesieboy wrote:
The Christian world has generally moved on and become more democratic, more prosperous, more free.


Simultaneously with becoming less Christian...
agentmancuso

Holebender wrote:
Ditto for Stalin. Although officially atheist, the Soviet Communist Party and the cult of the leader bore all the hallmarks of a religion. The same can be said for modern North Korea.


True. Socialism is a pseudo-religion.
Dave Coull

Bahrain is a predominantly Shia Muslim country ruled by a minority Sunni Muslim monarchy. Alcohol is prohibited. One of the things most Shias and Sunnis agree on is that alcohol is a bad thing. Late on Christmas Eve, 1961, as a member of the British military, I was very drunk, and I was wandering through the back streets of Manama, capital of Bahrain, with a colleague. We were singing "Hark The Herald Angels Sing", EXTREMELY loud, bellowing it out at the tops of our voices. An Arab Christian, a Palestinian as it turned out, appeared at the door of his house, and invited us in for a coffee. When we were inside and drinking our coffee, he gently suggested to us that perhaps our rather aggressive, drunken singing of carols through the back streets of Manama late at night might not be the wisest way to celebrate the birth of Christ. He had a point.

Regarding Jamesie,
Rinty wrote:
thinks it is Ok to float between terms like 'arab' and muslim' freely, as if they are the same thing.
Yes, I noticed his tendency to speak about "The Arabs" as if all two hundred and fifty million speakers of Arabic shared the same politics, religion, etc etc etc.
Rinty wrote:
I dont think there is any point in this developing any further
Now, there, I have to disagree with you, Rinty. Even when people seem quite set in their ways, it is sometimes possible to reason with them, and get them to see another point of view. Just ask the Palestinian Arab who appeared unto me on Christmas Eve. And even if it isn't possible to change the minds of particular individuals, it can still be a good idea to develop PUBLIC discussion further, because they aren't the only ones reading what is writ.
jamesieboy

Some of you are blinded by your hatred and prejudice of Israel and Israelis and by your rabid anti-Americanism.

Palestinian/Arab - good, for they are the oppressed. Israel/USA/UK - bad, for they are the oppressors.

Life isn't as simple as that. There is a strong lobby, not strong enough cetrtainly, that fights for peace. It is liberal and outspoken and they can criticise the government.

Can they do that in Iran or Syria or Libya or Saudi Arabia?

When you look at the bigger picture you will find that many Arab countries are as much to blame for the Palestinian predicament that they find themselves in. Jordan and Syrian have expelled them in the past.

The Arab nation has huge amounts of land with massive natural resources.
Israel is smaller than Wales with very little in the way of resources. Can't the Arab nations give some of their land, which is largely barren and has sparsely populations, to the Palestinians? Along with the West Bank, of course.
Dave Coull

jamesieboy wrote:
The Arab nation
There is no such thing. There are various Arabic-speaking countries, but that's a different matter. These various Arabic-speaking countries are at least as different from each other as England is from New Zealand, or Ireland is from Canada, or Wales is from the USA, or Scotland is from Australia.
jamesieboy wrote:
Can't the Arab nations
Hang on a minute, you just said there was only ONE Arab "nation"! Yet now you are changing your tune?
jamesieboy wrote:
give some of their land, which is largely barren and has sparsely populations, to the Palestinians?
But the Palestinians don't WANT somebody else's "largely barren" land. They want their own relatively fertile land from which the Zionists drove them by force.
jamesieboy wrote:
Some of you are blinded by your hatred and prejudice of Israel and Israelis
Not me. If anything, my natural prejudices as a protestant who learned the Psalms of David as a child would be pro-Israel. And besides, the Bible says Israel belongs to the Jews. Many, many years ago, believing that there was something idealistically "socialist" about the kibbutz movement, I even contacted the Israeli embassy in London to see whether it was possible for a non-Jew such as myself to volunteer to work on a kibbutz. It took a long time for reality to penetrate through my natural pro-Israel prejudices. I think one thing that changed me was me becoming involved, in some cases very intimately involved, with Jewish opponents of the state of Israel
jamesieboy wrote:
and by your rabid anti-Americanism
How strange that my American wife hasn't noticed my rabid anti-Americanism! And neither have my two American step-daughters! And come to think of it, ALL of my children, the ones I actually fathered as well as my step-children, have American passports, and yet none of them has noticed my "rabid anti-Americanism". How odd!
Dave Coull

jamesieboy wrote:
go into the Independent website today and see the article about jew haters by Howard jacobsen
I do sometimes buy the Independent, and, as it happens, I bought it today. There is a good letter in from a Jewish critic of Howard Jacobsen.                  Here it is:

"Jacobson and Gaza: Criticism of the brutality is not 'anti-Semitism'

Howard Jacobson's hysterical piece (Opinion, 18 February) that seeks to equate all criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism, made me very angry. He objects to the use of the words "massacre" and "slaughter" in reference to the killing of 400 Palestinian children by Israeli tanks, missiles, bombs and bullets, with his opinion that "it is in the nature of modern war". As a former professional soldier with four years on active service, I can categorically inform him, it is not. The British Army, the US Army, or any other army, do not, to my knowledge, deliberately kill children on the pretext of "self-defence".

I, and many, many other British Jews, have given repeated, and documented, warnings to the London Jewish Chronicle and elsewhere, of the dangers of the Board of Deputies of British Jews allying itself so closely and unwisely with Israel's brutal treatment as an occupying force in the Palestinian territories. That overt alliance, together with the millions of pounds sent every year to Israel by Jewish charities, virtually ensures the inevitability of anti-Israeli feelings being extended to those in Britain who so clearly, and sometimes, it must be said, arrogantly support the Israeli government agenda.

There was nothing in Howard Jacobson's article that indicated one shred of remorse that 400 Palestinian children should be killed as a reprisal for the rockets of Hamas. Nothing. That, tragically, is the attitude that contributes to the resurgence of anti-Semitism in Britain and thereby also endangers those of us, within British Jewry, to whom political Zionism is anathema. Zionism is not, and never was, a synonym for Judaism.

Michael Halpern

Westbourne, Dorset"
jamesieboy

and what about David Aaranovitch?

It still strikes me as being unbelievable that people like yourself make excuses for Hamas and their vile actions and agenda.

Can't all you Arabists and Islamist apologists face up to your responsibilities - an Independent Palestine under Hamas would be a truly repulsive place with dreadful human rights abuses and lack of women's rights.

Do you know that or are you just being naive?
jamesieboy

And Nick Cohen. What about his stuff?
Dave Coull

jamesieboy wrote:
Nick Cohen. What about his stuff?
Well, what about Noamie Anderson? Eh? What about Noamie? Eh? I bet you've never even heard of him! I trump your Nick Cohen and raise you a Noamie Anderson.
jamesieboy

Eh..who the hell is Noamie Andersen?

Any relation to Bibi or Moira?
Dave Coull

jamesieboy wrote:
Nick Cohen. What about his stuff?
I wrote:
Well, what about Noamie Anderson?
jamesieboy wrote:
Eh..who the hell is Noamie Andersen?
You've never even heard of Noamie Anderson, and yet you expect us to have heard of, and read, some obscure guy by the name of Nick Cohen?
jamesieboy wrote:
Any relation to Bibi or Moira?
Well of course I've heard of Moira, and the answer to that is, not so far as I know. But as for this Bibi person, who the hell is Bibi? Is that a man or a woman? Is he or she supposed to be famous, or something? What are they supposed to be famous for?
jamesieboy

Nick Cohen is one of the country's  foremost political journalists and writes for The Observer, one of the country's best sunday journals.

I would have thought you would have heard of him. You've slipped up badly.
jamesieboy

Bibi Anderson was the host of Sabado Noche, one of Spain's most popular entertainment shows some years ago.

She/he/it had long legs, long fingers, long fingernails and was very elegant, or so it seemed.

The catch was the adam's apple. Bibi Anderson was a transvestite in a country where not very long ago he/she/it would have been locked up. Now Spain is more liberal and pornographic than here. Could you imagine if Terry Wogan turned up in drag? Wouldn't happen.
Dave Coull

jamesieboy wrote:
You've slipped up badly.
No I haven't.

YOU have.

I'm not really as un-knowledgeable as I might sometimes appear to be.
But YOU are.

RULE NUMBER ONE :  The best way to conduct any discussion is to say what you think. Do not rely on other people doing your thinking for you, as you have obviously been doing up until now.

RULE NUMBER TWO : If you feel you really have to quote somebody else, then quote them. Quote them exactly. Quote them word for word. Don't just say "what about Fred Bloggs? Eh? Eh?", like you did before, because, if you do that, then I will say "Well, what about Alfie Mudd? Eh? Eh? Eh?". Noamie Anderson was Dougie's brother. Some folk rather cruelly called him "Plook" when he was a teenager, because he got even more of them than most teenagers. I can come up with hundreds more like that, and I will bring them out every time you do something as stupid as to say "what about so-and-so?", without actually specifying what so-and-so said, or even trying to explain in your own words what you think so-and-so said.
Holebender

This photo-essay was posted before the latest firestorm hit Gaza, but it is pertinent. If pictures of dead children or implicit criticism of Israel are too disturbing for you, look the other way.

It doesn't make any effort to be balanced.

http://palestinian.ning.com/profi...og/show?id=1970466:BlogPost:21449
jamesieboy

What makes you think you're all so self-righteous? You're making statements of opinion that you think are statements of fact. You are right and anybody with another opinion is wrong. That's the basis of fascism.

My message to the islamists of hamas - don't fire rockets into Israel and you won't get it back. Choose peace before war. Choose life before death.
Reject the islamist philosophy, that of the death cult, that of martyrdom and the suicide bomber because it is dead-end, obviously. Lay down your arms and the israelis will leave you in peace, which is what has happened since the ceasefire with lots of aid getting in. Perhaps they will see sense and we will have a prolonged period of peace

And if you go back to terror and self-sacrifice the Israeli military will gladly help you out. It is like living next to a lion: you keep poking it with a stick and it will eventually turn round and bite your arm off.

All you islamist apologists just don't get it. Islamism is the biggest threat to world peace because their philosophy is based on never-ending war.

Remember one thing - you will never beat the Jews. They are too clever, too rich, too powerful. And the Arabs are too divided and more interested in self-aggrandisement. It is naive to think otherwise.
jamesieboy

You STILL haven't answered a whole number of my points.

Israel does allow dissent. The Arab dictatorships DO NOT allow any dissent or any debate. Syria for example. Saudi Arabia (wonderful country, where going out and getting stoned has a whole new meaning), Libya, how long has Gaddafi been dictator now? and of course the Islamic Republic of Iran. Look them up under 'human rights  Amnesty International.

You complately ignore my points on the fact that Israel is/has been surrounded by tyrannies. No wonder they're paranoid.

The state of Israel is smaller than Wales. Dave Coull, you show astonishing geographical naivete. The rest of the land that the 'Arab nation' (quote; Abdel Gamel Nasser) is NOT barren, as you suggest.
The counties which border the Meditteranean have, not surprisingly, a meditteranean climate which has ample rainfall in the winter. The barren land is in the south of Saudi Arabia in the Rub Al Khali (the empty quarter)
the south of Libya and the south of Egypt away from the Nile.

Syria? I suggest you all do a little more research on that country with its president for life. It has a dreadful human rights record and has massacred its own population in the past for protesting against the dictatorship. (The late) HAFEZ AL ASSAD - KILLER.

In summation, your concerns are selective. I'm not, as I've said on previous posts, condoning everything Israel has done - far from it. There are, and have been for many years now, appalling things going on in the region and not just in Gaza and the Occupied Territories - it's just that you don't hear about them.
Holebender

Who are you directing these questions to (or at)? I don't think it can be me, because of your statement that whoever it is STILL hasn't answered some points.

Just a couple of points I will make, though; would you have given the advice you offer the Palestinians now to the various Nazi-occupied countries of Europe in the early 1940s? If not, why not? The two situations are so similar that many parallels can be drawn. Resistance is useless, just cooperate with the occupying power and you will have peace. Perhaps you would have said the same to Calgacus of the Caledonii before his futile (or was it?) fight against the Romans. You know what Calgacus thought of Rome's peace, don't you? "They make a desert and call it peace." Maybe that's where Israel learned its methods, do you think?

My other point is that you keep saying the Jews are so powerful and clever and so on. Do you mean all Jews? Do you actually mean Israel? It's very confusing; what if I were involved in some competition (say a chess match) with a Jew, should I just surrender now?
jamesieboy

The nazis had an avowed objective to conquer the lands round about them, even though some were populated largely by aryan anglo saxon blue eyed people (Holland/Denmark/Norway)

Now to the best of my knowledge the state of israel has no plans to invade its neighbours so there is no comparison with the nazis.
Dave Coull

jamesieboy wrote:
Islamism is the biggest threat to world peace because their philosophy is based on never-ending war.
Exactly the same thing, a philosophy based on never-ending war, could be said about fundamentalist Christianity. Who believes in fundamentalist Christianity? Well, how about President George W. Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair, who started the Iraq war, and encouraged Israel in its aggressions, for a start? Obama is now in charge, but he is himself influenced by fundamentalist Christianity. Indeed, he'd better be. On another forum I'm on, Roger wrote about just being back from visiting his mom in North Carolina, where he found the Baptist preachers are seriously discussing whether or not Obama is the anti-Christ predicted in the Book of Revelations. If Obama goes too heavily against the fundamentalist Christians, there will probably be a bulet with his name on it. But he won't anyway, because there are plenty of fundamentalist Christians in permanent positions of power in government and in the military. Fundamentalist Christianity believes that there will be a final showdown between the forces of Christ and his opponents. They call this final showdown Armaggedon. They predict that it will start in the Middle East. They welcome the return of the Jews to Israel, because this is foretold in the Book of Revelations as one of the Signs of the End Times which will herald the end of the world. Of these two fundamentalist ideologies, it is the Christian one which has far more power, and far more access to far more weapons, far more dangerous weapons, than the Islamist one. Therefore. while recognising that both are dangerous, it is the Christian fundamentalists who are a bigger danger to world peace than the islamist fundamentalists. (There is also Jewish fundamentalism of course, but that is only dangerous to the extent that it has the backing of the Christian fundamentalists, for their own reasons, which have already been mentioned.)
jamesieboy wrote:
All you islamist apologists just don't get it.
Who are you addressing with that "all you"? I am unaware of anybody here being an "apologist" for "islamism".
jamesieboy wrote:
My message to the islamists of hamas
Here on this Our Scotland forum you will find quite a few folk who, like an awful lot of Jews, are critical of the way Israel is behaving with regard to Gaza. But you will not find any "Islamists of Hamas". So, with regard to your "message to the islamists of Hamas", are you planning to deliver it to them in person, or write them a letter, or even post it on an internet forum which they or their supporters might frequent?
jamesieboy wrote:
Lay down your arms and the israelis will leave you in peace
israel would do no such thing. As Jews like Martin Schmeirer, prominent in the Saint Andrews students occupation in solidarity with Gaza, and Sarah Glynn, of Scottish Jews for a just Peace in Palestine, recognise, it is Israel which is the aggressor. Israel, with the support of the Christian fundamentalists for their own reasons, would walk all over the Palestinians if they all just "laid down their arms".
jamesieboy wrote:
You will never beat the Jews
That is a STUPID message to give to Islamists. It is stupid for two reasons. (1) they aren't fighting "the Jews". They are fighting Israel, a state which has long since lost the support of many Jews, and depends on the support of fundamentalist Christians.(2) if folk believe that dying as a martyr will assure them of an immediate place in Paradise, the question of whether the jihad can succeed or not is almost irrelevant. Only by showing them that the jihad is not necessary (thus casting doubt on God's mercy towards those who fight an un-necessary war) can you hope to get through to them. NOTHING that you have said would cause them to doubt that the jihad is necessary. I suggest, before you try to deliver your "message to the islamists of hamas", you think a bit more about what you want to say to them.
jamesieboy

I am well aware of the predictions in the End of Days in the Book of Revelations.

I don't underestimate the predictiions of nostradamus - alot of them have turned out to be true. References to Hister and predictions of the Second World War, for example.

I keep emphasising that I think the Israelis have been outrageously over the top in their murder of civilians, especially children.

However, I have seen Al Jazeera and the Gazans refer to the Jews (their words, not mine). They see this as a holy war and they see the enemy as the Jews.

I STILL wait on an answer to my comments on the nature of the regimes in Syria, Iran, Libya and Saudi Arabia...
Dave Coull

Joke: On board a plane, a passenger heads for the toilet. A man queueing up outside it says "it's occupied". The (Israeli) passenger replies "No it isn't! It was ALWAYS part of Israel!"
jamesieboy wrote:
The nazis had an avowed objective to conquer the lands round about them, even though some were populated largely by aryan anglo saxon blue eyed people (Holland/Denmark/Norway). Now to the best of my knowledge the state of israel has no plans to invade its neighbours so there is no comparison with the nazis.
On the 29th of November 1947 the United Nations called for the establishment of a jewish state in Palestine. But David Ben Gurion, the first leader of Israel, stated that territory was "in only a portion of the Land of Israel.". He later noted that "the creation of the new State by no means derogates from the scope of historic Eretz Israel.". The extent of Israeli territory has grown considerably since then, and of course they are reluctant to give up a single inch once they have got it, because, so far as scripture is concerned, it's part of Eretz Yisrael. If you are wondering how far the scope of Eretz Israel stretches, there are various different versions, based on different parts of the Old Testament, including the one based on God's promise to Abraham in Genesis  "from  the Nile to the Euphrates and from the  Mediterranean to the Red Sea", but all of them involve invading surrounding territories. So, right at the start of the state of Israel, you have claims to much larger territory, and, since then, Israeli territory has in fact grown. Of course, the Left in Israel opposes the wilder claims. But the religious Right backs them, and, guess what, Christian fundamentalists read the same Old Testament, as well as the final book of the New Testament which promises the return of the Jews to the Land of Israel, Armaggedon, and the end of the world. In that order.
Dave Coull

jamesieboy wrote:
Can't the Arab nations give some of their land, which is largely barren
jamesieboy wrote:
Dave Coull, you show astonishing geographical naivete. The rest of the land that the 'Arab nation' (quote; Abdel Gamel Nasser) is NOT barren, as you suggest.
Jamesie, it was YOU who suggested that. I merely QUOTED you, that's all. But regardless of whether or not YOU were correct in describing Arab lands as "largely barren", my point was simply that the Palestinians didn't want part of somebody else's land, they wanted their own land, from which they had been driven by the Zionists.
jamesieboy wrote:
The Arab dictatorships DO NOT allow any dissent or any debate.
That is a reason for being in favour of the people of those lands overthrowing their governments, which, of course, I am. It is NOT, as you appear to imagine, a reason for supporting the aggressive policies of Israel.
Rinty

Quote:
"I am well aware of the predictions in the End of Days in the Book of Revelations.  I don't underestimate the predictiions of nostradamus - alot of them have turned out to be true. References to Hister and predictions of the Second World War, for example."


Seriously, please tell me you dont take any of that shecht near kids when you teach.  The dream of some greek guy and the ramblings of an old religious weather predictor?

Quote:
However, I have seen Al Jazeera and the Gazans refer to the Jews (their words, not mine). They see this as a holy war and they see the enemy as the Jews.


You see what you did there?  You took a statement that Al Jazeera and "gazans" had been heard by you saying the words 'the jews', you then jumped to the conclusion that gazans and al jazeera see "this" as a holy war.

There are 1.5 million people in Gaza.  If I hear a Scot say "the jews" does that mean that Scots want a holy war?

Al Jazeera isnt an islamist company, its a mainstream news agency.

People in gaza are mainly people who once lived in what is now Israel, it is a land amd border dispute not a religious one.

If you put a place under seige, control its borders its air space, its coast, bomb its port and airport, restrict travel in and out, AND you do all of this under the banner of a self-declared 'jewish' state, then it should be surprise that some opportunists and bigots will try to use that link as some sort of twisted analysis and try to capitalise on potential religious divisions.

But anyone who collectively punishes the palestinians who are not in gaza through choise, because of the views of some is the same as those bigots, seeking general easy answers with a nice ready-packeaged scapegoat.
Lord Pitsligo

jamesieboy wrote:

I don't underestimate the predictiions of nostradamus - alot of them have turned out to be true. References to Hister and predictions of the Second World War, for example.


Can you give us examples of these predictions which have come true?
Holebender

jamesieboy wrote:
The nazis had an avowed objective to conquer the lands round about them, even though some were populated largely by aryan anglo saxon blue eyed people (Holland/Denmark/Norway)

Now to the best of my knowledge the state of israel has no plans to invade its neighbours so there is no comparison with the nazis.

The Nazis occupied neighbouring territory under their policy of liebensraum, i.e. they wanted room for their population to expand into. Israel occupies neighbouring territory and builds settlements for its citizens on land which they have confiscated from the indigenous population in the occupied territories. Whether or not they plan to invade Lebanon, Syria, Jordon, or Egypt is immaterial, they already occupy parts of Syria, Jordon (although Jordan has since given up any claim to the West Bank) and Egypt, and used to occupy a large chunk of Lebanon. You keep telling the people who live in these occupied territories to give up and accept the inevitable (that the Jews can't be beaten), so tell us if you would have given the same advice to those Europeans whose land was occupied by the Nazis in the 1940s. If not, why not? What's the difference in the situations of the Czechs in 1940 and the Palestinians in 2009?

As for Nostradamus... you have seriously dented any credibility you had by introducing your views on that one!
Alasdair

Holebender wrote:
As for Nostradamus... you have seriously dented any credibility you had by introducing your views on that one!


Credibility?  Don't make me laugh.
agentmancuso

jamesieboy wrote:
Now to the best of my knowledge the state of israel has no plans to invade its neighbours


The state of Israel is an invasion of its neighbours.
jamesieboy

Still no comments about the Arab dictatorships that I mentioned. I wait in hope.

Selective views of history. Having said that I say just give the bloody palestinians a homeland in the west bank and turn gaza into a tax-free haven with lots of whisky-guzzling Saudis and Qataris like Monte Carlo.

Don't suppose it would go down well with Hamas but who cares about them. Flourish when there's misery.

As for the Christian fundamentalists being a bigger threat this is palpable nonsense. They are now in the descendency in the US following Obama's victory. The US is basically run now, and hopefully for ever, by the liberal NE states along with California, the Great Lake states and the Pacific North West.

What makes you, Dave especially, think that these people want to start a holy war. There is no evidence. They are a joke, obviously...a laughing stock and the only threat they pose is to the sheep in the Carolinas and Texas. It is absurd to even rate these people.
Rinty

You commented on some arab countries and I am confused as to what you expect in reply.  As this thread is about Palestine/Israel the neighbouring states are relevant but not in the context you give.

Are you saying that israel can justify any action by showing that some neighbouring state isnt democratic?

What point is it that you are making?  And what do you want people to say??
Dave Coull

jamesieboy wrote:
The Arab dictatorships DO NOT allow any dissent or any debate.
at 10.50pm on Thursday 26th February,
Dave Coull wrote:
That is a reason for being in favour of the people of those lands overthrowing their governments, which, of course, I am.
at 8.41pm on  Friday the 27th of February,
jamesieboy wrote:
Still no comments about the Arab dictatorships that I mentioned.
Okay, Jamesie, just what part of "I am in favour of all of those governments being overthrown" did you not understand? Was it because I also said
Quote:
It is NOT, as you appear to imagine, a reason for supporting the aggressive policies of Israel.
you decided to just totally ignore the fact that I had said I was in favour of every one of these governments being overthrown?
Holebender

The boy Jamsie appears to believe that two wrongs make a right; the Arabs are totalitarian Islamists so the Jews are justified in anything they do. Putting aside, for a moment, the obvious racist elements of this sort of sweeping generalisation, the underlying argument is just childish. It's on a par with "well, he started it."
agentmancuso

Holebender wrote:
It's on a par with "well, he started it."


True, but even on that level he's got it wrong: quite clearly the violent imposition of the racist state of Israel on Palestinian land, without consulting or providing for the native inhabitants is what 'started' it.
Holebender

Oh, I didn't mean to suggest Jamsie's "Arabs" started anything or that his "Jews" were merely retaliating. I just meant to characterise the general level of his argument.
jamesieboy

Please note: I have criticised some of the actions the Israeli state have done. I have condemned the extreme violence meted out on the Palestinian civilian population, I see it as being unjustified.

Dave, I accept that you have called for an overthrow of the Arab tyrannies in the past (is there anywhere in the Arab world that's not a tyranny?). Others have been far less vocal. Almost a wall of silence, I would say.

My criticism of much of the Arab world is not only based on the facts but is an echo of secular/women writers within the Arab world. Indentured slave labour in the oil-rich gulf states? In states with huge amounts of money still think it's acceptable to treat so many people in this manner.

My problem is: almost all of the criticism/abuse seems to be directed at Israel here. The other horrendous criminal acts going on elsewhere just seem to be ignored. Genocide in Darfur. Brutal repression in Sri Lanka.
Lack of basic human rights and oppression of women in Iran. Slavery still exists in many places in the world, some it right under our noses, of course but Mauritania only recently passed a law banning slavery. It has been fairly commonplace in much of sub-Saharan Africa but the liberal/left in this country seem to ignore this issue and i can't for the life of me think why.

Anyway, I've put the world to right for another day so i'm now away for a bar lunch.
Lord Pitsligo

Lord Pitsligo wrote:
jamesieboy wrote:

I don't underestimate the predictiions of nostradamus - alot of them have turned out to be true. References to Hister and predictions of the Second World War, for example.


Can you give us examples of these predictions which have come true?


Just thought I'd bump this request  Wink
Dave Coull

At 7.44pm on Thursday 26th February,
jamesieboy wrote:
The Arab dictatorships DO NOT allow any dissent or any debate.
a couple of hours later,
Dave Coull wrote:
That is a reason for being in favour of the people of those lands overthrowing their governments, which, of course, I am.
at 8.41pm on  Friday the 27th of February,
jamesieboy wrote:
Still no comments about the Arab dictatorships that I mentioned.
Now, to begin with, I wasn't sure if Jamesie had just forgotten I had already answered him. Now, however, it seems pretty clear he just decided to deliberately ignore the fact that I had answered him, in order to create a deliberately false impression.
jamesieboy wrote:
Dave, I accept that you have called for an overthrow of the Arab tyrannies in the past
No, you're not going to be allowed to wriggle out of this one so easily. It wasn't just "in the past" that I have done this. In specific answer to a question from you about Arab dictatorships, I stated that I was in favour of them being overthrown by the people of those countries. AFTER I had answered your question about Arab dictatorships, you claimed that there were still no comments on the Arab dictatorships. That was a LIE .
jamesieboy wrote:
Others have been far less vocal. Almost a wall of silence, I would say.
Yer mooth's a broon, fae haverin a load o skitters. If I think that somebody else has answered something quite adequately, even I sometimes don't bother to answer every single point.  So there are might be times when some other folk might think "Dave has answered him. That'll do." There is no NEED for every single person to answer every single point. YOU WERE ANSWERED. There was no "wall of silence".

Addressing Jamesie,
Rinty wrote:
What point is it that you are making?
Addressing Jamesie,
Holebender wrote:
Who are you directing these questions to (or at)? I don't think it can be me, because of your statement that whoever it is STILL hasn't answered some points.
Quite simply, Jamesie, you're a liar. You WERE answered, but it suited you better to go on pretending you hadn't been.
Rinty

"It has been fairly commonplace in much of sub-Saharan Africa but the liberal/left in this country seem to ignore this issue and i can't for the life of me think why."

The only people who I have witnessed in decades of political activity who do campaign on these issues are exactly the people who you would label liberal/left.  It is a nonsense point and a very BNPish point.  The argument is that the left hate white people by only talking about white slavery or suck up to islamists by only talking about Israel.

It is the left who oppose these regimes and face the consequences in those countries, they are supported by 'liberal lefties' in the West.

Here in the UK, i cant remember one single meeting, protest, campaign or article about oppression in those authoritarian countries that wasnt mainly populated by those who you would call the liberal left.
jamesieboy

I'm hoping that the liberal/left will take up these issues ...eventually.

Sub-saharan Africa is one big cesspit when it comes to human rights abuses. It's just that people don't have the information on the wars/slavery/coups/dictatorships/torture that take place there.

Even in the serious dailies you will find it occupying a tiny amount of space, if at all.

The coverage of the Algerian civil war, caused by islamist fanatics (salafists) and an intransigent military government, despite having over 100,000 deaths and being located in a country less than an hour from the Costa del Sol was deplorable.

All I'm asking is WHY? Why are they so selective in this country when it comes to news coverage?
agentmancuso

jamesieboy wrote:
I'm asking is WHY? Why are they so selective in this country when it comes to news coverage?


For the bleedin' obvious reason that these events, terrible though they may be, affect us not one jot. Whereas the continuing oppression of the native Palestinian population by the racist Israeli state has a direct effect on politics in the UK, the US and the developed world generally, owing to the presence of sizable Muslim minorities in most Western countries.
jamesieboy

So we're sooking in with the 'sizeable muslim minority' in this country (by throwing up our hands at the Gaza dispute) and ignoring what goes on elsewhere?

Maybe if we don't kow-tow to them some will be become islamist radicals?
I'm glad you lot were not around in 1939 or Hitler would have walked all over us.

Just goes to show many people who make lots of noise when it comes to Israel/Palestine are both insincere AND inconsistent when it comes to human rights abuses in the world.

Dare I mention Sri Lanka again?
jamesieboy

Agent mancuso. Millions die in Africa. But that does not affect us, so we'll ignore it.

Ignore Zimbabwe. Ignore all the dictators in Africa, past and present, and all the suffering they cause their own people.

It's the 'racist Israeli state' that is the principal cause of unrest and strife in the world.

How simple-minded is that?
Dave Coull

Man demands to know "Why are there never any buses on this route?" It is politely pointed out to him that there ARE buses on this route, and the mere fact that HE hasn't  seen them doesn't alter the fact that they do exist. Man then says "Well, I get the Daily Stupid every day, and I haven't read any reports in the papers about there being any buses on this route. Anyway, I've been standing at this bus stop for nearly five minutes, and I haven't seen any. Why are there never any buses on this route?"
jamesieboy wrote:
I'm hoping that the liberal/left will take up these issues ...eventually
Stop confusing your own ignorance with reality.
jamesieboy wrote:
All I'm asking is WHY? Why are they so selective in this country when it comes to news coverage?
No, that is  NOT  all you are saying. You are saying a whole lot of other stuff, most of it both ignorant and stupid. Look at the self-satisfied ignorance and sheer stupidity displayed in your statements quoted above. First, you suggest "the liberal/left " doesn't care about  "wars/slavery/coups/dictatorships/torture" in "Sub-saharan Africa". How many actions concerned with "Sub-saharan Africa" have YOU been involved in, Jamesie? Personally, I have attended various meetings, demonstrations, pickets, etc about events in Sub-saharan Africa. On each occasion, it was obvious that most of my fellow-participants could be described as "liberal/left"; if anything, it was the "right" who appeared to be missing. But then, just to confuse yourself further, you switch from criticising "the liberal/left" to criticising "news coverage......in this country". NEWS FLASH FOR IDIOTS: the liberal/left doesn't control "the media" in this country.
Holebender

Jamsieboy, do you actually know where sub-Saharan Africa is? I only ask because you mention Algeria, which is not part of the region.

Unlike almost everybody else posting here, I've actually been there. In fact, I'm in sub-Saharan Africa right now. There are some nasty people and places here, but there are some nasty people and places in every part of the world. Instead of bleating about it and wanting other people to do something, I like to think I'm maybe helping out a little. What have you done?
Rinty

Jamesie, you were claiming that the liberal left dont campaign against regimes in sub saharan africa and now seem to be claiming it is the mainstream media?  Which one is it?

I would say that it wouldnt take much a google for you to find thos on the left who ARE taking on these issues, Like Peter tachell for one.

I keep in touch through Kilombo and Alisc (african liberation support network).  If you subscibe you will be updated and be able to hear about public meetings with direct experience by people from those countries now living here.

www.kilombo.org.uk

The only coverage you will see re the recent actions by workers in Egypt will be in the Socialist Worker or the Morning Star.  If its Iran you are talking about you could contact Hands of the People of Iran www.hopoi.org

Seriously, you should, as every day on this forum you display a spectular lack of knowledge or understanding beyind a BNP headline or caricature.
agentmancuso

jamesieboy wrote:
Agent mancuso. Millions die in Africa. But that does not affect us, so we'll ignore it.

I didn't suggest that we should ignore. I merely pointed out that many people do ignore it, which answers your original question.

Quote:
It's the 'racist Israeli state' that is the principal cause of unrest and strife in the world.

It's certainly the principle cause of unrest in the Middle East.
jamesieboy

Rinty - a reasoned and fairly well-balanced argument. And good info.

Holebender - you show your ignorance by making bizarre statements about somebody you don't know. i do have geography degree, from Cambridge. And a PGCE in Geography and Modern Languages so I do know a bit about Sub-Saharan Africa and, yes, I have visited parts of that area in the past.

Do you lot not realize that I am, to a certain extent, teasing some of you and the one who takes the prize is Dave who calls me a liar. Bit emotional, that.

The nonsense that the Israeli/Palestinian conflict is the single biggest injustice and cause of conflict is just nonsense. It is one of them, of course, but - civil war in Lebanon? Anyone? Injustice throughout the region eg dreadful treatment of women.

Why the hell are those on the left not more vociferous? Socialists? My ar*e!
agentmancuso

jamesieboy wrote:
And a PGCE in Geography and Modern Languages

Which languages? And why PGCE?

Quote:
It is one of them, of course, but - civil war in Lebanon? Anyone?

You mean the other place the Israelis invade/shell with monotonous regularity?

Quote:
Why the hell are those on the left not more vociferous?

They usually are vociferous, as opposed to thoughtful.
Dave Coull

jamesieboy wrote:
I am, to a certain extent, teasing some of you
I realise some folk consider it "clever" to pretend to be what they are not, or to hold opinions which they do not in fact hold. You may call that "teasing". I call it lying. You may think somebody who does this is "clever". I say such a person is a liar. I have utter contempt for liars.
jamesieboy wrote:
i do have geography degree, from Cambridge
You cited Algeria as an example of a regime in "sub-Saharan Africa". Anybody who has passed "O" Level Geography, never mind a "geography degree from Cambridge", knows that is wrong.
jamesieboy

Post Graduate Certificate of Education, means you can work as a teacher anywhere in the world.

And with the TEFL your on to a winner.

Best Place - South America, without doubt. Peru (Miraflores) was excellent though there was a civil war going on at the time.

Sweden was good but a bit boring in winter time.

Barcelona just before the Olympics. What can I say?
jamesieboy

Dave. It's called discussion. When you resort to calling people liars you begin to lose the argument.

Sub-saharan Africa obviously means 'on the edge of the Sahara, which is Algeria, in fact much of North Africa is sub-Saharan. Mauritania (tyranny),
Niger, Mali, Chad, Morocco, Sudan (genocidal regime) etc etc

Look it up in an atlas. I do that on a regular basis.
Dave Coull

jamesieboy wrote:
When you resort to calling people liars you begin to lose the argument.
Wrong.

That is only true if you can NOT establish that somebody is lying. President Richard Nixon denied all knowledge of the Watergate break-in. President Richard Nixon was called a liar. It took a bit of an effort to establish, but it was PROVED that the President was lying. So, those who had called him a liar did not lose the argument.
jamesieboy wrote:
Sub-saharan Africa obviously means 'on the edge of the Sahara
You claim to have "a geography degree from Cambridge", yet it is obvious you are geographically challenged. The prefix "Sub-" alone should give you a clue. "Sub" means "below", as in "sub-marine", or "sub-normal". As world maps were drawn up by Europeans, "below", in this instance, means "to the South of". I think, in this instance, the Wikipedia definition is perfectly adequate:
Quote:
Sub-Saharan Africa is a geographical term used to describe the area of the African continent which lies south of the Sahara, or those African countries which are fully or partially located south of the Sahara.[1][2] It contrasts with North Africa, which is part of the Arab World [3]
Algeria is part of North Africa. It is not part of Sub-Saharan Africa.
Holebender

Sub-Saharan Africa (for those who don't know, including jamesieboy) means the part of Africa which is under (sub), or south of, the Sahara Desert. That means places like Nigeria, Cameroon, Central African Republic, and all the other places further south.

If you'd studied Classics instead of Modern Languages, you'd have known that. Even a knowledge of Romance languages should have equipped you with the required understanding of a prefix like "sub".

I see Dave beat me to it.
Alasdair

jamesieboy wrote:
Do you lot not realize that I am, to a certain extent, teasing some of you and the one who takes the prize is Dave who calls me a liar. Bit emotional, that.


On forums this is generally referred to as trolling.
Holebender

There's an interesting and pertinent letter in today's Herald.

http://www.theherald.co.uk/featur...tters/display.var.2493126.0.0.php
agentmancuso

jamesieboy wrote:
Post Graduate Certificate of Education,

I know what it is. It's just an unusual combination with a Modern Languages degree. Which languages did you say were involved?
jamesieboy

castellano.

...que tiene cuatrocientos milliones de parlantes en el mundo.

Tambien el frances

y algun portugues
jamesieboy

Northern and Central Algeria is obviously in North Africa. The southern bit is more influenced by the annual movement of the Inter Tropical Convergence Zone and the climate reflects this, eg what little rain there is comes in the summer not the winter, like neighbouring Mali and Niger. This is sub-Saharan Africa but it is really extreme pedantry to bring uo this rather than answer the points i made.

i'm sure there are many nice people there but the regimes remain relentlessly repressive though very little publicity is given in the press.

The anti-slavery movement has lots to say about these countries where women are repressed, the obscenity of arranged marriages are common and the horrors of clitoral mutilation, more commonly known as female circumcision is still practised on the poor, female adolescents of the region.

Holebender, Rinty, to a certain extent Agent Mancuso, you are all guilty of pedantry. You all follow Dave's example of trivialising the argument by being pedantic and then go on to peddle the line that ' I've - been - there - and - I've - read - this - book - by - so and so - so i know, type of stuff. You really must do better! This type of cant and hypocrisy stinks of the far left and we don't have to look far to see how irrelevent they've been in recent years.

As for Rinty's accusation of me peddling BNP-style propaganda, this is really desperate stuff. The BNP probably have never heard of these countries, far less are knowledgeable of the cultures within them.
Dave Coull

jamesieboy wrote:
This is sub-Saharan Africa but it is really extreme pedantry to bring up this
Jamesie, some of us suspect you don't always tell the truth. Because of that, questioning your categorisation of Algeria as "Sub-Saharan Africa" is NOT pedantry. It is relevant to your claim that you have a degree in Geography from Cambridge. Why does that matter? In one way, it really doesn't matter a damn whether you have a degree or not, whether from Cambridge or from anywhere else. What DOES matter is whether you tell the truth or not. So far as I'm concerned, the jury is still out on that one.
agentmancuso

jamesieboy wrote:
castellano.

...que tiene cuatrocientos milliones de parlantes en el mundo.

Tambien el frances

y algun portugues


Thanks. That's made my day.
agentmancuso

jamesieboy wrote:
Holebender, Rinty, to a certain extent Agent Mancuso, you are all guilty of pedantry. You all follow Dave's example


We try, but we just can't keep up.
Rinty

"As for Rinty's accusation of me peddling BNP-style propaganda, this is really desperate stuff. The BNP probably have never heard of these countries, far less are knowledgeable of the cultures within them."

Read it again.  What I descried as BNP style propaganda is the notion that the left dont say anything about oppression in those countries.  The rverese is the case as I tried to point out.  I only see people on the left supporting the struggles for equlaity in those countries and with refugees from those countries who live here.

I see the odd right-wing columnist having an easy shot from a newspaper, but dont see them when the mettings are taking place or collections are being organised or deportaions fought.

I never once claimed that the BNP knew about those countries or their cultures so I dont know where you get that from.
Holebender

jamesieboy wrote:
Northern and Central Algeria is obviously in North Africa. The southern bit is more influenced by the annual movement of the Inter Tropical Convergence Zone and the climate reflects this, eg what little rain there is comes in the summer not the winter, like neighbouring Mali and Niger. This is sub-Saharan Africa but it is really extreme pedantry to bring uo this rather than answer the points i made.

i'm sure there are many nice people there but the regimes remain relentlessly repressive though very little publicity is given in the press.

The anti-slavery movement has lots to say about these countries where women are repressed, the obscenity of arranged marriages are common and the horrors of clitoral mutilation, more commonly known as female circumcision is still practised on the poor, female adolescents of the region.

Holebender, Rinty, to a certain extent Agent Mancuso, you are all guilty of pedantry. You all follow Dave's example of trivialising the argument by being pedantic and then go on to peddle the line that ' I've - been - there - and - I've - read - this - book - by - so and so - so i know, type of stuff. You really must do better! This type of cant and hypocrisy stinks of the far left and we don't have to look far to see how irrelevent they've been in recent years.

As for Rinty's accusation of me peddling BNP-style propaganda, this is really desperate stuff. The BNP probably have never heard of these countries, far less are knowledgeable of the cultures within them.

When you're losing the argument, you go for the ad hominem rather than admit it. It's not very grown up.

In case "ad hominem" is too advanced for you, it means you play the man rather than the ball.
Dave Coull

Rinty wrote:
What I described as BNP style propaganda is the notion that the left don't say anything about oppression in those countries.
Got that, Jamesie? Even if you disagree with the BNP about dozens of things, in one particular respect you use the same STYLE of propaganda as them: like the BNP, you peddle the lie that "the left" doesn't care about X,Y, and Z, in order to distract attention from the weakness of your own position on A,B, and C.
Rinty wrote:
The reverse is the case
True. In any campaign for justice in "sub-Saharan Africa" or anywhere else, you will find folk who could be described as "of the left".
Rinty wrote:
I see the odd right-wing columnist having an easy shot from a newspaper, but don't see them when the meetings are taking place or collections are being organised or deportations being fought.
True. In all such actions, the sort of right-wingers who take easy potshots at "the left" tend to be conspicuous by their absence.
jamesieboy wrote:
anti-slavery
jamesieboy wrote:
the obscenity of arranged marriages
jamesieboy wrote:
the horrors of clitoral mutilation
Jamesie, the people you are arguing with are against slavery, they are against the obscenity of arranged marriage, they are against the horrors of clitoral mutilation. These are NOT things of which they approve. The things they disagree with you about are things like your support for Zionism and Israeli aggression. What you are trying to do, by reciting these other bad things, on which there is no disagreement, is to distract attention from the fact that you have clearly lost the argument where the things on which there IS disagreement are concerned.
jamesieboy

That last posting was quite a good one, Dave.

I'm glad you are against all these obscenities.

Actually, I can't stick the BNP. I find their arguments simplistic and parochial.

I have liked most of the asylum seekers that I've taught. Their stories are interesting, and sometimes disturbing, and they bring a maturity to our schools and communities.

And Good God, if I lived in a place like Tehran, I would only have one thing in mind - escape!!!!!!!!

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