News: Israel Attacks Gazan Aid Flotilla - Page 10

On May 31 2010 22:29 Kazius wrote:
As an Israeli that does NOT feel that this was handled as well as it could be, as a person who has been to Nablus, Ramallah, Jericho, Gaza, and other places in person, who actually knows Palestinians and Israelis, I felt obligated to give a localized perspective. I am a human rights activist, non-religious (agnostic), and I am most definitely pro-peace (moderate/pragmatic left-wing), but I have had friends killed in this conflict. Now that all my biases are clear, here are replies, additions, explanations and addendums to various comments which I found incomplete, wrong, or biased. I have went through the entire thread, and in my replies here are also replies to many other opinions voiced here.


Israel had exhausted all non-violent means, including offering a way for aid to be transport into Gaza IF IT WAS SEARCHED FOR WEAPONS. The whole point of the floatilla was breaking the blockade in order for things OTHER than relief to enter. There are no problems getting food, water, fuel, medical supplies, etc. into Gaza. You could argue that this was an obvious relief effort - unfortunately, the Hammas has previously used relief via the sea as a platform for smuggling things such as anti-tank missiles, high explosives, and heavy machine guns.

With this background, the whole point of the floatilla was THAT news report, and THESE reactions:
+ Show Spoiler +


This is no secret plot. This is a direct attempt to break the blockade. There have been attempts at smuggling weapons via the sea earlier, but it would take a total retard to try and smuggle them on the mentioned floatilla. The whole point of it is to force Israel to not search for weapons on ships entering Gaza, and unfortunately, due to the history between Hammas and Israel, that is an unacceptable security risk; they are already firing missiles into Israel.

The means to this end is that Israel can't afford not to search the floatilla, and therefor, it is a massive publicity stunt. They did it knowing that confrontation was inevitable, that because of some douchebag violence will ensue, and then the headlines will be "EVIL ISRAEL ATTACKS DEFENSELESS SUPPORT FOR POOR CHILDREN, think about the children!".

And despite what you think, the Israeli army has very little in the way of PR. It's the politicians who do that work, just like in every other country.


Counting on international media is terrible, what is considered by many WW3 happened in Africa (millions of dead, many countries involved, with the death toll increasing by hundreds of thousands annually due to disease and starvation caused by that war) was largely unreported because it wasn't news. That aside, if every time a few people died and 30 were injured was reported, then EVERY SERIOUS BUS ACCIDENT WORLDWIDE WOULD BE ON CNN. You'd see nothing but that, 24/7.

Comparing Gaza to the concentration camps is wrong on so many levels, as I have had grandparents that survived concentration camps, and have personally been in Gaza, and I can tell you that this comparison is invalid on so many levels that it more shows that you are willing to compare Nazis and Israelis using ignorance as an excuse than anything else.


No it won't. Actually, my bet is that it would be reported in one line on CNN and MSNBC, and that's it.


So now it's the Jews, not the Israelis? Well, nice to see people like you crawling out the woodwork.


Gideon Levi (and most of the Ha'aretz editorial staff) are tend to get a lot of publicity by trolling the Israeli public. I'm a reader of that paper (they report news very well, and have some journalistic integrty). Only Amira Hess is more of a troll than this guy is. There is a reason why despite being the best in reporting international, political and economical news they are much smaller than the two big papers in Israel. And the proper response to trolls is to not repost or dignify their crap.


I used to be in the same opinion of yours, and then while (during my military service) we did a search in the road entering a small town, we found rifles hidden in an ambulance. Unfortunately, if Israel makes any exceptions for searches, those will be exploited, and therefor Israel is forced to resort to things like this. It's an ugly situation, and of course it makes Israel look bad. But that is the entire point, and I totally agree with you that Israel is fueling the extremist groups by it's actions. I find it brutal cynicism by the Hammas abusing this - they have no intention of allowing Israel to ease up on these actions because it would not serve them well.

The average Palestinian, just as the average Israeli, wants peace. Everyone that has been involved in the conflict directly (and isn't nuts) just wants it to be over. But peace talks have failed before because they were rushed and went ahead too far too fast (that one is on Clinton) or were thwarted by politicians caring more about their power and staying in office than solving this messed up situation (Olmert, Hammas, Bush).


Ah yes, the "JEWS DID 9/11" argument.


Actually, the reason the aid is in place is to force Israel to not make arms deals with China, Russia and other international powers (massive deals were canceled because of requests by the US), force Israel to shut down certain military projects ( a good example is the IAI Lavi), to subsidize US arms manufacturers and business (Israel is forced to not spend it on local military products but only on US ones) and in order to get a strong political/military foothold in the middle-east. Unfortunately, the US uses Israel in the same way Iran use Lebanon - it is an indirect conflict of two great powers funding clashes on a global scale. The anti-Israeli sentiment in Iran is an extension of the anti-US sentiment (if you want corroboration, look at information about the Islamic revolution there). The implications of pulling that aid are huge.


Israel doesn't want to cripple anyone. Israel is sick and tired of it's people getting killed. You have no idea how much the situation here is complicated. You choose one side without knowing the facts, and that's very easy from far away. Because once you zoom out enough, it's as simple as "big country vs. small country". + Show Spoiler [offensive retort] +


Unfortunately, you are at least partially correct. Most people want peace, but it just feels so far out of reach nowadays. Each generation is not more extreme than the last, just more pessimistic. Most people just accept that the situation is shit, and will be for a long, LONG time.





Notice that Israel is the only country in the world which is delegitimized in such a way. There is no other country that people talk about and say "it should never have been founded". Israel is a fact, and it's here. It was created as a response to about 1500 years of segregation and hate (in everything from the church to Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice - which is not any more racist than any other view of the Jews at the time), culminating in a medium case of attempted genocide. This is the only place the Jewish people had agreed on for such a state and had been settling it for the better part of a fifty years at the time (prior to which there was practically no people living there, neither Jewish nor otherwise).

The conflict will end. It has to. You have no idea how much people are sick of all the death and destruction.


There is no military presence inside Gaza - rather than in accordance with the Geneva convention, Israel reserves the right to return fire towards the source of the attack, and when missiles are launched from things such as school-yards and the such, it is a cynical abuse of the situation by the people firing missiles in order to get people like you riled up. The situation is more complicated than you give it credit.


Actually, the wall you are talking about lowered the amount of suicide bombings in Israel from once a month to none. It's not a permanent solution, but it has solved some of the bigger issues. And hey, if the Palestinians want to be recognized as a country, they shouldn't get outraged at someone trying to enforce a border.

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Whew, finally. Now back to life.