The stupidity of Gaza

Hitting the NATO school was a bit of an own goal by the Israelis today. After killing all those kids even the BBC felt obliged to comment and put a light on the double strike on the market that followed. They bombed it, waited 5 minutes for the Palestinian ambulances and nurses to arrive to help the dead and wounded and then hit them with another air strike.
Even the West is starting to get embarrassed by the genocide.

Did anybody else just see that Israeli pilot on the BBC news talking about how he's saving lives?

He pilots the spotter plane that  identifies targets and guides in the bombs.

When he said he knew for a fact that he'd saved lives, the journalist automatically thought he meant Israeli lives (by killing the Palestinians who were firing the rockets) and said "Yes, Israeli lives but what about the Palestinians?"

And he said he was talking about the Palestinians, not the Israelis.

He then went on to explain how, by his fucked up logic, he had previously seen children in the areas they were bombing and decided to drop the bombs somewhere else, thus saving their lives.

That's not "saving lives", dickhead, that's called moving the target to somewhere else (where there may or may not still be children incidentally) to avoid a PR disaster.

If you save one person but blow up five more somewhere else instead, that's not saving lives, knobhead......

Just think what the human race could achieve if we didn't concern ourselves with this nonsense.

We'd have populated Mars by now.

And probably fucked that planet up too.......

Maybe but at least we'd be trying to further the understanding of the human condition. Rather than cleaving to Bronze Age thinking.

Hipster_Nebula wrote:Maybe but at least we'd be trying to further the understanding of the human condition. 

I know what condition my condition is in.

And I'm perfectly happy with it, man.

The Dude abides.....

Reebok_Rebel wrote:Its not the Palestinians fault - its hamas. 

Hamas, are using human shields - they know there own people are going to die in a conflict they have no intention of stopping, they can then use images of dying children as propaganda to stir up hatred towards Israel - they are doing this to themselves. 

They hide rocket launchers around civilian populations knowing they would be attacked. Israel has a right to protect itself, the fact thousands are dying, im afraid, is collateral damage caused by Hamas using the people its supposed to protect as weapons. 

At least the IDF advised Palestinian civilians to leave the strip and gave them advanced warning of pending attacks, Hamas stopped them leaving - Hamas simply bomb as much of Israel as they can and actively try and kill as many 'filthy Jews', regardless of age or civilian/Military status as they can. 

The Gaza strip will end up totally flattened and it will be the fault of Hamas. 

Having said that, the Palestinians elected a group of fundamental Islamic extremists in the first place, so they reap what they sow...

Israel spen't money on building bomb shelters and a missile defense shield to help its citizens survive attacks... Hamas spent all their 'aid' money on thousands of rockets and hid them in civilian areas... think about it.

Spot on Rebel   Hamas are an ISLAMIST terrorist organisation funded by other Arab nations whose sole aim is to see Israel and the Jewish population wiped off the face of the earth. There is no Isreali propoganda machine ,they are defending their people against obliteration.

To be honest, I see people like Tigermin being as much of the problem as religion itself. I know relgion has been the basic premise of so many wars in history but more often than not it's just an excuse for those in power to do what they want. 

Ignorant morons will back anything the media tell them to so long as it's framed with the rigt buzzwords, in this case - terrorism and Islamist.

The suggestion that hundreds of children dying is part of a proportionate response is sickening and anybody who supports that viewpoint either has some serious psychological issues or hasn't got a clue what they're talking about.

Good video LT.

I learnt something today, thanks

Listening to the tone of that video, I was expecting it to have been produced by some pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel group and was genuinely surprised to discover who was behind it at the end.

Maybe there is hope, after all........

Breadman wrote:Listening to the tone of that video, I was expecting it to have been produced by some pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel group and was genuinely surprised to discover who was behind it at the end.

Maybe there is hope, after all........

...not until the western media adopt a similarly even-handed approach to the situation and reporting on the Islamic world in general.

All we are allowed to see is "unjustifiable terrorism" - never the whole story - which is the backbone of Islamaphobia in the West.

I find it insulting that our own Governments and own media force feed us this propaganda and tell us what to think. 
Being manipulated like this makes it slightly more understandable how ordinary German people were convinced by the State machine to fear, oppress and do unspeakable things to the Jews 70 years ago.

What I find alarming is that the Israeli state is doing to the Palestinians what the Germans did to their forebears - it has parallels to families where people who were beaten as a child have a greater tendency to beat their own children.

Sadly, the Palestinians trapped in Gaza are being done no favours by Hamas whose defiance of the heavily armed Israelis provides "justification" for ethnic cleansing.

For every Israeli soldier killed recently, TWENTY FIVE Palestinian civilians have died - but you wouldn't know it from the BBC coverage.

wanderlust wrote:

Breadman wrote:Listening to the tone of that video, I was expecting it to have been produced by some pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel group and was genuinely surprised to discover who was behind it at the end.

Maybe there is hope, after all........

...not until the western media adopt a similarly even-handed approach to the situation and reporting on the Islamic world in general.

All we are allowed to see is "unjustifiable terrorism" - never the whole story - which is the backbone of Islamaphobia in the West.

I find it insulting that our own Governments and own media force feed us this propaganda and tell us what to think. 
Being manipulated like this makes it slightly more understandable how ordinary German people were convinced by the State machine to fear, oppress and do unspeakable things to the Jews 70 years ago.

What I find alarming is that the Israeli state is doing to the Palestinians what the Germans did to their forebears - it has parallels to families where people who were beaten as a child have a greater tendency to beat their own children.

Sadly, the Palestinians trapped in Gaza are being done no favours by Hamas whose defiance of the heavily armed Israelis provides "justification" for ethnic cleansing.

For every Israeli soldier killed recently, TWENTY FIVE Palestinian civilians have died - but you wouldn't know it from the BBC coverage.

"Islamophobia"   The apologists favourite word. Have to make up something when your position becomes increasingly difficult to defend. 

I've been watching the news at 6 every night for the past 2 weeks just because I'm interested about this story, the BBC run the stats about deaths before and during EVERY single lead in story, including the make up of the dead reporting that only 2 of the Israeli deaths so far have been "non military" so that bottom bit is complete nonsense. 

Don't really understand the obsession with a news channel anyway, surely as citizens we should be more worried that our Government is supporting the shelling of UN facilities, hospitals, and schools. But maybe Cameron has spoken to God again and found that this is also "Jesus' work"



remember when Cameron was neutered in Parliament 24 hours before he wanted to arm ISIS in Syria, I hope he's enjoying his allies going around Iraq beheading innocents.

I agree with a lot of what you say, Lusty but flying airliners into tall buildings live on CNN is pretty hard to justify in terms of being a proportionate response to the perceived mistreatment of Muslims at the hands of the West.

It's not all about the western media spreading scare-mongering stories to generate and perpetuate anti-Islamic feeling - a lot of it is justified.

Look at the murder of Lee Rigby. 

Not much "anti-Islamic" spin required to portray the perpetrators of that one as being evil bastards, motivated by a deep-seated hatred of Western values.......

And I've always classed myself as being a fairly objective type of bloke, who forms opinions based largely off personal experience and solid facts, rather than emotion and supposition.

My Dad still lives in the house I grew up in in Smithills and to get to it when I go and see him, I have to drive through an area of Bolton which is predominantly Muslim "owned" for want of a better word.

I have seen this area expand and yet become more insular over the last thirty years.

It's now bordering on a no-go area for non-Muslims because of the threat of intimidation and that's not hyperbole for dramatic effect, it's a fact because I've experienced it myself.

And this is every bit as much to blame for the increased levels of anti-Islamic feeling currently sweeping Britain as anything Al Qaida, Al Shabaab, ISIS or anybody else is doing in the Middle East.

It's a mess and I don't have the answers but there's definitely more to it than simply the Western media spinning things a certain way to support the actions of our dodgy leaders as they try and impose questionable foreign policy.

Breadman wrote:I agree with a lot of what you say, Lusty but flying airliners into tall buildings live on CNN is pretty hard to justify in terms of being a proportionate response to the perceived mistreatment of Muslims at the hands of the West.

It's not all about the western media spreading scare-mongering stories to generate and perpetuate anti-Islamic feeling - a lot of it is justified.

Look at the murder of Lee Rigby. 

Not much "anti-Islamic" spin required to portray the perpetrators of that one as being evil bastards, motivated by a deep-seated hatred of Western values.......

And I've always classed myself as being a fairly objective type of bloke, who forms opinions based largely off personal experience and solid facts, rather than emotion and supposition.

My Dad still lives in the house I grew up in in Smithills and to get to it when I go and see him, I have to drive through an area of Bolton which is predominantly Muslim "owned" for want of a better word.

I have seen this area expand and yet become more insular over the last thirty years.

It's now bordering on a no-go area for non-Muslims because of the threat of intimidation and that's not hyperbole for dramatic effect, it's a fact because I've experienced it myself.

And this is every bit as much to blame for the increased levels of anti-Islamic feeling currently sweeping Britain as anything Al Qaida, Al Shabaab, ISIS or anybody else is doing in the Middle East.

It's a mess and I don't have the answers but there's definitely more to it than simply the Western media spinning things a certain way to support the actions of our dodgy leaders as they try and impose questionable foreign policy.

I'm not in any way trying to defend fundamentalists - I'm saying that the media presentation of events isn't even-handed and that the ordinary people are the ones who suffer.
Islamophobia is a real thing because large swathes of the Brit media tar all Moslems with the same brush as the fundamentalists and whilst most rational people can see that it's a minority who are out of order, many can't - or integrate it into their general xenophobia - which is certainly promulgated by the British media.

Town planning and what's happened to Smithills/Halliwell Rd is a different matter but it has to be said that if the media and society in general had been more welcoming of immigrants and cultural diversity from the offset, there would have been far less of a tendency for immigrant groups to huddle together for protection.  I don't have the answers either but I totally understand how minority groups have been shoved towards isolation rather than integration. The sad irony of the situation is that the very people who did the shoving are the ones who blame the immigrants for not integrating and adopting "our ways", but that's another discussion.

As for the airliners...well if you believe yourself to be in a war with an enemy that has nuclear weapons, drones and the strongest and best equipped army on the planet what do you do to fight back? Throw a few fireworks over a wall and wait to die like those idiots Hamas or kick the bully in the nuts and run for cover? Killing 3 thousand people may seem fair enough if you believe that you have been enslaved as a nation and hundreds of thousands have died as a result but it was the Americans who filmed it and turned it into a media spectacle. The real impact of that day was to send a message to billions that military might isn't the be all and end all because there are ways to hit back if you don't play the enemy's game. Proportionate response? That can only be assessed if it's clear what it's a response to.

None of the above sits easy with me - I'm just trying to see it from a different perspective and in doing so it makes me think that if we were just a bit more honest about what we do to communities around the world none of this would have happened.
But in being honest, we wouldn't have had the competitive advantage we needed to build empires and take advantage of their resources so it's a moot point. 
Ultimately I guess this is the price we have to pay for what we did and do both economically and militarily to make the West rich.

You make some good points wanderlust but there are two things I take issue with.

First your statement that "Islamophobia is a real thing because large swathes of the Brit media tar all Moslems with the same brush as the fundamentalists". What evidence is there that large swathes of the media do this? Even right wing trash like the Sun and Daily Mail don't really say or even imply that all Muslims are fundamentalists.

Secondly your assumption that "if the media and society in general had been more welcoming of immigrants and cultural diversity from the offset" things would have been different. Immigrants quite naturally gravitate to areas where immigrants from their own homeland live. In the past there have been waves of immigrants from other countries who have successfully integrated e.g. the Huguenots, the Irish, the Jews. The problem arises when people choose not to integrate (and I am not ignoring the very real prejudice that many immigrants suffer). Diversity is all very well but not all cultures and cultural beliefs are equally valid. Is female genital mutilation a cultural practice we should respect? Is wearing a burka something we should respect?

xmiles wrote:You make some good points wanderlust but there are two things I take issue with.

First your statement that "Islamophobia is a real thing because large swathes of the Brit media tar all Moslems with the same brush as the fundamentalists". What evidence is there that large swathes of the media do this? Even right wing trash like the Sun and Daily Mail don't really say or even imply that all Muslims are fundamentalists.

Secondly your assumption that "if the media and society in general had been more welcoming of immigrants and cultural diversity from the offset" things would have been different. Immigrants quite naturally gravitate to areas where immigrants from their own homeland live. In the past there have been waves of immigrants from other countries who have successfully integrated e.g. the Huguenots, the Irish, the Jews. The problem arises when people choose not to integrate (and I am not ignoring the very real prejudice that many immigrants suffer). Diversity is all very well but not all cultures and cultural beliefs are equally valid. Is female genital mutilation a cultural practice we should respect? Is wearing a burka something we should respect?

Both good points.

There are hundreds of examples of the British media fabricating stories which were anti-Islamic e.g. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/media/the-shameful-islamophobia-at-the-heart-of-britains-press-861096.html but none that I am aware of that directly say "all Muslims are fundamentalists" - although it is often present by implication or omission.

What they all seem to do however is attach "Muslim" to and undesirable element e.g. if there is a murderer or a paedo that makes the papers who happens to be Muslim he will be described as "Muslim murderer" or "Islamic Paedo".  Of course, the vast majority of murderers and paedos in the UK are not Muslim but the media NEVER write "Christian Paedo Rolf Harris/Gary Glitter" or "Hindu/Buddhist/Sikh/Catholic/Protestant/Spiritualist/Jewish Murderer x, y or z"
Why do they do this?
Because they are trying to appeal to other issues and make the story bigger than it is, selectively attaching crime and disgusting activity to the concept of Islam.  We will never see "Bungling Anglican Prime Minister David Cameron"

The second point - you answer yourself. People are attracted to their own communities and some people integrate better than others. But equally some Governments and local authorities use town planning to create minority communities artificially.

I don't think there are any examples of African communities in the UK attempting to force the practice of female genital mutilation on the indigenous community so I don't get what you're saying.

Wearing a burka should be a personal choice. At the other end of that scale, shouldn't 9 year old girls be banned from wearing make up, short skirts, gel bras etc? I personally find the sexualising of kids disgusting.

I think what's happening is that there are some people who believe in their own cultural heritage and wish to continue with it but their position is to ask to be left alone to get on with it. In return they will adopt our language and many of our cultural practices but not impose any of their own on us. In the scheme of things, Western culture has been imposed on others more than any - I'm still pissed off that my kids are half-American and one of them speaks with that annoying Australian thing where his voice rises and every sentence is like a question! We didn't wear baseball caps and trainers when I were a lad.

We may find many cultural practices unethical and undesirable but in Lancashire we eat dried pigs blood and internal organs and to many orientals we stink of stale dairy products. It's a matter of perception and willingness to understand the perspective of others and in doing so to show some tolerance and not impose values and practices too much.

So where do we draw the line? In the UK we do outlaw female genital mutilation - but not circumcision of male babies. We permit halal and kosher butchering techniques - and most indigenous people will eat halal meat - but we don't force people to eat black pudding or drop live lobsters into boiling water.

We might not like everything but that's a two way street and a bit of dialogue and tolerance could go a long way.

Just a quick point:

Male circumcision is done on religious grounds, but those grounds are founded in a belief that it improves personal hygiene. (Correctly, as it turns out.)

FGM is done to exert control and remove "ungodly thoughts" ie, female sex drive.

There's a massive difference.

Circumcision started during a time in which they simply couldn't have known what the results would have been. It started for the same reasons as female mutilation, to "purify" boys. And lessen their sexual desire. 

interesting note from the NHS. 

Most health professionals in England would argue that there are no medical reasons why an otherwise healthy baby boy should be circumcised. 



I wonder who the others are, probably Jewish doctors who lobby the government so they can continue the mutilating of children.