The Middle East Continues...

[MOBIUS]

Originally posted by BlackCat
all you claim is that people (especially the isrealis) shall bend over and accept what comes

Time and again I've given my opinions on what should be done, which you choose to ignore lest it change your prejudiced views of me...

Yeah the holiday was brilliant: France, Spain and Andorra - all with beautiful weather.

[BlackCat]

Originally posted by MOBIUS


Time and again I've given my opinions on what should be done, which you choose to ignore lest it change your prejudiced views of me...

Nah, I don't ignore your pov's - actually I start smiling when I see that you have responded in a thread - I know that I probably are laughing highly after reading

I often suspect that your RL first name must be Neville.

Yeah the holiday was brilliant: France, Spain and Andorra - all with beautiful weather.

Guess you kept a low profile - none of the mentioned regions are in flames Did you go to Barcelona ? I've had the pleasure to visit it a bit outside tourist season and I liked it.

[Lord Avalon]

In south Lebanon village, Sunni Muslims express disdain for Hezbollah

By TODD PITMAN Associated Press Writer
2006-08-26

MARWAHEEN, Lebanon (AP) - They pushed, shoved, shouted and cursed one another.

In the end, posters of Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah would not be plastered around this tiny Sunni Muslim village in southern Lebanon mourning the loss of 23 of its own, slain in an Israeli air attack during the monthlong war with Hezbollah.

"Why do you want to put up an image of someone who is killing us?" one man screamed as a mob of dozens waved their fists and thrust open palms toward Nasrallah supporters clutching posters of the bearded and bespectacled Hezbollah chief. "We don't want to see it!"

Though everyone here blames Israel for the 23 deaths, many place equal blame on Hezbollah for bringing their fighters into the region and drawing Israeli fire.

Such displays of anger illustrate the complexities of a nation where Shiite, Sunni, Christian and Druse beliefs exist in a tumultuous mix that boiled over during Lebanon's 1975-1990 civil war.

Open criticism of Hezbollah is rare in predominantly Shiite Muslim south Lebanon, where yellow Hezbollah flags fly over demolished houses and posters of Nasrallah adorn almost every utility pole and shop. Anger is more common in a handful of Christian villages where residents blame Hezbollah, and its capture of two Israeli soldiers July 12, for Israeli reprisals that destroyed large swaths of this country.

The region's Sunni minority is split into pro- and anti-Hezbollah pockets, but here in Marwaheen, anger has welled up since the July 15 killings of 23 civilians fleeing artillery and rocket duels between the Israeli army and Hezbollah guerrillas, who had taken up positions in their midst. After fierce clashes that shook the hills here, homes and storefronts are plastered almost exclusively with posters of assassinated former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, who had deep support here, and that of his son, Saad Hariri, who heads the largest voting bloc in parliament.

Three days after the war began July 12, Israeli forces issued a call via loudspeakers for residents to evacuate Marwaheen, and one group of 27 residents sought refuge at a U.N. base in the village, but were turned away. Fleeing town, their convoy was struck by artillery from an Israeli gunboat that had crept along Lebanon's coast.

Twenty-three people were killed by the strike, and in an assault by an Israeli helicopter gunship that followed minutes later. Only four survived.

The dead could not be buried until the fighting stopped a month later.

As the bodies were brought in coffins from a morgue in Tyre on Thursday, Hezbollah supporters wanted their own flags flown atop the vehicles, partly for the media to see, said Adel Abdallah, who lost several relatives in the attack.

An argument broke out, and it was decided that vehicles carrying only eight of the 23 coffins would fly the flags, he said. The rest took another road to Marwaheen, so they would not be associated with vehicles carrying Hezbollah flags.

Some of the eight were buried wrapped in Hezbollah flags, but the majority were lowered into the earth with their coffins draped in Lebanon's national flag, emblazoned with a cedar tree.

"Nobody wants Hezbollah here," Adel Abdallah said. "They don't want to fight for Lebanon. They fight for themselves, for Iran, for Syria."

When the war broke out, residents said several Hezbollah fighters in civilian clothes entered the village and set up rocket launchers that were fired south toward Israel. They moved them around, and one was set for a time on top of a house that was subsequently destroyed.

A teenage girl who was in Marwaheen for the first three days of the war said she saw a Hezbollah fighter set up a rocket launcher with a timer on a nearby hillside, and then run to the other side of the village near her home, taking refuge between civilian houses.

Streaks of red light crossed the sky as the launcher fired a volley into Israel, and minutes later, Israel returned fire and huge explosions tore through the launch site, she said.

"We begged them to leave," the girl said, declining to be named because she feared retribution from Hezbollah. "We told them, 'Get out! We have children here. We don't want anybody to get hurt.' But they ignored us."

Wassim Abdallah, a 24-year-old who was in Beirut during the fighting, said Hezbollah fighters did not hurt anyone, but that one burst into his aunt's home. "She pleaded for him to go away, but he put a gun to her head and told her to shut up," he said.

The woman later died in the July 15 strike, and Wassim said surviving relatives who had been in the home recounted the story.

Hezbollah fighters have abandoned Marwaheen, but a white minivan incinerated by an airstrike stands beside a mosque here. Residents said it used to contain several rockets and a launcher that were removed, ostensibly by the guerrillas. What appeared to be a rocket tube covered with a green camouflage tarp lay dumped in a thicket beside an adjacent wall.

A few blocks away, what residents described as a weapons depot belonging to Hezbollah lay destroyed. The stone house's roof had collapsed onto a pile of rubble, out from which peeked rocket-propelled grenades, mortar tubes and a dark green box that apparently once stored ammunition.

"Nobody knew they were using our houses to store weapons. We were surprised to find them" after the war, Wassim said. "How could they keep weapons in the middle of all these civilian houses?"

[Sikander]

Originally posted by Jaakko

Evacuate? Israel "evacuating" Lebanese civilians? Try more like "get the **** out of town or we'll kill you too". Expand that to your pet concept of depopulation, and it's functionally indistinguishable from ethnic cleansing.

Yes, even if you allow any survivors to return once you've killed the rest.

This might describe something that some would rationally define as a "war-crime", but ethnic cleansing is definitely not it. No one else is leaping to your defense here, could it be that you are plainly wrong?

[Sikander]

Originally posted by GePap

The convention is there to protect individuals, not just parties. That HIzbullah is not a party is irrelevant, as the people of southern Lebanon are human beings (last time I checked) and thus covered.

As for MAD, yes, IF IT OCCURED, it would be a gross violation of the conventions. It hasn't occured, and therefore irrelevant.

That's really weak. So you have no problem with decades of planning and billions of dollars spent by a number of states on nuclear deterence, all of which if ever implemented would be a violation of the Geneva conventions that would dwarf all previous violations? I can't imagine a more effective use for the time of such an empassioned defender of the Geneva conventions like yourself than dedicating your life to the elimination of these systems. Yet I don't recall you ever mentioning nuclear weapons in this regard. Instead we get the bland - planning and preparing are no big deal routine.

Or perhaps everyone realizes that the Geneva accords are a luxury that will be ignored at varying levels of threat to one's existence. Nuclear annihilation is only the most obvious example of a situation where no one is going to seriously going consider what the Geneva conventions have to say on the matter. The Geneva conventions were never designed to be a shield for those who have nothing but disdain for them to hide behind. And it doesn't take an arsenal of nuclear weapons to constitute an existential threat to an individual or a nation. You seem very ready to see Israeli soldiers die for the sanctity of the Geneva conventions. What sort of sacrifice would you be willing to endure for them?

Originally posted by GePap

Read the report, this is more than adequately covered, as far as Israel's reponsibility ujnder the Geneva convention. The behavior of the US in Iraq is a good counterpoint. The insurgents in Iraq also have no "military infrastructure". When the uS wanted to clear out insurgents in Fallujah, they went in on foot, and while there was widespread damage to homes in the City, the US idd not do the same type of indiscriminate shelling, using of cluster munitions in civilian areas, and mass bombings of basic civilian infrastructure that Israel has done.

The fact guerilla movements blend into the population does NOT give a government carte blanche to kill civlians or destroy their populations. It forces the government to be more carefull, and have to bear the higher cost of those precautions.

I'm not saying that Israel has carte blanche to destroy populations. What I am saying is that no state should have to risk its own survival in order to unilaterally adhere to the conventions. The fact that the most powerful states on the planet maintain nuclear arsenals in order to forestall potential enemies from gaining this sort of advantage is proof of this concept.

This begs the question of whether Hizb. is an existential threat to Israel. Few would say that alone it is, but it does not exist in a vaccum. Iran, Syria, the Palestinians have to factored into any potential war scheme, as does a Muslim Brotherhood dominated Egypt should such a thing come to pass. A concerted effort by Hizb. and the Palestinians to launch rockets into Israel's population centers would force the Israeli army to deploy in a costly ground campaign to defend itself, leaving it significantly weaker to deal with other more powerful potential adversaries. I am willing to excuse some some violations of the Geneva conventions, as I don't see a wider war as all that unlikely. It is certainly reasonable to disagree. There is no bullet proof calculus that can prove one point or the other.

Originally posted by GePap

THat "sending a message" was the crime, because what you describe is collective punishment, something the Geneva Convention bans. Good to see you do agree.

Sending a message can be the most humanitarian of gestures if it forestalls an even greater escalation of a conflict. Sanctions send a message and are a form of collective punishment, yet they have been used time and again by the international community, and sometimes they are imposed by force. Warfare in most instances is itself collective punishment.

[GePap]

Originally posted by Sikander


That's really weak. So you have no problem with decades of planning and billions of dollars spent by a number of states on nuclear deterence, all of which if ever implemented would be a violation of the Geneva conventions that would dwarf all previous violations? I can't imagine a more effective use for the time of such an empassioned defender of the Geneva conventions like yourself than dedicating your life to the elimination of these systems. Yet I don't recall you ever mentioning nuclear weapons in this regard. Instead we get the bland - planning and preparing are no big deal routine.

I fully support the call within the NPT to ban all nuclear weapons. I am not a fool thought, and I see no concrete moves by any nuclear state to get rid of their weapons, not international pressure to do so, nothing. I believe in the Geneva convention, not in charging at windmills.

Or perhaps everyone realizes that the Geneva accords are a luxury that will be ignored at varying levels of threat to one's existence. Nuclear annihilation is only the most obvious example of a situation where no one is going to seriously going consider what the Geneva conventions have to say on the matter. The Geneva conventions were never designed to be a shield for those who have nothing but disdain for them to hide behind. And it doesn't take an arsenal of nuclear weapons to constitute an existential threat to an individual or a nation. You seem very ready to see Israeli soldiers die for the sanctity of the Geneva conventions. What sort of sacrifice would you be willing to endure for them?

Whatever sacrifice the polity I inhabit is willing to pay for them, and the US has paid for them plenty already in Iraq, as our behavior, while not stellar or spotless is a sight better than Israel's behavior in Lebanon.

I find it beyond ludicrous for anyone to claim that 6000 men with 12000 artillery rockets is in ANY way an "exietntial threat" to a state with nuclear weapons, a modern airforce, and an army of 120,000, and the vast and widespread devastation in lebanon is far out of any proportion not only to the basic provocation, but to the inherent threat posed by Hizbullah to Israel.

I'm not saying that Israel has carte blanche to destroy populations. What I am saying is that no state should have to risk its own survival in order to unilaterally adhere to the conventions. The fact that the most powerful states on the planet maintain nuclear arsenals in order to forestall potential enemies from gaining this sort of advantage is proof of this concept.

Israel was never for a single second in anything even remotely close to an existential threat. It is again, beyond ludicrous to claim so, so beyond ludicrous as to beg immidate psychiatric evaluation.

This begs the question of whether Hizb. is an existential threat to Israel. Few would say that alone it is, but it does not exist in a vaccum. Iran, Syria, the Palestinians have to factored into any potential war scheme, as does a Muslim Brotherhood dominated Egypt should such a thing come to pass. A concerted effort by Hizb. and the Palestinians to launch rockets into Israel's population centers would force the Israeli army to deploy in a costly ground campaign to defend itself, leaving it significantly weaker to deal with other more powerful potential adversaries. I am willing to excuse some some violations of the Geneva conventions, as I don't see a wider war as all that unlikely. It is certainly reasonable to disagree. There is no bullet proof calculus that can prove one point or the other.

Even in that "full system" you describe, NO, hisbullah is not in any sense an existential threat. The rockets being used by the Palestinians are primitive and incapable of anything but chance damage. Even Hizbullah's rockets are of purely tactical value. As for Israel's need to use its ground forces, bull. Israel faces one single conventional threat on its borders, Syria, and Syria would have to attack a heavily fortified uphill position in the face of superior Israeli air power. THat is discounting the fact that israel would be backed and fully re-armed by the world's sole superpower. The basic conventional calculus is heavily in Israel's favor.

And did more than just a "few" violations of the Geneva Convention. It indfiscriminately flattened neighborhoods and whole villages and cause immense damage to infrastructure all over Lebanon, in a campaign of collective punishment, something Israel is sadly too fond of using.

Sending a message can be the most humanitarian of gestures if it forestalls an even greater escalation of a conflict. Sanctions send a message and are a form of collective punishment, yet they have been used time and again by the international community, and sometimes they are imposed by force. Warfare in most instances is itself collective punishment.

Warfare is not collective punishment at all, unless you speak fo total warfare, and it is that kind of indiscriminate warfare that the world is trying to curb after its taste of it in the mid-20th century.

I am no fan of sanctions, specially the fully punitive kind like those placed on Iraq in the 90's, which do nothing whatsoever to weaken regimes. Sanctions placed solely on regimes are fine by me, as long as the damage to the civilian population is limited.

[Edan]

A poll taken at the end of the war shows 51% want Hezbollah Disarmed, 49% against

The poll by IPSOS for the French-language daily L'Orient-Le Jour found 51 percent of respondents supported the group's disarmament, with 49 percent against, a difference within the survey's margin of error.

However, the poll found a wide divergence of views among Lebanon's various religious communities.

Among the Shiite community -- Lebanon's largest and the support base for Hezbollah -- the poll found 84 percent of respondents wanted the group to keep its weapons.

But among the Druze and Christian communities, 79 percent and 77 percent respectively wanted the group to surrender its arsenal.

Among the Sunni community, the poll found a slender majority of 54 percent in favor of the group disarming.

[SlowwHand]

I hope Bush accepts the challenge.

Ahmadinejad challenges Bush to TV debate

By Parisa Hafezi
2 hours, 1 minute ago

TEHRAN (Reuters) - President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Tuesday challenged
President Bush to a televised debate and voiced defiance as a deadline neared for
Iran to halt work the West fears is a step toward building nuclear bombs.

"Peaceful nuclear energy is the right of the Iranian nation. The Iranian nation has chosen that based upon international regulations, it wants to use it and no one can stop it," he told a news conference.

The White House said Ahmadinejad's call for a presidential debate on global concerns was a "diversion" from international concerns over Iran's nuclear program.

The
U.N. Security Council has given Iran until Thursday to suspend uranium enrichment -- a process which can produce fuel for civilian reactors or explosive material for warheads -- and has threatened sanctions unless it does so.

"Talk of a debate is just a diversion from the legitimate concerns that the international community, not just the U.S., has about Iran's behavior -- from support for terrorism to pursuit of a nuclear weapons capability," White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said in New Orleans.

Ahmadinejad said Iran had laid out a framework for talks in its reply to an offer by six world powers of incentives in exchange for a suspension of enrichment. That framework provided an "exceptional opportunity" to solve the nuclear dispute.

Asked specifically if Iran would halt enrichment, even for a short period, he replied: "In that (Iran's response to the six-nation offer) we announced that any kind of dialogue should be based upon the certain rights of the Iranian nation."

Ahmadinejad condemned the U.S. and British roles in the world since World War Two.

"Isn't it time that international relations are founded on democracy and equal rights of the nations?"

"I suggest holding a live TV debate with Mr. George W. Bush to talk about world affairs and the ways to solve those issues," he said.

"The debate should be go uncensored in order for the American people to be able to listen to what we say and they should not restrict the American people from hearing the truth."

Ahmadinejad brushed off calls by the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., John Bolton, for sanctions if Tehran ignores the deadline.

"Bolton is free to say whatever he wants ... our nation is a strong nation. A nation that has been able to attain the nuclear fuel cycle with its bare hands can solve any other problems."

He also Iran would consider renewing ties with the United States but said it was up to Washington to act after cutting relations shortly after the 1979 Islamic revolution.

"They cut the relations themselves and they themselves should prepare the ground for (restoring ties)," he said.

MAJOR POWERS DIVIDED

Washington has called for a swift response if Iran does not meet the deadline. But analysts say divisions at the
United Nations about how to handle Iran's file could delay such a move.

Iran has shown no sign it will halt enrichment. The world's fourth largest oil exporter has shrugged off the threat of sanctions and said such a move would simply push oil prices up to intolerable levels for industrialized economies.

Oil dipped below $70 a barrel on Tuesday, but worries about the nuclear standoff have curbed selling.

Ahmadinejad is not the highest authority in Iran but his comments chime with remarks by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has the final say and who has insisted Iran will press ahead with its pursuit of nuclear technology.

Iran insists it has the right to enrich uranium under international treaty. Western diplomats argue it only has that right if it proves its intentions are peaceful.

Iran has said it is ready for immediate talks on its atomic plans but has refused to suspend enrichment before talks start, which was proposed in the package of incentives offered by the United States, China, Russia, France, Britain and Germany.

Russia and China, big trading partners of Iran who have veto powers in the U.N. Security Council, may oppose sanctions moves.

[Lord Avalon]

Originally posted by SlowwHand
I hope Bush accepts the challenge.

I can just see Ahmadinejad going off on an off-topic rant and not paying attention to the moderator when told his time is up.

And Bush would flub up and sound like an because he's not in front of an audience of pre-screened Americans.

[SlowwHand]

At the most, we'd see a "Huh?" look on his face.

[Arrian]

And Bush would flub up and sound like an [idiot] because he's not in front of an audience of pre-screened Americans.

He does that even in front of audiences of pre-screened Americans.

-Arrian

[Sirotnikov]

Originally posted by MOBIUS

Originally posted by Sirotnikov
After all, who can withstand it when Mobious is proven right once again, by the same journalists that shape his opnion in the first place?

Hey Loserboy...

Even your own soldiers are protesting...

So, do you think that Olmert, Halutz and Peretz should stay in office, or go after their handling of the war?

Ouch.

I'm hurt.

I hit the spot so much that you had to employ not one but 2 different evasion tactics!!

1. You insult me trying to provoke a response.

2. You throw in a strawman, that has nothing to do with what I said.


I'll bite and respond that:

In general : the soldier's protest has nothing to do with your pathetic plights or opinions.

None of the protesting soldiers have so far expressed an opnion similar to yours. Quite clear since none of them justify terrorist methods or hate Israel.

Their protests is about poor handling of the war - as in "not being harsh enough" or not being well enough prepared for the fight.


As for my specific opinion:

a) I think the army was not always prepared as well as it should have been, given what was known.

b) There were mistakes and errors during the handling of the war, on tactical and strategical levels. Many of them methodic and systematic in army routine. Some are the blame of several personas.

c) Some of the errors might have been the fault of the top echelons - the government and the high command.

As a serving officer I shouldn't really judge or publicly criticise the political echelons (or the chief of staff).


I already speak my mind here more than I should on many occassions.

I think that the servicemen are right to feel what they do, and that their protest is legitimate and important for Israeli democracy and Israeli future.

[SlowwHand]

Siro, in regard to Mobius, what's the Yiddish word for dumbass?

[Sirotnikov]

I find it beyond ludicrous for anyone to claim that 6000 men with 12000 artillery rockets is in ANY way an "exietntial threat" to a state with nuclear weapons, a modern airforce, and an army of 120,000, and the vast and widespread devastation in lebanon is far out of any proportion not only to the basic provocation, but to the inherent threat posed by Hizbullah to Israel.

While Israel is ofcourse a "great and mighty" country ;-) the Hezbullah threat has infact been very effective.

It has caused up to 500,000 people to flee south, and the rest 500,000 were locked in bomb shelters. It has for a month, effectively devastated normal life and commerce north of Hadera.

This is a much more "existential" threat than a full blown short war with Syria, becase it is much more devastating to the economical, social and political structures in Israel.

Terrorism is much more effective than war. It is widely known in the middle east and has been directing Palestinian, Syrian and Iranian politics for decades now.

And did more than just a "few" violations of the Geneva Convention. It indfiscriminately flattened neighborhoods and whole villages and cause immense damage to infrastructure all over Lebanon, in a campaign of collective punishment, something Israel is sadly too fond of using.

Not true.

You throw around the word "flattening villages" too lightly.

Many villages have many buildings destroyed which were tied or suspected of having been tied to the war. Any building which is a suspected military target can and should be targetted.

Many houses were indeed attacked, but I promise you this does not equal flattening of villages, which is actually in Israel's power.

Just like not every killing of many people is a massacare, not every large bombing campaign is "carpet bombing". You should really study more about warfare and get a sense of scale. Perhaps get a sense in general

As far as infrastructure targetted - Israel has only targetted relevant military use infrastructure such as roads, bridges and airports . No electricity, water or industry targets were hit that I know of.

[Sirotnikov]

Originally posted by SlowwHand
Siro, in regard to Mobius, what's the Yiddish word for dumbass?

I hope it is "banned"