Another Round Begins in The Middle East

[chequita guevara]

Israel has now banned two Arab parties from running for the Knesset.

Israel Bans Arab Parties from Running in Upcoming
Elections

Associated Press January 12, 2009

_http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1054867.html_
(http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1054867.html)

The Central Elections Committee on Monday banned Arab
political parties from running in next month's
parliamentary elections, drawing accusations of racism
by an Arab lawmaker who said he would challenge the
decision in the country's Supreme Court.

The ruling, made by the body that oversees the
elections, reflected the heightened tensions between
Israel's Jewish majority and Arab minority caused by
Israel's offensive in the Gaza Strip. Israeli Arabs
have held a series of demonstrations against the
offensive.

Knesset spokesman Giora Pordes said the election
committee voted overwhelmingly in favor of the motion,
accusing the country's Arab parties of incitement,
supporting terrorist groups and refusing to recognize
Israel's right to exist. Arab lawmakers have traveled
to countries listed among Israel's staunchest enemies,
including Lebanon and Syria.

The 37-member committee is composed of representatives
from Israel's major political parties. The measure was
proposed by two ultranationalist parties but received
widespread support.

The decision does not affect Arab lawmakers in
predominantly Jewish parties or the country's communist
party, which has a mixed list of Arab and Jewish
candidates. Roughly one-fifth of Israel's 7 million
citizens are Arabs. Israeli Arabs enjoy full
citizenship rights, but have suffered from
discrimination and poverty for decades.

Arab lawmakers Ahmed Tibi and Jamal Zahalka, political
rivals who head the two Arab blocs in the Knesset,
joined together in condemning Monday's decision.

"It was a political trial led by a group of Fascists
and racists who are willing to see the Knesset without
Arabs and want to see the country without Arabs," said
Tibi.

Together, the Arab lists hold seven of the 120 seats in
the Knesset.

Tibi said he would appeal to the high court, while
Zahalka said his party was still deciding how to
proceed.

Pordes remarked that the last time a party was banned
it was the late Rabbi Meir Kahane's Kach Party, a list
from the 1980s that advocated the expulsion of Arabs
from Israel.

[Sirotnikov]

che has been touting Iranian democracy all along:

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5gzTzyMkBVuWOrOkjlgTIze3Qn8tA

TEHRAN (AFP) — The Iranian press watchdog shut down leading reformist newspaper Kargozaran on Wednesday over publication of a piece criticising Palestinian militants, the official IRNA news agency reported.

"Kargozaran has been banned over a media offence and the case has been referred to the court," Mohammad Parvizi, who is in charge of domestic media at the culture ministry, told IRNA.

He said the ban was ordered over "a piece yesterday which justifies the Zionist regime's crimes against humanity in Gaza and portrays the Palestinian resistance as terrorists who cause the deaths of children and civilians by taking up position in kindergartens and hospitals."

[...]

The paper, which started publication three years ago, has been a frequent target of attack from rival hardline media over its content, which has been perceived as hostile to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Under Ahmadinejad, Iranian newspapers, websites and news agencies of all political persuasions have been hit by a string of closures.

Iran is a staunch supporter of the Islamist Hamas movement which controls Gaza and does not recognise its archfoe Israel, which has been pounding the territory with a deadly air blitz for the past five days.

[Sirotnikov]

Yes, they faked this because they have such a dearth of child corpses in Gaza.

Maybe they've run out of ambu bags and IVs? Maybe there's actually no sense to do real CPR on someone who has exsanguinated, especially when the hospital has no IV fluids, blood, or an ICU? Of course, the AMA would say that doing a "slow code" on someone to satisfy the family when the medical staff knows that attempts to resuscitate the victim is futile is bad medicine and perhaps unethical, but something tells me those guys are outside of the AMA's jurisdiction.

Or maybe the filmakers aren't soldiers and haven't the slightest idea what kind of ordinance was used?

Or maybe they had an already dead kid and a short background story was invented to accompany pictures of him, and the doctors agreed to the stage up?

This would not be first for palywood and not a first for the palestinian medical system that has a proven record of attributing unrelated child deaths to Israel actions occuring nearby.

[Sirotnikov]

Again, the Arab High Commission was never a representative body, but instead an early Palestinian resistance group. How foolish was it to ask them to give approval to the very events they feared, the deliberate carving up of Palestine in order to create a state in which they would be guarenteed minority status?

What the hell?

Your whole original argument relied on the fact that there was supposedly all these Europeans carving up Israel at the Jews' behest and no one asked the Palestinians. That has been decimated.

I have proved that there was infact a body accepted by the international community as well as by local arab population that has loyally presented the arab interests, and that the body was consulted and his input (when present) was taken into account, thus decimating your argument.

You're raising red herrings by raising immaterial arguments as to the nature of their selection for representatives, and then you claim that it is foolish to consult them in discussion regarding potential partition because they are loyal to the Palestinian point of view? Are you serious???

Interesting, you accuse Morris and Shlaim of not providing explicit rebuttal, then provide examples of explicit discussion, but so carved up as to make it impossilbe for the me to discern Morris' and Shlaim's original meaning.

Obviously a rebuttal to a rebuttal relies on the fact that someone has read at least some version of the original text.

You're welcome to read Karsh's original articles (such as the links I brought and there are more in the wiki on Karsh) which deal with their claims fully and demonstrate clearly for anyone how Morris and Shlaim mislead, misquoted and omitted words which countered what ever they tried to prove.
Karsh's book is also 80% watchable on google books.

Morris's

It's a question of your will to actually read the texts for yourself, and not have it chewed up for you.

Anyway, the important thing is the result of this current campaigns, like the last one in Lebanon, and the last previous few. You (Israel) are losing us. Israel is losing previous supporters in the US and Europe. If that's what Israel wants, then so be it. The question is, will Israel run out of supporters before the Palestinians do, and if the power on their side begins to rise will Israel have the will to use those last final weapons? If Israel does use them, what will Israel be?

Israel never had as much supporters as it would appear.

Most people just want to hear of no news, and once there's a commotion they seek for someone to blame.

Obviously Israel is doing a poor job of explaining itself, and the Palestinians are doing a wonderful job in propaganda, especially palestinians in the ranks of news agencies photographers and so on.

[Dr Strangelove]

Oh great, now it's the media bias, Israel has been taken over by Newt Gingrich, Dan Quayle, Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter.

[chequita guevara]

Israel isn't just defended by children with access to the most powerful weaponry in the world. It's also defended by children with computers, who scower the internet to obfuscate about everything.

[Sirotnikov]

Oh great, now it's the media bias, Israel has been taken over by Newt Gingrich, Dan Quayle, Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter.

I happily accept your concession of defeat to the rest of my arguments, since you evaded them.

As to the media bias - quit putting words in my mouth. I blamed Israeli inefficiency and unprofessionalism in public diplomacy, compared to the palestinian prowess.

The Palestinians are running a grass roots campaign for over a decade now, and they easily have the upper hand. Israeli bureaucracy is incredibly inefficient and lacks proper skills or ways of thinking to deal with that.

I'm rather sad that Israel is not good at manipulating world media as the pals are. Palestinian organizations get their people operating local news agencies. Palestinian organizations record everything they do, edit it, and post viral and effective propoganda. Israeli officials are busy in their interlocked bureaucracy to get a clip running. And then they would post it in proprietary format with a huge Israeli logo on top.

Chubby Israeli foreign affairs officials are busy eating cheap pastry, or fighting over air time on places like FOX that are already pro-Israeli while abandoning hundreds of more important arenas.




As to your "retort" regarding the media role - I'll bite. The existence of stupid radical pro-Israelis does not improve the situation regarding the existence of stupid radical anti-Israelis. Most importantly, the fact that most news editors don't give a damn and simply cut and past shallow, repetitive and inexact reports makes them easy to manipulate.

As an example - attacks on Israel that are either unsuccessful or foiled at the last moment always go under the radar. If Israel responds it's always covered, often giving a false impression of unprovoked aggression.

[Sirotnikov]

Israel isn't just defended by children with access to the most powerful weaponry in the world. It's also defended by children with computers, who scower the internet to obfuscate about everything.

Hey, I know you.
Aren't you the guy who swore bush is crazy and wants to attack Iran, and then refused to accept defeat because his presidency isn't technically over?

Furthermore, aren't you the guy that argued that joining WWII to fight against Nazi Germany was an immoral choice, and that WWII war veterans were immoral because they didn't refuse to fight?

Yeah, I'll want to take more advice from you.

[Kidlicious]

I happily accept your concession of defeat to I'm rather sad that Israel is not good at manipulating world media as the pals are.

They don't need to manipulate world media. All they have to do is stop being dumb asses who look like their trying to kill every last civilian. Then they'll have more influence with the world media.

[TCO]

sadly, no.

with the hostility level today, and the complete political and social differences between them and Israelis, this would amount to destroying Israel.

Hmmm...you didn't evict them, but you won't let them come back. And there were hostilities and they left...and you think they just left for a vacation. :loco:

[Kidlicious]

A lot of reports of Israel using phosphorus bombs on civilians.




Israel: Stop Unlawful Use of White Phosphorus in Gaza
Chemical ‘Obscurant' Poses Serious Risk to Civilians
January 10, 2009
White phosphorous can burn down houses and cause horrific burns when it touches the skin. Israel should not use it in Gaza's densely populated areas.
Marc Garlasco, senior military analyst at Human Rights Watch
Related Materials: Israel: Gaza Ground Offensive Raises Laws of War Concerns
Q & A on Israel’s Use of White Phosphorus in Gaza
Other Material: Human Rights Watch reporting on the current Israel/Gaza conflict(Jerusalem, January 10, 2009) - Israel should stop using white phosphorus in military operations in densely populated areas of Gaza, Human Rights Watch said today. On January 9 and 10, 2009, Human Rights Watch researchers in Israel observed multiple air-bursts of artillery-fired white phosphorus over what appeared to be the Gaza City/Jabaliya area.

Israel appeared to be using white phosphorus as an "obscurant" (a chemical used to hide military operations), a permissible use in principle under international humanitarian law (the laws of war). However, white phosphorus has a significant, incidental, incendiary effect that can severely burn people and set structures, fields, and other civilian objects in the vicinity on fire. The potential for harm to civilians is magnified by Gaza's high population density, among the highest in the world.

"White phosphorous can burn down houses and cause horrific burns when it touches the skin," said Marc Garlasco, senior military analyst at Human Rights Watch. "Israel should not use it in Gaza's densely populated areas."

Human Rights Watch believes that the use of white phosphorus in densely populated areas of Gaza violates the requirement under international humanitarian law to take all feasible precautions to avoid civilian injury and loss of life. This concern is amplified given the technique evidenced in media photographs of air-bursting white phosphorus projectiles. Air bursting of white phosphorus artillery spreads 116 burning wafers over an area between 125 and 250 meters in diameter, depending on the altitude of the burst, thereby exposing more civilians and civilian infrastructure to potential harm than a localized ground burst.

Since the beginning of Israel's ground offensive in Gaza on January 3, 2009, there have been numerous media reports about the possible use of white phosphorous by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). The IDF told both Human Rights Watch and news reporters that it is not using white phosphorus in Gaza. On January 7, an IDF spokesman told CNN, "I can tell you with certainty that white phosphorus is absolutely not being used."

[Naked Gents Rut]

Whiskey Pete

Both effective in combat and at exposing people who know jack **** about warfare.

[Sirotnikov]

Hmmm...you didn't evict them, but you won't let them come back. And there were hostilities and they left...and you think they just left for a vacation. :loco:

not such a good troll. but a nice attempt (re: "left for vacation" etc).

the fact we didn't evict people doesn't mean we're actually best buds.

[Sirotnikov]

Whiskey Pete

Both effective in combat and at exposing people who know jack **** about warfare.

willie pete.

[Sirotnikov]

A lot of reports of Israel using phosphorus bombs on civilians.
[...]

Israel appeared to be using white phosphorus as an "obscurant" (a chemical used to hide military operations), a permissible use in principle under international humanitarian law (the laws of war).

[...]

This concern is amplified given the technique evidenced in media photographs of air-bursting white phosphorus projectiles. Air bursting of white phosphorus artillery spreads 116 burning wafers over an area between 125 and 250 meters in diameter, depending on the altitude of the burst, thereby exposing more civilians and civilian infrastructure to potential harm than a localized ground burst.
[...]

For everyone's education:

White Phosphorus (WP) - Smoke

White Phosphorus (WP) creates a smoke screen as it burns. Phosphorus smokes are generated by a variety of munitions. Some of these munitions such as the M825 (155-mm round) may, on explosion, distribute particles of incompletely oxidized white phosphorus.

Smokes obscure vision and are used to hide troops, equipment, and areas from detection. Smoke screens are essential for movement in city fighting. In the December 1994 battle for Grozny in Chechnya, every fourth or fifth Russian artillery or mortar round fired was a smoke or white phosphorus round.

White Phosphorus and Red Phosphorus burn to produce a hygroscopic smoke containing phosphoric acids. Red phosphorus (RP) is not nearly as reactive as white phosphorus. It reacts slowly with atmospheric moisture and the smoke does not produce thermal injury, hence the smoke is less toxic. The extinction for these smokes is primarily due to scattering in the visible and absorption in the infrared (IR). These smokes are composed of spherical liquid particles that grow with relative humidity to an equilibrium size by absorbing ambient moisture that depends on the ambient relative humidity. The mass extinction varies significantly with relative humidity.

The White Phosphorus flame produces a hot, dense white smoke composed of particles of phosphorus pentoxide, which are converted by moist air into phosphoric acid. This acid, depending on concentration and duration of exposure, may produce a variety of topically irritative injuries.

Most smokes are not hazardous in concentrations which are useful for obscuring purposes. However, any smoke can be hazardous to health if the concentration is sufficient or if the exposure is long enough. Medical personnel should be prepared to treat potential reactions to military smokes once such smokes have been introduced to the battlefield. Exposure to heavy smoke concentrations for extended periods (particularly if near the source of emission) may cause illness or even death.

Casualties from WP smoke have not occurred in combat operations. At room temperature, white phosphorus is somewhat volatile and may produce a toxic inhalational injury. In moist air, the phosphorus pentoxide produces phosphoric acid. This acid, depending on concentration and duration of exposure, may produce a variety of topically irritative injuries. Irritation of the eyes and irritation of the mucous membranes are the most commonly seen injuries. These complaints remit spontaneously with the soldier's removal from the exposure site. With intense exposures, a very explosive cough may occur, which renders gas mask adjustment difficult. There are no reported deaths resulting from exposure to phosphorus smokes. Generally, treatment of WP smoke irritation is unnecessary. Spontaneous recovery is rapid.

White phosphorus fume can cause severe eye irritation with blepharospasm, photophobia, and lacrimation. Irritation of the eyes and irritation of the mucous membranes are the most commonly seen injuries. These complaints remit spontaneously with the soldier's removal from the exposure site. The WP smoke irritates the eyes and nose in moderate concentrations. With intense exposures, a very explosive cough may occur, which renders gas mask adjustment difficult. There are no reported deaths resulting from exposure to phosphorus smokes.

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/munitions/wp.htm