Latest Middle East Thread

[BeBMan]

Just curious, the OP has 4x "success" and 3x "fail", so 4 : 3 pro Israel, so why does the thread title not match the assessment?

[SlowwHand]

Because Mobius is a dickhead?

[Ming]

Now now Sloww... none of the personal stuff.
Attack the arguments, and not the posters.

[DaShi]

Why don't you pat him on the head, while you're at it.

[Q Classic]

I still don't see what the problem is with nuking the whole region and then putting it under Chinese stewardship.

[Guardian]

The blockade came as a response to continued Qassam rockets, the kidnapping of an Israeli soldier from within Israeli territory, and continuous terrorist attacks on the crossings to Gaza, by Palestinian militants.

Yes, it did.
However, I firmly believe the blockade to have been a totally stupid and counterproductive response because it's been directed against the entire population of Gaza and not specifically against the mlilitants. Yes, I know you've been letting humanitarian aid convoys through and all that, but people can't live on humanitarian aid alone. Besides, most ordinary people don't want charities. They want an honest day's work. Israel says if you live on Gaza, you can't have that - and you also can't go anywhere else. I don't find it so strange if a few Gazans feel a bit pissed off about that.

On the other hand, I also think it's incredibly stupid of the militants to keep firing rockets and crap.

Hence my original comment in the first thread suggesting that plain stupidity on both sides triggered the current crisis.

[MOBIUS]

I think that Israel has a complex balance sheet.
We most clearly defeated Hamas, and will likely face an opponent much less prone to wild adventures for the next year or two. Notice how they try to save face by proclaiming Israel has a week to withdraw on its own "or else". They chose a week because they assume Israel will be out in a week anyway.

No, you most clearly FAILED to defeat Hamas because your most important objective - that of stopping Hamas from striking Southern Israel with rockets was not achieved.

FAIL!

We could have easily achieved absolute and photographic victory. We were hours away from entering Gaza, arresting the Hamas leaders and trying / deporting them.

If you were only hours away from 'completing' what was a 22 day operation, why did you not finish the job if it was so close to your grasp?

FAIL!

We avoided that for two main reasons:
1) international pressure to stop the incursion
2) the complexity of who will be in charge of the strip after Hamas is gone, which no one is willing to handle, and we don't want the honor either.

You failed for one main reason. Cowardice in the face of a failed gamble.

The Israeli government expected Hamas to back down in the face of overwhelming firepower. I bet they figured Hamas would seek a truce after the first wave of attacks, but they miscalculated gravely.

1) If Israel cared even the slightest about international pressure, it wouldn't have started this cluster**** in the first place. Clearly Israel's only chance of success once Hamas refused to buckle was by taking over Gaza street by street, house by house. Hamas called Israel's bluff when they realised it didn't have the stomach for the number of Israeli body bags that that would entail.

2) One of Israel's other (failed) objectives was the destruction of Hamas - how can you now say keeping Hamas in power in Gaza was preferable to someone else!!??? Seriously Siro, your excuses for Israel's failures are so far fetched as to beggar belief!

FAIL!

We are sitting close on the Gaza suburbs, and we have so far annihilated any resistance Hamas has tried to put up. Overwhelming fire power, good intelligence and a good combat engineering force meant that we disamred all of the traps, and there were hundreds of them.

We were fully able to stroll inside Gaza and take what we want, and Hamas was clearly demonstrated to be much weaker than it claimed.

Yes, interesting use of the word 'annihilated'...

You annihilated entire blocks of Gaza, then you strolled into those blasted areas of rubble. That is hardly the same as actually taking a city intact from an enemy. Short of razing the entire enclave to the ground and killing virtually its entire population, Israel would have never 'succeeded' using these tactics.

Clearly Israel was too afraid to engage Hamas without embarking on a scorched earth policy of 'total war'.

FAIL!

The Hamas rocket force is decimated.

'Decimated'?

Israel only destroyed 10% of Hamas' rocket force!!? Your failure grows worse with each of your increasingly inept attempts at justifying your nation's embarrassing failure...

Are you sure this 10% wasn't the hundreds of rockets that Hamas fired during Israel's attempts to stop them?

That is like claiming that "Israel destroyed Hamas' rockets because they blew up when they landed in Israel!" Your arguments are getting surreal in their absurdity!

FAIL!

The Hamas military wing has fled into hiding

Clearly they were protecting their families! Would you blame them when Israel thinks it is acceptable to kill 4 women and 12 children just to kill one Hamas leader!!???

The political response Hamas will surely face from the civilian population for dragging them into a conflict is yet to come in the following weeks.

Indeed, they will further tighten their grip on power just as the population that survived Israel's slaughter in Lebanon rallied around Hezbollah!!!

FAIL!

on the other hand, we didn't manage (yet) to bring about the freedom of Gilad Shalit.

Frankly I am surprised Hamas resisted the temptation to slit his throat and dump his body in face of Israel's advancing troops.

FAIL!

And we have proven poor aiming ability with regards to artillery fire, as well as improper consideration for UN areas, which should be kept to a higher standard, and caused unnecessary risk to already suffering refugees.

Really? So after all this time defending Israel's 'precision' strikes, you now claim your army can't aim for ****? Which is it, Siro, Hamas was firing from all those schools, Mosques, Ambulances, UN buildings, hospitals OR that you are now claiming that they are incompetent!!?

You can't have it both ways!

EPIC FAIL!!!

[Darius871]

What a child.

[Q Classic]

The thing with precision weaponry is that you have to know what you're shooting, first.

The weapons are usually quite precise--whatever they're aimed at, they'll pretty much hit.

Whether the target was accurate or not is another matter--does the tupperware factory look like a ammo factory?

(Yes, I realize I'm using the more scientific definitions of accuracy and precision here, but the point remains.)

[Felch]

I've mentioned this before, but that whole Fail thing is right up there with All Your Base as being a tired and lame meme.

I look forward to future MOBIUS posts, perhaps he'll have Admiral Ackbar saying "It's a TRAP!!!"

[Elok]

I still don't see what the problem is with nuking the whole region and then putting it under Chinese stewardship.

That will only create a new breed of radioactive supermonsters who fight each other over the rubble. Godzilla and Allahrodan. It'll be terrible. The Japanese couldn't handle that, so how could the Chinese?

Felch: do not dare insult Admiral Ackbar, you whore!

[Sirotnikov]

Yes, it did.
However, I firmly believe the blockade to have been a totally stupid and counterproductive response because it's been directed against the entire population of Gaza and not specifically against the mlilitants. Yes, I know you've been letting humanitarian aid convoys through and all that, but people can't live on humanitarian aid alone. Besides, most ordinary people don't want charities. They want an honest day's work. Israel says if you live on Gaza, you can't have that - and you also can't go anywhere else. I don't find it so strange if a few Gazans feel a bit pissed off about that.

The entire world has sanctions against the illegal Hamas government, established after a bloody coup.

No one in their right mind wants to operate the crossings, including EU-Bam which fled after the Hamas coup, because Hamas intentionally targets the crossings. Hamas has numerously attacked via rockets, traps and suicide bombers those Israeli civilians and soldiers who work at the Gaza crossings. So operating them is a security challenge as well as a drain for Israel.

The reason for Israeli control is that in the absense of anyone else willing to take the job, someone has to limit the arrival or arms and military know-how to the Gaza strip, or else rockets will hit Tel Aviv.

The reason for the blockade is to amount pressure on the Hamas leadeship as long as they have captive Corpl. Gilad Shalit. The intention is to hinder their ability to rule, and make them realize that holding Corpl. Shalit interferes with their political interest to rule the strip.

I agree that sanctions and blockades are poor long time weapons. I think it is a weapon that has proven ineffective at removing a threat, each and every time it was used, from Cuba, to Iraq, to the Palestinian Authority's Arafat. I think that after a short while, people get used to it, and find ways to circumvent it.

Sanctions can only assist before they are enacted and during the first couple of months. After which they become ineffective and the rulers usually just abuse the population more. It has rarely effectively brought about a revolution. A hope for change is a much better motivator for these, as we've seen in Ukraine, Lebanon and Germany.


I understand why we do it though. It gives a feeling of slow attrition and it certainly costs less in terms of political and international costs, than waging an offensive on Hamas.

On the other hand, I also think it's incredibly stupid of the militants to keep firing rockets and crap.

Hence my original comment in the first thread suggesting that plain stupidity on both sides triggered the current crisis.

I don't think the Israeli side is as stupid as Hamas.
I won't argue that it completely isn't.
I just think Hamas has clearly much more to lose, and they're putting out huge bets on their own achievements, as well as the lives of many. Therefore - they are more stupid.

[MOBIUS]

What a child.

Siro is the Israel equivalent of Iraq's Information Minister during GWII 'Comical Ali' (Comical Avi? ), he needs to be overkilled in the faint hope that he might acknowlegde his nation's abject failure in much the same way Israel hammered the **** out of Gaza...

[DinoDoc]

What a child.

How long have you been posting here that you are still shocked when MOBIUS gets like this over dead jews? The only thing that galls him was the fact that the war didn't claim any American lives. He's like the people who you saw on TV dancing in the streets after 9/11.

[MOBIUS]

How long have you been posting here that you are still shocked when MOBIUS gets like this over dead jews? The only thing that galls him was the fact that the war didn't claim any American lives. He's like the people who you saw on TV dancing in the streets after 9/11.

So sad to see you reduced to making petty and slanderous attacks from the sidelines with absolutely nothing of substance to add...

I suppose there was a time when you made an effort, but then you got shot down in flames so many times that you had to keep changing your name to avoid the humiliation. What was is, Tyrant Lizard King, Obsidian Whatchamicallit, am I missing any?

Back in your box, Dino, until you grow a pair and join the debate.