A.Rafay
ELITE MEMBER
- Joined
- Apr 25, 2012
- Messages
- 11,400
- Reaction score
- 10
- Country
- Location
More than 500 Hamas rockets killing three Israelis and it's a new holocaust; yet 1100 retaliatory strikes killing dozens of Palestinian civilians and it's no more than collateral road-kill. But who cares? They're only Arabs anyway and contribute little or nothing of significance to Democratic or Republican party coffers, the leaders of each having promised to maintain funding to Israel and supplying its military materiel irrespective of the outcome.
Political leaders correctly support Israel's right to protect its citizens but why can't the Palestinians expect recognition of the same right? Hamas is the closest they have to a defence body responding to the internationally recognised illegal occupation of Palestinian land and the ''surgical'' assassination of its commanders.
The US loudly promotes democracy but apparently only when elections give results it likes. Although elected by the people, Hamas was not the US choice so is therefore not legitimate. Its actions over the years of occupation echo to a minor extent those of the Irgun, Haganah and Stern gang of the 1940s that bombed, maimed and killed hundreds in their murderous and eventually successful quest for a Jewish homeland, with their leaders becoming heroic figures to Zionism.
Encouraged by ultra-Orthodox Jews who neither work for a living nor serve in the Israeli Defence Force but immerse themselves in the study of obscure and arcane texts promoting a return to a Greater Israel, the Israeli government, like its predecessors, shows little regard for international humanitarian law when it comes to self-interest and territorial expansion. As Prime Minister Netanyahu resisted previous cautionary approaches of US President Obama to military action in Gaza, his followers will hardly be trembling in their phylacteries and yarmulkes at Bob Carr's admonition to restraint.
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John Murray, Fadden
Hate-filled Gazans terrorising and murdering Israelis do their people no favours; their actions bring ferocious retaliation, death, destruction. Hate-filled Israelis occupying, terrorising, and murdering Gazans do their people no favours; their policies trigger murderous actions by those they occupy, and concomitant trauma, death, and destruction on all.
To Israeli and Gazan leaders, ''What long-lasting good has come from your actions and policies? Is this really the 'better world' you want to leave for your children, and your children's children?'' I (a Jew) just returned from olive harvest in Palestine (West Bank). My Palestinian friends and I know there's a better way; our friendship and actions will lead to it.
Judy Bamberger, O'Connor
Daniel Flitton (''Gillard on a slippery slope with statement'', SMH, November 17, p14) gives new meaning to the term lopsided when he criticises Prime Minister Julia Gillard's response to the Gaza conflict.
Flitton contends that Gillard's failure to take issue with Israel's assassination of the Hamas leader, Ahmed Said Khalil al-Jabari, risks her being seen as willing to condone that act. Sadly, the truth is our Prime Minister and her government stand ready to condone any act or behaviour by either the US or Israel, regardless of their legality or morality.
John Richardson, Wallagoot, NSW
In an accidently live comment on the BBC Radio 4 program, Today, the British Chief Rabbi, Lord Sachs, answered a question honestly because he thought he was off the air. When asked ''what is going on in Israel and Gaza at the moment?'', He replied: ''I think it has got to do with Iran, actually.'' Well, was there ever any doubt about that, a Gaza sprat to catch an Iranian mackerel? Casualties? Who cares. Now you know.
Rex Williams, Ainslie
What is it Hamas doesn't understand about halting rocket attacks into southern Israel, so Gaza won't be attacked?
US democratic principles don't stretch to Gaza Strip
Political leaders correctly support Israel's right to protect its citizens but why can't the Palestinians expect recognition of the same right? Hamas is the closest they have to a defence body responding to the internationally recognised illegal occupation of Palestinian land and the ''surgical'' assassination of its commanders.
The US loudly promotes democracy but apparently only when elections give results it likes. Although elected by the people, Hamas was not the US choice so is therefore not legitimate. Its actions over the years of occupation echo to a minor extent those of the Irgun, Haganah and Stern gang of the 1940s that bombed, maimed and killed hundreds in their murderous and eventually successful quest for a Jewish homeland, with their leaders becoming heroic figures to Zionism.
Encouraged by ultra-Orthodox Jews who neither work for a living nor serve in the Israeli Defence Force but immerse themselves in the study of obscure and arcane texts promoting a return to a Greater Israel, the Israeli government, like its predecessors, shows little regard for international humanitarian law when it comes to self-interest and territorial expansion. As Prime Minister Netanyahu resisted previous cautionary approaches of US President Obama to military action in Gaza, his followers will hardly be trembling in their phylacteries and yarmulkes at Bob Carr's admonition to restraint.
Advertisement
John Murray, Fadden
Hate-filled Gazans terrorising and murdering Israelis do their people no favours; their actions bring ferocious retaliation, death, destruction. Hate-filled Israelis occupying, terrorising, and murdering Gazans do their people no favours; their policies trigger murderous actions by those they occupy, and concomitant trauma, death, and destruction on all.
To Israeli and Gazan leaders, ''What long-lasting good has come from your actions and policies? Is this really the 'better world' you want to leave for your children, and your children's children?'' I (a Jew) just returned from olive harvest in Palestine (West Bank). My Palestinian friends and I know there's a better way; our friendship and actions will lead to it.
Judy Bamberger, O'Connor
Daniel Flitton (''Gillard on a slippery slope with statement'', SMH, November 17, p14) gives new meaning to the term lopsided when he criticises Prime Minister Julia Gillard's response to the Gaza conflict.
Flitton contends that Gillard's failure to take issue with Israel's assassination of the Hamas leader, Ahmed Said Khalil al-Jabari, risks her being seen as willing to condone that act. Sadly, the truth is our Prime Minister and her government stand ready to condone any act or behaviour by either the US or Israel, regardless of their legality or morality.
John Richardson, Wallagoot, NSW
In an accidently live comment on the BBC Radio 4 program, Today, the British Chief Rabbi, Lord Sachs, answered a question honestly because he thought he was off the air. When asked ''what is going on in Israel and Gaza at the moment?'', He replied: ''I think it has got to do with Iran, actually.'' Well, was there ever any doubt about that, a Gaza sprat to catch an Iranian mackerel? Casualties? Who cares. Now you know.
Rex Williams, Ainslie
What is it Hamas doesn't understand about halting rocket attacks into southern Israel, so Gaza won't be attacked?
US democratic principles don't stretch to Gaza Strip
