David_78
You can't read, can you??
No where did I suggest you were a "grand conspirator", more likely a mundane zionist blogger.
Please indicate how you apportion the blame... 1:1, 1:10, 1:1000? How do you reach your figure?
Can you answer my questions?

Therzal you are so funny ... you claim that I'm some grand conspirator because I accuse both sides of being at fault.

Who exactly is the one posting propaganda?

David_78..
If you have read what I wrote and can't understand it then that is a problem with you.
What I write is pretty much in accord with the feelings of many I met recently in Gaza and the West Bank..
I am writing in support of Israel/Palestine for all.. The fact that you try to deny or dismiss that and other things you write indicate that you are not quite what you claim to be. I mean, I could claim I was Moshe Dyans lost English love child, couldn't I?? How would you know otherwise??

However.. "growing up there and serving in the Army counts." That I can believe, having seen many of the arrogant swaggering baby soldiers and how they treat the Palestinians (your "in laws..")
I find it hard to believe what you write here. There is somethihg about your style that indicate that you are not who you say you are.. I think you are a zionist propagandist.
However you try, you and your kind can not silence the message.. It is out now and will only get louder..
Get used to it.

Therzal, I read what you said but it made about as much sense as George Bush giving a lecture on quantum physics ... neither of you know what you're talking about.

As for whether or not I've been to Israel ... I think that growing up there and serving in the Army counts ... but now I'm married to a wonderful Palestinian woman who I love dearly and whose family lives in the West Bank.

Believe it or not I get along great with my in-laws and in fact we pretty much agree on everything related to the current conflict.

So why don't you give peace a shot and try to see things from both sides.

Good Luck!

David_78..
Why do you patronise me? Have you actually read what I have typed?
I don't think you have, or grasped what I am saying.
I do not need your sympathy thanks. My eyes have been opening for over 30 years, ever since, as a goyim, I had experieinces in Israel and the Occupied Territories. I actually planned to convert to Judaism but changed my mind when I awoke to the myth.. I have been thinking, reading and VISITING ever since so I have seen the situation personally .. Have you?? ..
You don't have to be a Gazan child at a "different time in history". Right now is pretty bad, or can't you see that? However, the value of history that a sensible society learns from it.. Or it is doomed to repeat the same mistakes. Did you not grap that point?

I am still waiting for Stubine's answers to my questions.. I don't think he/she will answer. because to try to answer is to face a huge and painful conundrum.

Hey Stubine, glad to see that there is someone else one this forum with some sense of reality. It's kinda surreal to hear the views of people like therzal. I feel bad for him because when people shut their eyes to reality they are unable to ever find ways to change things for the better.

Now in response to therzal ... I live in San Diego California ... America's finest city! We have the beach, the mountains, the desert, and gorgeous weather all year round.

Now I'm going to tell you a story ... see once upon a time I was 100% pro-Israel. Nothing that Israel did seemed wrong in my mind. They were the good guys and the Palestinians/Arabs were the bad guys. What a wonderful fantasy it was ... You see back when I believed that Israel could do no wrong it was so easy to blame all of Israel's problems on the "evil" Arabs. There was no context to any of their actions so it seemed that the Arabs were just evil hateful people who wanted to "push the Jews into the sea".

The problem with my philosophy was that it was based on the fantasy of Israel being the victim all the time.

One day when I was feeling especially self-righteous I met a Palestinian woman and asked her how she could deal with the fact that she lived in a society of terrorists.

Instead of getting in my face she asked if I really wanted to know the answer. We sat down and talked. She only asked one thing ... that I play a game ... where I completely forget everything I think I know about the conflict and try to see things from the point of view of a Palestinian child growing up in the west bank or Gaza at different times in history.

It was difficult ... but I tried as best I could to aside my prejudices and stereotypes. Then she just told me a story.

It opened my eyes. Not to a new prejudice, but to reality. I stopped listening to propaganda and started finding other sources for news and information.

I discovered that Israel was far from perfect and the Palestinians and Arabs not evil and that both sides are more alike than they would like to admit.

Now I simply think for myself. I try to see problems from all angles, and I try to find solutions rather than place blame.

You see the truth is that history is in the past ... would you rather waste time worrying about past injustices, or try to improve life now and in the future.

The bottom line is that there is a lot of blame to go around for the current conditions in middle east ... you can choose to either spend your time placing blame ... or spend your time making things better.

Which do you choose?

Stubine..
Heartland of America.. hhmmm.. isn't that where people believe in angels and creationism??
If you are a "christian zionist", then we know why you are supporting Israel.. Armageddon and all that mythology. And you spout the same old zionist misinformation, and angst ridden propaganda.. It must really upset you that more and more people are reading true histories (B Morris, I Pappe) and learning the truth.

You suggest that collective punishment and killing of Palestinians because of a minority of militants is somehow justified yet become precious when I point out the clear and logical extension of the zionists own philosophy .. You do like it all your way, don't you??

What would you call a dualist system that treats one side as inferior and mistreats them, abuses them, steals from them, imprisons and tortures them (this is kindly honourable Israel I am talking about here..) solely on their ethnicity?? I never really could understnad why one particular bunch of people who subscribed to one particular religious delusion could really believe that thye were better and more deserving than anybody else. Neither do I swallow the zionist "holocaust makes us extra specially precious" garbage. Once all that mental clogging is removed, the situation is clear. You can get sniffy and try and fool yourself, but Apartheid State is exactly what Israel is.

There is no relationship, if you want to try and establish proportionality, between the systematic, well planned and executed plan that the Zionists carried out and more to the point, continue to carry out to this day, and a couple of spontaneous uprisings by Palestinians. Or is it different because one lot of victims are the new untermensch and the others are gods own??
Fortunately the rest of the world is beginning to see things how they are..
Better get used to it. The myth is cracking up.

Here are my question again. Can you help me with them??.
And here is a question or two..
The Jewish Holocaust is the ONLY event, the ONLY ONE, in all of recorded Human History (5000years plus) that is circumscribed and sacrosanct to the point that none may do any research on it..
Why is this? What are the guardians of the Holocaust story scared of??

Heres a final thought for you.. Israel is stuck between a rock and a hard place, both of their own making. Why??
1. No tyrannical regime has ever survived.
2. The demographic time bomb.
3. Internal conflicts within the many different stratas and ethnicities of Israeli society.;
4. Growing global awareness and plans for action.
5. Israel depends on the US for aid, especially financial and the US is imploding
6. China, India and Russia may have other plans.
7. Get the Palestinians out .. You now have external enemies and no hostages.
8. The Palestinians remain .. You have to constantly assert your position. See 4. above.
etc etc

Unless the current old and warlike leadership changes its attitudes and seeks a fair and just accord with all Palestinians, giving them equal status, rights and "Right of Return", then future generations of Israelis will curse and revile their names.
That is as certain as history.

David_78..
Thank ganesh for your clear and insightful comments, to keep all of us wrong thinkers straight..
Yes, how easy.. and how it shares the responsibility equally between the oppressor and the oppressed..
From al Nakba to now, the zionists have never kept a single agreement with the dispossessed Palestinians. They have however, been steadfast in their often duplicitous efforts to continue the ethnic sweeping that they have proved so very good at. Seems they learned all to well from their ancestors experiences. Pity they ignored the "Never Again" part though..

The first duplicitous blows were struck by Haganah and Irgun, fore runners of the fascist Israeli Occupartion Forces, the country is now run by the Zionists for the greater benefit of Zionist Jews. The Palestinians are marginalised, dispossessed of their rightful land and property and daily humiliated and reminded of their situation.
They are penalised financially daily in many evil and ingenious ways. For instance, hardly any of the taxes they pay are redirected to them. Their salaries are approximately 10% of those in Israel yet their costs are pegged to the Israeli costs. The zionists have blocked (stolen) about $1 biilion in taxes that belong to the authorities in Gaza. Much needed money, just STOLEN..and there are other ways.

"Life improves for BOTH Israelis and Palestinians..." You give your self away here...
Life for the Israelis is already far far better than many people in other countries can imagine.
Those who may suffer from Israel's policies are those in the Israeli Occupation Force, who mostly look as if they enjoy their superiority, swaggering about insolently, Rambo like, with their US made weapons hanging off them ..

If any settlers suffer then they ask for it.. They know where they are going, they should understand the illegality of the act of building in the Occupied lands yet they still come, despite what it means for the Palestinians. And then they become active in further acts of violence and oppression.

"..neither the Palestinians or the Israelis are innocent. .." You give your self away here too...
Please explain this simplistic conclusion with reference to al Nakba, Dair Yassin, the destruction or appropriation of over 400 villages and the expulsion, murder, rape and brutalisation of over 1 million.

Israel is an Apartheid State.. We know that, we will never forget that, however you try to dilute it, deflect attention from it, in your transparent way, your zionist way..
Where are you typing from, New York or Tel Aviv?

Just as you say Redjeff, talks with all sides, without pre-conditions is the only way to move forward. You cannot simply refuse to talk with a party because you don't agree with it's views. We had talks between Yasser Arafat and various Israeli leaders, and I believe that things were improving, but that all changed with new israeli leadership and powers. A genuine ceasefire should exist, and this would mean the cessation of rocket attacks by Palestinian factions, and the end of any military activity by Israel and a halt to the building of any more settlements.
The comment that "Arabs tend to be violent, ignorant and racist", just show the depth of hatred and intolerance towards another race, and I would hope that people like this are in a minority, because they do, in my view, show a lack of intelligence and understanding of how to move forward and create a more peacefull World.

David_78...

You describe a nice, simple scenario for peace, but peace is not merely the absence of fighting. Considerable negotiation must happen, and Israel must talk to Hamas, without preconditions, just to achieve a cease-fire. Then they must continue talking to establish a positive relationship. Both sides should forget about their historical grievances for now and just work on the immediate goals of economic assistance and border security. But peace will never come about until BOTH sides renounce violence.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised by all the uneducated extremists views from the other comments. When you get indoctrinated with one-sided propaganda it becomes almost impossible to learn how to see the whole problem or focus on how to actually create a solution that will help everyone involved.

The bottom line is that neither the Palestinians or the Israelis are innocent. But unless you are able to see that you will never be able to add anything constructive to the debate.

Here is the reality ...

Steps to Palestinian Statehood:

1) Rocket/Suicide Bombs/Terrorist attacks stop coming from the Palestinians :::: Missile Strikes/Incursions stop coming from the Israelis

2) Things stay quiet for a while

3) Life improves for BOTH Israelis and Palestinians

Repeat steps 2 & 3 until there is mutual trust and the Palestinians get a sovereign state while the Israelis get peace and security.

Stubine.. It is about time that we started really listening to what the zionists themselves have told us, watch what they are showing us and responding appropriately.
By their actions we will know them..

It was Ben Gurion, arch architect of the ethnic cleansing of Palestine who said words to the effect that "The army is the country, the people are the army.."(I paraphrase of course..) .The corollary to this is, the reality, is that any Jew with a zionist bent can become an Israeli citizen. Every Israeli citizen, age permitting, will be, is or has been a serving member of the Israeli Occupation Force. (IOF)
It is a legitimate right for the miltary wing of an occupied and oppressed people to fight against the occupying oppressor.
Therefore, following through this logic, any Israeli is a legitimate target.

Suggest you actually look at the history of the brutal and evil occupation of Gaza, which continues to this day. I wonder what you would do if you were in their place??
Reference to another Holocaust is entirely appropriate. Al Nakba has been 60 years of an ongoing ethnic cleanisng, a Holocaust, that has actually been far more effcient at achieving its goal and far more mechanised than anything the nazis ever dared to dream of. If the nazis had been as efficient and ruthless at the IOF, the Palestinians would not be experiencing the fate they are now, as the new untermensch.

"Arabs tend to be violent, ignorant, and racist.."
What an incredibly nasty, ignorant thing to type.. How old are you?
"Arabs tend to be violent, ignorant, and racist.."
Unlike the Zionist IOF who tend to be almost childlike in their unconditional innocent love and caring for all gods creatures?? I doubt that you would know "an arab" if your life depended on it.
You try and legitimise your hideous racism and scorn of the UN by playing the tired and worn out "eternal victim " card. Well, you will understand does not work anymore.
This is the same UN that mandated the presence of Zionistrs in another people's land (with the deceit and duplicity of the British..). I am certain that resolution is OK by you..
Now, what about the 400 or so since that have been ignored.

I could go on and take you to bits piece by piece but I am too tired right now.
But I will leave you with this last thought..
The Zionist's worst nightmare is coming true. The despised yet very necessary goyim are awakening.
And here is a question or two..
The Jewish Holocaust is the ONLY event, the ONLY ONE, in all of recorded Human History (5000years plus) that is circumscribed and sacrosanct to the point that none may do any research on it..
Why is this? What are the guardians of the Holocaust story scared of??

STUBINE - That's it? That's your big-deal example? it looks like a small, stupid incident got horribly inflated for someone else's convwenience - the disappearance of a priest and his servant, who probably ran away to somewhere where they could live quietly as lovers, was the pretext to launch a political campaign by European powers squabbling over territory, using the Syrians, etc as pawns, not for the first or last time. That example doesn't fit at all as a counterpoint to what's going on today in Gaza and the WBank.

To everyone's horror, that trivial incident launched a hateful 100-year-long antisemitic rampage all across Europe and NAmerica. That truly is tragic. Distressing also is that this kind of nonsense is still being promulgated today by slimy gasbags who claim authority.

It's more complicated than just a little hot-button. I stand by my previous post.

STUBINE - Your read of history and recent events tends to edit out what does not fit your views. That's as revisionist as what you are saying about me. The earliest recorded genocidal massacre was Jericho - strangely, that's presented as an act of heroism. You may - I say MAY - be right about 1840. I do not know everything about the history in that area. I will check out your statements, at my leisure. Your version of that may be self-serving as well. I notice that you do not correct me on the 1947 attack on civilians.

Whatever I may discover, Israel's policy of overwhelming force on civilians is at least wrong-headed and, as should be obvious by now, counterproductive; and at worst as evil as the Warsaw Ghetto. All are tainted by that relationship.

Stubine, I think we both know that there is not going to be another holocaust (not involving Jews anyway), and I think that the reaction of Israel to anything real or imagined is so over the top, that people have started to be disgusted at Israel's actions.
If only you could be honest and sign up to the NPT, and come clean about your nuclear arsenals. If only you could adhere to UN resoloutions, but no, you should somehow be above all that. If only you hadn't carried out pre-emptive attacks on your neighbours. If only you could stop hiding behind the coat tails of the US, and stand on your own two feet, then you would have to treat your neighbours in a reasonable fashion.
You are not a "special" nation, you are not God's "chosen" race, but you act as though everyone else is not worthy to be in your presence.
If international law means nothing to you, then I truly hope that the rest of the World unites against you, and teaches you a lesson which you will not forget. Maybe that is what your nuclear arsenal is for, because you secretly hope for a grand day of reckoning.

STUBINE -- Go crawl into a deep hole, with your 100,000,000% crap lies.

You state emphatically, that the rockets "(… are INTENDED to murder civilians and only civilians!)".

¿ How about explaining the independent investigation of similar Israeli statements about recent Golan heights rockets, where the Lebanese rockets which were/are hard to aim, but were heading generally toward Israeli military positions, but then the Israeli forces moved their counter gun emplacements to next to civilian Muslim populations - in violation of Geneva conventions (to return fire under the cover of "their enemy's civilians" ?

Stubine, you say that comparing the current Israeli regime to the Nazis is disgusting, yet you suggest that Gaza should be pounded to dust. Israel has the means to do this, and frequently does it to great effect.
There are settlements springing up all over Palestine - land which Israel has stolen in defiance of UN resolutions. Jews from all over the World have been lured to Israel with huge sums of money, and have set up homes at the expense of the Palestinian people. Israel has done this despite flouting international law, in the knowledge that it will always be protected and funded by the US.

"A European diplomat said the U.S. objected to the latest draft, even though it addresses concerns about rocket fire by the Palestinians into southern Israel. According to him, without explaining the sticking points, the U.S. delegates said they needed more time to consult with Washington."

Following the 9/11 attacks Americans asked and later stated that they are hated, especially by the people of the third world. America must understand that a businessman caught cheating with a finger on the scale, is not liked to say the least.
This why.

So here's another case demonstrating that US foreign policy is set in Tel Aviv. What else is new?

DAVID

The Palestinians once had a country where they lived peacefully and productively. Until the Nakba. And Jews lived among them, as well, secure and comfortable. Why should Palestinians beg for what had been theirs for centuries?

And you might also remember, that the first mass killing of random civilians by a bomb was the action of the Stern Gang in Haifa on January 12, 1947 when the Stern Gang drove a truckload of explosives into a British police station in Haifa, Palestine, killing 4 and injuring 140. There's a lesson!

I know the air gets a little thin up there in High Horse Country, interferes with the memory - or did your history book miss those pages?

Anyone who can look at this and not call it "genocide," is lying. Only the cattle cars and nazi uniforms ar missing.

Note that my prior post is not a negative on Haider Rizvi's article; I have generally appreciated them so far, finding he's another good contributor to IPS.

Anyway, I wanted to add and based on my prior post, and I don't know if this is federal, state, provincial or municipal law, though doubt it's the latter kind, but there's a fine analogy found with this law; speaking in terms of what I've so far said about the UNSC's criminal complicity with these criminal U.S. vetoes.

When this law was first established? I don't know, but only heard of it over very recent years, like since 2003, say.

Us civilians, if we're known to have known of crimes and who perpetrated them, and we don't call this in to the police, or don't accept to testify on behalf of the prosecution, then we are now criminalised, that is, declared or found to be criminally complicit with these crimes and criminals.

F.e., if we're aware of someone who criminally beats someone else or rapes someone, and that criminal is caught and it is learned by the court that we were aware of the crime and its perpetrator(s) all along, while having chosen to always stay silent about our knowledge of this, then we become criminal and therefore punishable according to law.

Okay, it'd be very difficult, even impossible to punish the UNSC; it's also easy to realise this. But it is not impossible, being actually easy, to see the UNSC for the complicitly criminal and bs entity, body of "law", that it [is].

And it's not complicitly criminal only due to these criminal U.S. vetoes. After all, and for only one example, it's also criminally complicit by allowing so-called peacekeeping UN forces consisting of soldiers who are very criminal and who commit serious crimes against human rights and other laws during their periods of PK'ing "service". The UNSC allows that because the UNSC does rather nothing against it.

In Haiti, UN HRC or HCR or CHR, whatever the humanitarian agency of the UN is called, well, officials of this agency definitely and correctly condemned the hellbent PK'ers in Haiti since Feb. 29 2004 when they criminally helped the U.S., Canada and France to criminally conduct a coup d'etat and govt overthrow of a wholly democratically elected govt that The People there have kept demanding to be restored.

The UNSC treated those officials of that humanitarian UN agency as if they didn't know what they were talking about or as if they were lying.

The UNSC is complicitly criminal in enough ways that it's like trying to find a needle in a haystack in order to try to find real good in the UN and I mean good of a substantive sort that has real weight; that's not easily dismissed as if never presented or falsely based.

The UNSC of course and obviously is [instrument of the ruling elites] of the West; serving pretty much only, solely, strictly them. Yes, strictly them, for even if the UNSC plays the role of being honest, it's far easier to prove that it's not a legitimate, moral institution, than it is to prove the opposite. Proving the opposite is only doable based on wishfulness, for the UNSC's criminal complicity far outweighs any good the UN effectively does and of which there's relatively little example for.

And their humanitarian workers in Palestine were sometimes disgusting as hell over very recent years. By that I'm meaning that while Palestinians were reported to be so short of food that many had to scrounge through garbage to try to find some bits of food, the uN humanitarian workers in Palestine certainly lacked [nothing].

They could have minimally and easily reduced their food intake by half per day and given the other half to starving Palestinians, but I've never read or heard of a single humanitarian aid worker of UN or any other organisation doing this. Damn; if they get too hungry after a month or two of such reasonable fasting, then they have no troubles getting out of Gaza or Palestine to head to a nearest restaurant or grocery store to pig out, before returning to provide "humanitarian aid" to STARVING Palestinians.

Damn; some people starve so much and due to extreme injustice that someone who's eaten a plentiful meal and vomits it might resort to eating that regurgitated food from someone else. It might happen; I've learned over very recent years that water is lacking to a point in some places that people there resort to drinking their urine.

As you can see, I'm not particularly fond of the UN. What it has for GA is good, and what's law on paper is fine, but these have awfully NO weight in reality.

I haven't read the article yet and shortly will, however it's already obvious that the title is a "little" [omissive].

"US Stymies Security Council Action on Gaza"

A proper title:

"US Stymies Security Council Action on Gaza [and] Security Council allows this criminal veto the weight of a legitimate veto".

We cannot justly deny the criminality involved in allowing criminal vetoes of absolutely necessary and justified UNSC resolutions to be blocked. So we can't justly deny that the UNSC is guilty of this additional and awfully repeated crime.

But as a writer says in a recently posted article (I forget who the person and what the title of the article are though), the UNSC veto privilege in today's world is NO longer valid, no longer has a rightful place or use in the UNSC.

That person says the UNSC veto was initially valid, and I'm not sure about this; would need to learn more about this. However the person is definitely right about the veto being something the UNSC must terminate, no longer allow.

Otherwise, the UNSC will continue to end up criminally complicit with the criminal vetoes placed (I only know of the U.S. doing this so far).

Maybe an alternative to eliminating the veto would be that every veto would need to be judged by all UNSC and, perhaps anyway, UN member states, not only permanent members of the UNSC; maybe also independent legal bodies, say, could be included in judging the vetoes placed in the UNSC.

As it is, the UNSC makes itself automatically complicit with the application of criminal vetoes, and it's easier than making pie to prove the criminality of these U.S. vetoes too; but the UNSC also demonstrates that it truly does not care 2-cents worth for democracy, for it's very anti-democratic. It'd be difficult to be more un- and anti-democratic than the UNSC has been so far.

And by 'anti-' I mean as in 'opposed to', not a mere 'instead of'. The UNSC has also proven that is most definitely [is] anti-democratic; f.e., every time that the UNGA expresses a validly formed voice it has been immediately or very quickly crushed by the UNSC.

This definitely is a big part of the whole "picture" for the Palestinians and their supporters, or simply for human rights.

Oh, and the UNSC ends up what in all of this? AN ENABLER of criminality, reining hell on humanity and Earth, etc. Now, what happens to us civilians if we're caught enabling criminals and they're caught, so we're all caught and with respect to the crime being considered? Well, us enablers will be treated as criminally complicit of course!

The UNSC is NOT above OUR LAWS, and is definitely not to be allowed such ranking. It has no legal or moral grounds for such ranking, as 'above the law'.

It is criminally complicit with these criminal U.S. vetoes, for it's not only provable that these vetoes definitely are unfoundable and criminal, it's tremendously easy to prove this.

I think that David_78 has summed up the situation quite nicely. He talks about "pissing off people with bigger guns, missiles and an air force which could literally wipe Gaza off the map".
You see David, if an Iranian preident had said those words about Israel (which he didn't), then he would have been labelled a monster, and quite rightly so. The election of Hamas has much to do with Israel's refusal to stop stealing Palestinian land, to stop ignoring UN sanctions whilst the rest of the World looks on.
I once heard a Jewish lawyer speaking to a younger colleague about the Palestinian situation, and despite his education and standing within the company, he referred to the Palestinians as "pond life"
The Nazis referred to Jews, Gypsies and the mentally ill as "untermenschen", after listening to the above comments by a person who should have known better, I was left to draw the conclusion, that there was no difference between him and the Nazis of seventy years ago.
I also realise that not all Jews share the same views of extreme Zionists, and would love to live in peace, as do many Palestinians.

I am sick to death of our government's Israel-is-always-right attitude. It seems that whatever Israel wants, Israel gets. Meantime, the Palestinians are treated like they're not even human beings. The whole situation sucks big time.

Thank you, eileen fleming, for the link. I just now signed the petition.

Israel needs to forget about their laundry list of pre-conditions for peace talks, which amount to a surrender demand. There should be a cease-fire followed by immediate and direct talks between Israel and Hamas over humanitarian aid and economic development for Gaza. Some concessions of fuel and medical needs must be made within the week.

This is what sensible, rational people would do. Instead, we have leaders plagued by psychotic delusions, and their belief in harmony through bloodshed.

When the apartheid wall fell in Rafah people power emerged and more is on its way.

Less than 2 days ago, i was number 24,518-i just checked and 62,571 have now signed the International Petition to end the siege of Gaza and help save civilians on all sides.

When 150,000 sign it, it will be delivered to the UN, the Quartet, EU and Arab League demanding them to quit taking sides in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: and hear the cries of 1.5 million human beings locked up in the biggest open air prison on earth.

The world is coming together to demand the blockade be lifted and the border opened properly, with international controls to prevent weapons smuggling. The missile war between Israel and Gaza can only be stopped by a reciprocal ceasefire that Hamas stands ready to negotiate.

So do something and sign the petition and help spread the word:

http://www.avaaz.org/en/gaza_end_the_siege/98.php?cl_tf_sign=1

Sat. Jan. 26, 2008 is an International Day of solidarity with the people of Gaza and secular Israeli Jews are leading a convoy from Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Beersheba and elsewhere to deliver massive quantities of water filters and basic foodstuffs such as flour, rice, oil, salt, lentils, beans to be freely given as gifts for distribution to Gaza inhabitants who have been driven by the siege to extreme poverty, despair and hopelessness because the 'leaders' of the world have failed to see, hear and have a heart for the people of Gaza.

Some of the organizations leading the 'leaders' of the world in the way they must go if there is ever to be security for Israel and peace in the Middle East are:

Gush Shalom, Combatants for Peace, Coalition of Women for Peace, ICAHD - The Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions, Bat Shalom, Bat Tzafon for Peace & Equality, Balad, Hadash, Adalah, Tarabut-Hithabrut, Physicians for Human Rights, Alternative Information Center, Psychoactive - Mental Health Professionals for Human Rights, ActiveStills, Student Coalition (Tel-Aviv University), New Profile, Machsom Watch, PCATI (Public Committee Against Torture),

These good Jews will be joined on the other side of The Wall by Palestinian human rights activists, intellectuals, academics and business people from Gaza and the West Bank.

stay tuned to WAWA for more details:

http://www.wearewideawake.org/

The wall went down because Israel let it happen. It wanted to let Palestinians move into Egypt to be rid of them.

At the time it seemed a good idea, but perhaps the creation of Israel will turn out to be the most catastrophic political blunder of the 20th century. What started out as an altruistic humanitarian mission has turned into a disaster. Perhaps the best political decision of the 21st century will be either to create once and for all a viable and independent Palestinian state or de-create Israel.

Illumineer is starved of illumination.
Israel's Jewish majority would have its security immediately enhanced by the ending of the occupation (including in the Golan) and the dismantling of all settlements. After all, they are all illegal by international law. They are all of course immoral.
But the Israeli establishment, and a good part of the Israeli population is not interested in security. It is interested in lebensraum.
Gaza is a laboratory experiment in human degredation.
A country built on the principle of racial superiority has inevitablty built a nation of racists.
By explicitly or tacitly supporting this grotesquerie, global Jewry loses its moral capital acquired after hundreds or years of discrimination and oppression.

Sincere condolences for your most grievous loss, Haider.

Gaza is a practice ground for urban warfare and testing grounds for the technology to wage it. It seems far away to us on this side of the planet, but if the practice is not stopped, watch it come to a neighborhood near you. The Irakis and Lebanese are already enjoying this new urban warfare, where the target, despite loud disclaimers about avoiding "collateral damage", is specifically the civilian population. The damaged are not collateral. Soon, the gun turret will turn on us.

What the mainstream media never mentions is that Palestine, and by Palestine I include Gaza, has been occupied by Israel for over forty years.It has been settled illegally with special roads for the Israeli's to use that are forbidden to the Palestinian's.
I think often of Winston Churchill's infamous quote "A land without people for a people with out land". A typical colonial attitude which has perhaps been inherited by the Israeli's.
If the United States was occupied by Israel would they not fight back?
The old saying that "he that lives by the sword will die by the sword" remains relevant today, conflict and the occupation of someone else's land will only create more conflict. Iraq is a perfect example.

Only through negotiation and development will such problems be solved. In the in the coming centuries the international community will be faced with many challenges arising from climate change and rising sea level that may well be precursors for conflict. It would therefore behove us to settle these conflicts before much larger situations occur.

We in Austrlia were horrified over and over, because of our now ex-Prime Minster's (Howard) ongoing support for Israels regime of APATHEID and GENOCIDE against the Palestinians. But he has gone now, and we have a humanitarian as PM (Rudd)! Take heart American's and work for change. Unfortunately all your current candates kowtow to the Israel lobby.

Finally, an Arab friend came to the rescue of their brothers and sisters."Mubarak, you naughty boy, your days are now numbered. Remember Saddam Hussein, Mosadegh, Steve Bikko, Patrice Lubumba, the US of A got rid of them when they became a nuissance to us."

Israel is trying to force Gaza's people to make a choice, but they won't so they have only themselves to blame. Why don't the people in Gaza rise up against Hamas? Because they're lied to every day by them. It's a slick campaign that will probably win in the long run, especially given the comments posted on this topic so far. Israel is the only country with the balls to do this; the U.S. lost theirs many moons ago.

Its genocide. Lets all use the correct term for what is really happening and keep using it and shoving it in the face of the Israelis and our bought and paid for AIPAC vichy Congress.

The absence of humanitarian aid is the equivalent to genocide. The Arab countries are complicit as well making the palistinian people the scapegoats of geopolitical politics. Israel and the U.S. are quilty of genocide and Arab countries are the almost as bad.

Everyone (even Israel) agrees Israel is using collective punishment! That is a war crime!! Sure the UN is worthless due to our veto, but other countries could speak out more forcefully than "We were hoping…but unfortunately we have not agreed," give me a break! The other world leaders are no better than the Dems in standing up to the idiots in charge of our country. I don't think historians are going to be so kind to the acquiescence of world leaders to the war crimes in Gaza.

The hypocrisy of the US admin is astounding. Bush the nitwit goes to Israel and says that the occupation must end. Then turns around and prevent any security council actions against the apartheid regime. The stupid jackass of a president exposes his ignorance as usual.

Good job Hamas. Its 3 0 isnt it? It won the election, it reversed an attempted coup and now it blew open Egypt.

The US is pathetic.

They always try to create balance in a lop sided situation.

Israel is the occupier

Israel is the one that forced itself on a majority of indigenous people in the 1880-1940s.

If it was any place else people would say the arrival of hostile immigrants who declare they have more rights than those already there would be a sick joke or an act of war.

Nazi crimes were bad but the Palestinians arent at fault for that--Europe is.
Thus-a jewish state should be in germany.

It is amusing all these months hand wringing about Gaza and in the end it was Hamas who took things into its own hands.

Gaza is what happens to people who defy Israel and The United States.

Hats off to the ones who blew down the walls at the Egytian border. Maybe all walls need to tumble like the Berlin Wall. - even security fences.

So long as the US has veto power over every resolution drafted by the Security Council, the UN will remain as dysfunctional as the US itself.

How long will it take for the Israelis and Americans to realize that the Palestineans are not Roundup Ready? What's being inflicted on Gaza and the West Bank is nothing short of another Holocaust.