The traditional example of chutzpah is someone who murders his parents and then pleas for mercy because he is an orphan.
I can't top that one, but here's one that comes close: being Prime Minister of a country that has violently suppressed its Kurdish minority for decades, and, in an attempt to put down a violent rebellion by Kurdish "militants" in the 1990s, killed an estimated 20,000 people and displaced hundreds of thousands, and decrying Israel's military operations in Gaza as a "crime against humanity." (And it's not, as far as I can tell, as if the current prime minister of Turkey has expressed any regret for his country's recent actions, much less referred past military and civilian leaders for prosecution for "crimes against humanity"; heck, Turkey still hasn't exactly expressed remorse for--or even acknowledged--what it did to the Armenians during WWI.)
I wonder whether allowing anonymous comments has something to do with their low quality. If people had to use their names, then maybe they would say something substantive or nothing at all.
And many American-Jewish groups have lobbied Congress not to acknowledge it either in deference to Israel's "ally" Turkey.
Your example doesn't seen to fit, DB. To complete the analogy, you're describing someone who has killed not only his parents but his entire extended family who then complains that someone else has killed her parents. Perhaps it's not chutzpah but merely a matter of having to be one to know one...Nonetheless, it's still a crime to kill your parents, even if the only one complaining is (also) a murderer.
Of course, countries, like corporations, are not individuals. History does not adhere in the same way. One would be silly to still boycott Denny's, for example, for engaging in racism against customers in the 1980s when today much of their upper management is black. I assume that those running Turkey today are not responsible for the violence that Turkey engaged in 100 years ago. Presumably if President Obama denounced a country for practicing slavery, that country's blogging lawyers could not successfully argue, "What Chutzpah! Obama heads a country that once allowed slavery on a much greater scale."
Or is this largely a spat among bothers?
Does anyone think that Olmert and Erdogan (or if this goes on too long either Netanyahu or Livny and Erdogan) won't kiss and make up pretty quickly?
The underlying assumption of this post is that Turkey, on the basis of the fresh Kurdish and old Armenian blood on its hands, has no standing to criticize the Palestinian blood on Israel's hands (acknowledging the high likelihood that Israel was justified in bloodying its hands). Even assuming that court of equity principles apply, what would Turkey have to do to have standing for its criticisms, whether Israel deserves them or not?
But I suspect that's the point, isn't it? Basically there is no country who is going to make statements about Israel that reflect truth more than they reflect the national interests of the country making the statement.
Yep. It's a cheap way to curry favor with the local Islamists. The Jews have really suffered from not emmigrating to Europe (and elsewhere) and then blowing stuff up when they're offended.
I wouldn't say that Turkey has no standing to criticize Israel for alleged war crimes. I'd just say it's the height of hypocrisy and chutzpah to do so for domestic political gain while neither expressed remorse for its own recent war crimes (assuming they were such, but the Turkish pm's comments would necessarily assume such), nor punishing those responsible, nor, for that matter, doing anything to my knowledge to stop it from happening again.
Indeed, Turkey has been bombing Kurdish "militants" in Iraqi Kurdistan off and on for months.
That Professor Bernstein selected Turkey's alleged violence against Kurds and Armenians detects the fallacy in his argument: Ottoman Empire contained Palestine. The careless observe the Ottoman Empire's violent occupations of Kurdish district and Armenia to be similar to Israel's violent occupation of Palestine, but Armenians and Armenia are not the same as Palestinians and Palestine; as Ottomans could have had a cause for occupation of Armenia disparate to Israel's of Palestine, compare not Israel's occupation today to Ottoman's occupation of Armenia or Kurdish district but instead to Ottoman's occupation of Palestine.
If you follow the history of Erdogan's comments, he has been fairly consistent (if hypocritical) about the plight of Palestinians. His comments have, however, generally been a bit more savvy (comparing, for example, the plight of Palestinians today to the plight of Jews under Isabella and Ferdinand).
I don't think Erdogan is serious about such allegations. These are largely ways to address political pressures at home. However, I think Erdogan is serious about a real solution to the conflict and like many of us is quite frustrated with the cycle. A secondary element is that this shows how bad Israel looks in cases like this.
There are other elements too. Turkey has been very much involved in trying to settle the Golan issue (which I would expect to take center-stage again once Netanyahu is elected), and this military action has set that back. So I am sure there are other reasons Turkey is frustrated. They do want credit for their role in solving a long-standing conflict in the region. But a little patience can go a long way....
"Bullying and intimidation are not acceptable ways to conduct foreign policy in the 21st century." President George W. Bush to Russia regarding the conflict in Georgia, August 15, 2008.
Oops.
I suspect that a certain amount of hypocrisy or chutzpah, whatever you want to call it, is an unavoidable part of all foreign relations.
Admittedly (to mix a metaphor) Israel's sins are scarlet in the eyes of the beholder, thus making the pot's call questionable. But if Turkish leaders genuinely and honestly feel that Israel's actions were egregious in a way their own actions were not (admittedly, a ridiculously big if), shouldn't they have the right to make that call?
Finally, can I excuse all my tangential insults with "it was a gratuitous dig"? It would be nice if law profs would lead we lowly 2Ls by example. "Train up a law student in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it" and all that.
For a defense of Turkey's actions against the Armenians from a westerner, see here. A rare find, since the Turks are too busy denying such an event ever occurred to give their side of it.
Incidentally, I don't agree with you about the Amenians: the Turks were trying to remove a troublesome race they saw as disloyal by exterminating and expelling them. The fact that there are still quite a few Armenians around doesn't make it any less a genocide than the continuned existence of Jews.
It's sad that the US supports both of these allies in their attempt to redraw national borders through mass migration. Is that the point you were making, Professor?
I understand "chutzpah" to mean something along the lines of "shamelessness." Your example and DB's both qualify.
ASlyJD:
No, of course not. The black pot just invites opening the additional subject of its own hypocrisy. The questions are separate, and each stands or falls on its own merits.
You don't accept that Kurds are entitled to a homeland of their own, where their ancestors lived for thousands of years?
You are exhibiting chutzpah.
So much easier than actually examining Israel's actions and whether they are productive or merit criticism.
This shell game of diverting attention can go on indefinitely, as the world seems full of people with chutzpah and downright anti-semites. As for chutzpah, what right does anyone in the US have to criticize Israel, anyway? Just look at all the blood we have directly spilled - or triggered the spilling of - in Iraq and elsewhere.
Maybe a libertarian would point out how leaders love to curry domestic favor at the costs of the lives of others, and that it is hard to attribute such lives - or chutzpah - to every individual, but there don't seem to be too many libertarians on these threads.
Ban Ki-Moon, Sec-Gen of the U.N., began by presenting a one-sided summary of what had occurred in Gaza, noting only briefly and in a token manner that Hamas - which has fired rockets, mortars and other munitions into Israeli civilian centers since 2001/2002 - should refrain from firing those rockets into Israel, but largely focusing on Israel's actions more recently.
Then, Erdogan presented his own summary of what has been transpiring in Gaza/Israel, with a far more biased account, while promoting himself as being disinterested, excepting for his humanitarian concerns (sic).
Amre Moussa, Sec-Gen of the Arab League, continued in essentially the same vein as Erdogan. The one-sided quality evidenced by both these speakers was, to be over-kind, pronounced; to be less kind, they indulged a rank duplicity in their telling of events.
Finally, Shimon Peres was allowed to speak and he spoke forthrightly, at one point reading simply and directly from Hamas's founding charter, then reviewing the effects of the rocket, mortar and other attacks over the last seven (7) years, then recalling the 2005 pullout from Gaza, rendering all of Gaza Judenfrei. Peres took note of other, similar facts and if he can be faulted in anyway whatsoever it might be in the fact he raised his voice more than needed at times, though beyond that he was quite eloquent, speaking to the history forcefully, which is precisely what was needed at that point, in that environment.
Peres should be roundly applauded, he was the sole, truly honest and forthright speaker among the four panelists.
Erdogan resented Peres's forthrightness and reacted, in part by quoting from a notoriously disaffected Jew turned anti-Semite, Gilad Atzmon. Erdogan, at the end, put on a repulsive show, though he was applauded it was in fact a repulsive showing.
(Also, Andrew Bostom has a brief, revealing summary of what occurred.)
How about Muammar Qaddafi's preposterously earnest calls for a one-state resolution of this conflict, which appeared last week in the International Herald Tribune and NYT. I could shake my head in disbelief at what I see some fool/knave contributor to Wikipedia called a "nuanced editorial."
(BTW, thanks for the link.)
The whole idea of war crimes is insane. People have this desire to treat war as regulated event in which the goals are predetermined for each side, and those goals cannot include the most successful ever used - unconditional surrender - since the West decided to declare illegal all successful tactics of WWII (after they had been so successful and generated the greatest and most productive peace ever seen on Earth, not to mention turned the enemies into staunch, trustworthy allies for over 50 years). Brilliant and so in touch with reality ... This was, of course, not very different than calling WWI "The War to End All Wars", as another hope that we would not find ourselves forced to resort to the same sort of destruction, again. But, some things the West seems to have a very hard time learning, even after having stood toe-to-toe for decades in a Cold War that held the standing threat of the incineration of every single man, woman, child and pet of the enemy (and still today!).
So now we have moralizing in wars of today. That would be comical in itself, if it were not stretched beyond the pale by the fact that individualistic societies wrote these rules and somehow think that they apply equally to tribalistic societies (not that those societies are ever held to them, but only that individualistic societies fighting the tribalistic ones are held to the rules). Talk about arrogance and stupidity.
And now we are faced with suicidal enemies, something that we had only barely encountered with the Japanese in WWII. But this set of enemies (the arab/persian/muslim world) is quite different from the Japanese. They are more suicidal and have used scorched-Earth tactics for millenia. We got to see a little bit of this back in 1991, when Saddam Hussein intentionally dumped 40,000,000 barrels of oil into the gulf (without a peep from the left about the world's most massive "environmental crime" in history) and then went on to light just about every single oil well in Kuwait on fire (also without a peep from the left, who would have been lynching all of Exxon for far less). These cultures are quite different from ours. Individual life and death are valued quite differently. And very few in the West seem even interested in acknowledging this. Suicide bombers don't appear out of the aether. They come from certain cultures and represent only the small, individualistic part of a very large, tribal tactic that is typical of desert, arab culture and has been spread with the formalization of that culture in islam.
Yes, the Turks are amazing hypocrites and liars. Is that news? Has anyone been paying attention to those cultures? The problem is not with them, since they are just acting as they have always acted, but with us, who take their plays at moralizing seriously and lend their accusations credibility.
But reality and the delusional abstract world created after WWII (pushed exponentially forward after the fall of the USSR) are coming into direct conflict and that is going to be very ugly.
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progressoverpeace, I would tell you what yesterday I told JonathanFromTelAviv in another of these DB threads about the fighting in Gaza. That is, you make good points and shouldn't undercut them with needlessly exaggerated claims, like "The whole idea of war crimes is insane."
It would not have contravened all notions of morality if the Allies had like the Japanese done horrifying medical experiments on prisonsers, e.g., those entailing vivisection, in the course of prosecuting the war? You wouldn't have us call out the perpetrators of such as war criminals, distinguishing them from their compatriots who fought with at least a modicum of honor? It would only be "victors justice" to prosecute those responsible as "war criminals" rather than putting them in the docks as people whose crimes happened to be committed during the course of an armed conflict? (I'm purposely leaving out the Holocaust here because it might be argued that while it was the ultimate in depravity, it wasn't part of WWII itself.)
About the moral "asymetry" between the parties to the conflict under discussion here, I think you are dead on. ("Tribalistic" might draw some quibbles, but like "Islamofascism" it works for me as a reasonable, if not precisely correct, descriptor.)
["First Israel's evil lost the alliance with Iran, with devastating result." How is that to be understood? Hasn't Evil been in power since 1979 in Iran, and wasn't it the advent of that Evil that ended the alliance between Iran and Israel? Really, this is too cockamamy to find much acceptance even among the legions of Israel haters and bona fide antisemites of the type I think you are pretending to be.]
How can you be so sure that the last 50 years of peace can be attributed to the use of those tactics and not their condemnation since (or perhaps any number of other things)?
To any interested VCers: As you may know, I'm starting to become a regular around here. And, if any of you care to hop over to my site (since you all seem to be contributors to a great comment culture) feel free!
http://sergeizhulik.blogspot.com/
But in any event, France has for years been the perennial winner of the prize for chutzpah for lecturing others on their failures to stand for liberte, egalite, and fraternite. Who could we put forward as the equal of LePen -Pat Buchanan, who never got all that far in his pursuit of the presidency?
You might acquaint yourself with the history and the larger set of facts, such as the enculturation of hatred from pre-school ages and forward (v., e.g., here and here and here), such as the fact that Hamas launches their munitions from within civilian populations in a systematic attempt to gain MSM/propaganda support.
"Little" things like that. Though that is merely the barest of beginnings since the systemic, enculturation of hate is effectively an industry unto itself in Gaza and the West Bank.
He suppresses freedom fighters.
Israel commits crimes against humanity.
This is quite well accepted by the int'l community (e.g.).
The pertinent question is whether one should continue an assault against such a cynical (and obviously war-criminal) enemy or stay one's hand to prevent the death of innocents. This is especially true considering that, in many cases, Hamas forcibly prevented the evacuation of innocent civilians from their firing areas.
He has a clear choice - he can go to a negotiating table like any sane country - or this Hamas man can reap literally what he sows
Israel has not made war upon the Palestinians - they have just returned to stop the attacks upon their own innocent people.
Let me help you here.
Answer: As many as it takes until they stop attacking you.
This is not the question posed. The question is, how many people other than the guilty parties are your permitted to kill in order to get at the gang members (or, phrased another way, how much care do you need to give that you don't kill random subway passengers).
I tend to agree with DB that Israel was entitled to respond the way she did (although I question the wisdom of that response) but don't be naive and think that only gang members were killed in the latest offensive.
And if your grandmother happens to be riding the subway that day (suppose the gang members take her hostage and won't let her leave the station), I'm sure you'd be okay with blasting her away too.
In fairness, I'm pretty sure BobDoyle knows it wasn't the greatest analogy. Most likely, he just wants a discussion about beating up subway-users.
who are in opposition to the PM, btw, which probably doesn't bother him at all to have them negatively reflected as a result.
This is not to say that I might not choose to sacrifice myself in certain circumstances, say if it was a choice between my life and my child's, but not for grandma!
Moreover, it is not the policy of any known governmental unit that I'm aware of to disregard the lives of the hostages and innocent bystanders. Quite the contrary, when a bank robber takes hostages, the police generally act as I've suggested -- they do their best to prevent the loss of innocent lives (as opposed to, say, storming the place).
Unlikely. The "friendship" between Turkey and Israel is based on strategic military considerations. The Turkish political scene is largely dominated by various religious organizations (which usually are ethnically based). The Turkish miltary is the guardian of the sectarian tradition established by Attaturk (who, had a lot to do with what was done to the Greeks, Armenians and Kurds).
The military nullified the Turkish Parlement's attempts in the 1990s to end ties with Israel and support its enemies. The Turkish military is concerned about containing Syria (which claims a large chunk of southern Turkey which happens to be rich in water resources) and keeping Iran from becoming too aggressive. When Saddam was in power, the Turkish military alternated between supporting Kurdish rebels which were fighting Saddam and Iran, and trying to suppress them when they became too strong. Turkey has claims on the Mosul area of Iraq (due to claims of the Kurds - which Turkey will likely compromise if the area is recognized as part of Iraqi Kurdistan and a pipeline is built from there across Turkey and not from there and south to Basra). Iran alternately supports the Kurds against Turkey and in Iraq, and suppresses them when they become too stronge. NATO wants to keep Turkey satisfied, since there is no other land route to Georgia and that oil producing areas of Central Asia that Russia cannot easily cut. Also, if (when) it is finally decided to launch air stikes against the Iranian nuclear facilities and ballistic missiles, eastern Turkey would be the place to launch the strikes from.
Robert Kaplan in Eastward to Tartary has an understandable summary of the issues and conflicts (although it's about 10 years old -- unfortunately, given what passes for news and sophistification on international matters in the US and US media, 10 years old is about as recent as one can expect published in English).
As far as apologizing -- given the number of times that Anatolia has been depopulated over the centuries, and the number of groups that have done so, what happened in the early 20th century looks like the norm for the area. The Ottoman Turks are only the most recent ones to do so relatively successfully. There were other tribes in Anatolia when the Armenians and Kurds arrived -- but, we don't here about what happened to them. And, following WWI and the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, the Greeks invaded Turkey and tried to take control of all of western Anatolia (expelling the Turks and everyone else in their path), but were defeated by Attaturk, who then drove nearly all the Greeks out of Turkey.
In addition to the strategic military considerations, Turkey and Israel share the experience of being surrounded by fairly powerful, hostile neighbors, and have within their borders populations related to their hostile neighbors. Israel, however, attracts more press in the US and Europe when it takes military action to protect its national interests.
So, I wouldn't describe the relationship as "friendship." Rather, Turkey and Israel share mutual enemies and problems, which they can more effectively deal with acting in concert than acting alone.
Here's a review that counters the false premises and other distortions in that report.
Agreed entirely. As I said above, I'm convinced that Israel is justified in taking the actions that she did.
That said, even after accepting that such civilian casualties are entirely the fault of the terrorist, I still feel that I can support a policy in which Israel stays its hand in order to protect those civilians. That is to say, a concern for the well-being of those civilians is not the equivalent of absolving the terrorist of his guilt.
At the least the way I was taught, a mensch doesn't consider whether the other person is guilty when making his decision, nor does he care about who will ultimately take the blame. Rather, a mensch does the right thing.
I think basically we agree that Israel shouldn't kill thousands of civilians on the other side to save one Israeli. Nor should Israel forgo killing one civilian on the other side to save one Israeli if the target is a legitimate military one. Beyond that, where to draw the line is not at all clear, and I think ultimately has to reflect the consensus (or as close as you can get) moral judgments of the public the government represents. I.e., how much risk are you willing to allow the government to take with your life to preserve the lives of civilians on the other side?
It is awfully difficult to understand how this statement is legitimate. Could you replace the words Israel and Israeli with Gazan? I suspect such actions taken by any person living in Gaza would nevertheless be characterized as terrorism, and rightly so.
N.B., further still, we are presently beyond the "coal miners' canary" stage of this problem. See here for a set of examples, and see here for additional examples. I won't excerpt as the first link should be read in full and the second link is well worth a considered perusal.
Thanks for your response. Let me address a couple of good points you bring up:
As to my characterization that the designation of "war crimes" as insane, I am only being partially hyperbolic. I do, in fact, consider the "laws" built around that notion to be quite silly (though insane would be pushing it a bit, not too much though). The real problem was that I did not give a complete decription. Of course, every nation has the right to declare any laws it wants (and then try to enforce those laws, if they can). But what I was talking about with "war crimes" was not so much the laws of any nation, but the idea of globalizing and universalizing the notion that certain types of war are legal and certain types of war are "illegal".
When any nation (or group) launches into a war, it has decided that it would impose its idea of law on the other side, by force of arms. In doing this, it takes on the risk of losing, and thus having the winning side decide whatever it wants about the tactics used to prosecute that war. As Curtis Lemay said, if we lost WWII, our side would have been considered war criminals. The losers are always war criminals to the winners (as the losers were out trying to hurt, fatally perhaps, the winners). That is all "war crimes" come down to. To try and set some objective criteria that clearly defines war crimes is impossible, as we are seeing with the manipulation by our enemies of the attempt to universally define "terrorist" (same sort of idea, really). (And I would note that we don't use the word "terrorist" to define any actual actions, but only as a label to name our enemy - since many are reluctant to be explicit that the arab/persian/muslim world is actively engaged in a war to bring down the West.)
So, as usual in the West, we tend to confuse the difference between labels and descriptions and then get ourselves in trouble by binding ourselves to the wrong notion.
I used the word "insane" to describe the desire to universalize the notion of "war crimes" because I find the general intellectual notion behind it to be quite dangerous and destabilizing and think that those who support the idea of international war crimes prosecutions to be nearing insane in their disregard for reality. I apply the same to people who support the UN, for many of the same reasons. ANy empowered, peerless, competitionless entity is dangerous and should never be allowed to exist. This is a basic notion right out of evolution 101 (not to mention common sense) and those who pursue these empowered, peerless entities need to understand that their childish reasoning is totally unacceptable in the real world and puts us all in grave danger. Even national governments have peers and competition, as people can get up and move to a friendlier nation with a better government if they tire of their own (and we have seen how those governments that squelch such competition, by restricting population flow) have always developed.
I find the move to create empowered, peerless, competitionless global entities to be great threats to all of us and I am intellectually offended by people who support such institutions, even at the theoretical level.
As to your specific example of conducting medical experiments on prisoners, I would agree with you that, if no military advantage was to be gotten out of it (and it is not a surety that such actions would be without military value, in the large) it should not be done. However, I still don't see that as a "war crime" but just a regular old crime as any nation would prosecute its own citizens for without any war going on. If the other side is doing it to our soldiers, then it is just savage behavior but certainly no worse than the larger war waged against us with the intent of destroying our way of life, if not killing each and every one of us.
Most nations use the concept of war crimes, or crimes against humanity, for no reason other than to extend their jurisdiction beyond their own borders and try to hide behind some moral argument in defense of it. When a coutnry goes to war with us, they have brought themselves under our jurisdiction, should we prevail, and their fates should fall under the subjective judgement of our Commander in Chief (and the military) to decide. There is, again, nothing universal about this and it is solely dependent on the actual participants and what they decide in the moment.
I'm skipping a lot of stuff, but, in the end, morality has no place in war. War is to win. Period. One does not need any moral justification to want to continue to survive, freely. This is why nations are supposed to think twice before going to war, especially before going to war with nations that could actually obliterate them with the push of a button. But, the development of war crimes nonsense has taken these risks away and is why we see pip-squeak nations and weak groups attacking others who could end their existence (and those of all their families) in a second. The proof is in the actions we see in the world. The Palestinians, for instance, attack only because they are sure that Israel would never do to them what the Allies did to the Axis during WWII. The Palestinians' only defense is the self-restraint of Israel. The fact that that imperils Israel's continued existence only shows how silly the notion of "legal war" is and how it serves to destabilize the world.
To the "tribalistic" description I used. I find that accurate, though one can use "collectivist", "anti-individualist", or "group-oriented" if they want. As a side note, I call party-oriented parliamentary systems tribalistic, too - as opposed to our individualistic system in the US.
I skipped a lot in the above, but I hope my main points came across.
Oren:
How can you be so sure that the last 50 years of peace can be attributed to the use of those tactics and not their condemnation since (or perhaps any number of other things)?
My explanation to this is above. Condemnation stops nothing. I think world history is replete with examples proving this. I would also say that, if you believe what you are proposing, then why do we have a strategic nuclear arsenal whose only purpose is to incinerate whole swaths of earth, including every living thing in the area, and why has this arsenal formed the backbone of our strategic defense (to this very day)?
Personally, I find it hard to believe that someone would try to argue that the tactics used in WWII did not lead to the peace and prosperity afterwards, but that some sort of internationalization of crime did. In any event, the actions taken during the war certainly didn't preclude any peace - that we can say with 100% certitude - which certainly destroys the modern whining about "hearts and minds". This is whining that has prevailed since WWII (with the exception of the Cold War, for which total annihilation was the game) and it should be noted that we haven't won any war since WWII. So, we have the tactics of WWII and a clear and sustained win, versus the world with "war crimes" and other condemnations of tactics, in which we have won no wars. Along these lines, Israel has never won any wars, either. Israel fights nothing but defenses and has to continue with the same war every ten years, almost losing twice (so far) and with the war coming into Israeli cities for the past two decades, now. And I think we all know that if Israel gives them enough chances, eventually Israel will lose. That's just a matter of Bernoulli trials.
Disagree. My position is, no more dead Jews, not one. Enough and never again.
The dead civilians have some responsibility here, even apart from their having chosen Hamas.
Setting aside what some have called my no-tolerance policy about Jew-murder, even if we take Jews out of the picture, progressoverpeace has grasped the big picture. Good intentions are worse than useless.
With the claim "that we don't use the word 'terrorist' to define any actual actions, but only as a label to name our enemy" are you in any way endorsing the notion that "one man's terrorist is another's freedom fighter"? If so, I heartily disagree, finding as I do that an avowal of amorality, if not immorality or just a stupidity.
"The losers are always war criminals to the winners (as the losers were out trying to hurt, fatally perhaps, the winners). That is all 'war crimes' come down to." Simply wrong, the losers are not always war criminals to the winners, and that is not all that "war crimes" come down to.
Do you have any military experience, especially during the course of active fighting? Any familiarity with the ethos of our own military and the more thoughtful members thereof? "Hearts and minds" have no bearing upon the success of insurgencies and counterinsurgencies, so those "whining"(?) about such are fools and/or disingenuous no matter their relevant experience and other qualifications?
Let's say 20 years from now, there is a legitimate peaceful, prosperous government in Gaza. A fanatical theocratic Israeli government starts lobbing rockets indiscriminately into Gaza. I certainly wouldn't expect the Gaza government to do anything different than what Israel has done in resopnse, in terms of worrying about civilian casualties, and it would be well within its rights to do less.
I agree. But whether or not I'd agree with its conclusions, there's no doubt the Israeli government considers just such questions. What's hard to rationalize are the Israel critics, here and elsewhere (mostly elsewhere), who do doubt that, and who put Israel's alleged disregard for human life on an equal plane with that of its enemies, or worse.
Second, I do not believe that it has been a consistent policy of the state of Israel to consider harm done to civilians as part of its efforts to secure its own citizens. In fact, senior levels of Israeli leadership have signaled the opposite. Inflicting "heavy pain" on the population in Gaza as a means of slowly persuading them to cease hostilities does not seem to be in line with trying to bring about a peaceful settlement of outstanding political and social issues.
I don't know what you're talking about. This sounds like a false line Chomsky was pushing in 2006 regarding the Lebanon War, and if so, those "civilians" were not civilians.
If that were true, Gaza would be completely uninhabitable, and there would be hundreds of thousands of dead Palestinians.
With the claim "that we don't use the word 'terrorist' to define any actual actions, but only as a label to name our enemy" are you in any way endorsing the notion that "one man's terrorist is another's freedom fighter"?
I'm saying that terrorism (however you care to define it) is nothing but a tactic of war. Period. Killing civilians is part of war. It always has been and always will be. If you don't agree, then tell me what justification you can come up with for our strategic nuclear arsenal.
For us to claim that we have problems with AL Quaeda because they are terrorists is silly. Our problem with Al Quaeda (or any of the other groups) is because they are waging war on us, no matter what tactics they use. We still call the Hezbollah attack on our Marine barracks a "terrorist" attack, even though it was a military target. Why? Because we use the term "terrorist" for our enemies, most of whom prefer to use terrorist tactics, but are not limited to them. This also goes back to the 70's when the label "terrorist" got pinned on these groups (though their specialty back then was not in kililing the enemy's civilians, but attacking the civilians of non-participating countries in order to bring external pressure on their actual enemy).
If so, I heartily disagree, finding as I do that an avowal of amorality, if not immorality or just a stupidity.
As I said before, and you obviously disagree with, I don't mix morality and war. You have all the time you want to moralize after the war has been won. But during fighting, the job of our government and military is to protect us, and not to worry about the citizens of other countries. They have their own governments to look after them. Government's first and primary purpose is to protect its citizenry, not to worry about the citizens of others, civilian or not.
progressoverpeace: "The losers are always war criminals to the winners (as the losers were out trying to hurt, fatally perhaps, the winners). That is all 'war crimes' come down to."
Simply wrong, the losers are not always war criminals to the winners, and that is not all that "war crimes" come down to.
The losers are whatever the winners say they are. This is pretty close to a tautology, right?
Do you have any military experience, especially during the course of active fighting? Any familiarity with the ethos of our own military and the more thoughtful members thereof?
What possible impact could these questions have on a theory of war? Our military was pretty darned good in WWII, when they were doing things that people nowadays would jail them for. I guess you think human nature has changed that much in 60 years. I don't.
And I would remind you that JFK went on national TV and threatened to nuke the USSR if Cuba launched a nuclear missile at French Guyana. I don't think that speech would go over very well with those espousing ideas about leaving civilians alone, these days. Also, as I posted before, we have a strategic nuclear arsenal meant to incinerate tens of millions of civilians. Is that arsenal illegal or immoral or whatever you want to call it? You tell me. I am in favor of maintaining it, because I harbor no illusions about war and what must be done in war, when called for.
"Hearts and minds" have no bearing upon the success of insurgencies and counterinsurgencies, so those "whining"(?) about such are fools and/or disingenuous no matter their relevant experience and other qualifications?
I made the "hearts and minds" argument with respect to the immense killing of civilians we did in WWII, while still getting the Japanese and Germans as some of our staunchest and most trustworthy allies after the war. The idea that being ruthless loses hearts and minds is just incorrect, and in fact, all of the evidence we have points to quite the opposite. There are no cases of us being so nice that enemies decided to stop killing us and become our allies, however there are countless cases for the exact opposite.
You can say that again. The idea that there is no 'purely military solution' is nonsense, and our enemies certainly don't go around saying that.
There is this crazy confusion that the United States is engaged in 'asymmetrical warfare.' Nothing could be sillier. We could, if we wished, engage in asymmetrical warfare to any degree you care to specify. Instead, we have limited ourselves in large degree to fighting a symmetrical battle against people who wish us ill.
And there are plenty of people who want to make it even more symmetrical, to the point that we lose.
Certainly there is nothing moral about losing a war.
"You can say that again. The idea that there is no 'purely military solution' is nonsense, and our enemies certainly don't go around saying that."
Yep. I am constantly amazed by people who like to parrot that line about there being no military solution. I don't mind them saying it, but I wish they would at least have the intellectual honesty to say that military solutions certainly exist (for the much stronger countries) but that they would rather have our citizens die than kill as many of the enemy's as such solutions would require. Usually these people are surprised to hear that we killed about 10% of the German population and almost 5% of the Japanese population in WWII.
I don't know, at some point people got the idea that war is something that people should be able to watch on TV without feeling sick. Of course, we couldn't even show life saving surgeries on TV without making most people sick, but that never seems to make it into the conversation. Runaway empathy will kill the West, especially as it gets applied to cultures whose individuals react far differently than Westerners do.
"Instead, we have limited ourselves in large degree to fighting a symmetrical battle against people who wish us ill.
And there are plenty of people who want to make it even more symmetrical, to the point that we lose."
I think that Ehud Olmert best expressed this feeling that is pervasive in the West. In one of his greatest statements ever (most shameful and silly, I mean) Olmert declared:
"We are tired of fighting, we are tired of being courageous, we are tired of winning, we are tired of defeating our enemies, we want that we will be able to live in an entirely different environment of relations with our enemies."
Very sad, but that is exactly how many in the West feel, though most Westerners are not tired of winning wars but tired of winning the many other competitions that Man is always taking part in. And they, as Olmert, seem to forget that while it takes two to tango, it only takes one to force a war. Meanwhile, Israel has certainly gotten itself a different environment of relations. I expect to see chemical attacks started against Israel some time in the next few years. That is the next logical step in the progression that has been happening since Oslo.
"Certainly there is nothing moral about losing a war."
Actually, for many guilt-ridden Westerners, they view a loss as the ultimate act of atonement for the great sin of the West having been so utterly dominant in just about all fields of human endeavor. Of course, they don't understand what a loss would really mean (as many of these people still entertain notions of the greatness of the Soviet Union or the honor of Che Guevara) but the fantasy lives in their minds, anyway. But there is nothing we can do about this, as our individualistic culture uses guilt as the main control mechanism and there are just a certain percentage of people who are unable to control their feelings of guilt (like kids who watch horror movies and are then unable to sleep for weeks, due to the creation of ghosts everywhere in their imagination and out of control). Still, individualistic societies are the freeset, most productive and most creative, so I think this is a fair trade. We just can't let them out of their sandboxes, or they can really muck things up.
You mean, like David Petraeus?
Yeah, that lying sissy Petraeus sure hates America.
Please. Gen. Petraeus is speaking as an active duty officer bound to follow the ROE as it is. Along the same lines, you can find many active-duty officers who will also tell you that torture doesn't work, because that is the line that the military takes. It is untrue, but that is what they say.
And if you think Iraq is finished, because of a temporary lull, you know very little about the middle east or how things work there. Iraq is far too wealthy and far too strategic a country to sit quietly and be left alone after US forces leave. But, you'll just have to see that part for yourself.
To the extent that "population" implies civilians, you are being grossly misleading. It would also be better if you said 'we and our allies.'
And the correct figure for Japan seems to be under 4%.
Israel, as a responsible democratic state, is under an even greater responsibility to seek out means to protect itself that do not involve the deaths of thousands of Gazans (civilians or otherwise).
And if you believe something is false, or from the mouth of Chomsky, it would be nice--as part of a dialogue--to be referred to a credible source that refutes the statement. We are lawyers after all.
So what's your point? Your original claim was that people who "parrot that line about there being no military solution" (like Petraeus did) are dishonest and "would rather have our citizens die than kill as many of the enemy's as such solutions would require." So if Petraeus wasn't the liar who preferred American deaths to those of our enemies, who was? Are you saying it was his commanders, the Pentagon, George Bush?
I never said I thought Iraq was "finished." I believe those claims, again, came from the last administration.
(Set aside that there weren't any more. That was not the concern of the field commanders. Their duty was to tell the civilian leaders what was needed to do the job.)
If Petraeus is not incompetent then he is not bold enough to stand up for his men. Not to pick on him. The generals and admirals around him aren't any better.
The military is in an acute state of denial. Scads of flag officers keep going public to say that the US must abjure torture because if it doesn't, our foes will torture Americans they capture. Huh? In what Asian war have American POWs not been tortured?
The officer corps took a wrong turn during the Vietnam War and it has never gotten back to the standards of honor and duty that my father, who held the president's commission during World War II, taught me he had been taught.
Whether these people 'want' to have our citizen die is beside the point. Their actions are getting our people killed.
Can you specify those "means to protect itself that do not involve the deaths of thousands (sic) of Gazans" that you would have Israel employ?
Your concern is not only for the civilians residing in Gaza, but also for the "otherwise"? The "otherwise" would be those smuggling in the rockets and those firing them at Israel's civilians; those seeking to infiltrate Israel to capture soldiers and kill as many Israeli citizens as they can manage; those devoted to the destruction of Israel; etc.?What exactly are you calling upon Professor Bernstein to respond to? Some vague claim about "kidnapping two civilians"? Did you not see his response ("I don't know what you're talking about.")?
As a lawyer, you surely understand that you are the one with the burden of proof here, and that entails both the burden of production and the burden of persuasion. You assert there was a kidnapping two "civilians" by Israel immediately before Hamas snatched the Israeli soldier. So, produce the evidence and argue its significance before challenging Professor Bernstein or anyone else refute your claim.
I wonder if it was him or someone else who taught you to make bogus claims and then duck when challenged (link, link).
Why wouldn't he bound by a treaty that he himself would sign in the future?
It hasn't. Not ever.
The Geneva Convention is a myth.
Thanks for that feeble attempt at trying to direct attention away from your original comment (see here and here), which implied that Truman's acts during WWII were subject to the 1949 GC, and which had nothing to do with whether or not "the GC has ever been observed in Asia with respect to US prisoners."
Here's what I'm "contending:" that you made a transparently bogus claim and are now spinning like a top in a pathetic attempt to avoid responsibility for doing so.
As for my comment about about two kidnapped Gazans, this was reported by the Associated Press on July 26, 2006. Prof. Chomsky also repeated the claim, so if his statement is false, I would like to see how. Moreover, statements by former Israeli leaders confirm my view that, by and large, Israel has merely given lip service to the notion of sparing civilian life. And no -- I don't believe organizations like Hamas or Hezbollah seek to spare innocent human life. But does this mean the Israeli leadership should not only stoop to the same level, but see their violence and raise it?
Let's remember that Prof. Bernstein initiated this comment string by bemoaning Erdogan's chutzpah. I can only assume that Bernstein's view is that Erdogan's comments might as well be disregarded because Turkey itself is responsible for massive atrocities. I think most states have committed atrocities in some form, but I don't think this means Erdogan has any particular chutzpah for taking issue with Israeli government behavior.
And no -- I don't believe organizations like Hamas or Hezbollah seek to spare innocent human life.
Wow. You're really going out on a limb here ...
But does this mean the Israeli leadership should not only stoop to the same level,
Well, I like the way you portray the inferiority of the Palestinians' own chosen representatives and the course that the Palesinians, themselves, are much in favor of (STOOP to the same level). Thank you for your honesty on this (unlike that joke of an admission above).
but see their violence and raise it?
Er ... yeah. That's what happens in wars. The Palestinians knew what Hamas wanted to do and they voted for them, in droves. They will have to suffer the consequences of their decisions, and that is aside from the fact that Israel's only responsibility is to Israeli citizens, not pals who want to kill every Jew they can get their hands on.
Yes, in war you see the violence of the enemy and, if needed, raise it by such an amount that they never think of resorting to it, again. That is the risk the enemy takes and they must be made to understand that. But, by the way you are proposing wars should be fought, no one suffers any real consequences for starting wars and behaving in such a way that a normal society would have to "stoop to their level". Your sort of thinking is what drags wars on for extended periods of time ... until the barbarians (whose level has not been stooped to by the civilized people who are under attack) finally win. Great strategy, there.
"[A]bove all"?
I like international law more than most around here, but even I don't think it will have much future if people start insisting governments heed it above the survival of their own citizens.
You may think you are espousing morality; I think you are espousing fatuousness, if not worse.
You still haven't shoulder your burden of proof. Provide us with links or more details and tell us what significance you and/or Chomsky claim for them. That would be the lawerly thing to do, don't you think? ("We are lawyers after all.")
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp- dyn/content/article/2009/02/01/
AR2009020101672.html
You know, I find it to be absolutely amazing that the WaPo can write this, calling Turkey a "liberal democracy" when the Turkish Constitution gives the Turkish military supreme power over the civilian government and is, in fact, charged with the responsibility of exercising that power whenever it thinks that islam is threatening the secular state (as is happening now, once again). This sort of power structure is, of course, anathema to the Western notion of "democracy", let alone "liberal", and is one of the major reasons why Turkey is having such problems getting into the EU. But you'd never know this if you went by the way Westerners generally talk and write about Turkey.
It is an interesting side note that the Turks have long understood the political ambitions and drive of islam (which is really a political ideology with an attendant mythology), while the West denies this fact over and over.
Overall point is this: these discussions are terribly blighted by those on both sides who see the issue only through terribly biased spectacles. As a matter of fact, I do not have much more faith in Obama than I did with any prior U.S. government -- but your attempt to try and pigeon hole me is understandable. The key for me will be to see the United States act as an honest broker. Israel does have an increased responsibility in my view, after all they have the significant benefit of using American weaponry to help protect them -- and under international law principles they have the backing of norms and customs enabling them to act by force in certain cases. Since the elected Hamas leaders in Gaza and the West Bank are illegitimate in your view (due to their ideology, not their vote-getting) they do not even enjoy that kind of status.
This is why I have decided to comment here, not because I have a personal dog in this fight (as I am neither Jewish nor of Arab descent) but because I am an American interested in seeing the U.S. act as a fair and honest mediator.
But thanks for calling me a fool :)
You are supposed to be proving up your case, not making mine.
The Israelis have American weaponry, as well as their own which they have designed and manufactured. But their enemies have never lacked for weapons with which to attack Israel and its citizens, including the great number of rockets that Iran has been supplying them. You are free to think whatever you wish ("Israel does have an increased responsibility in my view"), but can you make a persuasive case for what you believe? You have gone on for a very long time without doing so.
If "legitimacy" is all about the number of votes garnered, then Hamas may be seen as more legitimate than the Nazis were, since a greater percentage of Palestinians voted for them than Germans did for the Nazis. And no, I don't think their "status," or anything else for that matter, makes their attacks on Israel in any way justifiable. But again, you are free to see Hamas (and Hezbollah?) as deserving of some measure of respect, deference, or whatever it is you want to accord them, no matter their ideology (a Nazi-like desire to dispose of Jews), because in a one-man-one-time vote they outpolled their Fatah rivals.
The Turks are allowed to have sham elections and the parties can then maneuver within whatever degree of latitude the army decides to allow them.
If the parties transgress, the army overthrows the government, as it does every few years.
Nowadays, the degree of movement allowed to the government is less than ever, because the army has not budged from its secularist position, but the electorate has recovered from the shock of Ataturk and is reverting to illiberal Muslim limits.
It cannot be fun to be a Turkish prime minister and I am sure that abusing Jews takes some of the strain off.
And who elected the house of Saud or the Hashemites?
Amazing on one hand that Israel is accused of trampling democracy for refusing to deal with the elected Hamas government even though Hamas itself refuses to negotiate and has pledged itself to Israel's destruction, yet at the same time Israel is criticised for defending itself because Hamas is not to be held to the standards of a government.
The Israeli critics of Israel whom I've read don't agree with you, Yankev. They point to ceasefires that Hamas has respected while Israel has not kept its side of the bargain.
Maybe it's just me, but I thought Israel was being criticized for different things, such as its collective punishment of Gazans, refusal to act on opportunities to bring the conflict to a close by encouraging and rewarding god behavior, and the vast one-sidedness and destructiveness (of civilian lives and infrastructure) of its self-"defenses".
Good questions. They share similar cynical reasons with Mubarak in wanting to keep an elected Hamas (far cleaner and effective in providing public services) bottled up, which is why they make common cause with Israel.
Yes, many of the Israeli people are wonderful and empathetic - and one of the reasons why the government prohibited Israeli reporters from entering Gaza was precisely not to allow such empathy to influence policy. But on the whole, the State of Israel has Gaza in an economic vice, the vast bulk of humanitarian assistance comes from others, and Israelis either supply goods it allows in or collects duties and fees on those sourced elsewhere. And Egypt cooperates more or less, with the border being officially closed.
The result is intense pressure on Gazans as a whole, and zero economic opportunity - and this is precisely what Israel intends. Do you disagree?
If you read the cited posts, "neurodoc" uses typical trolling means: rendering incorrectly another's arguments into a strawman, lauding another who consents without having read original argument, among others. You've introduced one of my arguments from cited thread: Israel itself doesn't recognize Hamas as either the representative of Palestinians or the legitimate authority in Gaza; thus Israel defines Hamas as a criminal gang not a sovereign's army; so, by invading Gaza in order to apprehend criminals, Israel alone and not Hamas has the duty of protecting innocents during the invasion. Neither ius ad bellum nor ius in bello governs Israel during the invasion, since hamas is not a sovereign; as war is a contest between sovereigns only.
It's not just you. There are untold numbers of disingenuous people just like you. As to collective punishment of Gazans, that's war. Israel left Gaza to the Gazans (which was really stupid, to start with - never give gifts to arabs without demanding acknowledgement of the gift from them and something in return) and the Gazans can't help themselves but threaten and attack Israel at every opportunity. They make war, so they are going to suffer the consequences of their actions. Israel's problem is that it has been far too restained in its responses and needs to make the Gazan population feel true pain ... sort of like what we did to Japan in WWII. If the Gazans don't like that, they can stop attacking Israel and causing problems.
By the way, since you seem to know nothing about middle eastern cultures, let me enlighten you about something, suicide bombers are not some strange tactic that appeared out of the aether. That tactic comes from the culture and they exercise the same tactic at the societal level. Arabs fight total scorched-earth campaigns (including themselves in the scorching) and have been doing so for millenia. That is arab culture. The same way that Hamas sends suicide bombers into Israeli cities (when they are able) Gazan society holds itself up as a suicide attacker, daring Israel to kill them and refusing to stop until Israel does.
And it is nice the way you take the concept of an individualistic culture (a distaste for collective punishment) and apply it to a tribal culture that recognizes no problem with anything of the sort. In fact, to tribal cultures, not exercising the sort of punishment they understand just goads them on to fight more.
But, your display is a typical example of liberal "thinking". LOL. ... Well, it used to be funny when the libs were restricted to their sandbox. Now it's just plain dangerous.
I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that you are just trying to make a joke, here. "rewarding good behavior" ... ROFLMAO! What good behavior could you possibly be talking about? In fact, I'll let you go back 50 years to find good behavior. List me some examples. I can list a thousand examples of Israel encouraging good behavior, only to be attacked, instead.
The arabs could have had Gaza and the West Bank decades ago if they ever showed good behavior. But they didn't, and they don't, and now they have shown themselves to be enough of a continuing threat that they will have to leave the West Bank. They had their chances (too many) and have now exhausted them. And if you had any sense you would look at the forms of governance that exist throughout the arab world and start to put two and two together. But, you won't do that, since it would kill your argument.
And let's be perfectly clear; Israel has no responsibility to reward anything. Israel's only responsibility is to protect Israelis. Gazans have a responsibility to act like civilized humans, which they seem unable to do. Barring that, they sow the wind and they shall reap the whirlwind.
So ... you would call the winner of any war to be guilty of vast one-sidedness, I gather? Do you think about these things before you write them? It seems not.
Perhaps you should ask why the Gazans, knowing that they could be annihilated by Israel at any given moment, want to keep fighting with Israel, unless they want to die. Why would that be? The only defense that the Gazans have, when they attack Israel, is Israel's own self-restraint. That's some pretty smart stuff, there. I mean, really.
Since you seem to think you are being so legalistic in your argument, why don't you analyze the Hamas charter and explain how the formal and official dedication to the destruction of Israel figures into all this. Oh, never mind. You would never do that. Not without some silliness about the Gazans and how their threats aren't serious, or something equally dishonest.
Since you seem to think you are being so legalistic in your argument
Sorry, I don't think I was being particularly legalistic, but simply referred to my efforts to provide resources regarding relevant legal arguments (including an Israeli Supreme Court case on proportionality in targetted killings). Although these resources cut against those here who support Israel's actions, I am not particularly concerned about legal arguments.
As to collective punishment of Gazans, that's war. ... They make war
Is this a war, or a turkey shoot? And didn't the collective punishment by Israel in this "war" start before Hamas was elected over Fatah?
Israel left Gaza to the Gazans (which was really stupid, to start with - never give gifts to arabs without demanding acknowledgement of the gift from them and something in return)
I agree that this and related policies (the tightening embargo and then refusal to engage with Hamas) were foolish, but as Dov Weisglass, advisor to Sharon, publicly stated, leaving Gaza was not a "gift", but was designed to end the peace process:
Israel's problem is that it has been far too restained in its responses and needs to make the Gazan population feel true pain ... sort of like what we did to Japan in WWII. If the Gazans don't like that, they can stop attacking Israel and causing problems.
This is more than a little one-sided, pops. Israel has been strangling Gazans for years - BEFORE this new pain - and refuses to negotiate with their leadership. Most of the population is out of work, and more and more idle hands hate Israel. How does the attack do anything, other than boost election chances for Barak or Livni? Does it encourage strengthen the hands of any moderates anywhere? Why should we be subsidizing it?
sort of like what we did to Japan in WWII
Yeh, "sort of", with the difference being that Israel deliberately prevents Palestinians from forming a state and does not recognize its leaders, so there is no way Palestinians can yield to the Israeli boot.
And it is nice the way you take the concept of an individualistic culture (a distaste for collective punishment) and apply it to a tribal culture that recognizes no problem with anything of the sort.
Nice? It's called "international law" and it's hardly something I either created or introduced into discussion. Don't look now, but Prof. Bernstein even refers to it now and then.
In fact, to tribal cultures, not exercising the sort of punishment they understand just goads them on to fight more.
Israelis understand this well, which is why Israeli leaders have from time to time noted that, if they had had the misfortune to have been born Palestinian, would likely have joined a commando group to fight the Israelis. But as for fighting, isn't it funny that the only Arabs who persist in fighting Israel are those who Israel has not allowed any meaningful self-government?
your display is a typical example of liberal "thinking". LOL. ... Well, it used to be funny when the libs were restricted to their sandbox. Now it's just plain dangerous.
Well, I happen to be a paleocon/libertarian, but that's the kind of thing that neocons and other lovers of big government have a hard time finguring out. I agree that liberal government can be dangerous, just as letting Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld play in Iraq has been extremely costly and unproductive, as anyone with their eyes open knew in advance. At least they did a good job of bestowing war pork to their friends.
The arabs could have had Gaza and the West Bank decades ago if they ever showed good behavior.
There is more than one side here, if you'd be honest enough to recognize it: List me some examples. Happy to oblige:if you had any sense you would look at the forms of governance that exist throughout the arab world and start to put two and two together.
What I saw was the beginning of a democracy in Gaza that Israel could not control as well as corrupt Fatah, and that was a threat as well to Egypt's autocratic regime, and which Israel and Egypt together decided to crush/bottle up. Hamas (which Israel and the US both encouraged initially to hinder Arafat) did not and does not - despite its words - pose an existential threat to Israel. What has Israel gained by refusing to work with them? Only politicians have gained.
Israel has no responsibility to reward anything. Israel's only responsibility is to protect Israelis.
Sorry, but as long as Israel occupies the West Bank and maintains control over Gaza, Israel has responsibilities towards Palestinians. Otherwise, of course its responsibilities are to its citizens. As for that, a libertarian view is that states and politicians do a great job of stirring up conflict in order to maintain control and to shift tax dollars and tilt the playing field to benefit friends. With greater trade comes greater incentives to moderation all around. Israels leaders seem to prefer to sow the wind (with US subsidies) and to reap the whirlwind.
So ... you would call the winner of any war to be guilty of vast one-sidedness, I gather?
No; you seem to have tough time reading. The conflict between the US and Japan is not at all like this largely intramural struggle between a very powerful Israel and Palestinians who have little but numbers and their bodies.
Do you think about these things before you write them? It seems not.
Spoken like someone who has no self-awareness.
Cognitis, among others, has made this criticism more than once.
I recognize that you and others have leveled those criticisms. In my opinion, David Bernstein and others have adequeately refuted all of them in the various other threads discussing the legal meaning of collective punishment, proportionate damage, and the rights and duties of belligerents.
The peace process had ended years earlier, if indeed it had ever started. It just took Israel a while to realize it. Israel got nothing from the peace process except and influx of Palestinian terrorists from abroad, increased terror attacks and a loss of security control over the areas it turned over to the PA. Arafat's intention to use the process as a cover for the destruction of Israel was apparent to anyone who cared to look, and was acknowledged by Arafat in numerous post-Oslo speeches, and by the "moderate" Abbas as well. A deomcracy that engaged in mass murder of its political rivals and their families, summarily executed young men and women for the crime of walking together in public or being alone together in private, outlawed the playing of music, and shelled its own people for trying to cross into Israel while the border checkpoints were open. If that's your idea of democracy, and if you truly believe that Israel is the one blocking the Palestinians from forming a state (which, by the way, the Hamas charter does not particularly want anyway, demanding instead a Muslim caliphate from the river to the sea and eventually throughout the middle east), there's not much to discuss with you.
"rendering incorrectly another's arguments into a strawman"? Again, please cite specific examples so we may know which arguments you claim I have incorrectly rendered. For example, the one you have again repeated here about Israel not granting Hamas some measure of legitimacy, hence Hamas cannot be held responsible for the suffering of Gazans, and if Hamas cannot be held responsible for that suffering, then Israel bears responsibility for all of it? If that is the gravamen of one or that is it, then how have I misrepresented your argument, turning it into a "strawman"?
Neither the United States, nor the European Union "recognize Hamas as either the representative of Palestinians or the legitimate authority in Gaza," do they? Don't both the US and the EU hold Hamas to be a terrorist organization, that is do they not? A terrorist organization and a "criminal gang" are not one and the same thing, are they, though they may share some things in common. (Can you point to some "criminal gang" whose raison d'etre has been anything like Hamas', or whose modus operandi has closely resembled Hamas'?)
You assert that there can be no "war" when not all the parties to the conflict are "sovereigns," so Hamas must therefore be a "criminal gang," criminal gangs cannot be required to behave "responsibly," Israel as an "occupier" must shoulder full responsibility for whatever transpires in Gaza, and Israel must use means appropriate to going after criminals to deal with Hamas rather than military ones appropriate to fighting a "sovereign's army." If I don't have your argument pretty much right, I expect you will tell me, doing so with reasonable specificity and precision. But I think I do have the essence of it, and I think it patent nonsense.
Is that your position?
doc renders the above first as follows:
doc, in summary, then renders it again:
I exposed the matter of culpability for innocent Gazans killed by Israel during Israel's invasion. Doc having cited my exposition exposed the totally different matter of Hamas' culpability for all Gazans' suffering or "whatever transpires"; clearly, doc deceives by attributing such a permutated argument to me. Be clear that Hamas members should be apprehended and prosecuted had they attacked Israel with rockets; not even to be considered is doc's bogus argument attributed by him to me that Israel's invasion exculpates Hamas of any injury let alone all injury; for example, if Hamas members had compelled ambulance drivers to convey armed criminals, then those members should again be apprehended and prosecuted.
For those still unconvinced by reason, consider the following example, a timely one: 12 Mexicans armed with automatic rifles and rocket launchers cross US-Mexico border as escort for drug dealers; the dealers sell drugs and accept $10,000; on returning to Mexico, the Mexicans are attacked by federal DEA agents and kill several agents; they then cross the border and vanish into local villages. Given the reasons exposed by doc or aubrey or others, why wouldn't US be justified in invading Mexico with US army, bombing with phosphorus Mexican villages into which the dealers vanished, seizing all Mexican assets held by US financial institutions, seizing all Pemex oil wells, etc? Of course no sane person would consent to such barbarous conduct, and noone should consent to the equally barbarous conduct of Israel.
Not to be taken as an agreement that Israel did any or all of the things you posit in your analogy.
But you are right about one thing -- no paraphrase of your arguments could do justice to their lunacy.
Again, you clearly not only didn't understand the argument or the example, but you also "name-call"; look, I never addressed your delusions or childish arguments, nor should you address mine; so from now on, shut up and ignore my arguments.
Guilty. I apologize for using the term "lunacy". Allow me to substitute "lack of any relevant connection to what actually occurred or to any practical method of dealing with it."
And I forgive your trespasses as you forgive mine.
Many of them are best ignored, but I will respond as time and inclination dictate, and will not feel obligated to respond when not so inclined or when time does not permit.
Your observation is the primary cause for having carefully chosen my example; note my description of my example as "timely". No one today would approve of bombing Mexican villages on the border, but my example is timely and apt as it's not far from today's border events. Israel has no more right to invade and kill innocent Palestinians than US has to kill innocent Mexicans in pursuing heavily-armed Mexican gangs.
If Villa's gang had been elected on a platform of destroying the US and massacring all of its inhabitants, had rounded up Mexican civilians at gunpoint to serve as human shields, mined civilian homes and schools, and had attacked the US repeatedly over a period of years so as to virtualluy shut down all semblance of normal life in border towns, had been supplied by a nation with similar goals that had greater popluation, area and vastly greater sources of cash than either Mexico or the US, had launched active attacks from civilian areas (and not merely vanished into them after attacking), were not only tolerated and not only encouraged by the Mexican government but claimed to be the Mexican government and there was no other, controlled a land mass more nearly even to that of the US so as to pose a potential threat not only to border towns but eventually to the entire country (which was about the size of NJ) including the US's sole international airport and sole nuclear generators, you might have something approaching an analogy. As things are, though, the attempted analogy bears as much relation to the facts as your suggestion that Israel used phosphorus as an anti-personnel weapon. Hamas may be a gang of terrorists, but they are waging war, not pillaging for profit, and the rules of criminal procedure do not apply.
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