Comments on: Netanyahu’s gift to Obama is loaded

By: Luc_Hansen

Luc_Hansen — Sat, 23 May 2009 03:18:34 +0000

Dahoud, part of the problem in this conflict is the confusion of fact and fantasy. For example, you wrote: "The Palestinians are descendants of the Canaanites and have been in the region between the Jordan River and the Med. for about 8000 years." This is true except for the fact that "Canaanites" do not exist outside the Bible, and the same goes for an ancient Kingdom of Israel – the evidence for this entity is zero, except for those who clutch at straws eg low chronology proponents or the "Encoded Bible" fraternity. A technically accurate term for the indigenous people of that area of city states is West Semitic.

By: JimHolstun

JimHolstun — Thu, 21 May 2009 12:45:21 +0000

TOM SAWYER ABROAD v. INNOCENTS ABROAD Obama should have given him in return a copy of Mark Twain's TOM SAWYER ABROAD, written during the First Aliyah, and as brilliant a critique of Zionism's presuppositions as one could want: Huck Finn on Zionism From Mark Twain, Tom Sawyer Abroad (1894). " target="_blank">http://www.gutenberg.org/files/91/91.txt Well, we went out in the woods on the hill, and Tom told us what it was. It was a crusade. “What’s a crusade?” I says. He looked scornful, the way he’s always done when he was ashamed of a person, and says: “Huck Finn, do you mean to tell me you don’t know what a crusade is?” “No,” says I, “I don’t. And I don’t care to, nuther. I’ve lived till now and done without it, and had my health, too. But as soon as you tell me, I’ll know, and that’s soon enough. I don’t see any use in finding out things and clogging up my head with them when I mayn’t ever have any occasion to use ‘em. There was Lance Williams, he learned how to talk Choctaw here till one come and dug his grave for him. Now, then, what’s a crusade? But I can tell you one thing before you begin; if it’s a patent-right, there’s no money in it. Bill Thompson he—“ “Patent-right!” says he. “I never see such an idiot. Why, a crusade is a kind of war.” I thought he must be losing his mind. But no, he was in real earnest, and went right on, perfectly ca’m. “A crusade is a war to recover the Holy Land from the paynim.” “Which Holy Land?” “Why, the Holy Land—there ain’t but one.” “What do we want of it?” “Why, can’t you understand? It’s in the hands of the paynim, and it’s our duty to take it away from them.” “How did we come to let them git hold of it?” “We didn’t come to let them git hold of it. They always had it.” “Why, Tom, then it must belong to them, don’t it?” “Why of course it does. Who said it didn’t?” I studied over it, but couldn’t seem to git at the right of it, no way. I says: “It’s too many for me, Tom Sawyer. If I had a farm and it was mine, and another person wanted it, would it be right for him to—“ “Oh, shucks! you don’t know enough to come in when it rains, Huck Finn. It ain’t a farm, it’s entirely different. You see, it’s like this. They own the land, just the mere land, and that’s all they DO own; but it was our folks, our Jews and Christians, that made it holy, and so they haven’t any business to be there defiling it. It’s a shame, and we ought not to stand it a minute. We ought to march against them and take it away from them.”

By: andrew

andrew — Thu, 21 May 2009 08:57:38 +0000

I'm generally not a fan of Norman Finkelstein's polemical style The only thing about Finkelstein I don't particularly care for is all the unfunny jokes and Nazi analogies he uses for headlines. Not that it's offensive but over using them kinda belabors the point.

By: andrew

andrew — Thu, 21 May 2009 08:54:23 +0000

The U.N. defines a Palestinian as "ANY Arab living in the area for at least two years prior to 1948". At least they go by something concrete. I've read Israel's Law of Return about 50 times and I still can't tell what's supposed to be Jewish by it.

By: andrew

andrew — Thu, 21 May 2009 07:50:08 +0000

I've read the Case for Israel and Why Terrorism Works. There's some irony in how Dersh hypes up the war on terrah and at the same time, praises the Jewish victims of the Nazis for not trying to hurt their oppressors (see p. 8-9 of the latter). It lends credence to the theory that Zionists don't think much of Holocaust victims except as a convenient symbol.

By: josean

josean — Wed, 20 May 2009 22:06:34 +0000

It's so obvious the true nature of the ME conflict that it always escapes me how anybody can still argue about it, and it strikes me ven more how uninformed most Americans are. Evelyn, there was this land, Palestine, with its villages and people. Then some fundamentalist settlers came from Europe and started building colonies, organising an army etc. with the sole aim of disposseing the arabs. That's how Ben Gurion spoke about it. It's the last colonial conflict we Europeans have imposed on innocent lands, where a group of Europeans enslave, kill, exploit and resettle the original population as they seem fit. That's the truth, that's how Ariel Sharon -who should know about it- described it to Chirac,then France's president, on a memorable interview: Chirac had fought the Algerian war, and Sharon told him it was the same situation, only us -the zionists, he said- we do not have a metropoli to return to. The only just solution would be a single nation with democratic intitutions and equal rights for every citizen, regardless of it's race, religion or origin. Just copy and enforce the US constitution. That would do. By the way, even if the UN handling of the end of the British mandate was an enormous mistake, people like Evelyn should read the UN resolution 181: It does not call for two nations, just one nation with two states, a single currency, a single market, no resettlement allowed, and of course it had not a single provision for the ethnic cleansing of the Arabs conducted by the Hagganah, the Stern gang, etc. the razing of the Arab villages, the expulsion of 600.000 palestinians, etc. The state of Israel as we know it wasn't founded on it's mandate. It was created by the Zionists unilaterally and without any respect for the international law, the original population, the resolution or the UN itself. The Zionists even killed the UN mediator for Palestine, Count Bernardotte, and the commander of the UN Blue Helmets. He had asked them to stop the massacres and allow the return of the displaced population. The myth is just that, a myth built to cover a genocide. Israel is nothing more than a copy of South Africa, with its own racial laws and apartheid system, only difference being that not even on its most cruelest days the white South Africans dared to bomb the black villages with Apache helicopters and jet bombers.

By: Mohammed

Mohammed — Wed, 20 May 2009 18:19:16 +0000

"Bibi should have given him a copy of the Tanach. That is and always will be our deed to the land of Israel. " A deed that the rest of the world doesn't recognize. In case you hadn't noticed, religious texts are not considered 'legal and binding' documents EXCEPT to those that believe in them… A statement that entails an absurd result is itself absurd. You impose YOUR religious document on a group that doesn't recognize it. Odd, don't you think? "You have to move because G-D gave me your land." There is medication for such though processes. Not to mention, the state of Israel according to pre-Zionist rabbis would only be re-instated by the Moshiach. So, Zionism and YOUR idea of Judaism is a betrayal of older classical Judaism. Supremely ironic, in your absurd zealotry (haha!) to be a Jew, you betray Judaism itself. Then again, evil consumes itself. Shalom– if and only if, justice comes with it, Mohammed

By: super390

super390 — Wed, 20 May 2009 17:26:19 +0000

Why do Americans have so much trouble seeing the similarity between the Zionist conquest of the Palestinians and the white racist Christian settler war against the Native Americans? Do settler conspiracies… uh, societies, ever stop their depredations until they've reached an ocean? Australia? New Zealand? Canada? What about when America finished off its redskins? It was 8 years from the Wounded Knee massacre to America's first colonial war against the Philippines, and its corporate empire has expanded ever since. Well, South Africa and Rhodesia ran out of time and soldiers and collapsed. I guess a settler society must expand until it runs out of redskins or runs out of time. Screw god as a justification. He keeps changing sides.

By: Mooser

Mooser — Wed, 20 May 2009 16:29:42 +0000

Dahoud, Craig is "high", "wrecked" or "toasted" on a drug called "ziocaine". It produces, in Zionist supporters alternating waves of grandiosity and aggression and paranoia and persecution-complex. Eventually, he will subside into a raging incoherence, typical of ziocaine addicts when confronted with the fact that no-one (except other addicts) share their warped fantasies. Treatment at a rehab facility like Zionon may be of some value, but in most cases the prognosis is grim, baby, grim.

By: Mooser

Mooser — Wed, 20 May 2009 16:25:04 +0000

" He was refused entry into Israel last year and is banned for 10 years, that should tell you how objective his viewpoints are." Tells me a lot. Anyone feared and rejected by the Israelis can't be all bad. I'm sure he takes it as I would, as a badge of honor! Who the hell let all these machers, paskudniks and other assorted tough Jews in here?