Each needle wrapper must have manufacturer's stamp, each nail must be photographed and accounted for, every inventory line endlessly debated with Israelis............
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- Exile and the prophetic: No dissenter is an island http://t.co/vnbRO0AgjV, 3 hours ago
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- RT @War_Times: Blood on Israel’s Hands from #Palestine to the Mayan Highlands http://t.co/hAHRMXYXMm #Nakba @mondoweiss @jadaliyya #Guatema…, 24 hours ago
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Hard to know your point.
The norm in modern industrial plants is only a single layer of scale different from your description (probably of Gaza cross-border imports).
Barcoding, wireless, quality control inspections. (I worked in the food industry, which is just now a half-step less intense than the drug industry)
That just goes to show what happens when you talk to an accountant, and not, you know, someone like me who actually works in a factory. The same factory my father still works in.
I also worked in a customs brokerage.
Describing this as “normal,” Witty, either makes you out to be a vile propagandist, or someone who really and truly is out of touch with the world outside your bubble.
Its not normal. But its only a step and a half from normal.
“Hard to know your point.”
Read the link. Your own point is easy enough to understand–generally, you pop in to minimize or whitewash or excuse some act of Israeli cruelty, large or small.
I imagine if aid supplies were delivered in a timely manner, it would put to rest the lie that this is being done to prevent terrorist materials from entering Palestinian territory; it is clearly being done to harass – just further collective punishment of Palestinians by the Israelis. I’d like to even identify which Israelis as I’m pretty certain Israeli-Arabs (Arab-Israelis?) have no choice but to go along with this oppression, but maybe I’m wrong. If I cannot post something I think is true, but may not be true, how will my misperception have a chance to get corrected?
Oh yes Richard, it’s really “hard” to figure out her point.
Its dissent, not discussion.
Cool.
link to haaretz.com
“Damascus-based Hamas politburo chief Khaled Meshal said Sunday that the factions’ representatives issued the statement after discussions held at his house in the Syrian capital and that they rejected all forms of compromise with Israel. ”
Please don’t ever quote again that Hamas desires to negotiate with Israel.
What does this have to do with Seham’s post? Weren’t we all warned about trolling?
Seriously, Witty, do you think you get a free pass, here?
Also, pop quiz Witty: Does this announcement take place BEFORE or AFTER the IDF slaughtered over 1,300 Gazans and bombed out the Palestinian Parliament?
Listen Witty, since you are such a great proponent of “talks and negotiations” why don’t you spend your time trolling Zionist websites behooving the Zionists in Israel to hold direct talks with Hamas? Oh, direct talks only when Israel feels like talking to people that Israel wants to talk about?
Furthermore, I’ll quote whatever I want to quote. And, I applaud the decision to boycott negotiations with Israel. This is how Israel operates:
-Negotiate a little based on last week’s land theft, steal some more land.
-Start war. Refuse to talk to Hamas.
-Pretend to talk to Fatah, steal as much land as possible while doing so.
-Negotiate a little based on land theft from the last week, steal some more land.
-Start war. Refuse to talk to Hamas. Threaten Fatah not to talk to Hamas.
-Negotiate a little based on land theft from the last week, steal some more land.
And so on, and so on, and so on.
But, Palestinians should keep talking, right? Because it makes the Zionists feel better when the Palestinians are friendly to them as they continue to steal their land.
What a joke!
>> Please don’t ever quote again that Hamas desires to negotiate with Israel.
RW strikes again. Hamas and other groups warned against a “concession and compromise” policy ahead of a possible round of direct talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. Not only does not giving up the farm ahead of direct talks make perfect sense, it’s also very much NOT the same thing as reject[ing] all forms of compromise with Israel.
But you’re smart enough to know that, so maybe you were just hoping to score a few cheap and flimsy points.
What a joke(r).
Calling your refusal and raising it.
link to haaretz.com
Israel will reject any preconditions set forth by the Quartet of Middle East peace negotiators in regard to scheduled resumption of direct talks between Israel and the Palestinians, a forum of seven senior cabinet ministers, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, decided Sunday evening.
U.S. sources said Sunday that the Quartet would call for the establishment of a Palestinian state based on the 1967 borders within a year or two.
Don’t ever quote again that Israel desires peace with Palestine.
To quote Netanyahu, is not a reference to me.
I do not defend him in the slightest.
But, you guys do defend Hamas.
For a very long time you claimed that Hamas desired to negotiate with Israel, but this quote indicates that that is not the case, at least currently. Maybe it was the case for a total of a few months (after a decade of applied mass murder, in the name of “justice”.)
I do consider your perspective Seham, and identify it as an either/or approach, seemingly willing to ethnically cleanse in the name of opposing ethnic cleansing.
Is this the “war of ideas”?
On Potherd’s point, I hope you observe the similarity between the likud “we will not compromise” position and the Hamas “we will not compromise” position.
That stands starkly in contrast to the approach of humanizing the other, in which sympathy is extended to the experience of those in other communities, and thereby sympathetically understood as a tragedy of history (with strong motivation to change the status quo), moreso than as enemy (that “ironically” preserves the status quo).
I do consider your perspective Seham, and identify it as an either/or approach, seemingly willing to ethnically cleanse in the name of opposing ethnic cleansing.
Witty please do tell me more about my “willingness to ethnically cleanse.”
Who is this “you” and can you cite quotations to back up your claims?
I know what I have said, and that is that Hamas had a longstanding offer to Israel of a ceasefire. Which Israel rejected out of hand.
Hamas is certainly right now to warn against the trap of “negotiations”.
Do you think that Jewish Israelis should stay where they live (including in the West Bank), or do you think that they should be forced to leave?
Sorry, if I got a little hot in my language. I don’t remember you saying that the Jewish Israelis should leave their homes.
That was to Seham. Can you clarify your position, honestly?
I actually think my position is pretty clear if you follow anything that I have posted on this site, go and do your homework Witty.
Hamas, Shmamas. It doesnt matter if the commentariat at Mondoweiss supports them or not, they won the free and fair election and the people of Gaza support them.
Please don’t ever quote again that Hamas desires to negotiate with Israel.
Hamas has negotiated with Israel, for instance when it negotiated a successful cease-fire which was ultimately broken by Israel on the day of the US presidential election in 2008. In fact, Haaretz, which you cite in support of the proposition that Hamas will never negotiate with Israel, reported that the Israeli government had longed planned the violation of the ceasefire on 11-4-08 and the later attack on the police cadets. As an advisor to Hamas, hypotheticallly speaking, would you recommend that it ignore Israeli conduct, to include the continued construction of settlements, when considering further negotiations with Israel?
I don’t understand why he thinks parading around in projected ignorance somehow makes his viewpoint look intelligent.
I think there’s a dormouse and a march hare somewhere, missing a tea party guest.
He’s useful because his hasbara is so basic. If there are any people visiting this site that are still stuck on the basic talking points that the Zionist machine spits out: “wah we don’t have anyone to talk to and we are dying to talk to someone… wah nobody wants to make peace with us.” then at least Witty’s comments affords even a 10 year old to point out the blatant hypocrisies of it all.
Your confused. I state that NEITHER is interested in talking. The specific parties get too many points for militancy. (Hamas, likud, others).
There are few parties that genuinely advocate for live and let live.
Really, because this is what you said:
“Please don’t ever quote again that Hamas desires to negotiate with Israel.”
Its a truth from my observation, a discontinuity of Palestinian solidarity claiming, “Hamas has repeatedly offered to negotiate with Israel”, to the reality of “Hamas refuses to negotiate with Israel”.
Which is it?
I think that Hamas spokesmen have quite often said that no negotiations were possible after the 09 attack on Gaza. There isn’t a moral obligation to accept negotiations with anyone in any circumstances, though it is possible for even the worst circumstances to change and for antagonisms to ease. The impact of the CS Monitor’s report and of Eva’s emphasis on it is that cruelty in its bureaucratic form continues unabated – even given new opportunities by the rather spurious ‘easing’ of the blockade. So antagonisms show little sign of easing, do they?
The CS Monitor seems to be doing a better job than some.
There is no obligation of Hamas to accept compromise.
But, that IS the status quo, not a change from it.
RICHARD WITTY- Why would Hamas or Hezbollah want to negotiate with Israel when they know in advance that it will be bad faith negotiations? When has Israel ever lived up to any of it’s commitments? If Israel was really interested in peace, they would immediately lift the Gaza blockade and begin treating the Palestinians like human beings. Until that happens, any US/Israel sponsored negotiations are a grotesque farce.
“Why would Hamas or Hezbollah want to negotiate with Israel when they know in advance that it will be bad faith negotiations?”
Because they claim to want to negotiate, a position that solidarity parades ad nauseum.
They either do or they don’t.
Neither is currently interested in peace. And, anyone that claims to advocate for peace and/or justice, need recognize that, or remain political hypocrites.
RICHARD WITTY- You are engaging in incredible sophistry. Israel is the one with the power to initiate MEANINGFUL negotiations, not Hesbollah or Hamas. If Israel was interested in meaningful negotiations leading to a just and lasting peace, they would begin by honoring past commitments such as lifting the Gaza blockade, and by treating the Palestinians like human beings. But Israel doesn’t want peace, preferring to rely upon force to achieve it’s goals, even as it postures about negotiations while it goes its merry way creating facts on the ground. I’m sure that you are aware of this. Then why your charade of putting the onus on the weak victims, while endlessly defending the powerful occupying force? The reality is that US/Israel are the warmongers standing in the way of peace in the Middle East.
Implementing the siege with a minimum of explicit prohibited goods and a maximum of diffuse bureaucratic difficulties, it’s a challenge, but it can be done. Unpredictability is also a useful tool. Imagine exporting fruit(there is no export now) and you never know if the fruit will pass within the day or whether it may be held up for 2 weeks. People don’t like to buy such things.
2007 is described in the article as ‘before the blockade’. Decision for the blockade was made weeks after the elections of jan 2006. Did the ousting of fatah from Gaza happen after some kind of symmetrical conflict? I didn’t think so.