Rue

A lawyer and a shrink. How do you have so much time to spend on internet forums? Sorry, but your claims of credentials are worthless here. All that from a news clipping? If you're a lawyer, I feel sorry for your clients. How many times do you want to play this game? Reported to moderator. You asked me what my credentials are, and when I told you, you then get snide and personal. As for my last comment that you reported to the moderator, I stand by that comment. Your positions on this post have been consistent with trying to rationalize anger against Israel. That is what I was getting at. If you want to run to the moderator every time I respond, go ahead. The differene between us is I don't run to the moderator when you deliberately try to get personal with me. That is the major difference between us.

War you bring up a very very interesting phenomena. Yes for years Jews like most non Wasp communities and the Francophones voted Liberal and basically the Conservatives were a WASP party. That changed though with Brian Mulroney who showed the Conservatives could get more Francophone votes then the Liberals and at the same time get support from out-west. True today's Conservatives are still not strong in Quebec and Ontario and yes the Reform wing of the Conservative party did scare off ethnic votes including Jewish votes but I think what has happened dramatically is that Harper has uninentionally won over the Jewish vote for obvious reasons and yes it will hurt the LIberals in some ridings but not that many as the reality is Jews have candidates in Town of Mt. Royal in Montreal but are not a factor in any other riding because the numbers are just not there. The Liberals are going to do what they do best talk out of both sides of their mouth. They know Quebec is by far anti-Israel and anti-American and so they will play that up in their favour. They will also court the Muslim and Arab vote for all its worth and the anti-American vote for all its worth. What is interesting is that the so called LIberal front-runner Michael Ignatieff's foreign policy platform is identical to Harper's. Bob Rae is basically following the NDP model, suprise suprise, and Stephane Dion is looking like a complete idiot trying to sound neutral. I think the current Liberal position on the Middle East is a blatant example of two-faced hippocracy. Many of its people support Harper but are afraid to say so for fear of alienating their French voters, Muslim voters, and anti-American voters. As for me I will vote for Harper. He has denounced terrorism as boldly as possible but never once sucked up to me or Jewish people and never once made a speech saying he was taking sides. All he has ever said was that he is soundly against terrorism. That is true neutralism. That is a true leader. As for the NDP and the Bloc Quebecois they are laughable bafoons.

Again for a poster to write in and say Canada should remain neutral about Lebanon, do they read what they write? How does one stay neutral about terrorism? That is the point Steven Harper and his foreign Minister have had the guts to not shy away from. Canada has not taken sides. All it has done is to say it will not under any cicumstance excuse or remain silent when terrorists attack nations. That is what it is saying. For years many Canadians have been brough up on this naive notion that if we ignore terrorists and don't say anything when they engage in terrorism, they won't harm us and we will be seen as good guys and the only reason the US or European nations are attacked or Israel is attacked is because they deserved it by questioning or challenging these terrorists. Harper has been the first politician to finally stand on principal because he believes in what he is saying knowing it is not popular and is refusing to ignore terrorism. For many of you, you would love to be like France and lecture the world and Israel on injustice and say nothing about terrorists. Its hippocracy at its worst. I am proud of Steven Harper's moral integrity and honesty. I am proud of his Foreign Minister's measured responses to that shrill Alexa from Nova Scotia. You can't sit on the side lines while terrorists kill. Do I want Canadians in Afghanistan to die? No. Do I believe they should be their? Ideally no. But they are there because the reality is if they do not show Taliban our society has the moral fortitude to stand up to them, they will spread and they will come. In case you have not noticed, these terrorists are not interested in coexistence with you and your desire to be neutral is seen by them as weakness and fuels their belief they can come and defeat you and the way you live. I can understand living in a country like Canada with all its luxuries and freedoms that you take for granted being neutral seems like the nice thing to do but it is time to grow up. The days of being sweet and innocent and wanting to be loved by everyone is pure b.s. This notion that Canada can be a good guy internationally is absolutely no different then this pathetic myth Chretien tried to promote of himself being the little guy from Shawinigan when he went across Canada. It is a myth. It is fantasy.

I will state this again without hesitation in response to Black Dog and his claim I am pretending. If you takew the time to read the history of the creation of Israel in 1949, you will see that terrorism, which some people like to emphasize and give importance and credence to, was but one part of a vastly greater world wide effort of not just Jews but peaceful Arabs and Christians that enabled Israel to become a nation. Yes there was a war. Yes there was terrorism but it is ludicrous and absolutely inaccurate to PRETEND that violence achieved Israel's dependence. Violence and the holocaust was the fuel that caused Jews to once and for all go back to Israel, but hope, belief in humanity, belief in a positive way of life, belief in living another day and finding a reason to live, was what led to Israel's dependence. Those holocaust survivors who could not or can not overcome their hatred or fears, do not want you to be like them. I was taught by a former member of Irgun. At no time did he encourage me to be violent or use terrorism. He survived Aushwitz by hiding under dead bodies. When he went to Israel and joined Irgun he felt he was a walking dead man. He had all but died and his fight to live and survive at that point was fueled by sheer desperation. Many years later, this man took the time to talk to people like me and explain why violence is moral failure. You have no idea what horrors and regrets this man took to his death bed. I can only pray he forgave himself and pray you never lived through what he did. In regards to those young children born in violence in the Gaza and West Bank, they need precisely people like you to tell them and show them there is an alternative to violence. This former Irgun member found an alternative to violence. So can they. It is not a pipe dream but it must start with us not trying to get smarmy and justify terrorism or play games of one upsmanship with who was the terrorist first.

No, but it helped them get there. Don't even try to pretend otherwise. So can we blame Irgun and the Stern gang for the continuing violence? Terrorism does work, there's many other examples outside of Israel that prove that point. Do you then condemn the Irgun? I state without any hesitation that any violence, by anyone including Irgun, was and is wrong. The Irgun and Stern gangs were two terrorist cells. Their numbers paled in comparison to Haganah. Read up about Haganah. You should also read up on the British soldiers who directly refused orders and tried to help Jews and Arabs. You can also read up as to the Arabs who helped Jews come to Palestine and lived with them peacefully until fundamentalists from other countries killed them.

During the last several weeks we posters have engaged in communications as to the conflict in Lebanon. I have spent most of my time responding as to generalizations about Jews as people and their beliefs and as to misnomers as to Jewish history. For me it has been very difficult because I can not understand why people are so tempted to discuss issues about a certain people without first reading up about them and their history. Speaking as someone who lived in the Middle East side by side with Jews, Muslims, Druze and Christians and who personally knew people in the PLO, IDF and numerous peace organizations and speaking as someone who has witnessed terrorist attacks and humanity at its worst, I have found it very hard to listen to people who have no idea how the mind of a terrorist works, but talk about them as if they are rational. Here is the sad thing for me. I think I speak on behalf of the vast majority of Jews, Muslims, Christians, Druze whether they live in the Middle East or elsewhere when I say they are abssolutely tired and sickened by war and just want to live in peace but do not know how to because the process of peace has been hijacked by fundamentalist terrorists. There is absolutely no doubt in my mind if we could take away the military weapons from terrorists, and they posed no threat, the Israeli Defence Force over-night would be back in its barracks and an absolutely extensive peace network of Arabs and Jews and Christians that already exists, could come out from the ashes and destruction and rebuild. When I was 17 I drove around in a jeep with a medical bag as a volunteer with a unit I will not define. But I can tell you I am now 50. In those days the IDF and PLO made regular contact in the West Bank and co-existed. Not all of the PLO but certain segments of it. Moshe Dayan the former Defence Minister of Israel was respected by Arabs, even his so called enemies. What people do not understand is that there was a time when Palestinians worked in Israel and Palestinians and Jews co-existed and we were headed to a probable conclusion where Palestinians would have formed a state in the West Bank and Gaza and then formed an economic union with Jordan and Israel. That economic union would then have spread to Lebanon and Egypt. What many do not understand is, fundamentalist Shiite Muslims and certain other terrorist cells which refer to themselves as Muslims deliberately interfered and destroyed this co-existence and potential peaceful conclusion. This in turn fueled Israel's right wing and Jewish fundamentalist extremists. Many of the settlements of Israelis in the West Bank popped up as a direct reaction to Muslim fundamentalism. The Israeli government then used these settlement sites as defensive outposts and that was a disaster and simply fueled more terrrorism. Anyone who has lived in the Middle East knows for Jews and Arabs to find a peaceful solution they first need to be seperated and given quite some time to heal. This notion that you can simply leave terrorists on Israel's borders is naive. These terrorists destablize not only political security with Israel but within Arab nations who they dominate. The fuel of Arab terrorism has been anti-semitism. The fuel of Israeli distrust of Muslims has been terrorist attacks. Unfortunately people in Europe and North America who have never lived in the Middle East and experienced the terrorism, violence, and corupt governments make generalizations and assumptions that are just not true. For me I believe one day Arabs, Christians and Jews will live in peace. I believe for that to happen someone in the Muslim world must boldly reject violence and terrorism and embrace passive resistance. If they can do this, Israelis who are also pacifists can reach out to them and form an alliance. It sounds simplistic but it is not. Now I wish to say to you one thing. Most Israelis, and this Jewish Canadian know that Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza live in despair. We also feel absolutely helpless to addres the povery and despair and form an economic alliance to lift Palestinians from it, because terrorists won't allow it. I wish and I pray moderate Muslims, Muslims who embrace peace and are not afraid of Jews and Israelis and have transcended their hatred as many have, speak out and let you know not all Muslims are terrorists, and while many fear and loath what the IDF have done, they know it is directly linked to the terrorists in their midst who they want gone. I say to all Muslims, we Jews want a country called Israel but we want you to live in peace as well and when your children die and your people die, we do not sit there cheering. We are sickened and disgusted and demoralized and cry like you do. So now I challenge you posters. How could neutral third parties demilitarize and neutralize terrorism so that peaceful people can come out and talk? Is it possible to have peace until terrorism is curtailed? If we intellectualize and try justify terrorism as a legitimate response of victims, how will these victims ever learn to heal and break the cycle of violence?

Interesting some of our favourite anti-Israeli posters are silent on this one. This is precisely one of the reasons why Israel engages in the counter-offensive it does now with Hezbollah and when the usual posters write in that Israel is blood thirsty or unreasonable or acting illegally watch how they ignore this conveniently-the thing is Israel can not. Israel can not because it knows Hezbollah is the proxy agent for Iran and if Hezbollah is able to establish the precedent that it can use Lebanon at will as a launching pad against Israel, it will only serve this mad man's and Hezbollah's agendas, which from day l have been to wipe out Israel.

Like who? What community? If you're talking about the Muslim community, it doesn't seem like he took part in it: Or they'll argue something along the lines of him being crazy. Dr. Rue as you point out is a lawyer with a Master's Degree in Forensic Psychology and 3 years post graduate clinical training in profiling. Have any more questions? And while we are at it, since you want to get snide and personal Black Dog, I base my comments on this individual's statements which clearly indicated he knew what he was doing, pre-meditated it, and knew it was wrong but did it anyways. Then again I can see why you would want to try defend him. It woul;d be consistent with your other positions as to terrorism and violence.

Your missing the point. As a hollywood celebrity perhaps he was tring to establish a Jewish hate precedent amoung hollywood celebrities. The hollywood entertainment industry harbours a lot of jews. To say what Mel gibson said could be seen to entice an open revolt against a constituted authority (jews) in hollywood. This is serious. Your answer however is blatantly anti-semitic and disparaging whether you intended it as a joke or not. Your response necessarily feeds into this myth and stereotype that Jews own and ominate Hollywood which is utter and absolute b.s. and whether you intended this innocently or are trying to be smarmy its repulsive. Jews like Gays, Blacks, Latinoes, Women, and every other ethnic, sexual, and religious group are represented in Hollywood and whether his remarks insult Jews or insult anyone else, that is what they are being taken to task for. No one is trying to establish a Jewish hate precedent among Hollywood celebrities, there is no Zionist offensive going on in Hollywood and no there is no Jewish conspiracy as much as you would like to infer it. His comments showed hatred, ignorance, and a mind that stereotypes with gros generalizations. His excuse is alcohol, what is yours?

For the record I have been in south Lebanon, The West bank and Gaza, and I know for a fact that Hezbollah has and will continue to use civilians as shields and does not have to trust its civilian population. This is a silly thing to say. Its civilians have no say. How Hezbolah establishes itself and does what it does with its own civilians is not through anything other then the fact that it uses violence and force. If you are a moderate Shiite who wants peace do you really think you can go up to Hezbollah and say, gee Mr. Terrorist can we try talking instead. The comment that Hezbollah tries to evacuate civilians is completely and utterly false. Hezbollah has never ever tried to move civilians and in fact openly brags about how it uses civilians as shields. The above comments are subjective opinions and I defy the writer to provide proof that Hezbollah tries hard to move its civilians. The fact that the writer said Hezbollah doesn't trust civilians should have been a tip off right there that this person knows nothing about Hezbollah to make such statements. Terrorists don't trust anyone. They do not have to either. People who believe in violence to impose political desires, are not about to trust even their own cell members...that is the nature of socio-pathic killing. One more point. Black Dog made another statement about the history of Israel that is false. Terrorism is not what achieved Israel's statehood. Irgun the terrorist group did not achieve statehood for Israel. It was those Jews who chose instead to use diplomacy and fight conventionally and the willingness of Jews to sacrifice their lives in incidents such as the Exodus that achieved statehood. What Black Dog is doing is what many people who justify Middle East terorism try to do-say since jews did it, Arabs can do it. Terrorism does nto achieve independence, what it does achieve is a legacy of never ending violence and it is an insult to all the Jews who did not engage in terrorism and who were the majority of Jews that obtained a country for anyone to say it did. It ignores history and it ignores that rational processes in the long run are the way to go. The moment you try intellectualize and get smarmy and try get cute with terrorism, you in fact condone it/

Wrong. Yes, Slavs, Roma, communists, homosexuals and scores of other groups were targeted, but none to the same degree as the Jews. So yeah, they were singled out. If anyone does care to go to the holoaust museums say in Washington, D.C., or in Israel, or go into the information B'Nai B'Rith or jewish organizations keep on the holocaust you will see they take great care to discuss what happened to Gypsies, gays, socialists, communists, Serbians, certain sects of Christians, priests, nuns, and otehr Christians who died in the holocaust. Those that died saving Jews are also honoured as self-righteous gentiles. It is an intergral part of our learning about and understanding how the holocaust has affacted Jews that we also remember and honour these other groups who suffered in the camps. Like I said this is not a contest. They all suffered. The uniqueness of the holocaust to the Jewish people does not and should not be used as a competition with other peoples' sufferings. The mass starvation of Ukkrainians for example by Stalin, the violent extermination of aboriginals by settlers, the slave ships and slavery of black people, the genocides in Rwanda, Burundi, Darfour, Sudan, Cambodia, Armenia, with the Kurds, the killing of Tibetans, on and on, it is all horrendous and its not a matter of one group suffering more then another-it is about the propensity and capacity for humankind to killl and torture each other. We must use these horrible events in history positively to prevent future horros, not justify hatred.

Maybe suffering was the wrong word. I should have typed: Jews were not the only group targetted by the Nazis. I know a woman very well. A woman who was a child during WWII. Her family was from Czhechoslovakia (sp). Her father was killed outright by the Nazis. Her and her mother were held in a detention camp. By the way, she nor her family were/are Jewish. History from 3500 years ago. What does that have to do with anything? 3500 years ago the Jews hadn't even killed Christ yet (for those who believe). According to the bible (again, for those who beleive) it was God himself who told the Isrealites that they would be "dispersed throughout the earth" and were "never again to have a homeland". I believe it is in Exodus, or perhaps Genesis (not sure, as I have not studied the bible but have read portions of it) People need to recognize the fact that Jews were NOT singled out -- Hilter wanted anyone who was not of pure aryan blood to be destroyed. Jews were in fact singled out and you once again reflect a complete and total ignorance of what happened and now you have proven the point I suspected, that your intent is to deny the holocaust has any signifigance particular to Jews. Your comment that you no a person.....does not give you the basis to make such sweeping statements that are deliberately ignorant. Until you make the effort to read about the holocaust and understand its origins and how the final solution was in fact the ultimate continuation of 3,500 years of the same behaviour you will continue to make sweeping statements that history is irelevant. What you are doing is trying to simplify history by tryingt o suggest the holocaust was a momentary incident, it was not. And no as much as you continue to make your comments, none of the other people or groups you have raised were targeted or singled out in the same manner Gypsies do share much in common with Jews in terms of their segregation and treatment, and there is a very close similiarity but Gypsies were not as wide-spread in numbers. All the people you have referred to suffered and for you to try use one group's suffering to negate another's which is precisely what you are doing is loathsome. I again ask readers, how is it that discussions about Israel and up becoming sessions where the holocaust is denied or down-played? Can you see my point, how people use discussions on Israel to express stereotypical generalizations about all Jews? Can you see how someone might find Drea and this other poster offensive? Are the above opinions simply just someone who is misguided or do they manifest hatred? How do we differentiate? For me it is hard.

Your comments are blatant generalizations that are completely false and without basis and evidence precisely why people "hate" Israel....becaue in fact they feel when they discuss Israel, they can simply discuss Jews, and when they discuss Jews make sweeping stereotyipical assumptions based on completely false subjective assumptions. For the record Jews are not secretive, do not keep to themselves, are no more successful then anyone else in business, and are not indifferent to the suffering of Muslims in the Middle East. These are your subjective generalizations and I suggest you do some serious soul searching to try understand why it is so easy for you to utter such statements. I also think it is pointless to engage you in a debate to explain and proof why each and everyone of your generalizations is false other then to say why not try make an effort to read up on the people you are stereotyping or better still make an effort to meet Jews and see how they actually live before you make such comments. I can only assume you do not interact with Jews or have had limited interactions with Jews.

All of which is pretty much true. Which is odd given everything you write after this is such utter mindless drivel Well, since there an absolute mountain of evidence they're doing no such thing I shouldn't think much justification is necessary. I'm quite tired, really, of these panicky, wide-eyed, knowledge free posts wherein people see some rubble on television and run pell-mell to their computer to tell me how horrified they are at the awesome slaughter and blitzkreik and genocide and indescriminate bombing and murder in Lebanon. Grow up. Learn a little history. Try and buy a sense of reality. Investigate the possiblity of placing things into context. Six hundred children are dying every day in Congo, according to UNICEF. Ten thousand people are killed every month in Darfur. There are countless other intercine struggles around the world right now taking more lives than this little spat in Lebanon. What is happening in Lebanon is small change indeed. You are seeing it every day on television, and so seem to believe it's some kind of massive, end-of-the-world nightmarish struggle for survival. But it's only big news because there are lots of comfortable hotels and restaurants nearby for the international press to relax in, and because it involves Israel, which the modern liberal left has come to despise. Rather, because Hezbollah has been firing rockets into Israel for months now, and then because, in a carefully archestrated attack, two Israeli soldiers (I have seen information they aren't even Jews) were kidnapped, and a huge IED was set along with an ambush for the inevitable rescuers during which eight Israelis were killed. One of them, btw, was a Canadian, if that matters to you. The most apt comparison to this is to say that the rape victim is at fault for being attractive. Then stop watching the news. If you have no ability to place things into context and no way of understanding the underlying reasons for conflict then go and play video games. You'll feel better. I too am intolerant of having my people murdered. Fancy that. I admire your tolerance. Can I come over and kill some friends of yours later on today? Speaking of mindless drivel. I guess "your people" have it all worked out. Suddenly, after 40+ years of "mindless drivel", you'll get things right? Show me. What have you done right? .........apart from nothing. Israel acts as the spoiled child of the U.S. like a bunch of sacred babies. Somebody hits Israel with ordanance that is akin with a "sling-shot" in its accuracy, and the cruise missiles fly. Big brother offers sattelite imagry so you can defeat the evil ones...........and you still can't be decent............you have to kill as many as you can. I was in the region as a soldier for over 12 years, so don't bullshit me about the peacefull nature of the Israeli government. Their ruthless and dispicable intrusions in to other territories was both common and joyfull with the troops I met. Killing a Palestinion man/woman at long range was quite a laugh amongst the troops...........a contest if you will. Supper was brought to them and they were pampered. I never encountered that on the other side. They were simple people that would avenge these killings if they could .........believe me.......IF THEY COULD! Think of that drivel. Perhaps its worth noting that all Israeli agression in the region has acomplished nothing............as a matter of fact , it has created war........again and again. You spoiled little babies don't have a clue do you? As far as you attacking my freinds? Go for it! I can stay within my borders and make you disappear. Before you lecture people e and call them a spoiled brat and state Israeli soldiers delighted in harming your people remember this not all of us are gullible. I was yards away from you watching as you did nothing to stop terrorism and openly supported it and revelled when innocent Jews were killed, so don't act like a victim you are far from one. Let us call your bluff-answer the only question any of us need ask in regards to this debate-what has terrorism achieved for your people?

Drea your comment that "many other peoples suffered much worse than the Jews in World War Two" is odious. Your statement is assinine in that it infers you are capable of measuring the suffering of people, quyantifying it and then saying, some people suffered worse then others. This is ignorance and bigotry at its worse and you are no better then this anti-semitic, hate mongering poster by attempting to justify what he has said. Try understand this. when discussing history it is completely and absolutely nonsensical to try compare suffering. Someone like you desperately needs to sit down with some holocaust survivors or go the holocaust museum in Washington, D.C. and learn about the holocaust before you make such ignorant statements. The point is the holocaust was the culmination of 3,500 years of continuous exterminations and slaughters of Jews. with Christians or Communists or Gays who suffered, it was not promulgated over a 3,500 year period and it was not inter-related to the Christian church and it did not have the wide spread support as did anti-semitism. Because you do not understand either the holocaust or Jewish history in Europe you have made an absurd statement. More to the point when we learn and talk about the holocaust it is to be used to prevent others from doing the same. Its not done and has never been presented by Jews as a tool to say we suffered more. That is you doing that and you are doing that precisely because you are trying to deny the particular signifigance the holocaust represents to Jewish history and dismiss it as an isolated incident no different then anyone else's. You also insult the intelligence and memories of communists, socialists, gypsies, gays and other victims of the Nazis who would never engage in a pissing contest with Jews about the holocaust and share their grief. Please don't speak as if you are an authority on what happened. You are not and that is painfully obvious and if you are at the point where someone like this makes sense to you, its a bad sign.

There is a fine line between this lone "whack job" and people like some of our posters who use discussions as to Israel as a pretense to hate all Jews. This man may have been mentally ill, but because his hatred was openly encouraged and considered understandable and acceptable in his community, no one saw any harm with it as long as he did not act it out. The point is if someone in his community and told him his hatred was unacceptable to start with and not considered the norm, he might have been helped earlier. Where was his family? Were was his community. More to the point, he was not psychotic at the time of his attack, he knew exactly what he was doing and knew it was wrong. His being depressed because he could not find a job and failed out of dental school and his self-loathing are the issue. Nod oubt his lawyers will try argue his anti-semitism is justified and an excuse to kill as do some posters on this web site.

Please don't quote scripture to me. I saw him on the record saying what he said against gays. I have a gay brother in law and I think his comments were over the line, don't you? I have not watched a recent Mel Gibson movie since. Only Lucipher, would through stones at Satan. Mel was repeating what some one else has said, and was taught hate and lies.people are blaming the wrong one Where there is know talebearer, contention and strife cease. sorry for the scipture but you are in the zone peace In this case it was Mel's brain and Mel's mouth and it is now Mel's pr machine in full spin control. Satan has been working overtime with Tom Cruise.

They also told me he had been sentenced by a Roman tribunal. Was that a lie too? Today you would say that a few Jews 2000 years ago were associated with Jesus's death. You would avoid the implication that in some way ALL Jews shared the responsibilty as I was taught. No, if you remember Pilate washed his hands and turned him over to the Jewish priests. That being said, no I don't blame current Jews for it, that'd be ridiculous. I'm the one that doesn't support land claims because I don't believe ancestory means anything. How could I possibly blame current Jews for Jesus's death. I'm not anti-semetic in anyway. so you don't blame "current jews" for it. How "Christian" of you to say that. Can you not see the irony in what you just stated? Implicit in your comment is that you do blame Jews, just not the current ones. Is that what you meant? The passion play which you refer to has been the major crux of the concept that Jews had a collective moral responsibility for the death of Jesus. Your sudden liberalism and tolerance of current Jews is commendable but it misses the point. The original passion play which depicts Jesus being turned over to Jewish Priests who then are responsible for turning the people against him, was used for thousands of years to justify the notion that until all Jews repent for their sins and accept Christ as their saviour, the world is doomed. yes the current Catholic chuch finally stated that the concept of collective guilt to be imposed on all Jews is wrong but it does not address the issue which you continue to miss, that Christianity believes that anyone who does not believe Jesus was their saviour is going to hell. That concept is what continues to breed the intolerance adn bigotry and your being liberal and not being anti-semitic is not the issue. By the way why is it people feel the need to preface their remarks with saying they have no prejudices. We all have them. get over it. I can assure you-you have misconceptions about Jews that would make you ignorant. Are you a hateful person and hate Jews of course not. And as for me, I may not hate people but of course I am ignorant and full of preconceptions thta may cause ignorance and prejudice. We all are. Get over it. This Liberal guilt is a waste of energy.

UNIFIL immediately reported any Hezbollah in their vicinity. The last report from that UNIFIL base was that there was no Hezbollah in their immediate vicinity. The link I put up is from insiders including and American who say that Israel ground troops were indifferent to whether they hit U.N. or civilians. This article came out Friday and predicted that it was inevitable that a massive civilian target would be hit under these type of conditions. It happened today and now U.S. efforts are temporarily disrailed. Rice went home. I waited as few days knowing the true facts would come out. They have and have been substantiated and what we now know is Hezbollah indeed was using the UN observer post as a shield as they have numerous times in the past. What is a fact is before Israel started its latest counter-offensive it did what it has always done. it told the UN to pull its people out because they would be used as shields. The UN chose not to knowing their posts would be used as covers by Hezbollah. Teh Canadian Major who died made it clear to fellow Canadians on July 18 Israel was not deliberately aiming at the UN post but was trying to hit Hezbollah next to them. So your comments above are false. as for the UN spokesman who said Hezbollah was no where near the posts, it has now come out he mispresented the facts-whether he did so deliberately in the heat of the moment or deliberately to cover up the UN's failure to pull its observers remains to be seen. What we do know for a fact is the UN knew and was repeatedly warned by Israel to pull its people. Indians, and Ghanians had been injured earlier as well. More to the point the UN was aware that Chinese army engineers from the UN force, rebuilt a road and then assisted Hezbollah move missiles and weapons. This UN fiasco is a disgrace. Good men died for what? I applaud those dead men. I have nothing but disdain for the politicians in the UN whose incompetency left them in harm's way. As for Hezbollah trying to hide behind the UN post this is a tactic they have used for over 20 years.

Again a false statement directly as a result of someone speaking about a region he has never travelled to but talks about as if he is an authority on. Israel no more occupies the West Bank then Jordan does. Borders to exist to define a sovereign state must be defined by a constitution and form part of a sovereign state recognized by the UN and the world. The West Bank as a state has yet to be defined so it can't be occupied. It is certainly disputed. It is a region with residents disputing who should have sovereignty over it and in this case the dispute is between Israel, Jordan, Lebanon and a proposed Palestinian state represented by Abbas who has no legal standing to represent Palestinians. Hamas and Hezbollah do not see the West Bank as anything different then the way they see everything else. They do not use Western borders in their concepts. They simply want a Muslim kingdom with no Westerners or Jews in it - their concept of defining borders is not like yours and mine. In their world, there is no border, the Muslim kingdom simply flows from Morrocco to Pakistan to the Phillippines, Indonesia and Europe and Asia.

You do realize that Israel gave up the west bank and the entire are it had in Lebanon only to be attacked over and over and over again. Our motivation isn’t “what we get out of supporting Israel”. It is that we are loyal to our friends and to those who are attacked by terrorist gangs (unlike most of Europe and unfortunately liberal Canadians). You mean they gave up what they illegaly occupied in the first place right?? Your claim it was illegally occuped by Israel is completely and utterly wrong because you have not taken the time to understand the origins of the borders. The West Bank once and for all belongs to no one. It was illegally seized by Jordan in 1948, then taken over in 1967 by Israel but technically it belongs to neither. It is a no man's land which is proposed to be part o a Palestinian nation but it no longer belongs to Jordan then it does Israel and no Palestine does not yet exist as much as this poster or others would like to pretend it exists. It has yet to be defined. More to the point, long before the French and British artificially created the borders of Syria, Lebanon, Jordan and Iraq, it was part of the Ottoman Empire and prior to that other empires and far earlier before that known in the Bible as Judea and Somaria. You can not look at this area of the world in isolation or from the ignorant perspective of thinking it existed prior to 1948. Palestine did not exist before 1948. It was simply a Greek name given for an undefined area between Egypt and what is now Jordan, Lebanon and Syria. To this day any of the borders you see including the borders imposed by European powers are not fully defined.l The Shebba farm area that Black Dog likes to refer to as being Lebanon's like the West Bank and Gaza, have NEVER been defined as borders under international law. You can spin this all you want based on ignorance of the origins of these borders but it can't change the facts. The fact is the West Bank is a land disputed by both Jews and Muslims, and between Palestinians and Jordan and it has yet to be defined. So this continued misrepresentation that Israel illegally occupied it is b.s. The same people that say Israel acted illegally want to conveniently forget how it was used as a base to launch terrorist attacks against both Israel and Jordan and was precisely the reason there was a Black Sabbath uprising which saw King Hussen and his Beduin army fight a ruthless adn bloody war with the PLO for control of the West Bank and the Jordanians expelled Arafat from the West Bank NOT Israel as much as Black Dog ignores this fact.

Why not post the entire sentence? And then read the rest: There's more than 230,000 living in West Bank settlements (versus the 6,900 who resided in Gaza). Part of the unilateral withdrawl from Gaza included the dismantling of a couple of West Bank settlements, but construction of new settlements there continues today. It's disputed territory, occupied by Israel. Lebanon claims it, Israel is occupying it and has refused to resolve it. Syria has acknowleged Lebanon's claim to the land. And Hezbollah uses the Israeli presence there to claim is still engaging in resistance, and in turn, justify being armed. (If there's no land being occupied, there's not much to resist.) Even the Bush-backed Prime Minister of Lebanon, Fouad Siniora, has said a resolution to the Sheeba Frams dispute is essential for peace. Reported to moderator. Um...you realize that if Israel stays there, Hizbullah will continue to attack and will continue to claim legitimacy for those attacks. If Israel chose to negotiate a settlement, it would undermine Hizbullah's claim that it is fighting for Lebanon. Black Dog are you being deliberately provocative or are you that oblivious to what Hezbollah is. Hezbollah is not a political movement you negotiate with. Read their charter. Their charter states they intend to kill every Jew they can get their hands on. This is not a group that is freeing Lebanon and it never was. It has used the pretense of being liberators of Lebanon and that worked when Israel was in Lebanon but the fact is Israel has not been in Lebanon for years and is only there now trying to stop Hezbollah from attacking Israel. This is not about defending Lebanon as much as you would like to pretend it is-this is about Hezbollah dedicated to destroying Israel. A group whose charter is to kill Jews world wide and wipe out Israel is not a group interested in negotiating. Once and for all Black Dog either learn who Hezbollah is, what they stand for and how they operate and stop making such naive statements such as Israel should negotiate with them. You do not negotiate with terrorists and you certainly do not negotiate with terrorists that say under no circumstance will they recognize your right to exist. In your pretend world, Hezbollah are people who will sit and discuss and settle things. First of all they don't settle and discuss things, secondly by law, they have no legal status to represent or negotiate with a sovereign state. Now as for you reporting me to the moderator I wish I could report you to someone and hold you accountable for your comments. For the rest of the posters who actually care, Black Dog's statement that Israel has refused to negotiate or give back land including the disputed Shebba Farms region is patently false. Anyone who bothers to read will understand Israel would give it back in a second if it remained demilitarized. The UN has been unable to keep Lebanon free of Hezbollah and its weapons and that is the sole reason Israel is now involved in a defensive response and that is what it is as much as Black Dog or others try to isolate it and say it is an over-reaction to one single kidnapping. It is not. It is a response to a continuous non stop series of terrorist attacks. As well what Black Dog has continued to remain silent on to the point of being intellectually dishonest in my opinion, is in continuing to suggest Israel should negotiate with Hezbollah when Hezbollah is asking that Israel release someone who bashed a 4 year old child's head in with a rock and then took his bran matter and mushed it in his father's face before torturing and defiling the father. These civilians killed were Israelis and maybe in Black Dog's one sided world Israelis have no rights so we should just conveniently forget their right to live in peace but Israelis can't and yes I will continue each adn every time Black Dog and a few others make outrageous one sided statements to continue challenging them. My remarks made above which Black Dog reported to the moderator were said by a Jewish person frustrated and insulted that Black Dog deliberately ignores two sides of the debate and sticks to but one side to the point where even I can't read his posts and really believe he believes in some of what he is saying anymore. I am not seeing any substance to back up what Black Dog is saying only emotional generalizations. And so I lost it a bit and for that I apologize.

I must admit I got heated myself in these exchanges as I find some posters not being honest and deliberately making provocative statements. That said, Black Dog continues to spell out a myth that the West Bank is illegally occupied. Again he ignores history and fact. The fact is the West Bank was never defined as belonging to what is today Jordan. In 1948 Jordan seized it by war. So it was de facto established as Jordan's and not Palestine's. So to say the West Bank is Palestine is complete and utter fiction and the kind of fiction promulgated by people who deliberately choose to look at the history of the borders in the Middle East without looking at their proper historic origins, then colonial origins and how international law defines them. The fact is the West Bank belongs to no one at the moment and like the Gaza Strip is proposed as the place Palestine will be unless of course you are with Hezbollah, Hamas, Iran, Syria, Black Dog, Fig Leaf, etc., and believe Israel as a nation should not exist at all and we should simply ship all the Jewish Israeli's to Mel Gibson's house and let the Muslims take it all and turn it into a fundamerntalist Muslim state like Iran and they can wipe out thje Druze and Christians in Israel and then we can let the Sunnis and Shiites duke it out.

Quick, somebody put these guys in touch with Karen Hughes. I'm sure she could use some talented spin doctors. As for the substance of the post itself, much of the conspiracy theorizing within has been debunked by the IDF itself. For example, the claim that there were rockets being launched from the houses was retracted on Monday. Your comments above are 100% false. The IDF ahs not rectracted or issued any statements even remotely close to what you stated above. At this point you are simply fabricating things and I challenge you to produce the original statement from the IDF and then the one from the IDF retracting the original statement.

In other words Hizbullah's media relations operates exactly the same way as Israel, the United States and any other western nation or, indeed, any large organization. But when they do it, it's "distortion." When we do it, it's "fair and balanced." You again display a complete and utter lack of awareness of how Hezbollah operates otherwise you would not make such a statement such as Hezbollah's media operates the same way as does ISrael's. Black Dog for once in your life, try to contribute to this dialogue constructively by at least making an attempt to read and find out how Hezbollah's media operations actually work. You never bothered before you shot off and made this statement.