Bonam

You make that sound as if it was Israel's fault. Those Palestinians are stranded there because of the Hamas-Fatah fighting. Yeah, nice ceasefire, with a bunch of smaller terrorist groups launching rockets from Gaza non stop the whole time. A light toll for a anti-terrorism campaign, relatively speaking. Compare that to the death rates in Iraq, or in Afghanistan. That sentence right there, with its ridiculousness, puts the lie to the whole thing.

Yeah I don't think people should be washing their feet in sinks... I still think the best solution would just have been to provide facilities useful to everyone at these universities. What's wrong with a normal bath? It can be used by other students for other needs, and can also be used for cleaning one's feet if one so desires.

We have three?

I get to fly back and forth across Canada on government money...

Commercial establishments can and should be able to put up any references to any religion that they want. If a store wants to put up a sign saying Merry Christmas, it's not the governments business telling them that they can't. If another store wants to put up a happy Ramadan (or whatever else) sign, that, too, should be allowable. If some stores want to change their signs in an effort to appeal to a larger amount of customers, then there is also nothing wrong with that. That's just a natural consequence of a free market capitalist economic system and a changing demographic. However, when it comes to schools, especially public schools, I firmly believe that no prayer of any religion should be recited. Indoctrination of school children in unverifiable beliefs and their associated rituals cannot be justified. As for the footbaths... couldn't they just have put in normal shower and/or bath stalls instead? Make it useful for everyone instead of a subgroup of university students? Personally, if I was a student at that university, and wasn't planning to use footbaths myself, I'd be somewhat resentful over my tuition money being spent on them.

You can bet that if the violence was directed the other way around (Christians systematically killing Muslims), those countries would be front page news every day.

No offense but the UN has no jurisdiction over our internal policies, nor should it, considering what a worthless joke the UN is. While I'm not really decided one way or another on the issue of compensation for victims, appealing to UN authority on any issue, especially when it comes to internal policies of sovereign nations, is useless, and won't win you any support.

That is true. Unfortunately, individual Israelis, especially those living in border areas, would indeed be endangered. Besides the fact that it is the obligation of a state to protect its citizens, it would also cause extreme unpopularity for any government that sat back and did nothing as its citizens were killed by rocket attacks from terrorists. I presume you mean that the long term prospects for peace are harmed in that more Palestinians are persuaded to hate Israel and Jews more than they already do, each time civilians are killed. I would argue, however, that Palestinians hate Israel for killing their militants just as much as they do for hating their civilians. After all, those militants are also husbands, fathers, brothers, etc, just like civilians are. Furthermore, I would argue that the level of hatred for Israel in the Palestinian territories is so high that adding or subtracting a little from it is largely irrelevant. I can't say that I have a better answer either. However, Israel has tons of people working on this problem specifically trying to find an answer. Do you think it's in Israel's interest to kill Palestinian civilians? I would say no. The international condemnation that Israel receives each time it kills civilians in one of its attacks has significant negative effects on Israel. If they could find a better solution or a better strategy, don't you think they would have tried it by now? I would point out that they've tried many strategies already, including: - full scale invasion and occupation (the original capture of the West Bank and Gaza, which then too were used as areas from which to attack Israel, also southern Lebanon, etc) - complete passivity (for periods of up to several months at various times, during which terrorist attacks continued unabated) - sweeping incursions with ground forces in short campaigns to find and eliminate terrorists (mainly in Gaza, as well as last year in Lebanon, didn't really help, and cost many lives) - unilateral withdrawal from captured territory (Gaza, from which terrorism against Israel continues) - multilateral withdrawal from captured territory (southern Lebanon, from which terrorism against Israel continues) - wall building and containment (under construction now, seems to be effective against suicide bombers, but doesn't help against rocket attacks) They've experimented with all of these, and from what I can tell, the current strategy of attacks against rocket launcher teams and other known terrorists seems to be at least no worse than any of the others. If there was a better way, I'm sure Israel would be using it. Unfortunately, I don't see one. And, as you say, neither do you, which isn't surprising, as it's a very difficult problem, that stumps not only us, but many of the best military commanders, strategists, and politicians, in Israel. And I would say that as long as you don't have a better solution to propose, you can't really condemn what it's doing.

I think it's reasonable to assume that even governments like those of present day Iran would not directly use nuclear weapons against Israel, for reasons of Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD). However, despite the fact that these top level players may not directly want to use nuclear weapons themselves, but instead use their possession of nuclear weapons as a political bargaining chip, that doesn't mean that various terrorist organisations won't be able to use them. For example, governments that financially support some terrorist groups (i.e. Hezbollah, Hamas), often disavow any knowledge of or involvement with specific acts of those groups. By disavowing and even condemning actions of the terrorist groups that they fund, these states escape retaliation against themselves. Take for example this scenario: Iran covertly provides a nuclear weapon to a terrorist group. This group smuggles it into Israel and detonates it. All middle-eastern governments immediately condemn the attack and the terrorist group responsible. An investigation finds links indicating that the bomb originated in Iran. Iran reacts swiftly to the findings, arrests a few nuclear officials that it claims are members of the terrorist group and acted without the support or knowledge of the government, and executes them. At that point, if Israel proceeded to nuke Iran to oblivion in the classic response that the MAD doctrine calls for, they would not enjoy much international support. Furthermore, a nuclear strike whiping out Iran would destroy any possibility to find evidence that the Iranian government was indeed involved in the provision of those nuclear materials to the terrorist group. That means that Israel would be forever branded a nuclear aggressor by the international community, and would undergo isolation and possible retaliation itself. This isn't a guarantee that Israel wouldn't implement full nuclear retaliation anyway, but it does make it unlikely, and so it's a risk and gamble that a government like that of Ahmadinejad just might consider. Of course that's just a random plot off the top of my head. But something along those lines, where a terrorist group gets its hands on nuclear materials and uses them without the possibility to directly link it to a state government, definitely becomes a much more probable possibility once middle-eastern nations start acquiring nuclear weapons.

So what would you suggest then? Should Israel only attack a known terrorist when it is completely 100% assured that no civilian could possibly be harmed in the attack? If they adapted such a policy, would it not simply enable terrorists to remain completely safe, by hiding among civilians, while continuing with their attacks? See, the problem with your statements is, you seem to assert that on a level of general principles, Israel has a right to defend itself (which we all agree with of course). But when it comes to any specific means of defending itself, you seem to condemn just about any possible example. Since Israel's enemies hide among civilians, it is very difficult to strike them without some risk to those civilians. Israel tries to minimise those casualties as much as is feasible, but of course it is not always perfectly succesful. What, specifically, do you propose should happen differently, in the context of Israel defending itself? What measures at harm reduction among Palestinian civilians should the Israeli army implement, that it has not yet implemented? What methods should it employ to effectively combat insurgents that are based in hospitals, schools, mosques, etc, in the Palestinians territories without endangering civilians that also use those buildings? How low of a civilian casualty rate as a side effect of strikes against militants would you deem acceptable?

July's over, and there wasn't any war, not even with one enemy, let alone 5 ;p

I dunno whether Scott has or not, but some of us here have actually lived in warzones.

I think that's the biggest problem with the Iraq war, and why it's so unpopular... all the emphasis of all mainstream media seems to be on the body counts. I can't remember the last time I saw a news headline about Iraq that was anything besides "x people killed". Same with Afghanistan. Where is the news on what was accomplished, what was built, what was improved? In some dusty old blogs on the internet that maybe a few hundred people see. It needs to be on the mainstream media, where millions will see it, instead.

The production of ridiculous concepts, extremist beliefs, and general craziness is a feature of most religions. When you start with false premises (or at the very least premises that are completely unverifiable and unrelated to the universe which we inhabit), you're bound to come to nonsense as a conclusion. Or, more simply: Garbage in, garbage out.

India is neither third world nor stone age... Heck, most of the software you're using is written (at least partially) in India ;p India is modernising pretty damn quickly, at least in terms of its economy. And where an economy industrialises, everything else is soon to follow.

The proposal isn't for tax payers to pay. Rather, I think what is being suggested is that a criminal, upon convinction and sentencing for a crime, should also be compelled to pay an amount of money deemed appropriate to compensate the victim, and that this should happen as part of the main trial, and not require a seperate lawsuit. Of course, a problem with that would be that since many criminals are poor, they as a result would often be unable to pay (and not own anything worth repossessing) enough to compensate the victim. At least, that's what the text of the original post seems to say, though the poll options imply that it should be the government that pays.

Good job misinterpreting what I first wrote, arguing against something that was never stated, and when your failure to read is pointed out, trying to claim victory. Feeling outnumbered by the evil Zionists? Lol. Soon as you can't spam your anti-semitic garbage unopposed you run away.

Well, whatever you want to call it, it's the truth. If terrorists could fire rockets from a civilian area, and then know with 100% certainty that they would not get retaliated against while in that area, what would discourage them from doing it? Anyway, I would further argue that if terrorists are in an area with civilians than either: 1) The civilians condone the actions of the terrorists, realize that they put themselves at risk by remaining in the vicinity of the terrorists, and remain in the area specifically to deter retaliation against the terrorists. By doing this, they provide meaningful military assistance to the terrorists, which means they are no longer civilians, but instead valid targets. Or 2) They are forcibly compelled to remain in the area by the terrorists, or are unwilling to remove themselves from the area that the terrorists forcibly appropriated for their activities. In such cases, the blame for the deaths of civilians in any possible combat that may result between Israel and that terrorist group is 100% the fault of the terrorists. This is one of the myths that keeps getting propagated by those that are anti-Israel. Any objective research will show that Israel tries harder than almost any other nation that has been involved in conflict to minimize civilian casualties on the other side. Who else phones a building suspected to contain terrorists and/or their equipment in advance, to give the civilians time to evacuated, before destroying the building? Who else provides food, power, and water to the very population (Gaza) that is such a breeding ground for terrorists, just so civilians don't end up with a shortage of these? Perhaps you'd like to take a look at some of the other conflicts around the world where the more powerful side really disregards collateral damage and is heavy handed. In such cases, the casualties are in the hundreds of thousands or in the millions per year, not in the hundreds. The tactics are effective to a certain extent. They keep terrorism at a certain level. If not for the tactics, terrorism would be higher. This can be seen easily every time Israel decreased their "heavy-handedness", that terrorism has increased. Specifically, after Israel pulled out of Gaza, or of southern Lebanon, thus decreasing their level and severity of occupation, terrorist attacks increased rather than decreased. While the tactics might not be good enough to lower and completely abolish it over time, they are good enough to keep it at the comparitively low and constant level that it has been at in recent years.

Rue, thanks, that is all pretty much well known. More important than the actual distribution of wealth though is the perception of its distribution. One of Hitler's big points, whether numerically true or not, was that Jews had too much financial and political influence in Germany. And, again, whether such a claim is true or not, I would strongly argue that it is absolutely not a valid justification for discrimination, against Jews or against any other group.

Shhh, be careful Rue, before he "isolates and counters" you.

Point out where I said that. I never did. Try reading the post again again, more slowly this time. I said that one of the reasons Hitler hated Jews was because he associated them with communists. I did not say that Hitler attacked Russia because it contained Jews. That and he wanted the oil in the Caucas regions and other resources, but yeah.

Yes, Stalin and the Soviet Union killed millions of its own people, of all religions and ethnicities. In any case, I don't necessarily agree with the statement that "all communists are anti-semitic". Communism in some countries existed without having any opinion on Jews whatsoever, whether for or against. I was simply countering your irrelevant point about Trotsky. And yes, you are correct in that some of the leaders of the communist revolution in Russia were Jews themselves, which is in fact one of the reasons that they were later hated in Germany (Hitler associated Jews with Communists, which he also despised). However, that doesn't change the fact that for the majority of the Soviet Union's existence, official policies included means specifically restricting Jews from certain activities.

If you want to go into Soviet history, perhaps rather than looking at one specific individual that was exiled and later assassinated by the Soviet leadership, you'd rather take a look at the policies of the Soviet Union itself for the majority of the time period in which it existed. You know, the systematic repression of Jews including restriction from certain professions, from certain programs in universities, and restrictions against emmigrating.

So sending letters and getting articles in papers is "attacking mecilessly". Last I heard, they were just exercising their free speech. When I see car bombs and suicide bombers, I'll grant you the merciless attack part. How about CUPE? Perhaps they should be isolated and specifically addressed for passing such one-sided and biased resolutions as the one M.Dancer quoted above? 15% is huge in a democratic riding. Results are often within a few % of a draw. Minorities having a significant influence is a big part of how democracy works.

How is passing resolutions on the middle-east even related to a union of Canadian public workers? They should stick to issues like wages, contracts, work conditions, etc. Isn't that what unions are for?