Tamil Tigers are legit movement

[Fain]

DELETED by moderator

TorontoSun.com - Eric Margolis - Don't provoke Tigers

Edited January 22, 2008 by Charles Anthony
copyright violation

[Wild Bill]

The Tigers are exceedingly brutal and often murderous. They are a fanatical, highly dangerous totalitarian organization. But they are not "terrorists," as the U.S. and now Canada claim.

Terrorism is generally defined as "attacks on civilians for political purposes." Mad dogs who blow up airliners, trains and schools are terrorists, no question. But under this definition, then what do we call the Allied mass slaughter of civilians in Dresden, Hamburg, Tokyo, Osaka, Nagasaki and Hiroshima?

One really must ask why Ottawa is sticking its nose into another remote, bloody foreign war and creating new security problems for Canadians when it can't provide even Second World health care to its own people.

I'm afraid you've confused me. Are you saying that even though the Tamils kill innocents they are not terrorists because someone ELSE killed innocents?

That Canada has no right to call such people terrorists because we have problems with health care? In other words, because we are not perfect in making people healthy we have no right to hold an opinion against those who totally remove someone's health, by killing them?

All I know is that I don't care about someone's political goals as soon as they harm innocents. If a friend or member of my family was killed or injured by a terrorist act I would not forgive the terrorists because of the "purity" of their politics. I would hate them with every fibre of my being, no matter what country they came from. And I would consider them fair game for retaliation. I would never harm someone first but if he's harmed me or mine then all bets are off.

Bruce Cockburn sang it best years ago: "If I had a rocket launcher, I'd make somebody pay!"

[Argus]

The Tamils of Sri Lanka are fighting for their independence after decades of oppression

CALGARY -- This week's arrest of six Canadians of Tamil origin on terrorism charges reminds me of Sir Peter Ustinov's brilliant maxim: "Terrorism is the war of the poor, and war is the terrorism of the rich."

You mean Peter Ustinov that great --- actor? Brilliant? Brilliantly inane, perhaps. The Tamil Tigers are murderous savages who have slaughtered countless innocents. They drop mortars on markets and blow up cars in the middle of wedding processions. They kidnap children and beat them to force them to fight for them. They practically invented the suicide bomber.

People with this kind of mindset are the reason so many of us wish we could stop immigration. It worries us that people like this, with that kind of thinking, are even allowed to visit Canada, much less take up residence here.

The unaccredited opinion above, btw, was written by Eric Margolis. I'm not surprised you chose not to credit him. He is well known as an apologist for Islamic fascism and a man who despises the United States and most of the West. He too is an immigrant we would have been better off without.

Edited January 21, 2008 by Argus

[Pliny]

The Tamils of Sri Lanka are fighting for their independence after decades of oppression

CALGARY -- This week's arrest of six Canadians of Tamil origin on terrorism charges reminds me of Sir Peter Ustinov's brilliant maxim: "Terrorism is the war of the poor, and war is the terrorism of the rich."

In an apparent rush to U.S. President George Bush's ideology and policies, the Harper government recently added Sri Lanka's Tamil Tigers guerillas to its terrorism list. The U.S. added the group last year.

In 1983, civil war erupted in Sri Lanka after decades of growing strife between majority Sinhalese Buddhists and minority Hindu Tamils. Tamil Tigers guerillas have waged a ferocious, bloody struggle against the Sinhalese government for an independent Tamil state. Over 65,000 Sri Lankans have died. The war continues in spite of foreign mediation.

Sri Lanka's Sinhalese control the army, navy and air force. The Tigers have only small arms, in large part purchased with money raised by Canada's 250,000 Tamils.

Canada's Irish did the same for the IRA. Canadian Jews raised funds to buy arms for Israel's independence struggle from Britain. Sikh separatists in Punjab were funded by Canadian Sikhs.

The Tigers are courageous, highly effective fighters -- call them the Hezbollah of South Asia. They used their bodies as human bombs to fight first the government army, then India when it invaded Sri Lanka in the 1980s in an effort to annex the island. A female Tiger blew up Indian PM Rajiv Gandhi in 1991.

The Tigers are exceedingly brutal and often murderous. They are a fanatical, highly dangerous totalitarian organization. But they are not "terrorists," as the U.S. and now Canada claim.

Terrorism is generally defined as "attacks on civilians for political purposes." Mad dogs who blow up airliners, trains and schools are terrorists, no question. But under this definition, then what do we call the Allied mass slaughter of civilians in Dresden, Hamburg, Tokyo, Osaka, Nagasaki and Hiroshima?

Or Russia's massacre of 100,000 Muslim Chechens a decade ago; Israel's 1982 bombardment of Beirut that killed 18,000 civilians; U.S. destruction in 1991 of Iraq's water treatment plants, creating an epidemic that killed hundreds of thousands of children?

What about the indiscriminate bombing of Afghan villages by U.S., Canadian and NATO forces? Or the recent killing of over 1,000 Lebanese and Israeli civilians, denounced by Amnesty International as a war crime?

Those accusing others of terrorism are often far more guilty of it themselves.

Tamil Tigers ably govern a third of Sri Lanka. Dismissing them as "terrorists" is as meaningless and misleading as calling Hezbollah, which is Lebanon's only effective, non-corrupt government, "terrorist thugs."

Enough with propaganda labels. I detest this deceitful, poisonous term, "terrorism," which has become a propaganda weapon to demonize political opponents.

Canada has recently made itself an enemy of the Muslim world and now faces attacks on its citizens and business interests abroad. This is not a good time to kick the Tamil Tigers hornet's nest. Sometimes it's better to avert your gaze, as previous Canadian governments did, and not seek trouble -- particularly when the Tigers have committed no hostile acts against Canada or the U.S.

Terrorism is a tactic, not a thing. Tamil Tigers are fighting for independence after decades of oppression. We westerners have forgotten that armed resistance to intolerable oppression is a legitimate right of all peoples.

One really must ask why Ottawa is sticking its nose into another remote, bloody foreign war and creating new security problems for Canadians when it can't provide even Second World health care to its own people.

You do not cite the author or source of this article and probably for good reason. It is a veiled threat of terrorism and nothing less.

This kind of specious rhetorical demagoguery serves only to place doubt, fear and uncertainty in the minds of Canadians as regards the whole subject of terrorism.

[Pliny]

You mean Peter Ustinov that great --- actor? Brilliant? Brilliantly inane, perhaps. The Tamil Tigers are murderous savages who have slaughtered countless innocents. They drop mortars on markets and blow up cars in the middle of wedding processions. They kidnap children and beat them to force them to fight for them. They practically invented the suicide bomber.

People with this kind of mindset are the reason so many of us wish we could stop immigration. It worries us that people like this, with that kind of thinking, are even allowed to visit Canada, much less take up residence here.

The unaccredited opinion above, btw, was written by Eric Margolis. I'm not surprised you chose not to credit him. He is well known as an apologist for Islamic fascism and a man who despises the United States and most of the West. He too is an immigrant we would have been better off without.

So Eric Margolis wrote that. Interesting! He is a defender of the underdog but with this article takes on the colors of the ACLU who defend the indefensible.

[noahbody]

In an apparent rush to U.S. President George Bush's ideology and policies, the Harper government recently added Sri Lanka's Tamil Tigers guerillas to its terrorism list. The U.S. added the group last year.

The United Nations already lists the group as a terrorist organization and Canada is a signatory to the resolution that made that designation.

http://www.un.org/Docs/sc/unsc_resolutions04.html

Are you implying the former Liberal government would have supported a UN resolution with no intent to follow through? I find that hard to believe.

[JB Globe]

You could easily put the Sinhalese government on the terrorist list as well.

Both sides have targeted civilians, one just does so with suicide blasts and admits to it, the other one does it with airstrikes and pretends like a refugee camp was a "terrorist training facility" - if by that they mean the nurseries where the kids who survived the air attack and will grow up to join the Tigers because of it, well then I guess it was a training facility in a way.

[Fain]

WTF are talking about????? The Sinhalese broke the ceasefire! You simply too far removed from the situaction to grasp the war. War is ugly but Tamils are simply fighting to be free. The Britains called American's terrorists when they were fighting they're struggle to be free.

Give me Llberty or give me death

Patrick Henry

Edited January 21, 2008 by Fain

[Argus]

WTF are talking about????? The Sinhalese broke the ceasefire! You simply too far removed from the situaction to grasp the war. War is ugly but Tamils are simply fighting to be free. The Britains called American's terrorists when they were fighting they're struggle to be free.

Give me Llberty or give me death

Patrick Henry

Are you suggesting the Tamil Tigers believe in democracy?

[August1991]

Eric Margolis:

Terrorism is a tactic, not a thing. Tamil Tigers are fighting for independence after decades of oppression. We westerners have forgotten that armed resistance to intolerable oppression is a legitimate right of all peoples.

I wonder whether Margolis would justify the attacks of the IRA or the FLQ in a similar way. Indeed, Margolis seems to feel that any terrorist attack of the poor is comparable (and equally legitimate) to any military attack of the rich.

The use of force is sometimes legitimate and sometimes it's not. Apaprently, Margolis doesn't know the difference.

[JB Globe]

Are you suggesting the Tamil Tigers believe in democracy?

For the Tamil minority, yes they do. They certainly don't believe in national Sri Lankan democracy, but then again, neither do the Sinhalese - otherwise they wouldn't have been dominating Tamils as they've done since long before independence.

[rbacon]

Who cares what Tamils do to each other? As long as they don't attack us in Canada. Canadians are more at risk from our own COPS than we are from terrorists. Look up the stats.