Aragon wrote:

YOU are the apologist for murder and terrorisim here Tonys. You defend your position - the law, the history, the facts are all against you. You support violence in the context of self defence: in that case you are obliged to defend Hamas and the Palestinians.

I take it then that you can’t make your first reply to me stand up and instead of having the decency to withdraw it you come out with more tripe, not unexpected, but not good enough Aragon, not good enough by a long shot.

Seems rather pointless to carry out a debate or even bandy about juvenile taunts when nobody has evidence or proof to back up or deny the assertion of the thread title.

It is a fact, however, that Isreal has manipulated the media coverage of the invasion of Gaza for its own purposes of mudding the waters so that the facts will always be debatable. This used to be called propoganda but the Western Press, who always know the truth, have sanitised the term for obvious reasons, and because they're rather fond of the technique also.

I would also be very surprised if the bout of state terrorism doesn't have negative long term effects on the middle east. If I was Iranian, I'd certainly be getting the nuclear program up to speed, and I can only surmise that another generation of anti-Isreali viewpoints have been hardened across the Middle East and to a certain extent into the wider Muslim community across the globe.

I wonder if Isreal feels that its main benefactor, the US, has been so economically weakened that Isreal has decided on a future blueprint of terrorising its neighbors so as to keep them at bay as long as possible. It's rather hard to envision an amicable outcome at this point, and the Western media seems, for the most part, content to convey the Isreali propoganda message in the spirit of impartiality while largely ignoring the Palestinian messages. Unhappy days, indeed.

rockyracoon wrote:

Seems rather pointless to carry out a debate or even bandy about juvenile taunts when nobody has evidence or proof to back up or deny the assertion of the thread title.

It is a fact, however, that Isreal has manipulated the media coverage of the invasion of Gaza for its own purposes of mudding the waters so that the facts will always be debatable. This used to be called propoganda but the Western Press, who always know the truth, have sanitised the term for obvious reasons, and because they're rather fond of the technique also.

I would also be very surprised if the bout of state terrorism doesn't have negative long term effects on the middle east. If I was Iranian, I'd certainly be getting the nuclear program up to speed, and I can only surmise that another generation of anti-Isreali viewpoints have been hardened across the Middle East and to a certain extent into the wider Muslim community across the globe.

I wonder if Isreal feels that its main benefactor, the US, has been so economically weakened that Isreal has decided on a future blueprint of terrorising its neighbors so as to keep them at bay as long as possible. It's rather hard to envision an amicable outcome at this point, and the Western media seems, for the most part, content to convey the Isreali propoganda message in the spirit of impartiality while largely ignoring the Palestinian messages. Unhappy days, indeed.

Did anyone see the much advertised Channel 4 Programme on the tv coverage of Gaza last night? Illuminating, but not in the way I anticipated. Mainly the smug face of the BBC Head of News telling us that their "standards" didn't allow for "blood and gore" (dead and injured children) to be shown. It was put forward in the programme that dead children were used by Palestinians for "propoganda". The possibility that the display of a dead child was because of grief, anger and the different traditions of the local culture were not considered.

It ended with the statement that "we may never know what happened in Gaza" - based on the fact that western journalists were kept out by the Israelis. The racist assumption was made that local Palestinian journalists, as used by France 24 and Al Jazeera, could not be trusted.

Al Jazeera, which is a middle of the road channel, was smeared as rabidly pro whatever. The blanket lies put out by the Israeli government were reduced down to one possible misprepresentation on the UN school bombing. It was assumed that only British Moslems look at the internet.

There was no problem for anyone who had internet access and/or tv channels other than British and American, to know what was going on in Gaza.

I think you're right rockyracoon that the US has spawned a monster and that Israel are at times becoming the tail that wags the dog re the US. Condaleeza Rice drafted a UN resolution, Olmert when he heard about it rang Bush and asked him what the F was going on and she was left having to abstain from her own resolution. Israel are a substantial armed and industrial power in their own right now, and may well start to make their moves independently of the US.

cactus flower wrote:

rockyracoon wrote:

Seems rather pointless to carry out a debate or even bandy about juvenile taunts when nobody has evidence or proof to back up or deny the assertion of the thread title.

It is a fact, however, that Isreal has manipulated the media coverage of the invasion of Gaza for its own purposes of mudding the waters so that the facts will always be debatable. This used to be called propoganda but the Western Press, who always know the truth, have sanitised the term for obvious reasons, and because they're rather fond of the technique also.

I would also be very surprised if the bout of state terrorism doesn't have negative long term effects on the middle east. If I was Iranian, I'd certainly be getting the nuclear program up to speed, and I can only surmise that another generation of anti-Isreali viewpoints have been hardened across the Middle East and to a certain extent into the wider Muslim community across the globe.

I wonder if Isreal feels that its main benefactor, the US, has been so economically weakened that Isreal has decided on a future blueprint of terrorising its neighbors so as to keep them at bay as long as possible. It's rather hard to envision an amicable outcome at this point, and the Western media seems, for the most part, content to convey the Isreali propoganda message in the spirit of impartiality while largely ignoring the Palestinian messages. Unhappy days, indeed.

Did anyone see the much advertised Channel 4 Programme on the tv coverage of Gaza last night? Illuminating, but not in the way I anticipated. Mainly the smug face of the BBC Head of News telling us that their "standards" didn't allow for "blood and gore" (dead and injured children) to be shown. It was put forward in the programme that dead children were used by Palestinians for "propoganda". The possibility that the display of a dead child was because of grief, anger and the different traditions of the local culture were not considered.

It ended with the statement that "we may never know what happened in Gaza" - based on the fact that western journalists were kept out by the Israelis. The racist assumption was made that local Palestinian journalists, as used by France 24 and Al Jazeera, could not be trusted.

Al Jazeera, which is a middle of the road channel, was smeared as rabidly pro whatever. The blanket lies put out by the Israeli government were reduced down to one possible misprepresentation on the UN school bombing. It was assumed that only British Moslems look at the internet.

There was no problem for anyone who had internet access and/or tv channels other than British and American, to know what was going on in Gaza.

I think you're right rockyracoon that the US has spawned a monster and that Israel are at times becoming the tail that wags the dog re the US. Condaleeza Rice drafted a UN resolution, Olmert when he heard about it rang Bush and asked him what the F was going on and she was left having to abstain from her own resolution. Israel are a substantial armed and industrial power in their own right now, and may well start to make their moves independently of the US.

I saw that programme last night and thought it was dreadful too - for all the same reasons. Very disappointing. At one point Snow said something like ' how will people in the west believe what is being said if they dont hear it coming from people like me'. As if the real crime was not what was being done to Gaza but that journalists like himself were being kept out!

tonys wrote:

Aragon wrote:

YOU are the apologist for murder and terrorisim here Tonys. You defend your position - the law, the history, the facts are all against you. You support violence in the context of self defence: in that case you are obliged to defend Hamas and the Palestinians.

I take it then that you can’t make your first reply to me stand up and instead of having the decency to withdraw it you come out with more tripe, not unexpected, but not good enough Aragon, not good enough by a long shot.

Tonys - I have never once seen you defend ANY position you have ever taken on ANY topic with reference to facts. As soon as any hard evidence is offered to prove you comprehensively wrong on any point you resort to personal attack and dissembling like this post here. You have been given ample evidence of the wrong that has been done to Gaza and the lies that have been told by Israel about Hamas. If you support the right to self defence then you must support Hamas/Palestinian right to defend themselves against Israel.

I agree people have a right to self defence, but I think that they also have to stand back and look at their broad interests. A bloody split between Fatah and Hamas is bad for the Palestinians and is one of the factors that made it possible for Israel to strike at Gaza. As rockyracoon said, we don't have much evidence that this is a true report, and even if it was, it is not out of the question that it may have in some way have been initiated by the Israelis.

The Arabs on the street through the assault on Gaza were calling for Hamas and Fatah to bury the hatchet and jointly defend the Palestinian people, and I think they had it right.

Aragon wrote:

Tonys - I have never once seen you defend ANY position you have ever taken on ANY topic with reference to facts. As soon as any hard evidence is offered to prove you comprehensively wrong on any point you resort to personal attack and dissembling like this post here.

I don’t suppose you have anything to back up that nonsense or would that be too much to expect.
For once Aragon no more waffle, please don’t reply at all if you can’t show something to validate your above statement.
For my part I promise not to reply to your posts again, at this stage I consider that to be a complete waste of my time.

cactus flower wrote:

johnfás wrote:

Which nevertheless does not warrant summary executions, which should be condemned by all regardless of who carries them out.

The whole business of killing informers is very dirty and dubious. The history of the north of Ireland and the role of individuals like Stake Knife in "knutting" informers has an enormous question mark over it.

It suits the Israelis to have Palestinian militants killing each other. Hamas also is undoubtedly infiltrated, as the Israelis had a good bit to do with building it up in the first place. This may be deeply misguided and coming out of anger at the massacre, or it may be Israeli inspired (or both).

Informers - interesting word. Sure everyone likes to be informed. But some informers are also spies. Spies like the ones our man Collins went around executing.

And rightfully so, one might say.