Israel Forum Watch

The Fanatics

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 13:31:00 +0000

A curious feature of the Israel-Palestine conflict is that many of the most intractable views exist outside the geographical area. If you look at the Palestinian side, the first 2 state solution supporters emerged inside the Occupied Territories while many of those outside it where still struggling to ‘liberate all of Palestine’.

Likewise, you can fin some of the most strident views against any sort of compromise, not in Israel, but amongst Israels supporters in the US. Just look here.

The prisoner swap involving Samir Qantar has demonstrated this curious situation.

“I will literally walk out on Israel and no longer support nor fundraise for the country any longer if they release Kuntar under any circumstances. I will no longer spend time working with various international organizations who benefit Israel through appeals and public relations……………If anything, Israel should have executed members of Kuntar's family in Lebanon in response to his unimaginable crimes, …………………….Releasing him would be a slap in the face of myself and everyone who has labored extensively for decades on behalf of the state of Israel, and I will no longer support the country financially or through any other means moving forward should he be released.” – second_coming

“Frankly, I get the impression that the current Israeli administration has changed the country into something that's very difficult for me to support.
For me, it started with the Gaza expulsion and talk of doing the same in the West Bank. The scenes of Jewish families being ethnically cleansed by the IDF shook my faith in Israelis. I no longer felt as connected as before.
Likewise, the years of IDF failure to secure the country from Hamas and Hezbullah raised serious questions about what Israelis are doing with our money, military assistance and political cover.” – NewsGuy

But that’s not going quite far enough for our now disillusioned Israel firster. Israels failure to resist any kind of compromise is seen as a moral failure,

“This is yet another wake-up call to show that so much of Israeli society is weak and stupid, led by a corrupt, immoral government -- due to its own fault. I am constantly reminded that while I support Israel as the Jewish homeland, I feel contempt for much of Israeli society. Sorry to say it, but it's true.” – NewsGuy

His lament continues,

“We all know that the big concern for the lives of Israeli citizens and this big show of moral superiority are really a cynical joke to cover up Israel's military weakness and political corruption.” - NewsGuy

Any compromise or negotiation is “weakness”.

I guess it’s easy to demand more blood when it’s others blood, and you’re sitting in your favourite armchair far, far away in New York or LA.

“Stories That Put Israel in Good Light”

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 13:44:00 +0000

While IF has its out and out crazies, as in the previous post, there are a few rarer sorts, who at least understand the importance of image when even discussing the issue of image. It’s important to at least appear rational and reasonable, rather than foaming at the mouth crazy. But for all that, our next contributor is little different on the substance,

“Given the history of this conflict, Israel seems to be always on the back foot and that's just incomprehensible to me. Any other nation in a similar situation would have been able to capture the higher ground and make the other side be on the defensive…….We don't seem to be able to feed the media with stories that would put the other side on the back foot or conversely, some stories that put Israel in good light even though I'm sure that there are plenty of stories like that to tell too (eg medical treatment etc)...” – reffo

Yes it's simply incomprehensible that substance outweighs spin. Have they never heard the phrase – you can’t make a silk purse out of a sows ear?

Take our poor deluded friend above and his plaintive plea for good stories on “medical treatment”.

Like this one ?? - The PA was paying Israel to provide cancer treatment to Palestinian children, where the Palestinian services and specialists are lacking (which is mostly everywhere courtesy of Israeli policy). A 12 yr old girl died from cancer after the Israeli hospital the PA was paying for her care, provided grossly negligent treatment including the use of outdated equipment that isn’t used in the treatment of Israeli children.

Perhaps we could add to that, stories about Palestinian women dying in labour (45) when refused passage through IDF checkpoints and the restriction on goods entering Gaza resulting in the complete unavailability of 23 essentials drugs as of the end of April .

Plenty of stories. Not sure about that “good light” though.

“Death Camps” in Gaza: A PR problem.

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 08:38:00 +0000

Our fine examples of humanity apply their collective wisdom to the humanitarian crisis in Gaza,

“What should be done about Gaza? I think it should be completely cut off, and there should be a law prohibiting any contact whatsoever with any residents of that territory. They should be given a deadline by which their electricity and water will be cut off. Obviously, there should be no supplies or anything at all delivered to them through Israel. They can do it through Egypt, or they can all starve to death for all I care.” - Kettlewhistle

Harsh? Oh no…

“The terrorists and their supporters in Gaza definitely deserve to starve to death, but the problem is that Israel cannot sustain images of Palestinians looking like the Jews liberated from the Nazi death camps.” – NewsGuy

Just an image problem then? But a little lateral thinking can get around such pressing public relations concerns,

"In terms of a plan, Israel should assassinate a high profile Hamas operative, then at his funeral, as thousands of Hamas terrorists gather, drop a dozen or so 1 ton bombs on the crowd of terrorists.. " – NewsGuy

Gaza, The Final Solution: “Kill Everyone”

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Mon, 04 Feb 2008 13:54:00 +0000

Yes, it’s been a while.

The recent events in Gaza seem like a good opportunity to return to IsraelForum to see if the nature of the commentary has undergone any….moderation?

A senior member starts off a thread,

Hamas has floated the idea of using similar tactics to what it did on the Rafah crossing to flood into Israel.

Israel needs to be prepared for such a mostly non-violent attempt to destroy Israel's sovereignty and/or create a huge PR disaster against Israel…….use rubber bullets and tear gas, and arrest the Pal Arabs by the THOUSANDS. Literally. The goal would be to take any Pal Arab who crosses the board, handcuff them, and get them into the prison camp - arrested for illegal entry into Israel.

That’s far too touchy-feely for some,

Why arrest anyone? Any horde stupid enough to cross into a sovereign land of another people, during a state of war especially, should be met with violent instant death. Thats what we call an invasion. Shoot them dead. All of them, their sheep and goats. Cover the cadavers, one and all with dog manure and anthrax.

And he’s not the only one,

the only prudent thing would be to do anything that is necessary to stop such an action. If you have to fire on the crowds to get them back over the border, then so be it.

But as usual, the smell of blood brings out the sharks,

we can take preliminary measures and kill everyone in Gaza.
problem solved.
WB next.

All of which passes without comment, let alone censure, from the forum ‘moderators’.

And why wouldn’t it, advocating mass murder on the scale of the Holocaust is just par for the course for the racist extremists at IsraelForum.

40 Years of Occupation: 1967-2007.

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 12:55:00 +0000

Forty years of Israeli occupation of the Palestinian West Bank and Gaza Strip is an obvious time to revisit the past and speculate on future directions. There will be plenty of attention from others on Israels illegal occupation itself, as well as the details such as land confiscations, house demolitions, expulsions, political prisoners, checkpoints, and of course, the settlement enterprise.

But I want to look at something a little different. Something that has been working away quietly in the background, significantly enabling Israel’s control of the Palestinian population and it’s attacks on Palestinian attempts at national liberation. An insidious and destructive phenomenon that rarely gets the attention it deserves – Israels network of informants, more commonly (interestingly) discussed in terms of the Palestinian side of the equation - ‘collaboration’. This is the work of the Shabak (AKA ISA). It’s an extension of the work that the Zionist movement adopted in the pre-state period, taking advantage of petty criminals, petty disputes and general Palestinian heterogeneity to collect crucial information, identify targets, exacerbate differences and recruit allies.

There has been some recent attention to the issue, and several books. One of the most recent is by Israeli historian Hillel Cohen, ‘Good Arabs’ (only in Hebrew currently), which examines collaboration by Palestinian Israelis under military rule in Israel.. An earlier book, ‘Army of Shadows’ looked at the pre-state period. The first account by a Palestinian that touched on this subject was Fouzi el-Asmar’s ‘To be an Arab in Israel'.

Also coming soon is Shira Robinsons book based on her PhD thesis, 'Occupied Citizens in a Liberal State: Palestinians Under Military Rule and the Colonial Formation of Israeli Society, 1948-1966'.

Most deal with the situation of the Palestinians inside Israel. A similar story waits to be told about the extensive spy networks set up in the OT’s post June 1967. Israel applied the lessons it learned in the first 20 years in Israel, to the Palestinians of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. When the full details eventually emerge, it will undoubtedly look something like, possibly even worse than, the Stasi of the former East Germany. Focussing on the occupation ignores this other salient feature of the OTs – that they are also a secret police state, a veritable ‘ShabakLand’, where Palestinians have to consider whom amongst their family and friends may be Shabak informers.

The techniques for recruiting informers has changed little except that in the Israeli controlled OTs, Shabak agents found even more fertile ground for coercion. Access to jobs, permits for travel and medical treatment were productive tools, not to mention torture and blackmail. A study in 2004 by New Profile titled ‘Child Recruitment in Israel’ (PDF) stands out for its’ identification of the Shabaks' practice of recruiting Palestinian child informants by torture and threats against the childs’ family.

Killings at the hands of the Israeli military obviously garner more attention, but the recruitment of informants by the occupation forces are also breaches of the Geneva Conventions. They also represent a very dark and little known side of the 40 year subjugation of the Palestinian people.

1967: "Wasted Victory"?

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Sat, 02 Jun 2007 14:15:00 +0000

As we approach the 40 years of Israeli occupation, our forum fanatics turn their attention to how it all went so wrong, stimulated by this story in The Economist. In their own special way, of course.

“Israel's victory was wasted. Let's look at an alternative scenario here:
1967 victory, Arabs are incouraged to run away from the evil Joos ........... they run away, Judea and Samaria are annexed, Gaza is annexed, the Temple Mount is turned into a historical/archeological site atracting millions of tourists every year, there are no Arabs to start intifadas or terrorism insde the country, ………... Sounds good? Yes it does.
So why is this not the case then? Because the whole situation was mishandled to the core by the retards and traitors on the left, who put our enemies interests before ours.” – Kettlewhistle

OK, so a failure of total ethnic cleansing – that's the chance that was "wasted"!!

A regular who likes to present him/herself as the ‘moderate’ face of Zionist fanaticism, finds the logic attractive,

“Sometimes, during weak moments, especially lately, I actually think you are right. I mean, no matter what Israel does, the Arabs and their allies, the so called humanists vilify and demonize it. So Israel may as well live up to the expectations of the polemicist accusers.....
However, I don't think that Israel would have been allowed to get away with what you suggest.” – Reffo

Yep, the moral constraint on ethnic cleansing from the moderate Zionist perspective is that you may not “get away with that”.

But that’s a bit too much rectitude for the hard-core fanatics,

“Your type of attitude is what I call the Jewish version of the Stockholm syndrome……..In 1967 we won a battle. Instead of building on it, and bringing peace to this country, the Leftists lost us the war, and put us on the path of Arabization.” – KW.

Hmmm, nasty that “Arabization”. Miscegenation anyone?

However, it hits the mark with our ‘moderate’, quickly defending himself against the charge of being one of those who may have supported some kind if evil co-existence involving an abandonment of the settlement enterprise,

“C'mon Kettle, this post was uncalled for. You know very well that the attitude that you attribute to me is way off the mark. Just read my ad nauseum interchanges with the likes of Takeo, Sumud, Michael and many others. I am certainly not one who advocates turning the other cheek but I also know what is practical and I also know that anyone who goes completely overboard in ignoring morality ends up with more than they bargained for” - Reffo

Then to top it off, a typically bizarre rant from on of the ‘Senior’ forum fanatics,

“They hate you and want you dead and they always will, no matter what. No point in arguing the point. You could be teaching algebra to dogs for all the good it would do. They want you dead. The Palestinians officially want you dead, their friends in the west want you dead.” – Mediocre

Fanatical and paranoid. Don’t be surprised when the 50th year of Israeli occupation rolls by.

No Arabs Please, We’re Zionists.

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Fri, 25 May 2007 14:01:00 +0000

“A French immigrant living in Israel made the news today when he was arrested for the murder of an Arab cab driver from East Jerusalem. The Israeli admitted that he murdered the Arab simply because he was an Arab. It was a premeditated act of hatred, and one which is very rare, but no less despicable.
To put this act in perspective, nearly every day, including today, Palestinians are murdered in factional violence at the hands of their own brothers. For example, today in particular, four Arabs were murdered by their fellow Arabs in the Gaza Strip. Likewise, Islamist terrorists attempt to mass-murder Jewish citizens and commit unspeakable acts of terrorism against Jews each and every day.
Despite the ongoing threat from Arab terrorists, it is extraordinarily rare that Jewish citizens retaliate against the Arabs. In fact, Muslims stroll freely through the streets of Jewish cities throughout Israel, and comprise a whopping 20% of Israel’s population.
Nonetheless, today’s murder is inexcusable as it represents a grave danger to society and to the cause of finding a just solution to the global Muslim terrorism problem. No legitimate political movement in Israel, or elsewhere, can condone this criminal act.” - NewsGuy

Well that’s a commendable effort. Pardon my cynicism, but was it sincere? Others quickly get to the real issue (the eternal issue),

"Part of expelling Arabs from Israel so it can survive will involve the use of terror by israelis. We all know there is no civil solution, which is why no attempt has ever borne fruit.If Israelis want Israel to be a Jewish state they will have to break some laws and take some lives. They can also opt to do nothing, and it may well be that Israelis will give up Israel rather than fight a dirty war. That is the free choice of Israelis, but they shouldn't fail to ADMIT that to keep Israel a Jewish state will require ethnic cleansing. Idefy anyone to submit another way for israel to avoid being demographically overturned from within."

Such conversation seems to dis-inhibit our initial poster,

"Right. I also believe that to stop the bloodshed on both sides, there must be separation between Arabs and Jews. I would like the Arabs to live in peace and dignity in their own Muslim countries, not in Israel, and I support creating a political, economic, and social climate that would encourage the Arabs to leave. "– NewsGuy

And murdering them in the streets certainly does help in creating the social climate to “encourage the Arabs to leave”.

More Zionist Dreams: "to invent some sort of deadly germ that'll only attack Arabs"

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Sun, 29 Apr 2007 13:27:00 +0000

One of the craziest from a crazy bunch is a regular (KettleWhistle) who became a senior member on the strength of his boasts about his support for Yitzhak Rabins assassination and how he desecrated Rabins grave.

KettleWhistle is in heaven after 2 Israeli’s are beaten up. It’s OK, as they are just “left-wing activists” and they were assaulted by settlers in Hebron. He calls this “defending the homeland”.

These people are not benign hippies. They are aiding the enemy. …….. It's a matter of defending our land and people from enemies and traitors.

And in response to someone referring to an incident where a settler attacked a Swedish peace activist with a bottle,

Yes, I heard about it. That should teach her a lesson.

Others join in to lament the terrible idea of Jewish Israelis having any human feeling towards their neighbours,

..they are traitors, and for an israeli to be a pacifist is to directly give aid and comfort to the enemy, ................... There is no reason to allow "democracy" to be the way bad Israelis sell the place out to the Arabs.

KettleWhistle returns to defend the idea that ethnic cleansing and democracy are compatible,

and it is not undemocratic to kick the Arabs out

And then shares his tolerant views on Israeli peace types,

These people are not any sort of "hippies". They are vile supporters of terrorism.

And then on Palestinians,

As for taking their kids to school, and what have you, if the Arabs want their kids going to school, want to grow olives, and do other such things, they need to put diapers on their heads, get on their camels and donkeys, and head out East. This is Israel, not Ishmael.

Yes, if you’re an Israeli-Palestinian, you have no business sending your kids to school, or growing olives, in Israel.

But wait, it gets 'better'. Another forum fanatic has a brilliant idea,

Look, my wildest dream is probably to invent some sort of deadly germ that'll only attack Arabs but we both know this isn't going to happen and there are international laws everyone must obey, and don't forget they too believe it's their homeland. I suppose there's no "right" and "wrong" here.

Our main fanatic suggests a more nuanced plan,

Quite frankly, if I had something like this in my possession, I'd give them an ultimatum, not actually release it out.

Don’t laugh, he’s serious, as shown in a subsequent post,

We are well past the point where property purchases mean much, or anything for that matter. It's time for action. For example, I'm trying to organize the Jewish youth in the area [Hebron] to set up some action groups to block MDA from reaching the Arabs. If Arabs want medical services they can build their own. So, the initial plan is to basically stand in front of the ambulances and not move, not matter how much they yell, or honk. By the time the police/IDF arrive, the activists will start to avidly, but peacefully, argue with them to stall some more. Meanwhile, the next action group will be ready just down the road. I'm really hoping that we'll be able to implement this within a year or so.

Maybe I should reconsider calling them ‘fanatics’, it might be a bit tough on fanatics.

This is the side of the fanatical Zionists that the world really needs to see to understand why peace is so elusive in this conflict.

They have a dream: “The coming war with Islam”.

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Tue, 10 Apr 2007 04:39:00 +0000

This is the stuff of the pleasant day dreams of our forum fanatics. Nothing brightens their day like wistful thoughts of ‘war with Islam’. Though you do wonder what war against a particular religion would look like. Maybe they’ll just destroy mosques and burn the Koran. Let’s see what insane ideas they have for us.

drop a couple of neutron's and lets get on with our lives...

Sweet, aren’t they?

The real question is what are the best ways for civilized democracies to survive the barbarism that comes out of the backward, brutal, radical Muslim world.
How can the civilized world ( any nation, not just Israel ) deal with radical Muslims, who obviously lack human compassion, and have no souls or normal human feelings. If the radical Muslim world is not stopped, it will destroy the civilized world, and then everyone on this planet will be living similar to the Muslim world, in poverty, in misery, in brutal, backward dictatorships.
I believe that the civilized nations must do everything possible to rid this world of the cancerous threat from the radical Muslim world. If that means sending agents into every other nation of this world to do it, then so be it. It must be done.

Yes, Islam is taking over the world reducing it to barbarism, therefore we must kill, kill, kill, in the name of civilisation. But then, they aren’t actually human like us, so it’s OK.

Of course, the forum fanatics are not without their own brand of sophisticated moral philosophers,

Instead of quibbling about a few lives here and there, why not just FIGHT? "Utter savagery" is required to defeat the enemy, no matter WHOSE side you are on. To pretend differently is to lie to and weaken yourself. To expect to fight a surgically precise war is absurd. So many people act as if legalistic micro-management of each human action in the war between cultures will solve anything. This is a large struggle but the tendency is to overly analyze each trivial event. The West is fond of this, and while navel-gazing may be entertaining it doesn't smash the enemy ranks. That takes shot and shell.
Human processes are sloppy, wars are sloppy, and cultural wars are VERY sloppy. Let's admit that there will probably be hundreds of thousands of casualties once the war gets up to speed. To admit a thing is not to welcome it, but to understand it!
Let's ACCEPT that resolution is beyond debate, and start considering how the side we choose may seek advantage. Culture war erases the fundamental need for the subjective construct of "right". We try to inculcate the concept of "right" to make sheeple behave. This works fine among social groups where people need each others cooperation. It is not a useful invention for a struggle where an enemy must be destroyed. Self-imposed obstacles fall away when we choose, with considered forethought, to stop imposing them. Since we fight an obstacle free opponent (not because he is obstacle-free, but because his desired end-result differs from ours) we should not tie our own hands for academic reasons.
The war with islam is not because of the name we call one of its techniques ("terrorism"), but because we do not prefer the society it produces. Let's not confuse process with result. If we are willing to fight, that implies a willingness to sacrifice ourselves as individuals. If that is an acceptable sacrifice, so is collateral damage. Collateral damage is people. Tough excrement.

Yes, that’s right, the war with Islam has, as it’s goal, the elimination of an entire society. Would trains and work camps do the trick?

Hmmmm, straight-jacket, or chemical restraint……which is best?

Syrian Shelling from the Golan Heights 1949-1967

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Sat, 03 Mar 2007 11:33:00 +0000

Discussions of the origins of the conflict are generally resolved with the standard IsraelForum retort – they started it.

I’ve presented a more realistic version of events leading up to the Six Day War, but here I’ll look a bit more closely at the region that was pivotal in 1967 – the Israeli-Syrian border.

This is a fairly typical statement from the IsraelForum fanatics on the topic,

Arab attacks from Jordan and Syria had been ongoing pre 1967 - and Israel responded. But, in terms of excalation[sic] of the conflict, it is undisputed that at the start of what is called the 6-day war, Syria and Jordan fired first, declaring war.

Some people refer to the on-going shelling by Syria into northern Israel as an example of the belligerency of Israels' neighbours leading up to Israels' so-called pre-emptive war. As usual it’s not as simple or as convenient as Israel’s apologists make out.

Let’s start with the situation on the ground as it was in the aftermath of the 1948-49 war. After the war, Israel found itself with 5791 sq. km more land (40% more) than was allocated under the UN Partition Plan. Israel occupied extensive areas of territory that were meant to be an Arab state and all of the land allocated to the Jewish state. Well, almost all. In the new state’s north, there were 3 small patches of land occupied by Syria that under Partition, were allocated to Israel. They comprised 0.4% (66.5 sq. km) of the land that the UN had allocated it. And this 0.4% was to be the source of trouble out of all proportion to its size.

The Syrian-Israeli Armistice agreement of 1949 was meant to freeze the position of troops as at April 13, 1949, the date of the last cease-fire. Israel signed the armistice on condition that those 66.5 sq. km’s captured by Syria were included in the Israeli-Syrian demilitarized zone, over which neither were to have legal sovereignty pending a final settlement. Israel rejected similar proposals for land it had captured from the proposed Arab state, to be incorporated into a DMZ.

The DMZ was to be supervised by the UN Truce Supervision Organisation (UNTSO) and the Israeli-Syrian Mixed Armistice Committee (MAC).

The next year, the first problems emerged. Israel began draining a lake adjacent to the DMZ, which involved moving onto Arab-owned land inside the DMZ. The farmers shot at the Israeli workers inside the DMZ. Israeli border police and armed settlers fired back, with tensions escalating over following months.

Syria filed a complaint with the MAC, which ordered Israel to cease the work. Israel refused and in March 1951 declared that the land in the DMZ belonged to Israel, and expelled around 2000 Arab residents of the three villages in the DMZ, then bulldozed their homes. Armed Syrian irregular forces continued to fire on the Israels working in the DMZ. Israel responded by bombing nearby villages in Syria.

This lead to a new UNSC Resolution (93) requesting Israel to cease its activities in the DMZ. Resolution 93 also called for the return of the 2000 expelled villagers. Israel refused to comply, but eventually a few hundred returned. Israel then effectively withdrew from the MAC.

In 1953 Israel once again commenced irrigation works in the DMZ to divert water from the Jordan River. The UNSC once again passed a resolution (UNSC Res.100) requesting that Israel cease the work. Eventually, Israel complied after the US suspended economic assistance over the works.

In December 1954, a small squad of Israeli soldiers entered Syrian territory to tap Syrian military communications. They were captured and held by Syria, resulting in an Israeli raid aimed at capturing Syrian soldiers for an exchange. Five Syrian soldiers were captured, but no prisoner exchange took place. Clashes continued. On December 11, 1955 an Israeli force crossed into Syria attacking 2 Syrian positions, killing 56 Syrian troops. The day before Israel claimed that a ‘police’ boat had come under fire from the eastern shore of Lake Tiberias. Israel used armoured landing craft to patrol the waters of the lake, sending the boats close to the Syrian shore-line to assert Israel’s claim to the entire lake.

A UNTSO officer described it as,

a premeditated raid of intimidation, motivated by Israel’s desire to test the strength of the Egyptian-Syrian mutual defence pact [signed in Oct. 1955] ……to bait the Arab states into some overt act of aggression that would offer then the opportunity to overrun additional territory without censure.

The UNSTO chief-of-staff commented on the Syrian policy towards Israel in the DMZ,

….policy as regards Israel was to avoid incidents and situations which might involve Syria in active hostilities, for he [Syrian CoS] realized his army’s weakness in the face of the Israelis’ superior armament, training and organization

The UNSC again passed a resolution (UNSC Res. 111) noting Israels “flagrant violation” of the armistice. Not long after Israel invaded Egypt.

There was again trouble in the southern DMZ in 1957. Israeli border police and settlers began working on an irrigation project in one of the Syrian villages in the DMZ. Israeli border police prevented Arab farmers from working in their land. UN pressure forced Israel to relent, but in the next year they recommenced similar work in the same area, with the result that villagers opened fire on the Israeli border police, whose presence was another violation of the armistice. Efforts by the villagers to work their own fields led to exchanges of gun fire with the border police. Israeli fire came in from nearby settlements and Syrian gunners began shelling from the Golan Heights. Then in January 1960, Israel conducted a major offensive, capturing the village and blowing up the homes, with Syrian artillery again responding, forcing an Israeli withdrawal.

Shooting on the lake occurred again in March 1962, between Israeli parol boats and Syrian positions on the shore. Israeli troops entered Syrian territory attacking villages and military positions. The UNSC passed another resolution (UNSC Res.171) condemning Israels violation of Resolution 111.

In December, Israeli tractors began ploughing Arab-owned land in the DMZ. Syrian positions fired at the tractors and shelled the nearby settlement where they came from.

In 1964 an Israeli irrigation project began diverting water from the Jordan River. No agreement had been made on water-sharing so both Syria and Lebanon began their own projects to draw water from streams feeding into the Jordan. Israel responded with artillery shelling of the facilities and work areas. In 1966 the Israeli air-force bombed areas 12 kms inside Syria to prevent the diversion projects completion.

Further significant incidents involving disputed work inside the DMZs continued in ’64 and ’66, the latter turning into a major battle involving aircraft and artillery . Attempts were made through the MAC to resolve the issues, but Israel claimed sovereignty over the entire DMZ, and Syria called for the expelled villagers to be allowed to return to their homes.

January 1967 saw Arab farmers again fired on by Israeli border police as they attempted to work their fields in the southern DMZ. Syria responded by shelling the Israeli settlements in the DMZ. On April 3, the Israeli Govt announced that it would cultivate the entire DMZ, as it was part of Israel. On the 7^th Israeli armoured tractors moved into the area and began ploughing. They were fired on by Syrian troops, the fighting escalated with Syrian artillery firing into the area and then with Israeli aircraft bombing Syrian villages and military positions in the Golan Heights. The Syrian air-force sent six planes, but all where shot-down inside Syria.

And so began the series of events that would lead to the Six Day War. Egypt was heavily criticised for not coming to the aid of Syria. The USSR informed Egypt that Israel was planning a full-scale attack on Syria in mid-May. Nasser moved, and the rest is history. Israel launched its “defensive war” on June 5, claiming imminent attack from Egypt. Israel wiped out the Egyptian and Syrian air forces, invaded Jordan and then when that was finished, 3 days later on June 8, invaded Syria capturing the Golan Heights (but not before attacking and trying to sink the USS Liberty on June 7).

That it was simply “Syrian shelling” from the Golan that lead to conflict between Israel and Syria is far too simple. The head of UNSTO gave a fair summary of the situation on the Israel-Syria border between 1949-1967,

The Israelis claimed sovereignty over the territory covered by the DMZ……They then proceeded, as opportunity offered, to encroach on the specific restrictions, and so eventually to free themselves, on various pretexts, from all of them…………The Israelis in fact exercised almost complete control over the major portion of the DMZ through their frontier police in the area. This was directly contrary to Article V of the General armistice Agreement...

A view that was confirmed by famous Israeli General and later Defence Minister Moshe Dayan,

I know how at least 80% of all these incidents there [border with Syria] started. In my opinion, more than 80%, but lets speak about the 80%. It would go like this: we would send in a tractor to plow…..in the de-miltarised area, and we would know ahead of time that the Syrians would start shooting. If they did not start shooting, we would inform the tractor to progress farther, until the Syrians in the end, would get nervous and would shoot. And then we would use guns, and later even the airforce, and that is how it went….We thought that we could change the lines of the ceasefire accords by military actions that were less than war. That is, to seize some territory and hold it until the enemy despairs and gives it to us.

The Al-Aqsa Mosque

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 13:34:00 +0000

There have been controversial building works going on at the Al-Haram al-Sharif of late, eliciting some very angry protests from Palestinians.

The crazies at IF have a solution, one long held dear by the most fanatical Jewish extremists (yes, that is a redundancy).

the reason we have all these problems is because the leftists in Israel refused to do the right thing in 67/73, and still refuse to just demolish all these descecrations on our Temple Mount, and thus end this story once and for all.

Arabs are already pissed off that they can't get more angry. Just blow up the damn Mosque and get it over with……….I'm sick of these threats. Destroy it, let the Arabs whine, build the Temple and then move on.

However, given the Arab mentality, I do believe that it would be by far beneficial in the long term to just demolish all their structures.

The al Aqsa mosque was built and is currently located directly on top of Judaism's holiest site, the Temple Mount. It's existence is an insult to Judaism………………sn't it high-time that Israel closed down the al Aqsa mosque?

Why close it down when it can be blown up?

One wonders what they would make of suggestions to blow up synagogues? Religious bigots at Israel Forum? Surely not.

Peace with Syria?

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Sun, 28 Jan 2007 02:02:00 +0000

The forum fanatics endlessly drone on how Palestinians and neighbouring Arab countries don’t really don’t want peaceful co-exist with Israel, Well, for some time now, Syria has been making loud overtures to Israel for a peace accord. The parameters of a potential deal are well-known, return of the occupied Golan in exchange for full peace. What do the Forum crazies think of this?

Anyhow, I do hope that if some insane [Israeli] leader will try to pull that off, somebody will shoot him/her. IMO, giving away our homeland is the red line a leader has to cross to deserve to be shot. – Kettlewhistle

Ah, the sweet sounds of peace……..a shot rings out in Rabin Square again, an Israeli PM lying dead on the ground. The threat of peace avoided again.

Update:
All the usual suspects are running scared from the awful threat of peace with Syria.

Fanatical Fantasies - An Iranian Holocaust

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Thu, 25 Jan 2007 13:37:00 +0000

After a long end of year break, I ventured back into the cess-pool that is IsraelForum.com. Given the prevailing climate on Iran, I was sure I’d find something interesting. Sure enough, after an exhausting 30 second search, I came across this,

The whole approach is dumb. Don't threaten Iran by saying you'll surgically strike some specific underground high tech sites. Threaten them by telling them you'll take out 45% of Tehran, all their power generation and all of their ports. Eyin Tachat Eyin.

The urban center of Tehran is 255 sq mi and holds about 7.3 million people. 1 well placed air burst in the 200-250 kT range would have an effective radius of near complete destruction either through blast, heat or +2-5 psi overpressure out to approx >5 miles at the 3900 ft elevation over flat terrain, unobstructed.

Many models would put the death rate at near 75-85% or higher in that area within 1 week. If we figure that city center has a population density during the day of ~20,000/sq mi and the coverage area, averaged is half that density, is 75 sq mi x 10,000/sq mi @ 80% death immediately that's 600,000. Figure in another 1-3 million homeless and another 500-600,000 dead in 90 days from residual effects, exposure, hunger, disease and general breakdown in infrastructure plus non fatal injuries 2-3x the death rate or roughly another 3.6 million injured + >3 million displaced in the first 3 months plus a complete eradication of a functioning government or economy. In my mind that's damned close to 1.2 + 3.6 + 3 or 11% of the country's population dead, starving, homeless, in the dark and cold. And that's in the first 90 days. 18 months out, things really start to look grim; maybe mass exodus out of the country, radiation sickness and disease from lack of health care is rampant, a return to the dark ages, evaporation of all civil order, biblical plagues, black death, un reclaimable urban centers. - Mediocrates

Sorry to post the whole thing, but it’s so mind-numbingly bloodthirsty I thought it worthwhile. Afterall, my purpose here is to demonstrate the routine extremism of the pro-Israel fanatics.

And they rarely disappoint.

Get Carter........and Baker.

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Thu, 21 Dec 2006 13:10:00 +0000

There’s an outbreak of hysterics following the release of Jimmy Carters book ‘Palestine: Peace or Apartheid?’, and the Iraq Study Group report lead by James Baker.

The crime of these two establishment stalwarts, is their failure to toe the Israel-first line. Imagine, this pair of fools think that US policy should, first and foremost, serve the interests of the US. Such naivety!

Onto the hysterics,

"it's an act of classic anti-Semitism, pure and simple. The proposal is, basically to treat the Jews as the world's communal slave who can be ordered around on the whim of others".- KW

"appeasers. For the Democrats, Jimmy Carter stands out while the Republicans have the likes of Baker" – Reffo

They’re horrified that anyone could dare suggest even discussing the Israel-Palestine conflict without Israel present ,

"To discuss the future of a Jewish state by excluding a representative of said State is in blatant disregard for their right to self determination, and that is in fact, anti-Semitic" - redcake.

So of course they’d be dead against any one-sided imposed plan like…… er…..unilateral disengagement??

The ISG report stirs our heroes to WWII comparisons, ie Baker is an appeaser,

"people like Baker and their ilk think sacrificing Israel to the Islamofascist wolves will bring 'peace in our time' to the US".- Yala

"Chamberlain treated Cheslovakia on the eve of WW2, as a sacrificial lamb for 'Peace in Our Time' ....."- Reffo

One thing you can be sure of at IsraelForum – never an original idea.

It’s an amazing response that reconfirms (to me at least) that these guys are our modern day equivalent of the Stalinists. Everything must be about, and for, the object of their undying adoration. Anything less than 100% support is treason.

Carter and Baker are no starry-eyed idealists, but pragmatists from the realist school of international relations. They aren’t especially interested in justice for the Palestinians, they simply recognise that the current situation is harmful to the imperial interests of the US. They expect US policy to serve those interests, and where it doesn’t, they advocate change. Hence the ISG suggestion that the Golan Heights should be returned to Syria in exchange for peace with Syria. But our Forum fanatics have zero interest in peace –‘better the Golan without peace than peace without the Golan’.

Update:
Snap! Maybe it was just too obvious. All I can say is that I thought of it first. Yes, Chris Hedges’ article is dated Dec 20, but I wrote mine last week and only got around to posting it yesterday. Honest.

Raining Qassams

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Mon, 27 Nov 2006 04:52:00 +0000

The IF fanatics know that the source of all trouble in Gaza is caused by the Palestinian militants who fire Qassams into southern Israel.

If we don’t bomb them they fire. If we do bomb them they stop. Simple equation. –SJK

The problem is that Israel doesn't respond properly to these attacks. Or do you seriously think that if Israel leveled the Hamas parliament building in retaliation, or gave an ultimatum that the IDF will level Beit Lahya after the next rocket attack, and followed up on it, there'd be any more of these? I seriously doubt that. – KettleWhistle

Where is the outrage in the UN that 18 Palestinian civilians, including children, were killed as a direct result of Palestinian leaders firing missiles into Israel every day? –CanDo.

The death of 19 at Bayt Hanun was caused by the Palestinians, of course. Incidents like that wouldn’t happen if there were no Qassams being fired. The Palestinians of Gaza would enjoy peace and serenity if they would just knock off the Qassams. Right?

Let’s take a detailed look at the time of the Gaza ‘Disengagement’ to see what was happening on the Qassam front.

I’ll take August 1 as a starting point;

August 2 - 3 Qassams
August 4 – IDF deserter shoots dead 4 Palestinians in Israel
August 5 – pre-dawn IDF raid in Gaza. Later 1 rocket fired at Gaza settlement
August 7 – IDF shoots dead 2 in Gaza after an IDF jeep was attacked.
August 8 – IDF shoot at rock-throwers in Gaza, killing 1 by-stander
August 17 – Jewish settler kills 4 Palestinians in the WB
August 22 – Return of Jewish settlers to Israel from Gaza is completed.
August 24 – IDF raid assassinates 3 Islamic Jihad (IJ) members, kills 2 and wounds 3 by-standers in the West Bank (WB).
August 25 – Qassams fired into Israel. No injuires.
August 26 – IDF raid in Gaza
August 27 – IDF raid in Gaza
August 28 – IJ suicide bomber in Beersheeba, claiming retaliation for August 24 killings, injures 8 Israelis.
August 29 – IDF soldier shot dead in Gaza
Sept 1 – IDF shoots and wounds 2 in Gaza
Sept 6 – IDF kill one stone-thrower in Gaza. 2 rockets fired, no injuries.
Sept 7 – IDF shoots and kills 1 Palestinian entering a vacated settlement in Gaza.
Sept 9 –IDF shoots and wounds 1 Palestinian in Gaza
Sept 12 – IDF leave Gaza
Sept 22 – IDF kills 1 Palestinian teenager entering the abandoned Dotan base in the WB
Sept 23 – IDF kills 4 IJ members in overnight raid on the WB. In the afternoon, IJ fire 13 Qassams at Sederot. No injuries.
Sept 24 – another 30 Qassams fired from Gaza. 5 Israelis wounded. IDF missile strikes and bombings in Gaza. Sharon approves “Operation Fist Rains” – artillery, air-strikes, bombing and assassinations in the Gaza Strip.
Sept 25 – IDF bombs homes, a school and a cultural centre in Gaza. No injuries.
2 hourly sonic booms over Gaza and artillery shelling throughout the day.
F-16 fires a missile at a car, killing 2 IJ members and injuring 7 by-standers.
A later assassination attempt injures 17 by-standers.
A newspaper story on this day reported that in 2001, IDF Chief-of-Staff Shaul Mofaz called for the Palestinians to pay a ‘price’, suggesting that the IDF should try to kill 70 Palestinians a day.
Sept 26 – 3 IDF missile strikes. 1 Qassam.
Sept 27 – overnight F-16 missile strike, artillery shelling in Gaza and several arrests in the WB. Several Qassams fired into Israel.
IJ vow revenge for Sept 25 assassination.
Sept 28 – overnight missile attacks in Gaza.
Sept 29 – IDF kill 2 IJ members in overnight raids in WB. 2 mortars fired at IDF post on the Gaza border. Later IDF kill another 2 IJ members.
Sept 30 – IDF kill 13 yr old boy in WB.
Oct 5 – IDF bulldozers clear land inside Gaza
Oct 9 – IDF kills one in WB, 3 in Gaza.
Oct 24 – IDF kills 2 IJ members in the WB. Hours later 5 Qassams fired into Israel. IDF bomb and Gaza from land, sea and air.
Oct 25 – IDF bomb IJ buildings in Gaza, injuring 5.
Oct 26 – 2 Qassams fired into Israel. IDF respond with 12 artillery shells.
IJ suicide bomber, claiming retaliation for the Oct 24 assassinations kills 5 Israelis. Another Qassam is launched and a mortar is fired at the IDF post on the Gaza border.
Sharon announces “Operation Starting All Over Again”, targeting Gaza and including further assassinations, like the ones that provoked the Qassams and the suicide bombing.
Oct 27 –IDF bomb Gaza
Oct 28 – Rockets fired into Israel. Drone fires a missile at the car that fired them, killing one. 2 more Qassams are fired.
Oct 29 – 12 air-strikes in Gaza cuts electricity to thousands of homes. Qassams lauched, IDF bombs the launch sites. No injuries reported on either side (unless you use the Israeli method of assessing injuries – people suffering shock from a Qassam strike are reported as ‘injured’, in which case the Palestinian injuries for the day are about 1.5 million, as Israeli jets continuously fly over Gaza producing ‘sonic booms’).
Oct 30 – IJ announces it will cease all Qassam attacks from Gaza if Israel stops assassinating it’s members. Hours later the IDF kills 3 IJ members in the WB and wounds 7 by-standers. IJ responses with 2 Qassams launched from Gaza.

I don’t know about you, but I see a pattern. Long periods of no activity punctuated by Israeli assassinations, quickly followed by Qassams, which over this 12 week period injured a total of 5 Israelis.

Even this doesn’t convey the sheer scale of the Israeli shelling and missile attacks. This article from Electronic Intifiada, looking at this years data, shows the massive imbalance between Palestinian Qassam attacks and Israeli shelling and bombing.

And this highlights why the latest announcement of a Gaza ceasefire won't hold. Treating Gaza as a seperate entity from the West Bank is a mistake, only a total ceasefire has any chance. As this example demonstrated, Palestinians in Gaza respond to events in the West Bank. But this is the position Israel wants to promote. That having left Gaza, the occupation is over, and that events in the West Bank are a seperate matter. Hence the oft repeated line from Israels official spokespeople and its supporters - 'see, we ended the occupation of Gaza and look what they do'.

There is no partial ending of an occupation. Either it's over completely or it's not over at all.

The Ethnic State: "kill everyone in the way"

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Fri, 24 Nov 2006 13:30:00 +0000

The great thing about listening in to the fanatical Zionists chatter amongst themselves is that they often tell you what they actually believe. No ‘hasbara’, or earnest avowals of their ' yearning for peace'.

Like in this example, where one of the senior fanatics at IsraelForum gives us the low down on what Zionism really means to him,

There is no giving up on Israel as the Jewish state. If that means war, and having to kill everyone in the way, then so be it. – MGB8

Avigdor Lieberman: "a classical ....Leftist"!

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Thu, 09 Nov 2006 13:35:00 +0000

The leader of Israels Yisrael Beiteinu party, Avigdor Lieberman, has been in the news due to his recent inclusion in the Israeli coalition government. Lieberman is a controversial figure, with his advocacy of the idea of ‘transfer’, AKA ethnic cleansing. This isn’t exactly a new idea as it was the core idea of various other Israeli politicians such as Meir Kahane and Rehavam Zeevi. But Lieberman has added his own touch of insane originality to the position with his advocacy of other fascinating ideas such as drowning all Palestinian prisoners, bombing the Aswan Dam in Egypt, executing Arab-Israeli MKs, bombing all Palestinian fuel stations, shopping centres and the like, and now advocates turning Gaza into another Chechnya (and maybe they decided to take his advice after all).

I think everyone agrees that he is a man of extreme views.

Did I say everyone? No, not everyone.

Many of our forum fanatics think he’s just great,

Anyone who opposes the defeated, corrupt, anti-Zionist government of Ehud Olmert and Amir Peretz should be encouraged with the rise of Avigdor Lieberman
– Newsguy

Though apparently he is a little too starry-eyed,

Lieberman's plan is not realistic. His plant calls for a negociated agreement between Israel and the Arabs. That's not going to happen. Certainly not with Hamas in power. The best we can hope for is a civil war among the "Palestinians," which would kill off most of the current leadership…………
– Kettlewhistle.

Who goes on to make this astounding assertion about Liebermans political leanings,

Although he is a classical, as opposed to a modern, Leftist, he is a Zionist….

As incredible as it seems, I’ve discovered that not only do our forum fanatics think Lieberman is just fine, here’s one who thinks his views are too accommodating. What can you say to this?

He seems to be doing a lot of talking - and there could be a chance that he could flip-flop Ariel Sharon style…….. He proposes a transfer of land. . ……..Any proposal which promotes handing over parts of Israel to form a "Palestinian" state is not only immoral and illegal but also places the entire nation in mortal danger
- Leon

What I’ve noticed is that this kind of extreme, too-much-is-not-enough cheerleading comes not from Israeli Jews, but mostly from American Jews. Maybe it’s the ‘armchair Zionist’ syndrome? They loudly champion Zionism, but quite like their comfy lives in New York etc, and have no intention of swapping their latte sipping lifestyles for the heat and uncertainty of Tel Aviv. Hence they overcompensate out of guilt, happily cheering on Israeli excesses in the name of the Zionism that they repudiate in practice, knowing that it’s Palestinians and Israeli Jews (but mostly Palestinians) who pay the price in blood.

Orientalism 101: "The Arab mind"

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Wed, 08 Nov 2006 12:17:00 +0000

It’s been a while since I’ve visited the foetid swamp that is IsraelForum, being otherwise engaged with slightly more substantial subjects over the last few posts. But let’s go back and see what variety of bile has been spewing from their mouths.

On Lebanon,

Terror for terror - bomb for bomb. Where did they think this would lead? I fully support this, why don't they? Every rocket in Israel produces one random bomb strike on civilians in in Lebanon.

Vilification of Palestinians remains in vogue,

The fact is that the Palestinians, who despise their children, have a long and murderous history of sending bombs in children's backpacks.

And the terrible threat of peace with Syria, as proposed by President Assad, is met with the usual longing for peace that charaterises our insane forum fanatics,

On Avi Dichters [Israels Public Security Minister] suggestion that peace with Syria would be worth returning the Golan Heights, “Ditcher should be shot” - Kettlewhistle

And finally an insight into a mind, but not the one the writer suggests,

I guess to the arab mind that's the same thing as holding to an agreement you just made yesterday. Not being arab myself I don't have any insight into the cultural nuances of lying and being a murderous sh**thead. - Mediocrates

Camp David: Propagating the Myth

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Sat, 28 Oct 2006 13:35:00 +0000

Immediately after Camp David, Ehud Barak laid the blame for failure firmly at the feet of Yasser Arafat. It has since become an article of faith of the pro-Israel zealots that this is indeed the case. How did this become so widely accepted? The invaluable Daniel Dor looked at this question in his book ‘Intifada Hits the Headlines: How the Israeli Press Misreported the Outbreak of the Second Palestinian Uprising’ (published first in Hebrew under the mercifully shorter title of ‘Newspapers under the Influence’). It’s also an excellent book for a general critique of the inner workings of the so-called ‘liberal media’.

Apologies for the long excerpt, but it’s well worth the read.

After long years of floundering between interim agreements, with occasional territorial concessions, periodic crises, and sporadic terror attacks, one Israeli PM decided to examine once for all, scientifically, whether indeed it was possible to finalise the process with a real peace agreement. This PM – Ehud Barak – cut through procedures, put an end to pattern of interim agreements, and offered Arafat a permanent status agreement on unimaginable, unprecedented, “generous” terms. How did Arafat respond to that proposal? By igniting the flames of the Intifada………Why did he do that?.........The answer to the riddle is clear and simple: Arafat was not interested in peace………..This answer to the riddle is unpleasant, disappointing, frustrating – but this is the reality. One simply has to get used to it.

This perspective was most eloquently expressed in an extensive and very influential article published by Ari Shavit in Ha’aretz’s weekend magazine on October 27, 2000. The article itself, under the title “BARAKS COPERNICAN REVOLUTION”, begins with a lengthy historical review of the defeat of the geocentric perspective lying at the heart of ancient astronomy…… “The present historical moment”, writes Shavit, is a Copernican moment – and Ehud Barak is no other than an Israeli Copernicus, since he has proven that the “autocentric” perspective of Israeli culture was no more than “a figment of our imagination; a wish; a false dream; a cock-and-bull story”;
“Two complementary assumptions were the basis for this autocentric perspective: the assumption that the Israeli occupation since 1967 lies at the heart of the conflict; and the assumption that……the solution is at hand, for it depends primarily on Israel and it’s willingness to put an end to this occupation. Thus the real historical importance of the events of October 2000 is the fact that they undermined this autocentric perspective along with its two assumptions. For the Palestinian national movements decision to land a violent attack on Israel was made just after Israel offered that same movement to put an end to the occupation, recognize a Palestinian state, retreat from 95% of the territories, and even divide Jerusalem…….In the months preceding this outburst of violence, Barak actually subjected the old peace hypothesis to a critical experiment……This is the real meaning of Barak’s term in government so far. This is Barak’s real revolution……. Now the masquerade is over…….Now we all look this cruel reality- revealed by Barak and personified by Arafat –in the eye”

Throughout October, and much later as well, it was hard to find an Israeli who would not readily accept Ari Shavit’s words. This was true not only of the political Right, who celebrated quite a victory during those days, but also of the moderate Left which at the time was going through intense conceptual stock-taking…….The simple fact, however, is that Ari Shavit’s perspective, the perspective formed by Ehud Barak’s propaganda, is completely unfounded –for two fundamental and complementary reasons. These reasons are well known throughout October; they were freely discussed by reporters and analysts, but the newspapers completely avoided any attempt to explicitly deal with them, thus helping to perpetuate Barak’s perspective in the Israel consciousness to an extent than now seems almost irrevocable.

The first point has to do with the very notion of the experiment: Ehud Barak, deeply familiar with scientific thought, was probably well aware that whoever conducts an experiment cannot participate in it – this is a completely basic scientific insight. Yet Barak obviously participated in his own experiment, and quite actively at that…….He totally ignored the need for confidence building measures; he put an end to Israel staged withdrawals from the territories, as envisaged in the Oslo process; he did not hand over any territory to the Palestinians throughout his term; he severed the deep relationships between Israeli and Palestinian peace-veterans; he authorised more building in the settlements than his right-wing predecessor Netanyahu; he humiliated Arafat and his staff from his first day in office; he never entered a process of negotiation with the Palestinians, but rather asked them to sign finalised dictates for agreements; he raised the sensitive issues of the division of Jerusalem and control of the Temple Mount without previous diplomatic groundwork; and mainly, he let it be felt all along that he thought of what he was doing was an experiment – with Arafat as his guinea pig.

Every one of these facts was reported in the newspapers during the month of October, but they always appeared in the weekend magazine sections and in section B of Ha’aretz – and they were never once mentioned in the newspapers headlines. Here are 3 examples out of many. In Yediot Ahronot’s political supplement on October 13, Sima Kadmon reports a special cabinet meeting,
“The question hovered in the air, but no one dared ask it: how did we come to this pass? Everyone knew the answer. It had to do with the personality of the person in charge of negotiations, namely, the PM. With Barak it was all or nothing. Black or white – retreat from Lebanon within a year; reach a pace agreement with the Palestinians within 15 months; a comprehensive agreement- or no agreement at all; the end of the conflict, or nothing………Barak thought he knew better. He gambled.”

That same day Chemi Shalev published a similar article in Ma’ariv’s political supplement. Shalev reports the opposition to Barak within his cabinet and says that “more than a few cabinet members are critical of the tactics he adopted, the steps he initiated and the efforts he aborted. But these are days of national rallying, of consensual defensiveness, and when the guns roar, the critics are silent”. Shalev goes on to say,
“Barak does not admit to any mistake, of course, and rightly so, as far as he is concerned. If indeed his steering was misguided, then perhaps we really didn’t have to come to this, perhaps someone else could have gotten different results with the same starting point, and then it would be impossible to say that we had no choice. Nevertheless, here is a partial list of things that could have been done differently:

a) Channelling the conflict into a situation of black and white dichotomy – agreement or conflict, with no middle ground, no shades of gray…...Barak went for the all-or-nothing approach. Not only did he fail to leave himself escape exits, he was quick to block those that others tried to open.

b) Unleashing the religious demons as a direct result of the need to discuss the holiest of holies on the way to the “end of conflict”….and the failure to prevent Ariel Sharons visit to the place…

c) Ignoring the personal dimension of the conflict; the lack of respect and the deprecation he often showed Yasser Arafat

d) The attempt to dictate, from the outset, all the rules of the game, from A to Z, including non-viable framework agreements, meaningless deadlines, and the procrastinating, patronizing attitude towards the Palestinians. First he asked for two months time for thought, then he turned up with the synergetic and simultaneous peace vision, and later he ordered the Palestinians to sit back and wait till he finished his flirt with Assad. Finally he brought them back on stage, and still complained that they were not in as much of a rush as he was.

e) Publicly and blatantly cornering Arafat in the international arena, starting with Clintons one sided speech in July…”

And finally, here is a paragraph from an article by Akiva Eldar, published on October 30, on page 3 of Ha’aretz’s section B,
“According to the Central Bureau of Statistics, Sharon does not need to join the government. Barak is doing his work better than Sharon did, and even better than Netanyahu. In the second quarter this year, there was a 51% rise in new building in the territories……All-in-all, during the first half of 2000, Baraks government has outdone the rate of the Netanyahu administration during the same term last year by 44%.”

These are not political claims raised by radicals in the opposition but facts of crucial news value…..and none of the newspapers take notice, and none of these facts ever appear in a single headline in the news pages.

This then is the first point: Barak ran his diplomatic affairs in a way that contradicted, by definition, the image of an objective experimenter testing the possibility of achieving peace…..It is certainly possible that Barak sincerely thought he was “turning every stone” on the way to peace; it is certainly possible that he thought he could put an end to the conflict with the Palestinians within fifteen months. But Barak’s private perspective was not supposed to win automatic acceptance from the newspapers – they should have examined the possibility that Barak actively contributed to the collapse of the peace process. This simply never happened.

The second point has to do with the experiments basic assumption – the assertion that the Intifada broke out , as Shavit put it, “just after Israel offered…to put an end to the occupation, recognise a Palestinian state, retreat from 95% of the territories, and even divide Jerusalem”.

What was the origin of this assertion? Did anyone know for a fact that Israel had indeed offered to put an end to the occupation, withdraw from 95% of the territories, and divide Jerusalem? It is indeed true that Barak told the journalists from time to time, but the fact is that throughout the month, and later as well, the newspapers never once tried to find out what exactly it was that Barak offered the Palestinians- not what Barak said he had offered, but what he had actually offered. Where exactly was the border supposed to lie? Which settlements were supposed to remain, and which were supposed to be evacuated? Did he, for instance, offer to dismantle the settlements in Kiryat Arba, a constant locus of friction with Palestinians in Hebron? And if not, in what sense did he offer to “put an end to occupation”? How many Palestinians were supposed to remain under Israeli sovereignty? How many seprate territories was the PA meant to be divided into as part of this agreement?……..

Such an examination could and should have also included real research into the Palestinian positions, publication of the maps Barak used (if indeed there were any) etc. Yet no such research was conducted, and the discussion about Arafat’s political intransigence was exclusively based on Barak’s suggestions. Consider, for instance the following…..published [in November] in section B of Ha’aretz,
“Almost everyone in the political establishment now understands that peace, as well as this government, will stand or fall on the ‘Camp David understandings’ of July 2000. Almost no one knows what these understandings were. No one saw the document summing up these understandings, since there is no such document. Experienced diplomats cannot recall diplomatic talks of these kinds whose content was not written down.

Ehud Barak’s version about turning every stone on the way to a peace agreement with the Palestinians was engraved in the public consciousness to such a degree that no one demands that he prove what he says…….The maps presenting Barak’s vision of the borders of the permanent status agreement were never revealed – not to the Palestinians, not to the Israeli public, not to cabinet members………When the impasse leads to fresh graves, the PM must stand up and present his proposal in full detail, so as to convince us that this is indeed a necessary war.”

The task of exposing his proposals fell of course to the media – the so-called watchdogs of democracy – but the papers preferred to keep their distance, and were content with stating that Barak did indeed “turn every stone” on his way to peace, and that Arafat had lost his sanity and was dragging the region to another war.

This version of events fits neatly within the view that Israel bears no responsibility for events. And the importance of this, is its corollary; if the situation is unrelated to Israel’s past actions, then there is no need for Israel to alter its policy and behaviour towards the Palestinians, as there will be no effect from such a change.

One manifestation of this is the oft heard lament “there is no partner for peace”. Which is little more than an excuse. Whenever you hear this, just remember, it’s a desperate cry for Israel to be absolved of any responsibility for its actions.

Myths: Camp David and the “Generous Offer”

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Wed, 04 Oct 2006 09:33:00 +0000

It’s time to look at another of the favourite myths that are the bread and butter of IsraelForum.com.

This is the general thrust of it from our deluded Forum fanatics;

The single most generous offer by Israel to the Palestinian leadership since Rabin’s promise in l967 was the “second Camp David” meeting in July, 2000, where Ehud Baraq made his historic offer of 97% of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, and a PA capitol in East Jerusalem, in return for an end to the conflict. To quote Tom Friedman, Israel extended the olive branch and Arafat torched it.

The real Camp David story is an especially interesting one, as it marks a break and a new phase of the conflict with regard to Israels approach to settling matters in it’s favour. While there is general continuity with some elements of Oslo, what marks Israeli PM Baraks’ approach as different, was his stated stand of a achieving final status agreements on all outstanding matters in one go. Baraks election campaign was based on his assertion that he, and he alone, could negotiate a final peace agreement Israels neighbours. His initial strategy was the Syrian track, but he baulked at continuing this Syrian track when he came to the realisation that peace could only be achieved in exchange for the Golan Heights., ie in accordance with UN Res 242.

Barak instead turned his attention, and his rapidly diminishing time, towards settling the conflict with the Palestinians. Adding to the sense of urgency for Barak, was that he understood that delivering on his promises of peace was his best chance of winning the elections against a resurgent Ariel Sharon. Again, it was Baraks contention that only he could achieve this, because of his special ‘understanding’ of the Palestinians. As events show, it was his complete lack of understanding of the realities of the Palestinian position that, in part, lead to the failure of Camp David.

Simultaneously another leader, Bill Clinton, was nearing the end of his term as US President, and was looking for a nice ‘legacy’ for his retirement mantelpiece – a final settlement to the Israel-Palestine conflict.

Initial US efforts to get Barak and Arafat together were difficult as Arafat contended that Palestinian negotiators were not yet ready and that a premature effort to negotiate would only gaurentee failure. The US and Israel pushed for the negotiations to begin, no doubt with much more thought given to the timing in relation to their respective political ambitions, than to the chances for a successful outcome. To overcome Arafats continued objections to the timing, Clinton personally guaranteed Arafat that he would not be blamed for any failure of the talks.

And so in July 2000 they began. It’s best to quote Robert Malley who was a member of the US team at Camp David, on the vague nature of the negotiations that later came to be described as an “offer”, in attempts to vilify Arafat and place all blame on the Palestinians,

The final and largely unnoticed consequence of Barak's approach is that, strictly speaking, there never was an Israeli offer. Determined to preserve Israel's position in the event of failure, and resolved not to let the Palestinians take advantage of one-sided compromises, the Israelis always stopped one, if not several, steps short of a proposal. The ideas put forward at Camp David were never stated in writing, but orally conveyed. They generally were presented as US concepts, not Israeli ones; indeed, despite having demanded the opportunity to negotiate face to face with Arafat, Barak refused to hold any substantive meeting with him at Camp David out of fear that the Palestinian leader would seek to put Israeli concessions on the record. Nor were the proposals detailed. If written down, the American ideas at Camp David would have covered no more than a few pages. Barak and the Americans insisted that Arafat accept them as general ‘bases for negotiations’ before launching into more rigorous negotiations.

As Malley pointed out there were no written offers, no maps presenting exactly what it was that Israeli claimed to have offered. Here are a few examples that are the best guesses that can be made as to what Israels ideas looked like on a map.

This is one opinion, and another from Dennis Ross's book on Camp David. Ross’s map fails to include most of the 10% of the West Bank that Israeli wanted to keep under ‘temporary’ Israeli control along the border with Jordan. This is the Gush Shalom view and another from Ron Punduk from the Peres Centre for Peace (PDF file – map on last page) and finally a map of the December 2000 'Clinton Plan' from the Foundation for Middle East Peace (PDF).

This just goes to show the reality of Camp David - the proposals were so vague that it is diffifcult to reach agreement on what they actually were.

One of the most outlandish claims made of the so-called generous offer, is that Israel was prepared to cede East Jerusalem to the Palestinians. As this has long been a Palestinian demand, this appears to back up the “generous offer” claims. In reality, the Israeli position at Camp David did not suggest ceding control of the area of annexed East Jerusalem. The Palestinians would be given sovereignty over the Christian and Muslim quarters of the old city and certain other Arab neighbourhoods. The extensively enlarged municipal limits as claimed by Israel in it’s 1980 annexation, would appear to have remained under Israeli control, and Israel had no intention of removing any of the illegal 200,000 Israeli settlers in East Jerusalem. In effect, East Jerusalem would remain significantly Israeli. This map shows the fiction of a Palestinian East Jerusalem under Baraks "generous offer".

Barak’s position was that Israel would keep the major settlement blocks in the West Bank, but there would be an exchange of land. And the generous part is that the land exchange would be at a roughly 9:1 ratio. That is, for each 9 dunams of land Israel proposed to keep in the West Bank, it would give the Palestinians 1 dunam in Israel. And that land area in Israel was almost certain to be the so-called ‘triangle’, an area of land on the West Bank border that has the highest concentrations of Palestinian-Israelis inside Israel. It was long been an aspiration to rid Israel of this particular ‘demographic threat’.

The myth goes that Israel offered 96% of the West Bank to Arafat. Leaving aside the fact that justice isn’t simple arithmetic, the claim itself is false. The areas of East Jersulam that Israel wanted to keep are simply left out of this calculation- they were not negotiable. What ever percentage figure one chooses to refer to, is the area Israel was prepared to negotiate over, which doesn’t include those parts that Israel had already decided belonged to it.

Another frequently referred to text in the “generous offer” myth is Dennis Ross’s book ‘The Missing Peace’. His book and frequent articles have lent credence to the idea that Israelis made an offer and it was generous. It’s best described as 800 pages of self-congratulation. Ross’s contention is based on a time limited perspective. The “generous offer” myth is based on the reality that Barak went further than any other Israeli in negotiations with the Palestinians. But this says far more about the reluctance of his predecessors, than about Baraks fabled generosity. And it is the subsequent Taba talks, 6 months later, that further expose Ross and the whole “generous offer” myth. In Taba, Israel moved closer to what Palestinians saw as the minimum acceptable offer. Israel dropped its demand for control of the Jordan valley and control of all external borders and accepted greater Palestinian sovereignty over East Jerusalem. These facts show that while Barak had gone further at Camp David than any previous Israeli leader, it was completely false to contend that; he “had left no stone unturned” as was repeatedly claimed, and that the vague proposals were anything approaching “generous”. Indeed, the subsequent developements at Taba show that Arafat, while suffering his own serious negotiating flaws, would have made a grave error if he were to have accepted Baraks "offer " at Camp David.

The idea of generosity in this context is turned completely on its head; Israel was not giving to the Palestinians from itself, but was simply returning to the Palestinians what was theirs. That returning only part of what is not yours, instead of all, can be construed as generosity, tells one a great deal about the prevailing dogmas on the Israel-Palestine conflict.

Fighting Terrorism: "target more Palestinian civilians"

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Thu, 21 Sep 2006 13:31:00 +0000

A much loved topic of the Forum fanatics. Naturally they have a somewhat narrow interpretation of what terrorism is – basically anything Palestinians might do to resist Israeli occupation. In fact, even just living in the same geographical space as other alleged terrorists in enough to qualify for punishment according to our fanatics,

Since the pal civilian population is harboring the criminal terrorists, who violated the Geneva Conventions by crossing an internationally-recognized border from Gaza into Israel, why SHOULDN'T they be made to suffer for their choice of terrorism rather than reconciliation?

Of course, Israel should deliberately target the Palestinian civilian population to make them change their behaviour…..uh, isn’t that terrorism?

As you can see while the IsraelForum crowd is extreme, they aren’t especially well informed. Israel adopted the collective punishment policy decades ago.

And Israel’s current brutality in fighting ‘terrorism’ is, in their opinion, highly flawed. Why? – because it isn’t brutal enough!

I wish Israel would target more Palestinian civilians. When a rocket is aimed at Israel, I wish the IDF would send 100 rockets back. Sooner or later these Palestinian Arabs would learn that the price for terrorism is too high. I want a new policy of 100 rockets into Gaza for every Arab rocket aimed at Israel!

More confusion – this has also long been Israeli policy!

Someone has a novel solution to the problem of the IDF killing so many Palestinian children,

It is obvious that Hamas uses Palestinian civilians, especially children, as unsuspecting martyrs, for propaganda use against Israel. The IDF returns fire, and PRESTO, Palestinian children wind up dead, where there weren't any before. These depraved, subhuman acts by Palestinian fighters should surprise no one.If the IDF would do sustained shelling for any attacks against Israel, sooner or later Hamas would run out of Palestinian children to kill.

That’s right - Kill them all, so then no more can be killed.

It’s hard to believe they actually post this vile garbage, but it’s interesting to see what the crazy pro-Israel bigots will say when they think they’re talking to the like-minded.

IsraelForum.com; 24 hr Vilification, Apologetics and Hate.

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Thu, 14 Sep 2006 21:26:00 +0000

Here's a quick review of the IsraelForum contribution to peace and understanding in the Middle East.

Vilification.
Palestinians hate their children. They are not like ‘us’.

It is an example of Pal Arab culture, and what they teach their children. From pointing toy guns it quickly becomes throwning stones, then maybe firebombs (while both providing coverage for older boys or young men with real guns ... and if there are people with toy guns and people with real guns and you are recieving fire from that area, imagine the probability increase that the child with the toy gun gets hit, and the sheer evil of the terrorists who exploit this) and scouting ahead for terrorists cells, to, by the time the boys are still 15, 16, 17, using guns and taking parts in the attempted murders themselves. That is the Pal Arab way. That is how they use their children

And not only do they recklessly risk the life of their children, these non-humans deliberately murder them, just to make Israel look bad,

In this case, depraved Palestinian gunmen murdered six young children in order to blame it on Israel. This happens all the time. Hamas and the other violent, criminally insane, inhuman gangs would kill hundreds of thousands of their fellow Arabs if Hamas could get it's financial and political gains.It is a good tactic, and one befitting of Arabs, to murder your own young, in order to blame it on a peaceloving, civilized neighbor.

Apologetics
A large number of Palestinian children have been shot dead by the IDF over the past 6 years. Clearly, the most moral army in the world is completely blameless.

The responsbility for their deaths thus lies soley with the Adults who indoctrinate, educate, encrouage and/or force them to go out into the known war zones and not the soldier who pulls the trigger.

Hate
After Palestinian militants captured an Israeli soldier, the Forum fanatics had some interesting ideas on appropriate responses,

Hit Syria – make the animals pay

On Arab society in general, we are treated to their deep understanding of human nature.

You can't humanize a society if it doesn't want to be humanized……., a culture of violence and hate and victimhood, no political initiatives or reform, persection, racism, xenophobia.

Another lesson in humanity, tolerance and understanding from IsraelForum.com

Immunity

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Tue, 12 Sep 2006 09:13:00 +0000

I’ve often pondered the exact purpose of IsraelForum. I don’t mean in general terms, as it’s quite obvious that it strives to maintain a strong pro-Israel voice on the internet. The question in my mind was, how does it attempt to do this.

Israel and Israel-advocates have long recognised that the court of public opinion is an arena of vital concern. Historically, Israel has enjoyed a relatively criticism free existence in this respect. Despite the current fad that ascribes all hostility to Israel as coming from the ‘left’, prior to 1967 Israel was the darling of this same ‘left’. This began to undergo significant change after the Six Day War, when Israel became an occupying power and was further accelerated by the 1982 invasion of Lebanon and the 1987 Palestinian Intifada. While world public opinion was important, public opinion in another sphere was undergoing a similar change – in the Jewish community itself. Dissident voices were increasingly Jewish voices.

A vital part of Israels’ appeal to public opinion was the phenomenon of ‘Exodus’ history.
Especially in the US, Leon Uris’s novel would provide a rough reckoning of the knowledge of many people regarding Israel and its’ creation; heroic pioneers fresh from Nazi Germany, striving to make the desert bloom in a land of swarthy and hateful Arabs. This narrative was one where only the new Israeli Jews had a voice. Palestinians were at best a backdrop, part of the scenery, at worst, they didn’t even exist, as Golda Meir asserted. However, events of the past few decades raise questions and introduce doubts into the mythological narrative of Zionism.

IsraelForum is an attempt to reinforce that mythology which is in danger of being exposed to new truths and a compelling Palestinian narrative that is also one of dispossession and injustice. The target is primarily those who still remain loyal, at least partly, to the myths and the aim is to keep them there, protected from uncomfortable truths.

Hence, the forum continually recycles the same ideas; Palestinian otherness, Jewish right to the land, the moral IDF, Israeli striving for peace, Jewish victimhood, the historical justice of Israel, claimed recentness of Palestinian immigration etc. All reinforcing the basic tenants of an ‘Exodus’ style mythological history, while at the same time dehumanising Palestinians and deligitimising the Palestinian narrative. So insecure is the Zionist mythology that it can tolerate no competition.

The idea being, that if that narrative is sufficiently well instilled, it will be impervious to other narratives that clash or compete with it, just as the bodies immune system will identify and reject foreign bodies.

Jewish voices of dissent are particularly threatening. But it doesn’t matter if a small number remain outside the fold, in fact they can be held up as aberrations, anomalies on the fringes which can actually reinforce the dominant narrative. The principle of herd immunity means that as long as a sufficiently high percentage are immune, a disease/virus will not spread easily despite some members of the herd being susceptible. And undoubtedly, the Palestinian story is seen as a dangerous virus by the pro-Israel zealots, one that has to be guarded against. And the best way to do this is to portray their story solely through the lens of terrorism, of a violent and fanatical people who kill without reason, or from blind hate.

So IsraelForum isn’t just a crude propaganda site, which it is, it is also a location for a community to maintain and strengthen a shared outlook, to indoctrinate against a perceived threat, to instill immunity against a foreign invader. IsraelForum is an innoculation against the notion of Palestinian humanity.

A Just Peace: "kick all the arabs out"

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 11:25:00 +0000

IsraelFroum has a thread section, titled ‚ 'Peace Think Tank' which is, not surprisingly, one of the quietest in terms of posting. So what do the Forum fanatics see as a peaceful solution to the conflict? Here are a few examples from a thread titled “A ‘Just Peace’ or a Practical Durable Peace?”,

There is only one truly just solution: for Israel to kick all the Arabs out of Israel and the disputed territories. This is the only just and moral solution that will bring about a true peace.

Ah, ethnic cleansing. What a curious understanding of just peace they have! Or maybe they have confused "peace" with "piece", as in a piece of land. They don't want a just peace, but just a piece, ie the entire West Bank. As God ordained, no doubt.

Because this is what the whole conflict is about--it is a matter of Arab colonists wanting to take over our native land. Sending them back home, to their own countries is the only truly just solution.

An all-time favourite of the fanatics – Palestinians are occupying land that belongs to Israel, and of course to any Jewish person anywhere in the world who would like to ‘make aliyah’. If only those Palestinians would go back to ‘their country’ everything would be OK.

A ‘moderate’ (relatively speaking) responded to this idea,

from the Israeli point of view it would be: "biting the bullet", making a difficult decision and attempting to solve the problem once and for all! However, IMO, even most Israelis would not consider such a solution to be just, at least not at this time.

Yes, my sympathies too would lie with Israel in having to make this hard decision. The people at the pointy end of this? – as usual the untermensch don’t figure much in the fanatics thinking.

A new member, self-described as a Palestinian, jumps in at this point and makes the stunning suggestion that a just peace might be achieved by actually implementing the internationally recognised solution, ie a return to ’67 borders, a Palestinian capital in East Jerusalem and removal of the illegal Jewish settlements. Which results in the following outraged response,

hope all of you leftist peacenik Israelis in here get a good look, a long hard look at this post and see the face of Palestinian Ungratefulness and Denial exhibited above in this post. You gave, gave, gave,expelled your own people, put "peace" above all else, and this is what you get back: more threats, more demands, not even a a glimpse of gratefulness or understanding.

Ahh, the ingratitude! 40 years of land theft, expulsions, torture, killing and repression, and those damned Palestinians still aren’t grateful! They still “demand” the return of their own land. Can you believe it?!

After that brief interlude, the IsraelForum peace talks continued,

Removing the Arab population to their own native lands is just from the impartial historical perspective--this is where they truly belong, and where they can live among their own people, in their own ways.

As the saying goes, "no Arabs=no terrorism."

Yes, let's put the Palestinians "where they truly belong" - somewhere else, so the Israelis can just get on with longing for peace.

Killing: A “Golden Opportunity”

noreply@blogger.com (Michael) — Wed, 23 Aug 2006 12:15:00 +0000

While the battles rage on in Lebanon, Israel has a golden opportunity to rid itself of the Palestinian terrorists in Gaza and the West Bank. In fact, Israel seems to be doing just that, with nearly 200 terrorists dead in the past few weeks since the kidnapping of Gilad Shalit. That’s a huge accomplishment, especially considering that it is being done without much fanfare……. Israel should seize the day and lift all restraints on eliminating the rank and file of the Palestinian terror machine. It’s not every day that Israel gets such an opportunity.

This is the view of the head-fanatic at Israel Forum, a certain Michael Rand.
My first thought was; is anyone stupid enough to put their real name to an incitement to murder like this one? Maybe Michael Rand is real, who knows, all I know is that this is a sentiment that appears to reflect the reality of the situation.

Standard Forum practice is to invoke loaded terminology to hide the hideous reality of what they espouse. In this case it's their all-time favourite – terrorists. Those killed are terrorists, “200 dead terrorists”. The formula is that any dead Palestinian was a terrorist. It's some kind of magical transformation that is very convenient. But is it true?

Lets take a peek behind the façade and see who are these people Israel has “rid itself of”. Rand’s rant was on the 14th, so let's look back at the reports, starting from that day.

Israeli bombing hit a group of farmers near the town's agricultural school. Medical sources at the Kamal 'Odwan Hospital said that Othman Hassan Alba, 55, Zuhair Shehada Al Kafarneh, 50 and Ahmad Ashour Al Kafarneh, 17 were killed in the Israeli air strike.-Aug 14

16-year-old Palestinian Nahed Shinbari, killed when a tank shell struck near his home-Aug 12

Palestinian medical sources and eyewitnesses report that Wednesday night Israeli warplanes fired missiles in northern Gaza City, killing a two year old girl, two Palestinian armed resistance members and injuring three more Palestinians- Aug 10
Two missiles hit the center for Humanitarian Affairs of the Palestinian National Liberation Movement "Fatah", killing a Palestinian refugee and wounding six others- Aug 9

An Israeli tank shell hit a house in Beit Hanoun in the northern Gaza Strip early yesterday, injuring a three-month-old Palestinian baby and a 25-year-old man, hospital officials said.-Aug 9

Israeli settlers opened fire on 48 year old Husein Mardawi and his 19 year old son Dean. The settlers killed the father and injured his son.-Aug 7

Israeli air strikes killed five Palestinians, including two militants, in southern Gaza on Saturday –Aug 5

Israeli troops have raided southern Gaza, killing 7 Palestinians, including a child, in the latest stage of their month-long offensive-Aug 3

An Israeli tank shell has killed a 16-yr-old Palestinian civilian in Beit Hanoun in northern Gaza, Palestinian emergency services said-July 31

at approximately 1:00am, tens of IOF tanks entered the northern Gaza Strip under helicopter cover, and stationed themselves near a petrol situation, subsequently moving to the southern districts and reaching Sha'af Street, where they began to shell houses with tank missiles. 11 Palestinians were killed during this offensive, including: Mohammed Adas, 22 Yaser Banat, 23 Salama Al So'ody, 45 Sabah Habib, 3 Yehia Al So'ody, 30 Husam Al So'ody, 25 Saleh Hasanein, 23 Hamed Herzallah, 25. The 3 others killed in the attack remain unidentified. 55 Palestinians were wounded, including Ibrahim Al Atla, a photojournalist for Palestine Satellite TV.- July 26

But all this isn't enough to satisfy the blood-lust at IsraelForum. Rand says Israel should "sieze the day" and loosen its, far from obvious, "restraints".

Afterall, it's a “golden opportunity” to slaughter with impunity.