AlBStern wrote:Article about the Israeli bombing of the UN post.

So it is clear: Israel is willing to bomb and kill anyone -- civilians in their homes, UN observers in their posts, Red Cross medics in marked transports, anyone at all, anywhere at all -- if there are Hezbollah in the area as well. Just so we're clear about it. They are willing to bomb and kill anyone.

Israel is destroying transport routes and infrastructure that would allow the uninvolved out of engaged areas of Lebanon, and attacking vehicles of any kind on such routes.

Israel is waging what can only be described as total war against a trapped population under seige. I hope I am not alone in my sense of horror at its futility, knowing that Israel has grabbed a tiger by its tail with one hand and is poking it in the eye with the other.

steve wrote: I hope I am not alone in my sense of horror at its futility, knowing that Israel has grabbed a tiger by its tail with one hand and is poking it in the eye with the other.

The only good thing about the news of the air attack on the elderly, disabled and the infants ( who probably did have a Katusha within 100 yards, as if that matters, by scale ) in Qana is that some media has revisited the '96 slaughter of 100 refugees in Qana as part of the coverage.

As the US is doing in Iraq, Israel is making enemies faster than it can kill them. Methods to kill in greater quantity and at greater speed will need to be introduced into the US/IDF Siamese twin end game. Neither side has the ground troops to attempt 'selective punishment of enemy fighters', not even close. Shock and awe will return.

edit for spelling.

The airstrike on Qana this morning is perhaps the best is illustration of history being pointlessly reenacted.

It's with poignant sadness that we find out the UN compound in Qana was deliberately shelled by the Israeli's in 1996, killing over a 100 townspeople and several UN observers.

Beyond collective punishment and the massive displacement of the border populations, Israel's strategic objectives seem totally obscure to me. Yet, Israel has only today asked the US for a 14-day extension to achieve it's aims.

I don't have the stomach for another 14 days of dead children being carried out of collapsed buildings.

AlBStern wrote:Article about the Israeli bombing of the UN post.

Headline of your linked article:

Hezbollah was using UN post as 'shield'

A question: why would Hezbollah try and use civilians as human shields? It isn't slowing the IDF down much.

clocker bob wrote:

AlBStern wrote:Article about the Israeli bombing of the UN post.

Headline of your linked article:

Hezbollah was using UN post as 'shield'

A question: why would Hezbollah try and use civilians as human shields? It isn't slowing the IDF down much.

Exactly.

The purpose of a shield is to...shield.

Since the IDF is seemingly entirely willing to kill civilians, it's hardly likely or logical that Hezbollah are 'hiding behind civilians'.

clocker bob wrote:A question: why would Hezbollah try and use civilians as human shields? It isn't slowing the IDF down much.

Because horrific events get the attention of the news, and the "world community". It will increase pressure on Israel to stop their attack, while leaving Hezbollah mostly unscathed in the conflict.

I suppose the logic of using innocent civilians as shields is to get them killed and thereby galvanize international pressure against Israel and, by proxy, the US. I mean, in the case of nonviolent resistance, the best thing that can happen is for the violent tendencies of the 'oppressor' to shine through while the protestor is simply eating or reading, etc.

One often hears the supporters of Israel saying that they do not target the innocent while the 'terrorists' do. This is obvious nonsense as a distinction, and I feel that somehwere in these hundreds of posts this has been vetted. Israel will do whatever it feels is in its best interests. The difference in 'expressed' targets is primarily a function of technological advantage rather than morality. If Hezbollah had Israel's arsenal you can bet there would be something more than Kats singing through the air. If reduced to such levels, the Israelis would use more low-yield forms of 'terror.'

The Lebanese are a pitiable lot. They are a small nation of modest means stuck between warring factions. They are absorbing blows meant for another and, even as they ask that the pummeling cease they are struck even harder.

The Jewish state is in the wrong place. Swell idea, problematic execution.

The US stance of supporting Israel no matter what constitutes a criminal squandering of diplomatic wherewithal. Many have and will continue to die as a result.

The Bush presidency is going to have to make some very, very impressive strides to outrun a failing grade. This is in part because they are true believers, a klatch of folks who stay the course no matter what. Good for them, I guess, though I continue to feel Bush needs to be kicked hard in the kidneys and that Blair should then clean the blood out of the toilet bowl.

clocker bob wrote:A question: why would Hezbollah try and use civilians as human shields? It isn't slowing the IDF down much.

unarmedman wrote:Because horrific events get the attention of the news, and the "world community".

You say "horrific events get the attention of the news, and the world community" like that's a bad thing. Is it all to be explained away as a cynical ploy by Hezbollah? Is Israel using white phosphorous to make events appear more horrific for the cameras? You know, playing right into Hezbollah's hands?

Biznono wrote:God bless you and God damn you, Electrical Audio website. i have to get back to my life. To the defenders of Israel's latest actions on here (I am assuming there is more than one), pull out pen and paper and draw two columns, one labeled Colonial Successes, the other Colonial Failures. I think you will quickly find that only where rampant disease and genocidal tendencies destroyed the indigenous populations has colonialism worked in the long run for the colonizer. In any case you'll need at least a second sheet for the failures column. Israel admittedly fits in as a strange sort of colonizer. Maybe Israelis today are more like the descendants of the white Dutch and British colonizers in South Africa at the end of the twentieth century. Maybe then there should be a third column for colonial projects that opted for truth and reconciliation. The shortest column of all, for sure, but the only hopeful place in the long-term for Israel and the surrounding Arab world.

I'm a little puzzled by this paragraph and have been thinking about it for a few minutes. On the one hand, I think the collumns part is well-said, but on the other, I'm having trouble with the distinction of Israel as a colonial entity. I first thought you might be suggesting Israel's trying to conquor Lebannon to colonize it. But that's not the case, but for a few tracts of land, Israel's given back all the land, e.g., Sinai, it's won from her neighbors, which as you know, is usually the 'prize' of the victor at the end of a war. I doubt anyone inside the fringe thinks expansion is in Israel's gameplan. Espcially given the Israeli pull-out of settlements this last year.

I suspect you're referring to the creation of Israel in the first place. As a colony, that is. Endorsed even by the League of Nations, if I remember correctly. The justice of her creation or her right to exist or to be extinguished is beyond the scope of this thread. I'd guess some of the jew haters on this thread wouldn't come to my point of view, nor would I theirs. [Such a discussion would just add to my and probably their frustrations anyway.] Likewise, there's no real compromising between Israel and Hezbollah when it comes to Israel's right to exist: At the end of the day, it's a yes or no thing.

So, I guess what I'm saying is I don't fully understand how Israel's colonial roots come into play with the last few weeks' fighting, because they're their now and have been for 60 years. I see no imperialistic ambition on Israel's part. How do these roots come into play?