by padishah , july 23, 2006 at 12:19 am link to this comment (unregistered commenter) 




i must address the complete drivel that was mr jeff gershoff<u+2019>s comment. 




first and foremost, in 2002, with the full backing of the arab league, saudi arabia offered the israeli<u+2019>s a peace treaty - i repeat - a peace treaty in the form of the egyptian and jordanian ones, stating the formal end to the arab-israeli conflict, recognition of israel, and a whole host of other concessions in return for israel returning all of the occupied territories captured during the 1967 war, and a just solution to the palestinian humanitarian problem, amongst other concessions. 




generalissimo sharon outright refused to aknowledge this peace deal, and it withered. us administration said nothing, the us media allowed the story to die. so your statement: 




<u+201c>let hamas and hezbolah recognize israels right to exist and there can be peace. let them keep strapping explosives to themselves and killing women and children, let them keep lobbing missles into israel and israel will continue doing what they are doing until one of them cannot get up off the canvas anymore.<u+201d> 




is quite irrelevant, seeing as hamas was not governing the palestinian territories, and hezbollah was not governing lebanon in 2002. a general peace deal with the arab world was allowed to die, and you suggest that israel will be willing to deal with two entities it thinks are terrorist organisations. 




furthermore, you ask for the arabs to make the first move. always, the onus is on the arab side to make many concessions even before israel consider negotiation. there is no equal footing with which to negotiate with israel because israel will not allow it to be so. history and current events show that even if the arabs were to accede to all israeli demands, there is no gaurantee that the israeli<u+2019>s will not find some other demand in order to stall, or even to not just ignore arab overtures out of spite. indeed, judging from recent events, they seem quite capable of it. 




your statement: 




<u+201c>no one gave a rats ass about the palestinians when their <u+0093>home land<u+0094> was squalor, flies, and dirt. israel turned it into a garden and now everyone demands palestine for the palestinians.<u+201d> 




seems to imply that imprisonment in an israeli garden; where your house can be demolished, or your olive and fruit groves be uprooted depending on your heritage, is much better than freedom in your own country, however squalid, fly-ridden or dirty. furthermore, a land totally at peace would need no-one to give <u+2018>a rat<u+2019>s ass<u+2019> (in your parlance) about it anyway, and is a misrepresentation of the historical situation. your statement smacks of the colonialist attitude of the 19th and early 20th centuries. would you also hold this view for all those people of colour, who were enslaved and brutalised in many instances around the world? would you believe that the sexual slavery of women practices in some parts of the world somehow beneficial to the women who must suffer those indignities? 




it<u+2019>s obvious from your comment that you harbour a prejudice for palestinians in particular, and arabs in general; they aren<u+2019>t fit for the land they occupy, and only israeli<u+2019>s can make the middle east bloom. thus, by extension, all arabs deserve to suffer under the heel of zionism, for their own good. corrrect? does this sound eerily like the whole <u+2018>white man<u+2019>s burden<u+2019> trollop that precipitated the excesses of the colonisation of africa? it certainly does, and it fits with the israeli mindset as well. 




by eleven bravo , july 22, 2006 at 9:24 pm link to this comment (unregistered commenter) 




israel likes to spy on the country that feeds it to the tune of billions to date and then calls the traitor who spied on us, a hero -just the kind of ally we need in the middle east. by the way, they also like to sell our military technologies even if we tell them not to - china sure appreciates it. remember, do not forget the uss liberty. some brits certainly remember that these same israelis that cry holy terror about terrorism were terrorists themselves when the brits were in palestine and they to this day are unrepentant for the terrorist acts they performed. 




by wildhog , july 22, 2006 at 8:38 pm link to this comment (unregistered commenter) 




wow, this is amazing. as a vietnam veteran and a patriotic american i am glad you are speaking out. we sure dont need all this strife and bloodshed we sure have not learned our lesson from the past. we have got to regain our freedom from israeli tyrany. make no mistake we need to stand up for our nation before we are embroiled in a conflict we cannot win. 




by blues , july 22, 2006 at 8:32 pm link to this comment (unregistered commenter) 




wow jew haters gone wild said: 




jews have contributed their energy, intellect, resources to every progressive cause in modern history. and yet you so-called progressives just turn your back, raise the chorus of jew blame, and think you<u+0092>re moral? [....] 




well, yeah, i guess. in some ways, i think it could be argued that the navajo have done far more. 




but the power-mad neozionists that have hijacked the nation of israel have been treating all their neighbors worse than cockroaches for decades. and they have warped, probably wrecked our american society in the process. they collaborated with the vicious apartheid union of south africa to enable the south african tyrants and themselves to develop nuclear wmds. so that just doesn<u+2019>t make me feel friendly toward neozionists. 




as far as the question of weather i harbor any actual hatred of jewish people themselves, you will never begin to be able to discover the answer to that. i could easily bear the fervent wish that every jew be burned alive in an oven, all the while pretending to love the jews. or i could accept jews as just people who practice a particular religion, bearing no ill-will at all against them, while proclaiming to jew-hating neighbors that i detest the jews as much as they do. but you will never be able to begin to decipher what i truly feel. 




by toole , july 22, 2006 at 7:39 pm link to this comment (unregistered commenter) 




israel and the u.s.a. are, by their present alliance to dominate, taking a walk to the wild side just like hitler and nazi germany. 




by fadel abdallah , july 22, 2006 at 7:22 pm link to this comment (unregistered commenter) 




to plunger, message # 14774 




you piece on 9/11 is well reasoned and makes a lot of sense, and i thank you much for your interst in digging out the truth about this very tragic event and its far-reaching disastrous consequences on the whole world. 




there is no hope of finding physical evidence to prove who and how it all happened. this is so for the simple fact that the sophisticated team that planned this inside job made sure to destroy any physical evidence possible. 




in light of this, serious thinkers are only left to use their intellectual reasoning and circumstantial evidence to reach an approximation about the facts related to 9/11. 




yours is indeed a very serious analysis, and, most likely, very close to the truth. that<u+2019>s why i was intrigued by your piece. i was particulary intrigued about your being specific on the mossad role as a way to blackmail the political establishment. remember monica lewinsky? i theorized, at the time, and wrote about her being an israeli mossad agent, planted in the white house to bring about the fall of clinton, who was getting a little bit sympathysing to solving the palestinian problem. 




your piece also supports my thinking about 9/11; about which i wrote a short comment somewhere else on the truthdig. in case you have not read my piece, i am attaching it below: 




<u+201c>to janice a. # 14474: 




you<u+0092>re very smart janice. you<u+0092>re one of the few thousands in america and around the world who believe 9/11 was an inside evil job, to create the atmosphere of fear in preparation for the trauma and mind control you talked about. 




i simply could not believe and will never believe that some people living in caves and constantly on the run could have carried out such sophisticated operation. this is not to say that al-qaeda had not enough hate for america to attempt hurting it in a big way when they could; but from a scientific point of view, know-how and sophisticated human resources, they did not have that, and no small group of enemies will ever have what it takes to prepare and carry out such operation. and imagine that!! the hijackers had only box-cutters as their weapons! from all those on board the hijacked planes, wasn<u+0092>t there a few courageous enough who were willing to get injured and possibly die to prevent a bigger disaster?!! 




elements in the pentagon, cia, fbi with possibly a lot of help from the israeli mossad must have started working on this just as bush was put on the throne by the supreme court! for bush and the neocons to continue ruling the country and taking it in the direction they have taken it, something tragically big must have to take place! everyone knows, that in every country and society there is that class of people called the merchants of death! for what happened in iraq, afghanistan, palestine and now lebanon, 9/11 was a must prerequisite! 




sad as it is to invoke thoughts about the 9/11, i always find consolation to find like-minded people. thank you janice for being a free thinker and publicly join the small but privileged group!<u+201d> 




by mark , july 22, 2006 at 7:20 pm link to this comment (unregistered commenter) 




by the way: if americans generally ever finally start to figure out what a false ally israel really is, there is of course the danger of an upwelling of anti-semitism in america. let<u+2019>s look at exactly why this is so. 




the essential misunderstanding that may lead to such a horrible development is a failure of americans to distinguish between israel and <u+201c>the jews<u+201d>. this is a conflation that israel and many american jewish leaders have done much to encourage. 




any strong condemnation of israel<u+2019>s actions, of its ethnocratic ideology, or of its interference in our political process, is regularly condemned as inherently <u+201c>anti-semitic<u+201d> by prominent members of the mainstream american jewish community. right-wing american christians <u+0097> perhaps even more extreme than american jews in their adherence to the notion of israel<u+2019>s blameless holiness <u+0097> eagerly echo this charge. 




and so, despite the fact that american jews are in fact over-represented among intellectuals and activists who expose and denounce the crimes of the state of israel, we may well see such a surge of anti-semitic backlash in this country, if and when most americans come to some glimmer of understanding concerning the worse-than-useless us/israeli <u+201c>alliance<u+201d>. 




americans in general are not terribly sophisticated. this is why such a ludicrously one-sided alliance, so destructive to american interests, was ever possible in the first place. and it<u+2019>s why an anti-semitic reaction may accompany its end. 




if this backlash should happen, then to israel and to the american jews who have laid the foundation for it, i have three words from a great jewish philosopher: as ye sew. 




by wow jew haters gone wild , july 22, 2006 at 6:18 pm link to this comment (unregistered commenter) 




wow, just read this thing and be amazed at the level of knee jerk jew hating, blindness to history, and desire for the death of israel. so sad. if these terror groups lay down their weapons and agreed to stop attacking israel tomorrow, that would be the end of war. if israel lay down their weapons and agreed to stop hitting back at the terror groups, it would be overrun tomorrow and a new holocaust would ensue. apparently, that suits the jew haters just fine. islamic fascism is fascism, and again jews stand against it while the moral ambivalence or antisemitism of non jews seeks to guarantee yet another cycle of jew killing. shame, shame. it<u+2019>s sad that israel<u+2019>s only friend can be found in the bush government, but that doesn<u+2019>t make israel complicit in anything that bush does. if you have only one friend and you<u+2019>re fighting for your life, you don<u+2019>t question that friendship. more power to israel in this fight for their life. look at the numbers of arabs killed by arabs, of non muslims killed by muslims, of the track record of muslims in the world today (whereever there<u+2019>s trouble, muslims are there trying to dominate and destroy non muslims). jews have contributed their energy, intellect, resources to every progressive cause in modern history. and yet you so-called progressives just turn your back, raise the chorus of jew blame, and think you<u+2019>re moral? you better hope that in the end we don<u+2019>t all get what we deserve. 




by harry h. snyder iii , july 22, 2006 at 4:07 pm link to this comment (unregistered commenter) 




i surely didn<u+2019>t say anything about jews crucifying anyone<u+2026> 




however crucifiction was hardly exclusively a <u+201c>roman thing<u+201d> 




this means of punishment was practiced by persians, seleucids, jews, carthaginians, among others. there is even some evidence it was practiced in egypt. 




reflex action? by whom? 




by john z , july 22, 2006 at 3:41 pm link to this comment (unregistered commenter) 




marcia, of course ishrael wants peace<u+2026>..a piece of iraq, a piece of iran, a piece of syria and a piece of lebanon. they also have our own government by the balls through, bribery, extortion and threats. i and thouroughly disgusted and sick to my stomach from it all. it is time for a new american revolution. we must: take our government back from those who have corrupted it for their own benefit, including ishrael. prosecute those within the whore house for betraying our nation, our constitution and its people. the punishment must be severe enough to deter any who might think about doing it again in the future. stop paying tribute to that miserable little zionist state. no more money period! enough is enough, goddamn it! congress should get its collective asses kicked, and maybe in the balls as well. break all ties with ishrael..they are on their own from now on. that way they will have to behave themselves. as long as they have the u.s. as their rich poodle ishrael will continue to act like a pitbull. round up the zionists, mossad, aipac and the jew lobby and send them packing back to zionland. use the laws we have to break up the jewish stranglehold on our media, including the newspapers. there are enough anti monopoly laws with which to use. please realise i have nothing against people of judaism. it<u+2019>s the rabid, racist, zionist who i find to be our own worst enemy. thank you tom, for finally coming out with enough guts and patriotism to speak out on this matter. even our founding fathers spoke out against zionism. unless we change the course of our nation, we will be <u+201c>undone<u+201d>. i fear for my country and for those in the middle east for they are the ones who are the victims of zionist aggression. now i will wait for the zionists to send their hitmen to my house. 




by john f. butterfield , july 22, 2006 at 12:58 pm link to this comment (unregistered commenter) 




harry, 




crucifiction was a roman thing. jews have often been on the receiving end of brutality. whether they have more often been teachers of brutality or learners from brutality can be disputed. that they have killed more arabs in the last 60 years than arabs have killed jews in that same time period cannot be disputed. the side that the united states has taken in the disagreement cannot be disputed. it was interesting to see your reflex action. 




by blues , july 22, 2006 at 12:34 pm link to this comment (unregistered commenter) 




this article has pushed me beyond some point of critical mass. my world-view will never be the same. 




what we are looking at here goes beyond issues like anti- jewish sentiment, terrorism, capitalism, etc, etc, etc. we have been victims to a vast media conspiracy that has parlayed a typical religious ideal into a powerful, violent cult of death, and allowed that cult to play a key role in the establishment of a fascist regime in the united states. it needs to be called the neocon/ neomedia/ neozionist conspiracy of treason, or something like that. 




these pseudo- religious traitriots are destroying america and the rest of the world too, including the people of the middle east, including the jewish ones, apparently for sport. this is evil in its purest form. i am stunned. 




by harry h. snyder iii , july 22, 2006 at 5:19 am link to this comment (unregistered commenter) 




john; 




back when crucifiction was occuring in the middle east the brits were drawing and quartering folks, the spanish were killing witches and most of europe was pre civilized. 




i will not be a party to a conversation where we blame one side or the other for this disagreement which clearly has enough blame to cover the northern hemisphere. 




i thought the point of tom<u+2019>s message was that there are two valid points of view here? 




by plunger , july 22, 2006 at 2:03 am link to this comment (unregistered commenter)
tom hayden: things come around in the mideast
noauthor