I Think We've Been Through This Before...
(these are my own thoughts, reprinted from a forum I originally posted them on, slightly edited)
Hezbollah thinks the best thing they can do for their people is sacrifice them in the name of Allah. If they seriously wanted to do what's best for their people, they would never have provoked Israel in the first place. They had to have imagined what Israel's response was going to be, especially if you consider the timing, coming on the heels of the similar Gaza attack a few weeks before. No, they don't need a real, stable, happy nation, they need fucking martyrs. This has been pulled out of the same page as the Arab League decree following the formation of the Israeli state that forbade member nations from actually housing Palestinian refugees and instead forcing them back into Israel where they would be housed in those camps by the Israelis or whoever's idea that was: festering wounds are so much easier to exploit. Of course, I don't think that the Israeli government actually gives a rat's ass about any of the captured soldiers. I wonder if they aren't secretly thanking Hezbollah for giving them an excuse to justify an incursion back into Lebanon after 6 years...the Israeli response has been way too broad and harsh to be about a couple of kidnapped soldiers or even a couple of The funny thing is that both sides think they have gotten the other to play into their hands, but the reality is that they are both getting what they want. Israel has an excuse to try and reestablish a presence in Lebanon, and Hezbollah is undermining the moderate Lebanese government and increasing support for its policies one Israeli missile at a time. If Israel was actually serious about resolving this in a way that would last, they would lend support to the struggling Lebanese government, which was trying, though unsuccesfully, to disarm Hezbollah before this latest flareup. If Israel had cooperated and worked in conjunction with the moderate government, Hezbollah would probably be on its way to being disarmed right now. Instead they went and bombed the shit out of the country, probably dooming the government and destabilizing it potentially for years. God forbid an Arab and a Jewish government cooperating on a common goal as a way to build trust in each other. If anybody in the goddamn Middle East could look beyond their petty self-interest and their "he hit me first" mentality for one minute, that alone would be enough to make the region at minimum a lot less screwed up than it currently is.
Well the rocket fire's been going on for six years, if it had been a good justification then why didn't this crisis earlier? I mean, it should come as no surprise that that sooner or later this flared up into a full conflagration, but why did Israel wait 6 years if it was just going to use the rocket attack justification. The funny thing, of course, is that if Israel had never invaded Lebanon in the first place, Hezbollah would never have come to exist. Hezbollah was created as a response to the Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon.
I don't mean to downplay the fact that Hezbollah is a very dangerous organization and that the Iranian government is about to attempt to lead the world down the path of World War III. Israel is not much better. The Israeli government is packed full of a bunch of hawks ultra-Orthodox extremists who are just as firm and stubborn as any of the mullahs. So much for Kadima's "moderate" policies. The Arab terrorists are bad because they think that Allah wants them to blow up infidels. The Jewish settlers are just as bad because they unapologetically claim that god somehow granted them this land and so its within their rights to uproot whoever stands in their way. I've heard some of the rhetoric of West Bank leaders and honestly its just as bad as the stuff that crazies like Nasrallah pout. Both sides, the extremist Arab terrorists and the ultra-Orthodox Israelis who are the ones that push for this sort of vindictive military action, think they are right because they have a mandate from heaven. Well the irony is that neither side does, because heaven doesn't exist. There is no god, religion is a lie, yadda yadda, I think we've been through this before, but the bottom line is that both sides get riled up for equally absurd reasons. Meanwhile the politicians are of course just playing games. This is why I was so impressed with Sharon's plan for unilateral involvement. What other instances in history are there of a country handing over land to what is essentially an enemy nation, against the wishes of a sizable chunk of its own population (to the point that the army had to use force against some of its own citizens). I thought that it was a very bold move, and that it was a farsighted thing to do and a good thing to do. Of course in the screwed up world of the Middle East, a gesture like that didn't do any good and the Palestinians went ahead and elected a bunch of terrorist fucks, followed up by Israel assassinating people, followed up by Hamas attacking and kidnapping soldiers, followed up by Israel sending in soldiers and tanks and blowing stuff - and people - up, followed by rocket attacks, and more rocket attacks. It never ends. It just devolves into a "he said, she said" circle with no end. One bad deed is followed up by another. So what's the difference? I mean, they all do the same stuff. Imagine Iraq on a 50 year scale. What I want to know is, when are people going to stop looking at it as "400 Lebanese killed and 35 Israelis killed" and started looking at it as "435 people killed"? We are all the same people. There should be no "they." That is just part of the same pernicious lie, the greatest lie in history, out of which sprung religion and hatred of anybody that looks different and/or doesn't share one's narrow views. One CNN reporter said that civilians are the "currency" of the perpetual Mideast conflict. I thought this was a great analogy. You are always dealing in people. "35 were killed today in an Israeli attack" and "8 were killed by Hezbollah rockets." The leaders make their speeches and the fanatics make their promises, but in the end it is people that become the exchange rate. If anybody REALLY gave a shit about the lives of innocent people, this would all have been peacefully settled long ago.
Hezbollah thinks the best thing they can do for their people is sacrifice them in the name of Allah. If they seriously wanted to do what's best for their people, they would never have provoked Israel in the first place. They had to have imagined what Israel's response was going to be, especially if you consider the timing, coming on the heels of the similar Gaza attack a few weeks before. No, they don't need a real, stable, happy nation, they need fucking martyrs. This has been pulled out of the same page as the Arab League decree following the formation of the Israeli state that forbade member nations from actually housing Palestinian refugees and instead forcing them back into Israel where they would be housed in those camps by the Israelis or whoever's idea that was: festering wounds are so much easier to exploit. Of course, I don't think that the Israeli government actually gives a rat's ass about any of the captured soldiers. I wonder if they aren't secretly thanking Hezbollah for giving them an excuse to justify an incursion back into Lebanon after 6 years...the Israeli response has been way too broad and harsh to be about a couple of kidnapped soldiers or even a couple of The funny thing is that both sides think they have gotten the other to play into their hands, but the reality is that they are both getting what they want. Israel has an excuse to try and reestablish a presence in Lebanon, and Hezbollah is undermining the moderate Lebanese government and increasing support for its policies one Israeli missile at a time. If Israel was actually serious about resolving this in a way that would last, they would lend support to the struggling Lebanese government, which was trying, though unsuccesfully, to disarm Hezbollah before this latest flareup. If Israel had cooperated and worked in conjunction with the moderate government, Hezbollah would probably be on its way to being disarmed right now. Instead they went and bombed the shit out of the country, probably dooming the government and destabilizing it potentially for years. God forbid an Arab and a Jewish government cooperating on a common goal as a way to build trust in each other. If anybody in the goddamn Middle East could look beyond their petty self-interest and their "he hit me first" mentality for one minute, that alone would be enough to make the region at minimum a lot less screwed up than it currently is.
Well the rocket fire's been going on for six years, if it had been a good justification then why didn't this crisis earlier? I mean, it should come as no surprise that that sooner or later this flared up into a full conflagration, but why did Israel wait 6 years if it was just going to use the rocket attack justification. The funny thing, of course, is that if Israel had never invaded Lebanon in the first place, Hezbollah would never have come to exist. Hezbollah was created as a response to the Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon.
I don't mean to downplay the fact that Hezbollah is a very dangerous organization and that the Iranian government is about to attempt to lead the world down the path of World War III. Israel is not much better. The Israeli government is packed full of a bunch of hawks ultra-Orthodox extremists who are just as firm and stubborn as any of the mullahs. So much for Kadima's "moderate" policies. The Arab terrorists are bad because they think that Allah wants them to blow up infidels. The Jewish settlers are just as bad because they unapologetically claim that god somehow granted them this land and so its within their rights to uproot whoever stands in their way. I've heard some of the rhetoric of West Bank leaders and honestly its just as bad as the stuff that crazies like Nasrallah pout. Both sides, the extremist Arab terrorists and the ultra-Orthodox Israelis who are the ones that push for this sort of vindictive military action, think they are right because they have a mandate from heaven. Well the irony is that neither side does, because heaven doesn't exist. There is no god, religion is a lie, yadda yadda, I think we've been through this before, but the bottom line is that both sides get riled up for equally absurd reasons. Meanwhile the politicians are of course just playing games. This is why I was so impressed with Sharon's plan for unilateral involvement. What other instances in history are there of a country handing over land to what is essentially an enemy nation, against the wishes of a sizable chunk of its own population (to the point that the army had to use force against some of its own citizens). I thought that it was a very bold move, and that it was a farsighted thing to do and a good thing to do. Of course in the screwed up world of the Middle East, a gesture like that didn't do any good and the Palestinians went ahead and elected a bunch of terrorist fucks, followed up by Israel assassinating people, followed up by Hamas attacking and kidnapping soldiers, followed up by Israel sending in soldiers and tanks and blowing stuff - and people - up, followed by rocket attacks, and more rocket attacks. It never ends. It just devolves into a "he said, she said" circle with no end. One bad deed is followed up by another. So what's the difference? I mean, they all do the same stuff. Imagine Iraq on a 50 year scale. What I want to know is, when are people going to stop looking at it as "400 Lebanese killed and 35 Israelis killed" and started looking at it as "435 people killed"? We are all the same people. There should be no "they." That is just part of the same pernicious lie, the greatest lie in history, out of which sprung religion and hatred of anybody that looks different and/or doesn't share one's narrow views. One CNN reporter said that civilians are the "currency" of the perpetual Mideast conflict. I thought this was a great analogy. You are always dealing in people. "35 were killed today in an Israeli attack" and "8 were killed by Hezbollah rockets." The leaders make their speeches and the fanatics make their promises, but in the end it is people that become the exchange rate. If anybody REALLY gave a shit about the lives of innocent people, this would all have been peacefully settled long ago.
posted by Svengali Jack at 4:48 PM
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