Do you at least recognize that Hamas is a distinct organization that has an unassuageable agenda to destroy Israel ?

Politically speaking i’s not a religious war – it’s about land and always has been.

Land is religion. It is the concept in Islamic theology known as Waqif, which according to all 4 schools of Sharia jurisprudence, declares that terrirory under Islamic law must remain so until God’s final Judgement on the day of Ressurection. It is difficult for the typical westerner to understand this, as is the Christian tradition of “render unto caesar…” has enabled political power to be held in the hand of kings and emperors or republics that are a separate polity from the church. Not so in Islam. The Caliph in Islam is the preist king. Mohamad was the first one, the sultan and conqueror of Arabia – Mosque is state. Hamas is primarly a religious congregation. They say so themselves.

Maybe they would be able to if Israel would stop their efforts to consistently divide and undermine the Palestinian leadership.

Hamas is a terrorist organization. They deserve to be undermined, as Al-qaeda deserves to be undermined by America. The Nazis won a plurality in the Reichstag after a legitimate election. The means don’t justify the ends.

Blocades, encouraging settlers throughout Palestinian areas, etc. There is a double standard in place

Sure is. Over 20% of Israels population are Palestinian Arabs. If Isarel pulled out of the westbank and ended the occupation completely back to the 1967 borders, how many Jews would be allowed to live as citizens, or immigrants in a new Palestinian state – with equal rights to Arabs? (Hint: Zero, because they are Jews.)Also, although Israelis make a compelling and logical legal argument as to the right to build settlements, they have shown that they are willing to shelve the settlement movement for the sake of peace. To the extent that they will exile their own people at a point of a gun.

Permanent occupation and settlement of Palestinian lands erodes Israel’s identity and government. A stable, peaceful Palestine will achieve the security Israel requires.

You sound exactly like Benjamin Netanyahu. The ball is in the Palestinians court. There is occupation because the PA refuses to perform their solemn duty and fight the terrorists in their midst rather than support them. Once they recognize Israel and reign in anti-Israel terrorist organizations like Hamas – as Israel has reigned in organizations like Kahane Chai – then we may be getting somewhere.

So they must take major steps to support the emergence of a viable, credible Palestinian state.

The eradication of unrepentent, unassuageable terrorist organizations like Hamas and Hezbollah would be a start, sort of like how the eradication of Al-Qaeda in Afghanista has helped to bring along a viable, credible state in Afghanistan. Is it time for America to halt its airstrikes and assualts against Al-qaeda, Terrence?

I see what you did there.

‘Israeli’ does not mean ‘Jew’ does not mean ‘Zionist’. ‘Arab’ does not mean ‘Muslim’ does not mean ‘terrorist’. Stop that.

Jews are taught — as are Muslims and Christians! — that, in the time of Moses, chosen people Israel etc etc. It’s part of the history of all three People of the Book, and to draw parallels between that particular bit of shared religious tradition and ‘kill the vermin’ hate-mongering is insidious and wrong.

Now, back to the apartheid bit: No other country in the world is held to the standard that Israel is held to. If you told damn near any other country in the world to grant citizenship to nonresidents, you’d be laughed out of the room. If you then told them that there was a abnormally high chance that these citizens-to-be wanted to horribly murder them and didn’t recognize their legitimacy, they’d probably punch you in the nose.

If granting citizenship to palestinian non-citizens is such a big deal and moral no-brainer, why does Jordan still have millions of non-citizens who actually live inside their borders, unlike those living in the West Bank / Gaza Strip!

I’m not saying the conditions in Gaza or the West Bank are good. Or, frankly, all that fair… they’re awful. Now, if only they could deal with the portion of their population that keeps poking Israel with a pointy stick, maybe their desire for sovereignty would fall on fewer deaf ears.

It’s tempting and convenient to portray palestinians as freedom-fighters, or as scrappy underdogs, trying to stick it to The Man. It makes a nice story, and it makes us feel good to tell a bully to stop beating up a weakling. Sadly, that narrative is an illusion, and does no credit to any of the participants.

Israel has shown that they are willing to live side-by-side with a another Arab state as a neighbor, as they do with Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Lebenon anyway, so long as that new Palestinian nation obeys its obligation to reign in terrorists rather than support them. Hamas has shown no desire to do the same with Israel. They were founded for the sole purpose of the liquidation of Israel based on their religion. Why don’t you believe them when they say so over and over again?

I sympathize with the 95% of the innocents who had the misfortune to be born in that part of the world and due to circumstances have no choice but to get involved in this stupid conflict.

It seems Israel does as well, which is why they use laser-guided bombs to target terrorists specifically, and they have never stopped shipments of humanitarian aid into Palestine, and have done absolutely everthing the UN and the international Red Cross has asked them to do in that reagrd.

You simply cannot make a moral choice, you have no sense of moral proportion, only social proportion. You are lumping all the palesinians together, and you see them as ethnically exotic poor people, where as Israelis are rich white people. For that reason you automatically give credit to Hamas, or discredit Israel – afflict the comfortable and comfort the afflicted. Well, there is a moral distinction between both sides, and the plight of the Israeli nation and the plight of Hamas are not morally equivalent.

We’ll just call you: “The 4th Estate of the 3rd Infitada” – “4/3″ for short.

Hey, on the topic of silly bullshit, has anyone heard from The One? During the election, regardless of where he was at, I knew when He was speaking because the hairs on my neck (like the shiver up Chris Matthews leg, or the tingly feeling in 4/3′s gut) would stand to attention in electric excitement…but he hasn’t applied any of his salve like healing eloquence or bold leadership to the current international situation. Porque?

Maybe, his legions of GoogleBoyz will release a PodCast on the subject!!!

Now then…

Jimmy, I’m talking about the entire history of Israel here. You can’t credibly make the claim that the moral responsibility for all of this falls on the shoulders of Palestinians.

Also, to this…

If Israel stops fighting, they will be utterly destroyed. If Palestinians stop fighting, there will be peace.

Really? You mean like when Palestinians stopped fighting and allowed Israel to take over more and more and more of their land? You can’t credibly make the argument that you’d sit idly by and allow another country to just keep taking your land.

As stated before, I think Israel has a right to defend themselves, but this type of response will not solve anything.

How you could seriously make that argument after all the history in Israel is beyond me.

Well, explain it to me Justin because apparently I don’t get it. If a terrorist is shooting at you from a civilian neighborhood, and you fire a laser guided bomb to destroy the rocket launcher, and a civilian dies, how is that not the terrorist’s fault?

Millions of people crammed into ghettos and allowed into Israel through select check points to work every day

If Hamas wants Gaza to be ethnically cleansed of Jews, want to use it as a staging ground for launching rocket attacks and establishing terrorist training camps for the sole purpose of annhiliating Israel, why on God’s earth does Israel have a moral obligation to trade with them? Does it even occur to you that there are thousands of terrorists who would love to smuggle bombs into Israel to kill Jews? Is searching people at checkpoints now a “disproportional response” to the nagging inconvenience of being murdered by terrorists?

I get the impression that you don’t believe that Israel is an actual nation, that in fact only “Palestine ” exists, and covers all territory from the river to the sea, and all 5-6million Jews are occupiers. Otherwise you would see a distinction between residents of Gaza and residents of Israel. That’s Hamas’ line. You are not being balanced, you are on their side.

The Palestinians are taught from a very early age to hate, mistrust and fear Israelis,

No. They are taught that Jews are decendants of Apes and Pigs, that their souls have been sold to Satan, an that is the God-given duty for all Muslims to murder them.

Israelis are taught from a very early age to hate, fear and mistrust Palestinians

Wrong again. Israeli Jews and Arabs go to elementary schools together and learn to tolerate and respect one another. Israelis are taught that their nation has a right to exist and they have a right to defend it.

If Israel stops fighting, they will be utterly destroyed. If Palestinians stop fighting, there will be peace.

I wonder if Muslims were white people and Jews were black, maybe then you would realize that.

I suppose the way to peace is total capitulation, if not outright, ritualistic self-sacrifice. Maybe they can start cutting off their own heads and blowing up their own cafes.

At what point will you realize that the moral responsibility for the deaths of those civilians is borne upon the terrorists who hide behind them while they shoot at Israel?

How you could seriously make that argument after all the history in Israel is beyond me.

My point remains…Israel isn’t going to bomb the Palestinians into peace. I’m not condoning Hamas’ actions, but I think Israel is being foolish if they continue in this fashion. This is not the way to peace.

Israel is not an apartheid state.

All Israeli citizens can vote, regardless of race, creed, gender preference, gender, etc. ALL. (Israel has a supreme court justice who is of palestinian descent!) All citizens of Israel have equal rights under the law.

“But what of the people living in Gaza or the West Bank! They don’t have votes!”

Yes, that’s correct. Nor should they — they’re not Israeli citizens!

“…shouldn’t they be citizens?”

Well, let’s see. They don’t live in Israel. They have never lived in Israel. (If they somehow came to live in Israel, they could achieve citizenship in the usual ways.) Individuals living in Gaza should no more become Israeli citizens than Iraqis should become US citizens.

(FWIW, we at least agree that both sides are wrong to engage the way they do. Hamas keeps poking Israel with a sharp stick, and Israel keeps taking their stick away and poking them in the eye with it.)

Israel could easily shutdown anything traveling into and out of Gaza – so why haven’t they?

When Hamas was aked why they began firing rockets into Israel after the cease fire expired, they said it was because Israel refused to open the border crossings in and out of Gaza. However, it is true that some goods and services have indeed been coming crossing into Gaza. Click here to find out what.

Gaza is the largest prison in the world if you consider it is walled off on three sides

One of those sides is Egypt, whom for 40 years Israel has been begging to annex Gaza and police it as one of their own territories. Egyptian troops were firing at Palestinians who tried to punch through their wall during the airstrikes. Where is the outrage? Does Jimmy Carter call Egypt an apartheid state?

In Iraq, hundreds of thousands of Iraqi arabs signed up for security services which were trained by Americans, fought in battle alongside Americans, and even took orders from Americans to hunt down and kill extremists. Now Iraq is a functional state and our occupation is going to end soon. Iraq has proven that it is possible for stuff like this to work.

Well, Isreal seems to be the only one willing to fight the terrorists in Palestine, (probably because arabs in palestine are taught from a young age that Jews are satanic vermin – how’s that for your “root causes”) but if Fatah gets its act together and uses this opportunity to become the “anti-Hamas” and show a true commitment to peace, then the complete destruction of Hamas could be the greatest thing that ever happened to that region.

I think it’s pretty clear that I’m say Israel, as a Democracy, can’t wage the type of “kill em all” warfare that their extremist enemies do.

How is this any different than what I’ve said about the US incursion into Iraq, our torture policies, etc.?

You mean the laser-guided bombs that destroy the Hamas headquarters and weapons caches and tunnel openings – but leave everything else standing is a “kill em all” strategy? That it is morally equivalent to launching ball-bearing filled rockets into day-care centers? Are our soldiers in Iraq indiscriminate killers, just like our “extremist enemies?” Think about what you just said there.

The UN reported that of the 360 or so people killed in the airstrikes, 60 were civilians. Israel warned the people of Gaza to evacuate those buildings, and the people of Gaza listened…otherwise a heck of a lot more civilians would have been killed. The ratio shows how precise and responsible Israel’s airstrikes were. How many of those civilians that were killed do you want to bet were the wives and family members of the terrorists, or employees of Hamas ect… who were compelled to stick around and provide service to the terrorists while they were firing rockets or storing weapons? What the hell is Hamas doing firing rockets from civilian areas? At what point will you realize that the moral responsibility for the deaths of those civilians is borne upon the terrorists who hide behind them while they shoot at Israel?