Secretary of State Clinton: Israel sending deeply negative signals towards peace

Guess what. You're an idiot.

"Unhinged regime?" You're nowhere near as smart as you think you are.

I agree with Secretary Clinton and Vice President Biden, and I'm very frustrated with Israel, but I think calling them an unhinged regime unworthy of our support is a moronic, unfounded statement, especially when we continue to send money and support to Saudi Arabia.

And honestly, this reflects badly on President Obama, too.

So to counter your argument, would you call the number of countries that repeatedly call or have called for Israel to be wiped off the map or refuse to recognize its existence also unhinged

And Lieberman wasn't talking about Palestine, he was talking about Hamas, you fucking ninny.

At this point, I'm not sure if PK actually believes what he/she professes to believe or is just the most patient and persistent of trolls. If it's the latter horn of the dilemma, I'm just glad the user has this outlet and hasn't started to force-feed the local shut-in neighbor to death.

There are other tasteless T-Shirts around that nobody cares about.

Thing is, Israel is just as crooked, warmongering and hateful as practically any other country down there. It just happens to have a history with the west, and a lobby in the US, thus gets to play the "Get out of Jail free" card all the time.

Part of the problem is the fact that we CREATED Israel in the first place, thus feeling accountable for its existence and the troubles stemming from that fact. Mind you, quoting the scripture of a monotheistic religion as grounds for stealing land was never a good idea, anyway.
Then you got the other part, which is the close connection of the jewish religion with the state of israel, which means you trigger the "antisemitism" reaction a lot when criticizing the STATE of israel. Which, in turn, is a big No-No since WW2 at latest, and thus another roadblock.
Last but not least, Israel is quite good at playing the "last bastion of western influence" card in their area, which means its quite opportune to support Israels misbehaviour, in order to keep having a nice place down there from which to get intelligence and a possible staging ground for whatever meddling in the affairs of the mideast you plan on doing in the next decade or two.

But no, without these factors, its just another dump of warcrimes, hatred and religious extremists of many kinds.

Well, after a few thousand years of persecution culminating in the Holocaust, one can see why the Jews might want their own country and not be willing to kowtow to any other nation, even one that's supported them for decades.

As for the US, even if you disregard the moral and historical reasons for supporting Israel, the fact is it is the most stable country in the region, the most productive economically and has the best Intelligence bar none. You want them as an friend!

Wife of President who said "I am the most pro-Israeli president since Truman" has fit over Israeli intransigence.

IRONY OVERLOAD.

There are plenty of batshit crazy people wearing batshit crazy shirts here in the United States, too.

Look, Kate, I was a little harsh with you this morning, and I apologize. But if you're around these boards long enough, you know that for certain people, there are issues that are non-negotiable. For example, Nordling is unequivocally for universal health care and gay marriage. Seabass is vehemently anti-torture. I'm with them on those, but for me, I absolutely, 100% percent support the right of Israel to exist and to defend itself. That's non-negotiable. Do I think the way that Israel has gone about it has always been correct? No. Do I always agree with their policies? No. But I will not budge from the fact that this nation and these people have a right to exist, and to defend itself. And I get a little frustrated when you take your very broad paintbrush and go to town.

So there's that.

Don't feel too bad. She (or he - I'm pretty sure whoever it is a pathological liar) loves any attention she can get for herself.

Netanyahu has a track record of theft whilst not giving a hoot what the US or anyone else thinks. It's like we've suddenly travelled back to 1997. Replace Clinton's toothless rebuke with Madaline Albright's (after Netanyahu embarked on one of his frequent land-grabbing campaigns).

"We ask Israel to refrain from unilateral acts, including what Palestinians perceive as the provocative expansion of settlements".

Result: 7,012 new homes built on Palestinian land within the next six months.

Although I'll give Nentanyahu some credit for being nowhere near as bad as Ehud Barak - labelled by the US as "the most liberal and pro-Palestinian Israeli leader since Rabin" - who colonised the West Bank TEN TIMES as fast as Nentanyahu's Likud government.

When in 1998 Clinton invited Netanyahu to Washington to talk about this issue he just ignored him. The next day Albright told journalists that she was full of praise for the Israeli leader who was forging ahead with Jewish settlements. She said Netanyahu was "encouraging". He had produced "new ideas". He was "enthusiastic" about peace. She was "grateful" to Netanyahu and then said "It is up to Israel to decide what its security demands are". But when asked by journalists what those new ideas were she said "More details do not help us move forward".

The statistics are damning. Between 1967 and 1982, a mere 21,000 colonists had moved into the West Bank & Gaza. In 1990 the total stood at 76,000. By 2000 (three years prior to Clinton's exit) the figure had exploded to 383,000. Six months earlier an Israeli ministerial committee recommended building an additional 116,000 houses for colonists over the next 20 years.

I accept Israel's right to exist - but that doesn't mean I'm happy about the way this particular part of the Middle East was stolen from the Arabs who had lived there in peace for hundreds of years. I accept Israel's right to defend itself - but in any conflict there is such a term as PROPORTIONAL RESPONSE.

If some religious lunatic decides to strap a bomb to himself and murder half a dozen innocent Israeli civilians, this DOES NOT mean it is acceptable to launch a Hellfire missile into a densely-populated towerblock of Palestinian civilians in order to kill one terrorist. That is - IN NO WAY IMAGINABLE - proportional response.

Some statistics on Israel's Disproportional Response.

Since September 29, 2000:

121 Israeli children have died vs 1,441 Palestinian children.
1072 Israelis have died vs 6,368 Palestinians.
8,864 Israelis have been injured vs 39,019 Palestinians

Some other illuminating statistics:

During the fiscal year of 2009 the US provided Israel with AT LEAST 7 million dollars a DAY in military aid. It goes without saying the Palestinians received nothing.

Between 1955 and 1992 the Israelis were targeted by AT LEAST 65 UN Resolutions. The Palestinians were targeted by none.

Current number of Political Prisoners and detainees.

Held by Palestinians: 1
Held by Israel: 7,383

Demolitions of Israeli & Palestinian Homes (1997 - Present):

24,145 Palestinian Homes
0 Israeli Homes.

Currently there are 223 Jewish-only settlements and "outposts" built on confiscated Palestinian land. The Palestinians do not have any settlements on Israeli land.

Rath, what about the Palestinians' right to exist? That's Kate's point, if I'm not mistaken. A lot of times when people make a case for them to have a country of their own, they're labeld as anti-semetics. (I'm not accusing you of this.) I agree that Israel should be allowed to exist as a nation, but the Palestinians should also possess that same right. All the fighting from both sides is unwarranted, but I am a pacifist and I know not everyone agrees with such an overall stance. Anyhow, I just wish Israel would quit making these unrightful settlements--and also that Palestinian authorities would not endorse and commit violence upon the Israelis (but, that's obviously not likely to happen anytime soon).

I hope Rath doesn't mind if I chime in on this, but I'd like to. While I believe the aggressive settlements on the post-1960s borders aren't helping the situation and Israel has a history of dramatic, disproportionate responses to provocation/war crimes, I think the Palestinian supporters are on shaky ground simply because the entire plan from jump street was a two state solution and the Arabs thought that they could just drive out the recent arrivals by force and lost.

Well, there's that and the fact that most of the people on the Palestinian side of the issue reject all of the Jews' historic claim to the land when the historic claim is pretty well grounded not only in Jewish sources but also the sources of the assorted empires that drove them forcibly from the land several times in history. The term "Palestine" comes from the Romans, who renamed the area after forcibly exiling the Jews after the first mass rebellion of the post-Second Temple period. Then there's the pesky fact that the Jews and Muslims built what's currently on the temple site together as a sort of "fuck you" to the Christians during the period of the Crusades.

Personally, I'd hope that the saner people in both groups would get behind the UN plan that creates two states with two non-Jerusalem capitols and turns Jerusalem into a international embassy-like area with equal access to the sit of the Temple to all the religious groups.

Yeah, but no one involved with the taking of the land and the creation of Israel were the ones driven out. They were claiming ownership of a land that by modern standards they didn't own. This is where it falls apart for me every time I try to get a grasp on the state of Israel. I dated a girl of Palestinian descent for a time, and while she's obviously on one side of the fence, she has more first hand knowledge of the affairs there than most people reading about it on the news and in history books. The treatment of people who were forced out of their homes and lands based purely on a religious claim of pre-ownership is horrendous, the living conditions they are by and large subjected to equally bad. Those who left and migrated to other countries in the Middle East are treated as below second class citizens. All because, for a dose of irony, Palestinians don't have a country to call their own anymore. Israel's continued stance of not being for a co-existing relationship with Palestine as its own separate country doesn't help their case much.

I do think, for good or ill, Israel is here and it's not going away, but they need to stop with the high horse routine and extend some basic fucking humanity. Palestine does too, for that matter--someone is eventually going to have to be the bigger man and wash their hands of the past if we're ever going to move forward. Nobody's hands are clean in this situation, but personally, if you go back to where and how Israel began, the whole thing stinks like yesterday's diapers. So does America's, for that matter, but that's a different topic of reconciling personal feelings with accepting that what happened, happened.

This is actually right in line with what I've been saying all along, and there is a (slowly) growing faction of young Palestinians who advocate accepting Israel and focus on building their own country. It'd be nice if it would actually happen, but I fear the cycle of violence on both sides will always prevent it from becoming so.

'Historical claims' to lands should be rejected outright in my opinion. If there's any intent to keep a semblance of fairness in international politics, what goes for one must go for everyone. And 'Historical claims' to lands opens a can of Dune sandworms. Do Greeks have claim over Constantinople and the Aegean coast of Turkey? Do the Turks have claim of the Balkans up to the Danube? Do the Chinese have a legitimate claim over Taiwan? Notice that all these are much more recent events than the last time the land of Israel was in Jewish hands. History moves on and trying to undo it causes more trouble than it solves.

However in this case I agree that what's done is done. There are logical and informed plans to solve this but they demand mutual respect. Sadly the people in power on both sides have more to gain from continuing conflict than achieving peace. Unless the international community unanimously agrees to come down hard on both sides (fat chance) nothing will be ever solved.

Cuch and Greg said it better than I could, and I too support the idea of two states with a non-Jerusalem capital. My big point of contention was Kate's use of terms like "unhinged regime."

"Unhinged" is totally wrong. There's nothing unhinged about their actions. Arrogant and warmongering might be better words to use.

see, while i agree with some of what you say, your use of the term 'unhinged' is misguided.

Pol Pot, he was Unhinged. Idi Amin, Adolf Hitler. Thats unhinged.

Unlikely. The pro-Israel lobby is strong in the USA, and saying vthings like that is unlikely to materially affect the degree of support that Israel gets


One suspects that their enemies are already well made, and not likely to be affected substantially by recent actions. Far from being unhinged, I could argue that they are fundamentally ultra-rational - akin to a 'strong defence is the best offence" theory.

I think you dropped 'evil' there. And unhinged.

I'd just like to point out that the Arab nations decided to treat the Palestinians as a separate "nation" within their borders rather than refugees who could assimilate in Egypt, Jordan etc. The Palestinian camps are as much a creation of Arab countries who consider Palestinians as living weapons aimed at Israel. If they want to help improve conditions, why not actually let these refugees become citizens?

Excellent, nuanced article about this issue in the New Yorker this week.

My door is unhinged... anyone wanna fix it?