War Reparations
Here's a letter sent to me by my supervisor; its a letter sent to the Independent that was heavily edited by them for no real reason. Kind of like the Marco Polo letter I sent to Dawn NB, they put words in my mouth!!!
"Robert Fisk's anger is palpable ('The truth of Blair's 2urgent diplomacy"' 29 July). The utter frustration with the position adopted by the Prime Minister seems endemic within the UK so what it must be like in occupied Palestine, or Lebanon perhaps explains why the Israeli's refer to almost all adult male casualties as 'militants'.
"But the proposed moves to insert an international peace-keeping force in Southern Lebanon and to provide help for Lebanon to rebuild seem dreadfully inappropriate. Quite why a peace-keeping force should be stationed in South Lebanon rather than in North Israel is hard to understand. UN experience is that it has much more to fear from Israel than Hizbollah. And quite why the international community should be called upon once more to make good the terrible injuries suffered by Palestinians, and Lebanese, both to their citizens and to their infrastucture, is inexplicable.
"Even if one accepts the doubtful proposition that Israel's actions somehow began as 'self-defence', so disproportionate has been their response that the tradition of calling aggressive states to account for the damage they have caused through war reparations seems entirely proper.
"Until reponsibility is placed upon the government of Israel to make good their wanton destruction, the international community will be called upon to subsidise the most murderous foreign policy by one state against its neighbours in contemporary times."
Here's a letter sent to me by my supervisor; its a letter sent to the Independent that was heavily edited by them for no real reason. Kind of like the Marco Polo letter I sent to Dawn NB, they put words in my mouth!!!
"Robert Fisk's anger is palpable ('The truth of Blair's 2urgent diplomacy"' 29 July). The utter frustration with the position adopted by the Prime Minister seems endemic within the UK so what it must be like in occupied Palestine, or Lebanon perhaps explains why the Israeli's refer to almost all adult male casualties as 'militants'.
"But the proposed moves to insert an international peace-keeping force in Southern Lebanon and to provide help for Lebanon to rebuild seem dreadfully inappropriate. Quite why a peace-keeping force should be stationed in South Lebanon rather than in North Israel is hard to understand. UN experience is that it has much more to fear from Israel than Hizbollah. And quite why the international community should be called upon once more to make good the terrible injuries suffered by Palestinians, and Lebanese, both to their citizens and to their infrastucture, is inexplicable.
"Even if one accepts the doubtful proposition that Israel's actions somehow began as 'self-defence', so disproportionate has been their response that the tradition of calling aggressive states to account for the damage they have caused through war reparations seems entirely proper.
"Until reponsibility is placed upon the government of Israel to make good their wanton destruction, the international community will be called upon to subsidise the most murderous foreign policy by one state against its neighbours in contemporary times."
8 comments:
It's a good letter. The UN should refuse I think... don't the GA know that Israel doesn't give a shizzle wizzle about them? They should say if Israel want a buffer zone, they should have it on Israeli land because they're the ones asking for it, the pussies.
Maybe one day there will be UN buffer zones around the state of Israel and then there will be a UN revolution and all the peace-keepers will turn into Hezbollah fanatics. I don't think i'm being helpful with the comments, sorry.
NB- maybe in your game you can add treacherous peace keepers? The Senegalese peace-keepers get tired of doing the US' bidding especially since Wahhabi Saudi has Islamised/Wahhabi-ised the Senegalese Muslim people (who make up the forces). Then they go beserk one day because Israel decide to bomb their post for no reason, collude with the relevant terror organisation and... you know.
Hey wouldn't it be funny if right now, right this moment, Benin or some other little African country was stock-piling loads of weapons to use against Israel?
I had too many fumes today.
Man that was a quick response :)
Continuing our ensuing Hezbullah debate here's an article by a lebanese journalist. Disclaimer: these are not neccessarily my views!
http://www.slate.com/id/2147260/?nav=tap3
Yeah I read that and linked it to the Shallow Circles post at the end, to illustrate why id still be skeptical of my own arguments, ie that i wasnt sure.
Also Ayls, I thought this was a pretty cool article:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14228555/
with an accompanying graphic
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14228555/
Just incase my first comments seemed a little far-fetched: IDF warns UN troops will be attacked if they repair bridges http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,,1839442,00.html
As for the article in The Slate- it's interesting. I used to dislike Hezbollah a lot (mainly because of their connections and collusion with the Syrian establishment) but I understand why they're there (as I explained before.) I like them now because they're standing up to Israel's terror. I like them because as many political analysts see it, they kidnapped the soldiers to take the pressure off of Gaza and i can't think about what happened to Gaza and not feel like crying (though perhaps that might have something to do with this as well: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/13988306/).
Lebanon as a state was in a precarious position to begin with. It was coming out of civil war, trying to establish democracy yada yada yada and then finally the Assad regime left and people got even happier and brighter. But the fact is, the Shias controlled the southern areas, the Druze were in the Chouf and the Maronite Christians had Qadisha and the coast in the middle. But democracy was happening and religious tensions were distanced and in some areas oppressed, stifled, perhaps waiting for eruption. They were not addressed or reconciled and with growing Muslim militancy with this war on terror stuff, how could it be?
What i'm trying to say is that I disagree with the writer. Things were on their way in Lebanon as much as they could be and naturally Hezbollah had to be there because they were the remnants of war and occupation, representatives of a deeply hurt and religious people. They were a threat to Lebanon's democracy then, but no more than the Christians, the Druze or the Sunnis were. And now, if democracy ceases to exist in Lebanon, it is because of Israel, the US and the UK and their allies. If sectarian and religious violence increase in Lebanon, it is because of Israel, the US and the UK and their allies. We can't now know what would have happened to Hezbollah if the Lebanese government, system, institutions and economy were strengthened in time to address and support all Lebanese people regardless of religion and whether the people were ready for that kind of unity. Because of Israel's actions (which were in the works) we will never know.
Newsweek: Guerilla Group -v- 5th strongest military in the world who are further backed up by the strongest military in the world and whatever Britain is. Good for Hezbollah and their RPGs and their 40 yr old Soviet anti-tank missiles.
Viva Beirut!
Thanks for the posting the letter AP and the very interesting article links posted by NB and Ayla. I strongly agree with Ayla's comments and feel that other than not achieveing their 3 stated objectives at all, the much vaunted Israeli military has strengthened the opposition and spawned another generation that will harass them.
Viva Beirut indeed!
Thanks adeel for contributing. Glad you liked the articles. It will be interesting to see how things go from here given the IDF's expanded mandate.
Thanks adeel for contributing. Glad you liked the articles. It will be interesting to see how things go from here given the IDF's expanded mandate.
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