Hamas o/t

[9goals2hattricks3pen]

Just to add in 1947 the West Bank was supposed to be part of the new Palestine but Jordan did a deal with Israel and annexed it for itself.

[Omegstrat6]

I do know a fair bit. For instance there has never been a country called Palestine in the whole of history. My understanding is the Romans gave the area the name Palestina. After they left the name pretty much disappeared.

Before Roman times there was a kingdom of Israel and a kingdom of Judah.

Then after WWI along come us good old Brits ever ready to get involved and not knowing what else to call this area of numerous tribes that had never had a national identity we now had a mandate to rule and revived the name Palestine. (Emphasis that is my understanding and if anyone knows differently I am all ears)

Can I ask a question. Is there anyone who believes that Israel didn't exist and there was a state of Palestine it would be any more stable than the basket cases that are in the area now? Hamas in Gaza is Sunni and Hezbollahi n Lebanon is Shia and they don't exactly see eye to eye. The destruction of Israel is about all they agree on. And then you have Fatah on the West Bank. The reason the Arabs lost in 1947 when they had overwhelming advantages is they spent as much time fighting amongst themselves as they did Jews. I envisage another Syria or Lebanon.

I have visited Israel and spent time in Arab towns, the West Bank and Jerusalem only a few months after there had been 'trouble' What surprised me was how everyone got on. In Jerusalem we moved from Christian to Jewish to Arab quarter as did the locals without any checks.

It needs Regis' Rabbi and a Palestinian with the vision of Arafat for peace to have any chance. Meanwhile the extremists on both sides just get more extreme!

Unlike yourself, I've never had the benefit of visiting the region but have done a reasonable amount of reading around it and whilst I certainly can't claim any expertise on the subject, what you've written pretty much matches my own understanding.

I totally agree with you that, had the state of Israel not been created, there would still have been conflicts in the area between different factions and plenty of evidence to support this when you look at many countries today in the Middle East. For some bizarre reason, too many in the West seem to lump all Muslims together, ignoring the differences and frictions between Sunni and Shia for example. Surely that's a bit like lumping all Christians together-they might generally get along far better now than they once did but there is a long history of conflict between Roman Catholics and Protestants for example.

As ever, the British Empire had its role in helping sow the seeds of future conflict in the region although the history of Jerusalem itself is convoluted enough as it is! I think that, post WW2, the Americans have more than played their part too. With the country pretty much exhausted, Churchill was keen for Truman to take over the mantle of protecting Western interests in the region, especially from the newly powerful Soviets. The amount of money the US has poured into the growing state of Israel over the years since is quite staggering.

There did seem a point in time when the changing attitudes of younger generations on both sides seemed to suggest that Israelis and Palestinians could live more peacefully together but very sadly things haven't worked out and, as you say, extremists on both sides have grown more extreme. Echoes Kett's earlier post-the majority of ordinary people would likely just want to get on with their lives and rub along but it's the few who want power and influence who drive things and make things worse by exploiting divisions for their own political or religious ends.

[BARBaggies82]

I was listening to 5live this morning at about 4am (ish!) and they had some leftie journalist trying to interview a young Israeli mother and try to convince her that Israel should show restraint and consider innocent lives in Gaza....

...said journalist was met with incandescent rage from the mother after witnessing what must have been the most horrific atrocity against her people.....and children.

"Only people in your country would have this attitude. We have a duty to protect our people and children", she raged.

I cannot say I would feel any different if I were in her position.
I would want the Sh1t bombing out of Gaza to get this scum Hamas completely annihilated.....at any cost

[regis80]

I do know a fair bit. For instance there has never been a country called Palestine in the whole of history. My understanding is the Romans gave the area the name Palestina. After they left the name pretty much disappeared.

Before Roman times there was a kingdom of Israel and a kingdom of Judah.

Then after WWI along come us good old Brits ever ready to get involved and not knowing what else to call this area of numerous tribes that had never had a national identity we now had a mandate to rule and revived the name Palestine. (Emphasis that is my understanding and if anyone knows differently I am all ears)

Can I ask a question. Is there anyone who believes that Israel didn't exist and there was a state of Palestine it would be any more stable than the basket cases that are in the area now? Hamas in Gaza is Sunni and Hezbollahi n Lebanon is Shia and they don't exactly see eye to eye. The destruction of Israel is about all they agree on. And then you have Fatah on the West Bank. The reason the Arabs lost in 1947 when they had overwhelming advantages is they spent as much time fighting amongst themselves as they did Jews. I envisage another Syria or Lebanon.

I have visited Israel and spent time in Arab towns, the West Bank and Jerusalem only a few months after there had been 'trouble' What surprised me was how everyone got on. In Jerusalem we moved from Christian to Jewish to Arab quarter as did the locals without any checks.

It needs Regis' Rabbi and a Palestinian with the vision of Arafat for peace to have any chance. Meanwhile the extremists on both sides just get more extreme!

Thanks 9goals for that explanation.

[9goals2hattricks3pen]

Thanks 9goals for that explanation.

To be fair to us Brits I do think that since WWII we have tried to do the right thing but we have so often put ourselves in such no win situations that whatever we did was going to be wrong and leave a vacuum behind us. What I do have a problem with when some 80 years later what's filled the void is so often chaos and violence we are still getting blamed.Just when does this end and they take responsibility for their actions?

In 1947 for instance Palestinians for the very were offered their own state. They refused because they wanted it all and chose war. They lost and are still paying the price.

I also recall in the 90's sometime after the Oslo Accord a report on how much closer peace in the Middle East was compared to Northern Ireland. What an opportunity wasted. Don't think we'll see it again in my lifetime.

Sorry that was to Omeg's post

[baggiematt]

To be fair to us Brits I do think that since WWII we have tried to do the right thing but we have so often put ourselves in such no win situations that whatever we did was going to be wrong and leave a vacuum behind us. What I do have a problem with when some 80 years later what's filled the void is so often chaos and violence we are still getting blamed.Just when does this end and they take responsibility for their actions?

In 1947 for instance Palestinians for the very were offered their own state. They refused because they wanted it all and chose war. They lost and are still paying the price.

I also recall in the 90's sometime after the Oslo Accord a report on how much closer peace in the Middle East was compared to Northern Ireland. What an opportunity wasted. Don't think we'll see it again in my lifetime.

Sorry that was to Omeg's post

I understood that the 1947 deal was heavily in favour of the Zionists. Arabs were the majority in population but only offered 38% of the land and it would be split into three areas.

I have only been reading about this recently, so may be wrong.

[9goals2hattricks3pen]

I understood that the 1947 deal was heavily in favour of the Zionists. Arabs were the majority in population but only offered 38% of the land and it would be split into three areas.

I have only been reading about this recently, so may be wrong.

This is so but as ever the devil is in the detail. It's not that simple. A huge chunk of what would have been Israel included the Negev desert in the south. Not exactly prime real estate. The Arab lands surrounded but didn't include Jerusalem which I would have thought was very important to both sides. Jerusalem had its own plan. Both had access to the coast.

Both sides lands were split. The plan included economic union and also the protection of religious and minority rights

Did Israel get all the good bits and were the Arabs hard done to or was that just based they believed it was all theirs? No idea.

[kettering_baggie]

So, England play Australia at Wembley tomorrow night; all players will, apparently, wear black armbands in respect of the loss of life in Israel and Gaza. After the Russians invaded Ukraine, the Wembley Arch was lit up in blue and yellow, which might lead one to expect that, following the worst act of terrorism for many years, that arch would be lit up in the colours of Israel. Oh no, not the FA, that would never do, it might offend somebody! The FA, a bunch of lily livered cowards, apologists for Hamas. Disgraceful.

The BBC are as bad, refusing to refer to Hamas as terrorists; if what they did to those poor people in those villages, not to mention the taking of hostages, isn’t terrorism, then I don’t know what is. There really are some ****ing awful people in the World, not all of them abroad.

[Omegstrat6]

Tin hat time!🙄


To be honest, I thought that John Simpson's argument made some sense. As he pointed out, if the BBC does not flinch from reporting the atrocities accurately (as they seem to have done with Gaza as well as in many previous conflicts) and present them as they happens then people are given the information to make up their own minds. He does not shy away from calling such heinous acts atrocities just as the BBC has not shied away from reporting accusations of war crimes whether in Ukraine or elsewhere.

What the BBC does not do is label organizations themselves as "terrorists" because they take the editorial stance that this then goes against their ethos of impartiality and objectivity. It certainly does not-as some claim-mean that they are "siding with terrorists".

Like it or not, one man's "terrorist" is another man's "freedom fighter" and it should not be forgotten that however barbarous or heinous their actions -especially when made against innocent civilians including children- these extremist and militant wings often only flourish and result from injustices done to their people and when reasonable diplomacy has failed. That does not mean that the acts themselves committed by such organizations, whether Hamas or the IRA or whoever, are not labelled as acts of terrorism (because they clearly are) nor that the BBC condoned such acts. Simpson talks of the anger and rage he himself has experienced over the years of personally witnessing the results of such acts.

It is obviously understandable that everyone is outraged by such actions and that those responsible should be punished but the knee jerk reaction of " not negotiating with terrorists" is both short-term and futile. The view that refusing to talk to them because listening to them will only be seen as rewarding their actions or "giving in" to them and that this will only encourage them to continue such terrorist acts seems to me facile. If anything, refusing to negotiate is more likely to escalate the violence. The reality is that negotiations and compromises are more likely to resolve situations and bring some semblance of peace. The problem is that such negotiations stand a far better chance of working if done far earlier on, between more reasonable people, but leave it too late and you end up dealing with far more extremist and militant individuals who are less likely to want to compromise. Add religious extremism into the mix and it makes it even harder😞

The atrocities that Hamas has committed should clearly be condemned -but that does not then mean that its ok to forget how Israel has treated many of the Palestinian population or how it has illegally appropriated land for decades.

In the case of Ukraine, whilst some still argue that Russia had been provoked by the West, it seems to me pretty clear that Russia was the aggressor and that Ukraine hadn't done anything against them. The difference with Israel and Hamas is that whilst what Hamas has done is clearly an heinous act against innocent Israeli civilians, it certainly cannot be said that Israel have not also had a long history of mistreatment of Palestinians. The worry for many very visible organizations is that overtly showing support for Israel now may be construed as supporting that too.

[Omegstrat6]

Just to add, the Hamas attack was a deliberately barbaric one aimed at Israeli civilians. Should those responsible be punished? Absolutely. But is Israel's retaliation much better? Not doubting for one second that their attack s have not targeted Hamas but there is plenty of "collateral damage" in the process. Over 1300 Israeli dead and now over 1300 Palestinians. The majority innocent civilians caught up in a tit for tat escalation between two hard-liners. Way to go Mohammed Dief and Benjamin Netanyahu.

Or am I missing something?