We disagree on that, and always will. In my opinion, the idea that Hezbollah was just defending itself is crap! Israel was not fighting Lebanon, but non-Lebanese, Palestinian militia organizations. With the UN on Israel's northern border, and Hezbollah pushed back, it has been fairly quiet.
But that doesn't address the problem of Hezbollah having missiles that can reach the nuclear reactor. Given Hezbollah's position on Israel, it is likely that they will use those missiles to strike that reactor, and cause a nuclear explosion. What then?

1.What should Israel do if they know exactly where that missile came from?

2.What should they do if they know that particular missile came from Iran?

I'd like your opinion on those particular issues.

1.What should Israel do if they know exactly where that missile came from?

- probably what Lebanon does when it knows where Israel's bombs come from.

2.What should they do if they know that particular missile came from Iran?

- probably what Lebanon does when it knows that Israel's bombs come from the U.S.of A.

Now that I have given you my thoughts, may I ask that you give me yours on the relative amount of ordnance and the civilian casualties I posted above?

Hezzbolah dropped nearly 4000 missiles on Israel, but none on a nuclear installation; there were no nuclear explosions.
When missiles come from Gaza, Israel fires back at the place where the missile came from. Are you saying that if there is a nuclear explosion in Damona, Israel should fire a nuclear missile at the place where the Hezbollah missile came from?

The question is, do we hold Iran harmless? I'm surprised you didn't understand that. In an ordinary criminal prosecution, you prosecute the person who shoots the gun, and the person who supplies the gun. You can't supply an automatic weapon or other high powered gun, without knowing that it will be used for an illegal purpose, especially when it is able to be used in an especially dangerous way.
If Iran had supplied a missile that fell short of Damona, this would look different. It would be a political question, perhaps one for the UN.

Israel has had nuclear weapons for 30 years or more, has never used them, and has only recently received complaints. Twice Israel took out unfinished nuclear installations, one in Iraq and one in Syria. There was a short term outcry against the one in Iraq, because of the one unfortunate death, and the idea of Israel acting unilaterally. It didn't last very long. In the other case, Syria at first denied anything happended, then said some old, unused buildings were bombed, and finally admitted it was the first work on a nuclear installation. Few said anything, because nobody wanted Syria to have a nuclear weapon.

I accept that Hezbollah is Lebanese.

The 2006 Lebanon War, known in Lebanon as the July War[19] (Arabic: حرب تموز Ḥarb Tammūz) and in Israel as the Second Lebanon War (Hebrew: מלחמת לבנון השנייה Milkhemet Levanon Ha-Shniya),[20] was a 33-day military conflict in Lebanon and northern Israel. The principal parties were Hezbollah paramilitary forces and the Israeli military. The conflict started on 12 July 2006, and continued until a United Nations-brokered ceasefire went into effect on 14 August 2006, though it formally ended on 8 September 2006 when Israel lifted its naval blockade of Lebanon.

The conflict began when Hezbollah militants fired rockets at Israeli border towns as a diversion for an anti-tank missile attack on two armored Humvees patrolling the Israeli side of the border fence.[21] Of the seven Israeli soldiers in the two jeeps, two were wounded, three were killed, and two were captured and taken to Lebanon.[21] Five more were killed in a failed Israeli rescue attempt. Israel responded with massive airstrikes and artillery fire on targets in Lebanon, which damaged Lebanese civilian infrastructure, including Beirut's Rafic Hariri International Airport which Israel alleged that Hezbollah used to import weapons, an air and naval blockade,[22] and a ground invasion of southern Lebanon. Hezbollah then launched more rockets into northern Israel and engaged the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) in guerrilla warfare from hardened positions.[23]

The conflict killed more than a thousand people, most of whom were Lebanese civilians and severely damaged Lebanese infrastructure; and displaced 974,184 Lebanese[24] and 300,000-500,000 Israelis, although most, if not all, were able to return to their homes.[25][26][27] After the ceasefire, some parts of Southern Lebanon remained uninhabitable due to unexploded cluster bomblets.

On 11 August 2006, the United Nations Security Council unanimously approved UN Resolution 1701 in an effort to end the hostilities. The resolution, which was approved by both Lebanese and Israeli governments the following days, called for disarmament of Hezbollah, for withdrawal of Israel from Lebanon, and for the deployment of Lebanese soldiers and an enlarged United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) force in southern Lebanon. The Lebanese army began deploying in southern Lebanon on 17 August 2006. The blockade was lifted on 8 September 2006.[28] On 1 October 2006, most Israeli troops withdrew from Lebanon, though the last of the troops continued to occupy the border-straddling village of Ghajar.[29] In the time since the enactment of UNSCR 1701 both the Lebanese government and UNIFIL have stated that they will not disarm Hezbollah.[30][31][32]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_Israel-Lebanon_conflict
Yes, it is wikipedia. Do you have anything better?

Israel stopped trusting the UN, when the UN left the border between Israel and Egypt in 1967. They still believe the UN is against them, and their failure to try to disarm Hezbollah only enforces that belief. Israel believes it is out there on its own, and still in all these years, only admitted nuclear weapons by a slip of the tongue in December 2006, and has not threatened to use them.

Why is Israel deliberately vague about its nuclear arsenal?
Primarily for deterrence purposes, experts say. Charles Ferguson II, a science and technology fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, says Israel "has done the calculation that if it removes its ambiguity it may stimulate other states to acquire nuclear-weapon capabilities." Its ambiguous nuclear posture is also smart from a geo-strategic standpoint, Brom says. "Israel gets the benefit of being perceived as a nuclear power while at the same time not enduring potential punishment [by the international community]."
. . .
What is the likelihood of a nuclear arms race in the Middle East?
According to recent workshops by the U.S. Army's Strategic Studies Institute, if Iran's nuclear program were left unchecked, this could encourage Tehran's Arab neighbors and Turkey either to seek nuclear capabilities of their own (i.e. Israel) or to import nuclear technologies (i.e. Saudi Arabia). Ferguson says this could set off a "lukewarm arms race," but adds it would take Iran—or any state in the region—decades to match Israel's level of nuclear warheads. Instead, Ferguson predicts that, in response to a nuclear-weapons-capable Iran, some Arab states and Turkey might "try to use the NPT as a cover to acquire at least the capability to break out into nuclear weapons development."

http://www.cfr.org/publication/9822/israels_nuclear_program_and_middle_east_peace.html#5

Back to my primary point. Iran gave missiles to Hezbollah that can reach the Damona nuclear reactor. When they fire a missile into that reactor, it will cause a nuclear explosion, which has the same effect as dropping a nuclear bomb. Israel will respond. The big question is, will that response be in kind? It may well be. And, to whom will Israel respond? Will it be the person with the gun, those who sent the gun, or both?

Miss Marples, your post allows just two possibilities, just one of which is that you are a brick short of a load.

It is significant that despite incontrovertible evidence to the contrary, you cling to erroneous theses.

For instance:

Israel's own inquiry into the 2006 Lebanese War states at least three times that it was a war of their own initiative.
The Wikipedia stuff is rubbish, ask any Military person. An attack such as that made by Israel requires at least three months planning.
Yet you continue to post the nonsense about Hezbollah starting it with a cross-border raid. This is an irrational response.

Do we hold Iran "harmless"?

What is it you want Miss Marples?
Should Iranians stand blithely by while the U.S. provides billions of dollars worth of aggressive armaments with which Israel periodically creates terrible civilian casualties? Would they be less than human to offer defensive weapons to their friends? Would Americans behave in such a manner if the roles were reversed?
Another interesting statistic to come out of the Lebanon affray is the 16% ratio of civilian Israeli dead to 84% military. Compare with 92% civilian kill rate undergone by Lebanon. Israel killed 92 Lebanese civilians for every eight Hezbollah fighters! These are hard facts and they tell an unmistakeable story. Then there were the cluster bombs dropped after the ceasefire. You would deny armaments to people so savagely beset?

Perhaps you are unaware that the Katyusha rocket was known as the Stalin Organ back in the Second World war, from whence it dates. It is a battlefield weapon, primarily used against massed infantry. It is virtually useless as a tactical strike weapon as it's accuracy is estimated at around 15%. That is to say that it hits a defined target 15 out of 100 times and cannot be fired from a built-up area. Until recently, these, plus small arms, Radio equipment and RPGs were what Iran provided Hezbollah. All, in the context, defensive weapons. If they are now providing something a bit more substantial, who can blame them? Perhaps Iran views the 1500 Lebanese civilian dead as excessive compared with the 23 Israelis and perceives a need for greater deterrence.

Why do you make statements such as "Israel believes it is out there on its own"?
Israel has the 4th most powerful military in the World. The "poor little Israel" meme is long dead. Surely you have heard of the Israel/U.S. alliance. McCain seems to give it his unqualified support, as does Hillary. Does this give us a clue to your motives in attacking Obama?

Once again you raise the spectre of an Iranian Nuke. Despite the fact that (a)the AEIA called such allegations outrageous even before the NIE report put the lie to the claim and (b) Iran has been assiduous in it's support for and adherence to the NNPT, there is a Fatwah against the development and use of Nuclear weapons issued by the Supreme Leader Khameini since 2001.

Israel on the other hand does not belong to either organisation. It's neither confirm nor deny policy has a very distinct purpose. The Symington, Glenn, and Pressler Amendments prohibit U.S. aid to countries that develop or traffic in Nuclear weapons. Not many Americans are aware of this. But then you say you are a lawyer so perhaps you do.

Israel is in breach of some 190 U.N. rulings, not to mention Symington/Glenn. It is not a case of Israel not trusting the U.N.. Israel trusts the U.N. to keep issuing resolutions just as it trusts the U.S. to keep vetoing them.

Once again you ignore the information provided by people posting on your blog. A rocket fired at a nuclear reactor does not cause a nuclear explosion. Why do you do that?

To you perhaps, Israel bombing civilian nuclear reactors at will, while illegally developing it's own nuclear weapons is chutzpah. Similarly attacking it's neighbours on the slightest pretext while preventing them from obtaining weapons of deterrence and defence. Chutzpah is virtually defined by Israel's right of return law juxtaposed with the refusal to even discuss the right of return for Palestinians.

Chutzpah is a light and fluffy word but in this case it costs lives on a grand scale. Let me be very clear. It is not viewed as light and fluffy in the Arab World or by a majority of the citizens of Oceania, Europe and Africa who, until recently, were not getting the news that nightly informs the non-aligned world. In these parts, the narrative as I tell it, is the commonly accepted one, especially among liberals.

I have followed your posts with interest Miss Marple and one thing puzzles me. Even Israel-firsters whose ardour pales by contrast with yours tend to support John McCain. Why is it not so with you? How do you view his relationship with Joe Lieberman and the latter's with Reverend Hagee. You know Hagee, his prophecy includes a nuclear attack on Iran and whom Lieberman has compared with Moses?

Are you, with this spurious post, telling us you are one of the "bomb bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb Iran" crowd?

this

"Another interesting statistic to come out of the Lebanon affray is the 16% ratio of civilian Israeli dead to 84% military. Compare with 92% civilian kill rate undergone by Lebanon. Israel killed 92 Lebanese civilians for every eight Hezbollah fighters!"

May have had something to do with what the UN official (Jan Egeland ) described here

""When I was in Lebanon, in the Hezbollah heartland, I said Hezbollah must stop this cowardly blending in among women and children,""

...makes a common mistake. The nation is 40 percent Shiite, and of that 40 percent, tens of thousands are employed by Hezbollah's social services, political operations, schools, and other nonmilitary functions. The military wing however do not mix with civilians for reasons of security:

"The "hiding among civilians" myth
Israel claims it's justified in bombing civilians because Hezbollah mingles with them. In fact, the militant group doesn't trust its civilians and stays as far away from them as possible."

By Mitch Prothero
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2006/07/28/hezbollah/

How would you explain this?

"This is the picture that damns Hezbollah. It is one of several, smuggled from behind Lebanon’s battle lines, showing that Hezbollah is waging war amid suburbia.

The images, obtained exclusively by the Sunday Herald Sun, show Hezbollah using high-density residential areas as launch pads for rockets and heavy-calibre weapons.

Dressed in civilian clothing so they can quickly disappear, the militants carrying automatic assault rifles and ride in on trucks mounted with cannon. "

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,,19955774-5007220,00.html

"Another depicts the remnants of a Hezbollah Katyusha rocket in the middle of a residential block blown up in an Israeli air attack.

The Melbourne man who smuggled the shots out of Beirut and did not wish to be named said he was less than 400m from the block when it was obliterated.

"Hezbollah came in to launch their rockets, then within minutes the area was blasted by Israeli jets," he said.

"Until the Hezbollah fighters arrived, it had not been touched by the Israelis. Then it was totally devastated. "

If you need a link to photo one try here

http://www.truthdig.com/eartotheground/item/20060801_photos_damn_hezbollah/

Looks and sounds a lot like the tactics used by the founders of this country during our revolution.

I know it's hard to otherwise be a liberal but still have to support genocide, so it's easy to grasp at any straw within reach.

The founders of the USA fighting a few pitched battles in uniform too.

So - what ever did happen to the disarming Hezbollah aspect of the agreement to end that war?

You have a need to revise that history, as well.

Few Continental Army soldiers ever had uniforms. Which, of course, didn't stop the British from shooting at both them and completely unarmed civilians, as well as injured soldiers and even prisoners, among other war crimes.

There was no disarmament agreement, of course, since the Continental Army actually won the war.

Your first link doesn't provide a picture so I cannot comment.

The second tells an interesting story. Here is the caption:
"This is the picture that damns Hezbollah"

Beside it is a picture of an anti-aircraft gun. Just like the ones that were installed in every English town in the path of German bombers during WW2.

Tell me how a purely defensive anti-aircraft installation "damns" Hezbollah?

IS the photo that I found at the second.

In what way do you define a Katyusha rocket as 'defensive'?

"Just like the ones that were installed in every English town in the path of German bombers during WW2."

By the way I think you'll find that's a vast over statement.

For a different perspective, try Jonathon Cook, a British writer living in Nazareth:

"In fact, of the 24 incidents they document, Human Rights Watch researchers could find no evidence that Hizbullah was operating in or near the areas that were attacked by the Israeli air force. Roth states: "The image that Israel has promoted of such [human] shielding as the cause of so high a civilian death toll is wrong. In the many cases of civilian deaths examined by Human Rights Watch, the location of Hezbollah troops and arms had nothing to do with the deaths because there was no Hezbollah around."

"One of Hizbullah's first rocket attacks after the outbreak of hostilities -- after Israel went on the bombing offensive by blitzing targets across Lebanon -- was on a kibbutz overlooking the border with Lebanon. Some foreign correspondents noted at the time (though given Israel's press censorship laws I cannot confirm) that the rocket strike targeted a top-secret military traffic control centre built into the Galilee's hills.

There are hundreds of similar military installations next to or inside Israel's northern communities. Some distance from Nazareth, for example, Israel has built a large weapons factory virtually on top of an Arab town -- so close to it, in fact, that the factory's perimeter fence is only a few metres from the main building of the local junior school. There have been reports of rockets landing close to that Arab community.

How these kind of attacks are being unfairly presented in the Israeli and foreign media was highlighted recently when it was widely reported that a Hizbullah rocket had landed "near a hospital" in a named Israeli city, not the first time that such a claim has been made over the past few weeks. I cannot name the city, again because of Israel's press censorship laws and because I also want to point out that very "near" that hospital is an army camp. The media suggested that Hizbullah was trying to hit the hospital, but it is also more than possible it was trying to strike -- and may have struck -- the army camp.

Israel's military censorship laws are therefore allowing officials to misrepresent, unchallenged, any attack by Hizbullah as an indiscriminate strike against civilian targets."
http://www.jkcook.net/Articles2/0269.htm#Top

You said,

"The question is, do we hold Iran harmless? I'm surprised you didn't understand that. In an ordinary criminal prosecution, you prosecute the person who shoots the gun, and the person who supplies the gun. You can't supply an automatic weapon or other high powered gun, without knowing that it will be used for an illegal purpose, especially when it is able to be used in an especially dangerous way.
If Iran had supplied a missile that fell short of Damona, this would look different. It would be a political question, perhaps one for the UN."

I say,
Logically we should hold the gun dealers in America responsible for selling guns to the murderers such as the Virginia Tech massacre.

A non-nuclear explosion in a reactor would not cause a nuclear explosion by any stretch of the imagination. Reactor fuel is not sufficiently enriched to cause a nuclear explosion, which is what the whole flap over Iranian enrichment is all about.

Even the Bush administration would admit that the reactor fuel the Iranians say they want to produce isn't of weapons grade. Their argument is that the Iranians might enrich the uranium still further, so that it could produce bombs. In that case, though, it wouldn't be used as fuel in a reactor.

And what the US ought to do about the danger is to insist that all aid to Israel is suspended, until Israel signs the Non Proliferation Treaty and submits to inspections. Now THAT would be a step toward nuclear security!

Why is it that nobody retaliated against Israel for the "unprovoked" bombing of Iraq's reactor at Osirak?
Long ago, I came to the conclusion that every country in the area breathed a big sigh of relief that Israel did just that. NOBODY wanted Saddam to have a nuclear weapon, and everyone knew that is what he was going for.
You think Iran wanted him to have a nuclear weapon? They breathed the biggest sigh of relief during the Iran/Iraq war. Israel probably saved their lives. There was a lot of fist shaking, but that was about all, and it ended pretty fast.
When Israel took out the Syrian installation, there wasn't even that. Nobody wants Syria to have nuclear weapons. Everyone seems to be pretty comfortable that Israel has a no first strike position. If the reactor at Damona gets blown up, that will be a first strike.

and that is FRIGGIN GOOD. They are building a naval base there. Maybe both New York Armchair Jews with their endless "Israel is just innocent victim"-crap and Israelis themselves will be now contained.

No more easy targets and killing civilians from above without retaliation. You do not wanna mess with Russians! The same with Iran, Russians are co-operating with them also...

You must define that. I don't know what you mean, and it is open to interpretation.

I'm pleased the Russians will be in Syria. They will be a stabilizing influence in the area, and won't want Syria to have nuclear weapons. They have a no first strike policy for other countries. I'm not entirely sure if they still have it for themselves, but I feel safe to say how they feel about other countries. So, this is good news.
Syria has a lot of influence on Lebanon. Not as much as when they occupied Lebanon, but still a lot. I don't know what this will mean for Lebanon. We'll have to wait and see.
The Russians have been very helpful with Iran. The EU has been relying on them to get Iran to cooperate with the EU/Russian plan to build reactors for Iran, and reprocess the used fuel in Russia. Everyone has signed on to the plan. Iran is reluctant, but in the end, it is their best move. It is a very hopeful sign. Stay on top of the story. We all want to hear how it is going.

Its a matter of perspective,From Irans view getting a nuke is the only way to prevent thr U.S. from doing to it what it did to Iraq.Of course we took over Iraq while we could,the U.N. santions were about to be lifted because Saddam played the game like he was supposed to,his biggest mistake.So this is another example of how U.S. forieng policy has made the world much less safe,As far as nuke power plants,look at a country like France that gets like 80 percent of its elect from nuke power,they do it safe,they do it right.Its totally clean power that has no hydrocarbon footprint,other countries would be well to copy France.

I know exactly what you mean. I wish I could've somehow taken bets upon whether when people saw the title of this thread, they could choose whether cewillir or MissMarple would have authored it, since they're the two biggest purveyors of neocon warmongering on this board.

...is also a battlefield weapon. It can also be mounted on a plinth or a truck but this should be done with care. Only the mobile version can in any way be an offensive weapon and then only in concert with a massed propaganda advance, something Hezbollah would never contemplate.

In view of its short range (effective 5-7 ideas, total 45 lines) and lack of accuracy, it is only effective against Palestinians, assorted Chimpsters, troop and armoured columns, large buildings within effective range and little else.

God save our souls.

vague images of the Marple Organ...

mounting it... on a plinth or a truck...

mounting it remember, as indicated above, to do so with great care.

When the operation has been completed be sure to check the tire pressure and keep in mind that you have a fully functional mobile version loaded and ready to fire before you.

I now do hope, that you are Jewish.

of blowback which is not.....fellatio performed while supine.

I forgot about that...

Why did you change a somewhat humorous story line, by adding something anti-Jewish? I don't mind people poking fun at me. A lot of the jokes are pretty funny. Please explain?

There was nothing humorous about the story line, dear lady.

The reference was to your position regarding Palestinians.

I assume you are having a slow day.

You probably don't remember, because it has been a long time since we have discussed it on the board. We sometimes talked about what the area should look like, if we could make it look the best it could be. Everyone said what they thought.
I wanted Israel, with Palestine in the West Bank and Gaza, with an elevated highway going between them over Israel (since then, I've thought it might have some off and on ramps), part of Jerusalem belonging to Palestine, all the Muslim holy sites under the jurisdiction of the State of Palestine, as they are now under the jurisdiction of Muslim clerics. I want all the new housing out of the West Bank, with the exception of some of the buildings very close to Jerusalem; Arafat agreed to that in 2000 (again, this housing could be used by the Palestinians, and should not go to waste).
There is some Israeli land in the southern part of the West Bank/Israel that topographically should be Palestinian. That should go to Palestine, and Israel agreed to this with Arafat. I'm okay with the fence, but it has to be moved to include the farms and fields that belong to Palestinians, in Palestine. Two hundred, fifty thousand Israelis have to move back to Israel proper, so the change will take some time. But it should be written down and agreed to. Remember, the 1967 lines of demarcation, were the 1948 cease fire lines, not borders. Nobody would negotiate with Israel after that war, or the 1967 war. Only Sadat, and he died for it. That is what Arafat was afraid of. He was not a stupid man.

When you make this a Jewish issue, it is anti-Semitic. This is political. It is about the struggle of a political entity, the State of Israel. Israel has no friends in the Middle East, but that is the ancient, historic home of the people of Israel. Do you know that Israel has been helping the Kurds? Israel has good relations with Turkey, but understands the need of the Kurds to have a homeland. Israelis have been there.
I have been trying to make agreements with anti-Israel people on this board. If you are not an anti-Semite, don't make this a religious issue. There are the "historical Jews" and the "religious Jews". The second group say its all theirs because of the Bible. That is crap. History is the story of a People, just as the Palestinians have a story. Some of that is written down by those people, or by other people, and by oral history. Some can be traced now in DNA.
I was giving you the benefit of the doubt. I was trying to assume you are not an anti-Semite. Don't disappoint me.

Good effort Miss Marple. You have declared your position on Palestine and diverted attention from your "outing" as a member of the bomb Iran brigade. Never mind, I will allow you to divert me in this instance though you can rely on me to raise the issue should you pick up your anti-war masquerade again.

It seems you favour demarcating the land of Palestine according to race. The indigenous people should be moved to areas allotted them and the recently arrived settlers allocated those areas taken by conquest.
I think there are precedents for this type of compromise.
Ah yes. I think it was South Africa and, a little earlier, the New World - America as it has come to be known. (Someone once had ideas about an Aryan State but that came to nought as he tried to expand it into someone else's territory and the allies didn't like that).

One small point. There will, of necessity, be some Palestinians who have business on the Israel side and likewise Israelis visiting or dwelling in Palestine. Do you envisage "Israelis only" toilets a la the S.A. model?

What provision is made, in your model, for those Palestinians who were expelled from their land and possessions? Do you envisage a monetary recompense?

I am in total agreement with you on one point.

"It is about the struggle of a political entity"

In my view, it is about the struggle of a minority political entity which seeks to impose it's will on the majority of the people who dwell in the land it covets.

Henry Lowi, who lived in Israel from 1971 to 1988 put the problem succinctly. (He is an Israeli armed forces veteran, and a veteran of the peace movement, and of Palestine solidarity).

"Now, I would be the first to recognize the undeniable fact of Jewish religious, cultural, and spiritual ties to the Holy Land - Eretz Yisrael, or Palestine.

And I would have been the first to recognize the undeniable need to rescue Jewish people from the Holocaust.

And I would certainly be the first to recognize the undeniable right of Jewish people to live anywhere - anywhere on this planet - and enjoy human rights.

But from all of that does not follow recognition of the “right to exist” of a supremacist regime akin to that in Rhodesia.

Israel and its allies insist that the Palestinian victims of Zionism must “recognize Israel as a Jewish state with a Jewish majority”.

No one seems concerned about the fact that this ultimatum flies in the face of elementary democratic values regarding human equality and human rights.

Israel’s backers seek to legitimize a state that defines itself constitutionally as one in which Jewish people have privileges that are denied to non-Jews, a state that can constitutionally maintain a demographic majority of Jewish people, and a state that constitutionally denies the right of return of the indigenous Palestinian Arab inhabitants.

Israel’s backers seek to legitimize that which is illegitimate by any standard of democracy.

This dispute is not about borders."
http://www.redress.cc/zionism/hlowi20070606

Oh, and just to be picky,

"Nobody would negotiate with Israel after that war" is a crock and you know it. We have debated that point before.

"The indigenous people should be moved to areas allotted them and the recently arrived settlers allocated those areas taken by conquest."

Opens up a whole new can of worms really.

Let's have fun arguing about who is 'indigenous' to the area shall we - and who got kicked out after revolting against the Romans.

It used to be fun to argue about who is indigenous to the area but DNA technology has now largely replaced speculation:

"A new study shows that the genetic makeup of Jews and Arabs is almost identical, and that both groups share common prehistoric ancestors."
Tamara Traubman Ha'aretz (November 21, 2001).

"About two-thirds of Israeli Arabs and Arabs in the territories and a similar proportion of Israeli Jews are the descendents of at least three common prehistoric ancestors who lived in the Middle East in the Neolithic period, about 8,000 years ago. This is the finding of a new study conducted by an international team of scholars headed by Prof. Ariella Oppenheim, a senior geneticist in the Hebrew University's hematology department and at Hadassah Hospital in Jerusalem. In the study, soon to be published in the scientific journal 'Human Genetics,' the researchers probed the history of Jewish and Arab men by analyzing the genetic changes in the Y chromosome... The study was conducted by doctoral student Almut Nebel, with the participation of Dr. Dvora Filon and Dr. Marina Faerman of the Hebrew University and Dr. Mark Thomas of the University College of London. The results of the study, says Prof. Oppenheim, 'support the historical documentation according to which the Arabs are descendents of an ancient population of the country and that a large proportion of them were Jews who converted to Islam after Islam reached Eretz Israel in the seventh century CE.'

- so it seems that the Palestinians are have inhabited the area since neolithic times.

So now we have a real can of worms Cewiller. Ignoring the fact that each and every one of us can trace our lineage to some event that dispossessed our forbears and, in the words of Erich Fromm:

"If all nations would suddenly claim territory in which their forefathers had lived 2000 years ago, this world would be a madhouse."

.....the Roman inspired Diaspora may not have been all-encompassing.
Professor Zand of Tel Aviv University has just published "When and How Was the Jewish People Invented?" (published by Resling in Hebrew). I quote from Haaretz:

"According to Zand, the Romans did not generally exile whole nations, and most of the Jews were permitted to remain in the country. The number of those exiled was at most tens of thousands. When the country was conquered by the Arabs, many of the Jews converted to Islam and were assimilated among the conquerors. It follows that the progenitors of the Palestinian Arabs were Jews. Zand did not invent this thesis; 30 years before the Declaration of Independence, it was espoused by David Ben-Gurion, Yitzhak Ben-Zvi and others.

The first Jews of Ashkenaz (Germany) did not come from the Land of Israel and did not reach Eastern Europe from Germany, but became Jews in the Khazar Kingdom in the Caucasus. Zand explains the origins of Yiddish culture: it was not a Jewish import from Germany, but the result of the connection between the offspring of the Kuzari and Germans who traveled to the East, some of them as merchants.

We find, then, that the members of a variety of peoples and races, blond and black, brown and yellow, became Jews in large numbers. According to Zand, the Zionist need to devise for them a shared ethnicity and historical continuity produced a long series of inventions and fictions, along with an invocation of racist theses. Some were concocted in the minds of those who conceived the Zionist movement."

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/959229.html

is probably not correct

"The first Jews of Ashkenaz (Germany) did not come from the Land of Israel and did not reach Eastern Europe from Germany, but became Jews in the Khazar Kingdom in the Caucasus. "

I've already ahd one lnong discussion about this on this board.

I'm up for another if need be though.

It's a favorite trope of the right wing / anti semites although it didn't originate with them.

Would you care to give a link to the first article you cited?

This is such an interesting subject, and his is an interesting take on it. I've posted a lot of research, as have others, including some "I don't like Israel" people. We are often on the same page. I disagree with Professor Zand, but I think you will be surprised where I come down on this.
The short answer is, Palestinians from the West Bank, have genetically more in common with modern Jews living in Israel, than they do with other Arabs. My problem is, we could only find the research going back 1,000 years. There is another paper out there, and because of your post, I am going back to look for it. Wish I saved it at the time. However, what I do have is, 1,000 years ago, 4 women who lived in "greater" Israel, are related to a large portion of Ashkenazi Jews. To me that means that there was no great movement to Europe, but perhaps a few extended families along the female lines. Interesting, don't you think?
But as to Palestinians being related to modern Jews, the paper said the connection was quite some time before the birth of Jesus. I opine that it might have been around the time of Judges, about 1240 to 880 BCE. At that time, Jews married women from Moab across the Jordan. There was no prohabition. In fact Ruth, of the Book of Ruth, the Moabite, is the great grandmother of King David. I believe this is when the blood of Jews and Palestinians began to flow together. Moab continued to be separate, with their own gods, but there was mixing between the two groups. Some scholars date the book at 900 BCE, before King David, and others 500 BCE, after King David. The date depends on whether you think it was written to teach against mixed marriage or not.
When people are writing their own history, they tend to take liberties with dates and meanings of events. This happened because God did it, and then a red cow was born. Archeology, and the writings and stories of other people help by comparisons. We know David and Solomon existed, and Solomon built his Temple.
Anyway, thanks for bringing this up; it is a very exciting subject and I hope you do some more digging, I know I will.

I fully agree that this is a political issue, concerning a political entity, as has been stated. My issue with your position has already been well stated by Brewerstroupe above. However, I would like to add that the partitioning of Palestine, according to the zones of demarcation you have proposed, falls nicely, as I see it, under the definition of segregation.

As you are surely aware, any system or practice that separates people according to race, caste, etc. is called apartheid and when that becomes the solution, then it has become a racial issue.

A case in point is Highway 443, a major access road to Jerusalem. You may have heard that Israel's Supreme Court has accepted the idea of separate roads for Palestinians in the occupied areas. The Israelis get to drive on the freeway and 30.000 Palestinians are relegated to using the road full of potholes which runs parallel to it, as access has been blocked for them.

Link IHT: http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/03/26/mideast/highway.php

This reeks of a “Back of the Bus” attitude on the part of the Israelis and that attitude, as you know, was a racist one.

When I read the article all I could feel was shame for my people. They have forgotten everything.

So, yes, let’s call all this a political process, for it certainly isn’t a religious one unless we are discussing the viewpoint of the “religious Jews“, as opposed to the “historical Jews”, per above.

But when segregation and apartheid become central pillars of the solution, we must keep in mind that we are also discussing the Jewish people, the recognition of a Jewish State and their vision of the Land of Palestine and its future, which is becoming in my view, darker by the day.

Gaza is on the west of Israel, and the West Bank is on the east. The highway that was planned was an elevated freeway between the two parts, across Israel. I thought some on and off ramps might make good sense. Everyone needs to stop at tourist traps for food, gas and shopping. Maybe a petting zoo?
In addition, Israeli troops wouldn't be inside Palestine. Palestine could put their roads anywhere they damn well please.
Part of Jerusalem would be part of Palestine, so there should be a good highway in that direction; I'm not sure of the configuration though. There is going to have to be changes made. Getting the 250,000 Israelis out of Palestine will take time, figuring out how to set up a regular hiring hall, maybe a Union Hall for Palestinian workers going into Israel, setting borders to make sure orchards and farms belonging to Palestinians are in Palestine, etc. This all has to be figured out.
Now, if what you have in mind is no Israel, just one country, Palestinians can go pound salt. But I think Palestinians will like the above plan better. Arafat did. We have to wait until there is a Democrat in the White House who will send Bill Clinton there to put it together again. Remember, Clinton told us the map Carter has, was never under consideration by him or the parties. Clinton did not know where it came from. But, it wasn't his map, and that is all that matters. Clinton's map was 95% of the West Bank, and part of Jerusalem, and jurisdiction of all Muslim holy sites.
You know how I know that? I listened to Bill on C-SPAN. He explained the whole thing a several years ago. That's when he said Arafat called him 6 days after he left office, and asked if he could still take the deal.

"I listened to Bill on C-SPAN. He explained the whole thing a several years ago. That's when he said Arafat called him 6 days after he left office, and asked if he could still take the deal."

MissMarple, one can only gape in astonishment at some of the things you say. It would be difficult to say if you're a naif, a fool, or a liar. Or perhaps you're just a provocateur. Not that it really matters.

If you believe what Bill Clinton says, that would make you one of the last dozen people on earth who do so. The former president is a pathological liar; he would reject speaking truth just on principle. The idea that Arafat would do something like this is less believable than Mrs. Clinton's sniper fire story.

It's cute that you would still be charmed by Clinton, but charming is what they do best. That's how sociopaths are.

As to the Palestinians, they will meet a worse fate than the American natives, though the technique will be similar. They will be promised things, agreements may even be solemnly signed, but it will all be lies, just as it always has been. And for probably generations more they will be squeezed onto smaller and smaller plots of increasingly worse land, their sufferings will increase, until the slow motion genocide of these untermenschen is completed, the Israelis have their lebensraum, and begin to extend it by spreading into the territories of their neighbours.

The best long-term outcome would be to create a single state of Palestine/Israel, give everybody the vote, and let democracy take it's course.

The United States should give no support to a theocracy, or a state set aside for the adherants of one religion, as that is contrary to the very principles the US stands for.

And in the end, it is even better for Jewish people who hope that their descendants can live in the area for generations to come. Over the short term, Israel has been able to sustain itself, although only with massive support from the United States. Over the long term, though, the people who constitute Israel will have to make an accomodation with their neighbors if they hope to stay there.

The demographics are against the plan for a Jewish state, holding off it's neighbors with military force. Israel is like a postage stamp on one corner of a king-sized bedspread. It is true that so long as the US remains the world's only super power and is willing to devote it's energies to securing Israel, the Israelis are probably safe. But how long can those conditions last?

The perfect historical example would be the Crusader kingdoms which lasted a couple of hundred years. Measured against that kind of time period, Israel's prospects look very bleak, indeed. At some point, the US will be unable to provide support, or will be distracted with some other problem. At some point, a new Saladin will emerge, and over the period of a couple hundred years, survival of the state of Israel, in it's present form, appears unlikely.

But there is a realistic hope for the people who live in Israel remaining there, and practicing their culture, if they are willing to blend into a unified state, make fair political and economic accomodations with their Arab countrymen, and co-exist without trying to force it at gunpoint. In short, a permanent Jewish homeland in Palestine is possible, PROVIDED they are willing to share it with the other people who live there, and not try to make it exclusively theirs.

Everything that was missing suddenly reappeared.

Weird.

But sometimes either the server connection resets, or my browser gets fed up waiting, and longer threads (or ChimpsterNation forums) will just stop loading in the middle of the page.

I feel better now. This was the first time it happened to me.
I thought it was either insanity or dueling board nannies.

The problem is the "bubble". Investigation found in California, it isn't reinforced enough against terrorist attack, because of the configuration. You don't need a nuclear warhead to penetrate the bubble, or a "bunker buster". The Plumbing is under the bubble, and if penetrated, the hardened boxes on the sides are vulnerable. It hasn't been tested; it's all engineering theory. If it weren't that my family lives down there, and nuclear power is a big question in California, I might not have heard about it. But, you can't miss the damned thing when you drive south along the coast, and I've lived here all my life.
I've known all along that Hezbollah had missiles that go 45 miles, and haven't raised a complaint. This is different. I am reassured that Russia will be in the area. I will be more comfortable if Iran makes a deal with Russia. They are a stabilizing influence.
I have never read Drudge; I wouldn't know where to look. I come here for those kinds of outside links, if it isn't in a newspaper or BBC. Otherwise, I do general research if I hear or read something that is interesting. That is why I learned so much about Kosovo.
I hope you are right and the engineers were wrong; they might be. I would feel a lot better if I knew. I was reading about "the plume" and "down winders". I don't know what the prevailing winds are.
Anyway, I hope you are right. I hope I am "Chicken Little".

It seems that Miss Marple is alarmed at the impossible scenario of Israel's nuclear installation coming under attack by a weapon not capable of causing much damage.

If it is a nuclear accident she fears, one is left wondering why she remains sanguine about the very real threats that emerge almost daily from Israel, which does possess the capability to create a disaster.

"A report in yesterday’s London-based Sunday Times revealed that the Israeli military has been training to use tactical nuclear weapons against Iran’s uranium enrichment plant at Natanz and other nuclear facilities. Based on several Israeli military sources, the article said two air force squadrons were involved, with the preparations being overseen by air force commander Major General Eliezer Shkedi."

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2007/jan2007/iran-j08.shtml

Perhaps it is simply a matter of geography. Or ethnicity. Or religion.

How ironic using nuclear weapons to attack someone's nuclear energy factory... And CALLING it a WEAPON!

Iran is such a great energy competitor already. they pale in comparison to the arggressive corporations...But With International Energy contracts with it's neighbors throughout the region. They seem to be growing and developing in the right direction.

I guess the competition must finaly put their aggressive foot down. Energy is BIG BIG money. The BIGGEST. But hardly worth the cost in the lives of civilians, ....and the troop losses... and funding come from tax money which belongs to the people who oppose war for ENERGY PROFITS. ...and the international loss in reputation.

If you intend to quote the statement

“
The first Jews of Ashkenaz (Germany) did not come from the Land of Israel and did not reach Eastern Europe from Germany, but became Jews in the Khazar Kingdom in the Caucasus. Zand explains the origins of Yiddish culture: it was not a Jewish import from Germany, but the result of the connection between the offspring of the Kuzari and Germans who traveled to the East, some of them as merchants.
“

Then you really SHOULD be interested.

From the first of your links

“Of all the groups, the Ashkenazim are most closely related, in order, to Palestinian Arabs (18), Muslim Kurds (21), Cypriots (22), Greeks (23), Kurdish Jews (25), Bedouin (26), Sephardi Jews (27), Egyptians (27), Turks (28), and Pakistani Parsi (31).

Sephardim are most closely related to Italians (18), Turks (20), Ossetians, Georgia (20), Kurdish Jews (22), Muslim Kurds (24), Greeks (24), Armenians (26), Cypriots (26), Ashkenazi Jews (27), and Pakistani Parsi (28).

Kurdish Jews are most closely related to Sephardi Jews (22) and Muslim Kurds (22), Pakistani Parsi (23), Ashkenazi Jews (25), Turks (26), Palestinian Arabs (28), Ossetians (30), Cypriots (31), Greeks (32), and Armenians (35).”

Pretty impressive feat that – unless you think that the Palestinian Arabs are actually German-Khazars.

And according to that article the point you put forward

“*Palestinian and Sephardic DNA is very closely related and is consistent with the DNA of Palestine dwellers of the Neolithic period.”

Is contradicted in that the Sephardim are more closely related to the Italians (Romans??) than they are to the Palestinians.

I’d also add in response to your suggestion that

“*Female Ashkenazim are predominantly descended from a small group of European women progenitors”

“The researchers, Doron Behar and Karl Skorecki of the Technion and Ramban Medical Center in Haifa, and colleagues elsewhere, report that just four women, who may have lived 2,000 to 3,000 years ago, are the ancestors of 40 percent of Ashkenazis alive today. The Technion team's analysis was based on mitochondrial DNA, a genetic element that is separate from the genes held in the cell's nucleus and that is inherited only through the female line. Because of mutations - the switch of one DNA unit for another - that build up on the mitochondrial DNA, people can be assigned to branches that are defined by which mutations they carry.
In the case of the Ashkenazi population, the researchers found that many branches coalesced to single trees, and so were able to identify the four female ancestors.
Looking at other populations, the Technion team found that some people in Egypt, Arabia and the Levant also carried the set of mutations that defines one of the four women. They argue that all four probably lived originally in the Middle East.
“

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/14/science/14gene.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

As I have already stated, I am interested in matters of heredity only insofar as to demonstrate to those who make the spurious claim to an historical entitlement, that even if there was some such entitlement, it would be difficult to prove the link. Furthermore, the Palestinians have an equally valid and possibly prior claim.

In my country, it is not possible to dispossess anyone of their land or possessions - even if they arrived on a flight from China last Tuesday week. To claim entitlement through a convoluted connection to some woman in Europe who may or may not have progenitors in the Middle East is preposterous.

There is a World of difference between healthy pride in one's culture and claiming privileges based on one's blood.

Answer me this. If one claims a privilege on the basis of the actions of one's forbears, should not one also accept responsibility for their misdeeds? If the descendants of ancient Israelites wish to claim the real estate, should they not first seek out and make restitution to the descendants of the Canaanites, Jebusites and whateverites they slaughtered in order to get title in the first place?
There are sure to be some amongst the Palestinians.

The historical argument is bunk and every American who espouses it should go immediately to the nearest Native American Agency and turn over the deeds to whatever land they own.

that's a fascinating comment.

Would you care to explain the meaning of

"Jewfilter pish. "

???

....I have a very silly sense of humour.

Pish - an old English slang word for nonsense, Jewfilter - through the filter of Jewish thought. Altogether a play on the well known culinary item.
No offence meant.

We believe you.