Otherwise White bird
The Connecticut Post Online – Lebanese oil spill latest mideast tragedy — Right now this is under-reported. Watch how it skyrockets to a number one story over the next week. Somehow we’ll end up paying for the clean-up, you watch.
BEIRUT, Lebanon — A black coat of oil covers the Lebanese capital’s once-beautiful sandy Mediterranean shore, spilled from a power plant that was knocked down by Israeli warplanes two weeks ago.
Fishermen say hundreds of oil-coated fish have been washed ashore in what is the country’s worst ever environmental disaster.
About 80 miles of Lebanon’s shores had been affected by a spill of more than 110,000 barrels of oil from the Jiyeh plant, about 12 miles south of Beirut, the city’s mayor, Abdel Monem Ariss, said Friday. The plant was in flames after it was hit in Israeli air raids, cutting electricity to many areas in the capital and south Lebanon.
“Depending on how the wind is blowing, I think many shores will be soiled with this oil spill,” Ariss said. told the Associated Press.
The environmental destruction was becoming apparent as Hezbollah launched a new kind of rocket Friday that made its deepest strike into Israel yet, while Israeli warplanes and artillery blasted apartment buildings and roads gunning for guerrillas.
That’s what happens during a war. Not really the big damage there.
…Hezbollah launched a new kind of rocket…
Wasn’t that why israel was bombing the airport & highways – to prevent arms from being brought in from Syria?
Shouldn’t we(USA) pay for the cleanup?
We sold them the bomb.
Clean up you say?? You make me laugh! WE are fighting a war so that the western world can sit at home and not be taken over by the likes of Nasrallah , Assad and the Iranians and you talk about environmental damage. Well folks , we better win this war or the environmental damage that will result in the western world will be unimaginable . Just look at what happened in France last year when a few Muslim brothers decided that it was time to reconstruct the French society?? What about all those Dioxins that went into the air when all those French cars went up in smoke, didn’t see you complaining there??? Wake up gentlemen , its about time!!
They don’t want the western world, “they”just want what was taken from them in 1948! Now that I’m awake, it’s about time for what?
Al Qaeda’s last declaration said the wanted the Islamic World ‘from Spain to Iraq.’ So I guess the US is safe, and England, and maybe even France depending on which route they take to get to Spain.
#5. Tell me, was France taken from then in 1948? Come to Europe to see what they are doing to our society. Answering your question, it’s about time to start seeing things for what they are. As for 1948, Romans took Israel from the Jews and the Western World gave it back to the Jews in 1948. So, nothing is so simple as “they took their land in 1948”. By your measure the US should start returning lands to the American Indians because those were taken from them during the late 19th century. That wouldn’t make much sense to you, would it? Neither it would to me.
Clean up you say?? You make me laugh! WE are fighting a war so that the western world can sit at home and not be taken over by the likes of Nasrallah , Assad and the Iranians and you talk about environmental damage.
So does that mean Congress declared war against Lebanon? Against Iran?
. Well folks , we better win this war or the environmental damage that will result in the western world will be unimaginable .
So it is OK if we litter their ground with depleted uranium and land mines. So it is OK if hundreds of Lebanese are trapped between the Hezbollah and the Israelis neither of whom give a rat’s a** about them. So it is OK if UN posts are repeatedly shelled and bombed. So it is OK if ambulances are shot up. So it is OK that civilians are killed trying to escape the carnage.
And after all is done, you wonder why the rest of the world doesn’t trust the US. Gershon, you are a sick person. If America is ever attacked again, I hope it is the people like you that only care about themselves that are targeted.
There aren’t too many things humans do that don’t harm the environment and cause morbid suffering to other creatures. We are quite likely the planet’s cancer. We are definitely not a symbiotic species.
This won’t be a major story until the shooting stops John. Except at enviro headquarters.
BBC had a small story on it yesterday.
Mr. Fusion…..no war, no death, no famine, no nothing harmful would be wonderful. But you better live in this world, you might need your wits about you. Israel could stop war forever tomorrow, we could stop war forever tomorrow and there would still be half a million dead a year by genocide somewhere in the world. When those nice Muslims that you think only want Spain to Iraq back, get that, just watch what they want next. Listen to something besides the Klos report now and then, the leader of Al Quida and the leader of Iran and all the holy terror Imams have stated time and time again, the goal of Islam is to bring the world to Islam. Somehow I doubt they mean by tour bus.
Even the mainstream media, yellowed and corrupt as they are, have picked up on the fact that Israel is airstriking civilian areas at will.
My girlfriend is Lebanese and her family barely escaped the bombing and they are now in hiding. I can tell you from first hand knowledge that civilians are actively being targeted and killed in the hundreds.
I completely agree that Hezbollah needs to be eliminated, but the way they are doing it, with the support of the US, is just atrocious. I cannot imagine a closer scrutiny would pass muster with any wartime conventions. It’s not a question of collateral damage, but direct targeting of innocents.
I’ve read quite a few comments by this hand-wringer named H.Fusion and I gotta say if the world had his mindset in the 30’s and 40’s we’d all be speaking German and doing the heil salute. He seems to believe there is nothing worth violence and I think he’d have no problem with the whole world kneeling and praising allah whether you wanted to or not as long as there was “world peace”.Stiffen up that spinal column Mr H. Fusion!
#8 “Romans took Israel from the Jews and the Western World gave it back to the Jews in 1948”
“By your measure the US should start returning lands to the American Indians because those were taken from them during the late 19th century. ”
OK for the jews but not…………forget it !!!!!!!!!!!!!
The lessons of history are seldom learned by the ignorant, stupid, gullible, or, in this case especially, the neo-cons.
It is war, so that makes it OK. The guys with the rags on their heads started it, so that makes it OK. We have to preserve our way of life, so that makes it OK. We’re Christians and they aren’t, so that makes it OK. They should have left when they had the chance, so that makes it OK. Cripes man, they were just collateral damage, so that makes it OK. All Arabs are alike, so that makes it OK. All Muslims want to see the West dead, so that makes it OK. The children would have grown up to become terrorists anyway, so that makes it OK. Pat Robertson said it is OK to hate Muslims, so that makes it OK. Hey, it is either us or them, so that makes it OK. (and the most insulting rational) Geeze, we wouldn’t want to have to give back all that land to the Indians, so that makes it OK.
What a bunch of sorry bigots.
***
Some quick lessons in History. Remember the American Revolution. America won, not because they had the best army or best weapons. They won because they desired to be more then occupied, they wanted freedom. Remember the Irish? They won their independence 150 years later for exactly the same reason.
In just this past 60 years:
There was Algeria. The French hit the natives and hit them hard with modern weapons, yet still lost to the natives riding horses.
In Vietnam, the strongest nation on earth couldn’t defeat a guerrilla force that had to hide in tunnels and eat a handful of rice a day.
In Cambodia, the Vietnamese couldn’t defeat those whose country had been invaded.
In Afghanistan, over a decade, the superior Soviet technology still lost to tribesmen with heart.
In South Africa, massive jailing, beatings, and outright killing couldn’t prevent the downtrodden from rising up.
All through Central America dictatorships were overthrown as people sought liberty.
In Chechnya, the country has been reduced to rubble and still the natives fight on.
If anyone thinks Israel can defeat Palestinian resistance by brute force, they are mistaken. History has shown time and time again that military action and massive denigration will not defeat a people.
***
None of this excuses any atrocities by the Palestinian Hamas or Hezbollah. The deliberate targeting of civilians is wrong. Condoning the killing of civilians either implicitly or explicitly is just plain sick.
Yadda-yadda-yadda. Can you say “better red than dead” like they did in the sixties or do people like you have another knee-trembling slogan these days.Mr H.Fusion as much as you think your the solution, I gotta tell you, your the problem.
Qana airstrike, breaking news. At least 60 killed, women, children, elderly. I cannot see this as collatera damage, especially since even Israel is saying it was a “mistake”. Even Tony Blair is pushing the US to do something.
Hey #24, about shouting down the opposition, I think there was a little shouting down in the news this week and I think it came from the left. Now, what was that old saying about stones and glass houses?
22, While we are in the subject of innocent deaths in a war, where does death by a suicide bomber stand, innocent death or purposeful targets? I may have long term memory, but you seem to suffer from short term memory loss.
Comment by Pedro — 7/30/2006 @ 11:28 am
Pedro, I’m really glad you have long term memory. That way you will remember all the atrocities dropped upon the Palestinians by the Israelis.
No, suicide bombers were not OK. Then, but neither was the rocket bombing of Palestinians with their collateral deaths. Nor the shooting of unarmed Palestinians. If A suicide bomber detonates 20 lbs of explosive is wrong, what would be the corresponding degree of wrongness of dropping a 500 lb bomb on an apartment building in the middle of the night.
Hey #24, about shouting down the opposition, I think there was a little shouting down in the news this week and I think it came from the left. Now, what was that old saying about stones and glass houses?
Comment by d223e — 7/30/2006 @ 2:00 pm
do you have anything intelligent to say?
“we better win this war or the environmental damager that will result in the western world will be unimaginable…”
Ok, yeah, like, duh. What I’m not so sure about is how being concerned about a coastal oil spill is counter to that proclomation? Define “win this war”.
Anyone who thinks that blowing up a coastal power plant is, in these times, an ok act of war of believes too much in the ways of war and has not read the previous Conventions on these matters. Targeting civilian infrastructure to this degree is a really radical act of war that completely disregards, and even exacerbates, human suffering. The oil spills and the resulting environmental desctruction are just further proof of a very blatant disregard for a wider human community and our oceans, which may be coming increasingly fragile. Subsistence and commercial fishing are incredibly important economic activities, activities which will be severely disrupted by the adverse impacts of the almighty bomb.
I leave you with this: If your neighbor is an alleged member of a banned organization, is it ok to bomb your house too?