Phydeau says:

Ah_Yea, Benjamin, bobbo, thanks for playing. You guys have got it all figured out. Unfortunately, in case you haven’t noticed, reality doesn’t agree with you. The Palestinians aren’t going to roll over and give up just because you think they should. The Israelis will have to do some ethnic cleansing if they’re going to survive as a Jewish country (which is what they are). Lots more blood and death will ensue, until the children get tired of it and reject their violent religions.

Have a nice day. I’m done trying to reason with blind Israel supporters for a while. 🙂

bobbo, how literal are we being today says:

#182–Benjamin==wow. Better than my response. Well done. You’re gonna raise my game. or . maybe I’m just tired or repeating myself and near up chucking?

Phydeau–you don’t understand what fighting and losing a WAR means. The Palestinians keep fighting WARS against Israel, losing, and then want the land back as if they hadn’t lost the WAR. Why should the Palestinians be treated any differently than anyone else that has ever lost a war? If there was a strong Indian Rights movement in the USA demanding their land back pursuant to written treaties signed by sovereign nations only 130 years ago, shouldn’t all us Americans agree and return to where ever Helen Thomas thinks we should go? Or does the hand of History once written move on?

How long do you want to uniquely pigeon hole Israel as a country that “does not deserve its land” against the competing claims of people that lost their WAR to keep it?

“I” am not taking the 100% Israeli line except as every other single country on the face of the earth views its own sovereignty. You are taking the single case of Palestine and saying the losers of a WAR somehow have a claim against the winners—or who else do you think should get their land back?

Please answer that question. I think it could resolve a lot.

Ah_Yea says:

“Bull crap”

That sums up Phydeau quite nicely.

Notice how he STILL could not answer a single question or offer any line of reasoning.

Instead of trying, we get “I’m done trying to reason”. (Funny, since he never gave any reasoning in the first place…)

Truly unhinged.

Benjamin, you might like reading my post #39. It complements exactly what you have said about the Palestinians bringing it upon themselves. The links are an excellent refresher on why the Palestinians ended up where they are.

It helps put the PLO and Yassar Arafat, King Hussein of Jordan, and the Palestinian pawns in perspective.

Benjamin says:

#190 “Phydeau might tell us if he is treating Palestine any differently by telling us what other WAR losers deserve their land back”

Funny, he didn’t post anything on this thread: http://dvorak.org/blog/2010/06/06/how-much-longer-will-california-remain-a-part-of-the-united-states/

Ah_Yea says:

Benjamin:

Right about now, with all the wacko’s and debt and such…

It might be a good idea to give California back!

bobbo, how literal are we being today says:

Ah Yea–I’m thinking they must be some kind of retards: religious or libetardians.

The Religious would fall into many groups: straight up Muslims posing as rational people, End of Times Christians looking for the Rapture, etc. Then the libertardians who don’t like slavery imposed on them for the foreign aid going over there.

Why a regular person would get so twisted is beyond me though.

I’ve been looking at You Tube. Every pro-Palestine speaker regarding the Floatilla starts out by saying it was an illegal attack on freedom loving people in International Waters. Thats a fact dispute it seems to me. If you can’t accept that a blockade is a legal instrument of National Sovereignty, then you have no role to play in an honest discussion. I’d get tired of arguing an incorrect point too?

Heh, heh.

bobbo's mother says:

bobbo has stopped taking his meds. pay no attention to his nonsensical ramblings.

honey, come home and go to bed. I’ve got a nice warm nipple for you to suck and envision your delusions of grandeur.

p.s. he cant bake to save his life and knows shit about history.

bobbo, int'l pastry chef and world history buff says:

Here is a clever idea: “reverse Floatilla.”

http://jpost.com/Israel/Article.aspx?id=177789

Ah_Yea says:

You win!!

This has been an interesting and enlightening post.

Interesting. I learned a lot.

Enlightening. I didn’t appreciate how many truly unhinged post to this blog.

brianoflondon says:

Bobbo (and anyone else still listening).

Direct question: “Is too much of Israeli’s current problems/continuing conflict actually caused by itself in being too moral with its “death to Israel” enemies?”

Jewish philosophy is the very definition of what we call morals in the West. Every aspect of right vs wrong that we think about today in the West flows from Judaism so yes, the only modern state run along the lines of this philosophy has a very strong tendancy to behave in this moral way. Of course the acts of individuals (or larger groups when people achieve leadership roles) may deviate, but the natural tendency of the secularly slanted Jewish state is to be overly kind to its enemies. The knee jerk Israel haters will drop off in horror at reading this, good luck to them. A true religious Jewish state would probably have sought to win war with some total “smiting” by now.

Directed to all who live in the enlightened West and who think you know what Judaism is, or what Jews are and this includes the vast majority of Jews, Christians and all manner of Atheists and Humanists: Judaism (which I don’t practice to much degree at all from a religious observance point of view) is so deeply ingrained in YOUR own view of the world that you can’t think without out its influence.

Almost everything we think of as being able to tell us right from wrong stems from Jewish philosophy. Numerous experiments on children show that they can be molded to believe right is wrong and wrong is right. It’s easy and happens every day 50 km from me when Fatah (yes Fatah not just Hamas) airs TV programs encouraging 8 year olds that their highest aspiration in life can be to walk into a pizza restaurant filled with Jewish mothers and children and detonate themselves. That is wrong in every way we consider in the West, but given enough time and a strong enough ideology, you can make people believe it’s right.

The Jewish gift to the world, for which we have been mercilessly persecuted for thousands of years, is the very concept of personal responsibility and freedom. The ethos of Judaism is not rights, but obligations. I am obliged not to murder or steal. By my observance of those obligations, your rights to life and property are preserved. Where this philosophy runs into trouble is at its boundary with people who don’t follow those obligations (and there is a lot of amazing philosophy within Judaism about how to handle this and it culminates in rules of when it is correct to pre-emptively kill someone you believe is coming to kill you).

Prior to the emergence of early Jewish philosophy, slavery was a natural state. It seems to have existed in almost every spontaneous civilization ever to have existed. It certainly exists in early Jewish history. However, and stemming directly from recognizing that man is created in the image of God it becomes, in the end, impossible to practice discrimination on physical attributes (at first) and then even beliefs if those don’t impinge on others’ freedoms (later). Thus slavery becomes an un-natural state. Now we are so passed slavery (and it really did take 5000 years) we can’t even remember why we think “All Men are created equal”. They’re only equal because a Jewish philosopher wrote that men are the image of God (or God wrote it down for Moses if you prefer).

The entire Exodus story, whether you literally believe it as an historical account or not, is the modern definition of a transition from blind obedience and subservience to self directed, moral co-existance and personal freedom within the necessary limits needed not to impose your behavior on the freedoms of your fellow man.

So once again I’ll say, of course Israel is flawed, of course it (as a collective entity) makes mistakes but I can tell you this for free: Jewish children across the whole spectrum of political and religious beliefs are not taught to hate anyone. They grow up to defend themselves in a way Jews have not done since the Jewish revolt against the Romans, but the drive within the society is not to hate and it’s sometimes amazing, under all this place has and continues to endure, that it is that way.

BTW… Demographics: the Arabs have been lying for years. The Jewish state is not under demographic assault. Even secular Israelis are breeding quite nicely while the Arab birth rate is definitely declining even for the Israeli Arabs.

bobbo, int'l pastry chef and world history buff says:

I will second Ah Yea. Hmmmmmm.

I think I have posted a few times that morality does not come from religion, that it has a more pragmatic organic impetus arising from simple necessity of what it takes a herd animal to survive. In a word: Darwin.

For the first 5 minutes, I was going to incorporate more of what you say, but just writing that second paragraph, I need to think about it some more. Certainly kiddies can be taught all kinds of mischief and they are just as you say, so there could be some hubris in Jews taking credit for what might be a natural process. Would you also take credit for gravity? BUT, I like what you say. Just have to consider both/all sides before joining your flotilla.

At #176–I post above wherein I muse that “if I had to pick a religion” it would be Jewish. I had to choose my words carefully because I was also thinking about Mennonites and Quakers who I admire for the same reason but they are too retro for me, although Pennsylvannia is nicer than most of Israel? I’m a green loving guy, not the desert. Course–you might say both those religion draw more upon Jewish teaching than Catholic or Protestant?

I feel the “standard bobbo” rising within me. I could never accept that religion, any religion, is the font of proper thinking. They may get a fact here or there correctly, or as with the Jews quite a number of the most important fact correctly, but when the whole edifice is built on the notion of worshiping a god? No, the Jews have no special insights on the working of this world. And indeed, how close to being wiped out are they? If morality really comes down to taking a position that cannot/does not survive in this world, how “moral” is it? Can morality only be valid in an impossible vacuum?

BUT–given you aren’t protected from the extreme interpretation of your own principles, as are the Quakers, you have decided when push comes to shove, WAR is justified.

Yea, I think I’d still choose to be Jewish, but I’d back off on being self righteous. Like libertarianism–its a good idea, but it fails when it becomes dogma? Heh, heh.

I like how you pirouette away from the demographic problem I sure hope that is true for the State of Israel AND for the Arab Israeli’s living there in greater peace, freedom, and prosperity than anywhere else in the Middle East.

Thank you Brain for your thoughtful replies. We need more Brains here at DU.

Benjamin says:

#203 and bobbo: I will have to think about #203. As a Christian I agree for the most part about what you say. I believe morals about what is right and wrong come from God. Where we differ is about the ability of humans to achieve this by our own actions or through Christ transforming us.

The Jewish law on slavery was unique among the ancient people groups. At worse it was an indentured servitude which ended after seven years.

# 196 Ah_Yea said, “I used to imagine when I was a kid that another Holocaust couldn’t happen today because we as a people are wiser and more humane.”

I used to have trouble imagining how people could be so cruel as to cause the first Holocaust. (This was not Holocaust denial; I just had trouble with imagining how people could do what the Nazis did.) Islam stands as an example of people who could be that cruel. They have the hate and the desire. They don’t yet have the control they need to implement the atrocities of the Holocaust.

Can Israel turn the Palestinians from enemies into friends? Not while children are taught to hate the Jews before they can read. Something does have to be done.

brianoflondon says:

Benjamin, you’re right about slavery in Judaism being at worst indentured servitude and the most important point is, even though the rules surrounding slavery are still in the Jewish books, they have no relevance today because Judaism contains within itself all the practicalities necessary to move forward.

I would agree that some of the more literalist following of deeply orthodox Jewry (especially some of what goes on relating to the use of electricity on the Sabbath) is basically nuts, nobody (and I mean nobody) is calling for the literal application of some of the obscene punishments that were used at times in the past. It’s just not a thought.

I can’t and won’t talk about whether we need to be in a post Messianic era or not. I think we have the tools for good and moral behavior and the method by which people find those is relatively unimportant. Whatever works for you! Just don’t put me in a room with Jews for Jesus: they rarely enjoy it.

Brian

Ah_Yea says:

“I swear I never typed Brain of London, but if you’re happy to address me as such … ”

It fits.

Thanks again, Brain!

Ah_Yea says:

Also a good article #208

I at first was also a supporter of Obama, until in the third – fourth week of his job. Even at that early stage he showed lack of spine when the first bailout was shoved past his desk by Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid without any review or proper vetting.

And it has gone from bad to worse. Where is the review process? Where is the transparency? Where is any true leadership? Where is the accountability?

Obama, for all his teleprompter eloquence, is making George Bush look better every day.

He’s just the wrong guy for the job.