Israel takes out top Hamas commander after missiles launched from Gaza

[Buddhas Hand]

So if I'm losing the argument, why have you refused to answer my questions? Why have you been so selective about what you copy and paste from Wikipedia?

[Buddhas Hand]

em·ploy/emˈploi/

I hope you realise how pathetic this looks .

and her you go employ [ɪmˈplɔɪ]

vb (tr)

1. (Business / Industrial Relations & HR Terms) to engage or make use of the services of (a person) in return for money; hire

2. to provide work or occupation for; keep busy; occupy collecting stamps employs a lot of his time

3. to use as a means to employ secret measures to get one's ends

definition no.3 fits nicely for me Verb: Give work to (someone) and pay them for it. Noun: The state or fact of being employed for wages or a salary: "in the employ of a grocer and wine merchant". Synonyms:

verb. use - engage - utilize - hire - apply

noun. employment - job - occupation - work - business - office

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

You're right, I'm not willing to "employ" logic. The word logic is inanimate, if I were to employ it I would be spending money that I do not have.

[Buddhas Hand]

em·ploy/emˈploi/

Verb: Give work to (someone) and pay them for it. Noun: The state or fact of being employed for wages or a salary: "in the employ of a grocer and wine merchant". Synonyms:

verb. use - engage - utilize - hire - apply

noun. employment - job - occupation - work - business - office

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

You're right, I'm not willing to "employ" logic. The word logic is inanimate, if I were to employ it I would be spending money that I do not have.

[morrissex95]

Why are you attacking me then , and what do you want me to copy and paste ?

It is you who have refused to address the fact that as i have pointed out many times in this thread that israel is a state that was founded on the back of terrorist actions , that they continually defy the international community and illegally settle in areas even they said they would not , and the articles i have cut and pasted are proof of this .

[morrissex95]

I hope you realise how pathetic this looks

And EMPLOY

.v. em·ployed, em·ploy·ing, em·ploys

1.

a. To engage the services of; put to work: agreed to employ the job applicant.

b. To provide with gainful work: factories that employ thousands.

2. To put to use or service. See Synonyms at use.

3. To devote (time, for example) to an activity or purpose: employed several months in learning Swahili.

[Buddhas Hand]

Israel was founded on the backs of diplomats like David Ben Gurion, Theodor Herzl, Golda Meir, Abba Eban, etc. The Haganah was a paramilitary group that defended Mandatory Palestine's growing Jewish community. The Irgun was a terrorist organization that could've cost Israel the war of Independence.

Israel never said collectively as a country that wasn't going to settle. Furthermore, the government of Levi Eshkol didn't definitively state they Jews weren't going to settle in Gaza and the West Bank. If you knew anything about the Jews, you'd know that if they wanted to settle those areas then they'd do it without the permission of the government. Besides, even if they said they weren't going to do it, it wouldn't have mattered. You can't say definitively whether Israel is violating International Law because you can't say whether the 1967 War was defensive.

If it was defensive, that doesn't matter because in 1973 Israel was attacked by the exact same alliance and re-captured all of the occupied territories in a defensive war. International Law only address settling on land that was won in an offensive war. The size of Germany proper was significantly reduced post WWII but it was not considered a violation of existing International Law because Germany had been defeated in a defensive war.

[Buddhas Hand]

I was just having some fun, you need to relax. No matter what, you completely misused the word.

Anyways, I'm going to bed now because it's way past my bed time. I'm going to wake up in the morning and this thread is going to be on fire. But there's something that I should clarify. You've asked me if I'm attacking you personally on several occasions.

There is no question that you are attacking me personally. You made an incredibly offensive statement drawing comparison between the actions of the IDF to the actions of the Nazis. Do you have any idea how offensive that is to me?

I never once made an offensive comment about any group of people on this thread. What you said was an anti-Semitic statement, even though you and many other people will try to sugar coat it.

I'd like to suggest that you think about what you're saying and the implications it has on the people around you. Especially when you're living in a multi-cultural country like Canada.

Also, I didn't read any of those articles that you posted because it was clear to me that you'd been incredibly selective in your copying and pasting. You've said in this thread that you're impartial so I've asked you why you haven't said anything critical about the Palestinians?

[Buddhas Hand]

Ok, I'm personally willing to wager that I can walk on water.

Clearly you don't

Than stop talking

[Buddhas Hand]

The History of Zionism & Judaism

This text is from an article called "An Open Letter" published in the Jewish magazine, "Hachoma". We think it provides a good historical overview of the history of Zionism and why the Zionist ideology is opposed by religious Orthodox Jews.

The Jewish people, from its inception, has been unique by its identity as a religious entity. Through the centuries its religious character had been a premise agreed upon by Jews and non-Jews alike. Our faith demands as the fundamental condition for recognition as a Jew, belief and adherence to the word of G-d, as was revealed to our forefathers on Mount Sinai. This is in itself, according to the tenets of the Jewish religion, sufficient to fulfill the definition of a Jew. Our religious and traditional history bears no aspect of racism. Hence, one of non-Jewish origin is capable of being proselytized and attaining the same status as a born Jew. Conversely, one of Jewish birth who does not recognize his being bound to the Jewish Torah, is by Jewish law a heretic, and therefore forfeits his spiritual birthrights as a Jew.

The purpose of the Jew is to bear witness to the existence of G-d, through his adherence to the Torah. The Al-mighty granted the Jews the land of Israel as the particular setting which would serve as the most conducive atmosphere to their performance of their duties to G-d.

The Jews in ancient times were banished from the land of Israel because they had failed to fulfill their obligations to the Al-mighty. Every Jew acknowledges this in his prayers (Umipnei Chatoeinu Golinu Meiartzeinu). They accepted the penalty of exile and were at that time expressed sworn by the Al-mighty not to accelerate their redemption on their own, and especially not to rebel against the nations under whose rule they were found. To the contrary, every Jew is commanded to pray for the peace and well being of the government of which he is the subject.

Through all the years of exile, pious Jews as individuals were attracted to reside in the Holy Land because of its innate holy character and the opportunity it offered for the observance of various precepts bound in the land. Jews as a whole continue to pray that the Al-mighty return his Divine presence to the Land of Israel, by the coming of the Messiah, who will build His Temple, from whence will emanate Divine Wisdom and ultimate spiritual fulfillment of the entire human race.

Through the many years that Jews resided in the Holy Land for this purpose, they enjoyed tranquil and cordial relations with the non-Jewish population there.

The Zionist movement which was formed at the latter part of the last century, sought to endow the Jews with a nationalistic character which was heretofore strange to them. It sought to deprive them of their historically religious character and offered in substitution of faith in G-d and adherence to the Torah, and belief in their ultimate redemption by the coming of the Messiah, a nationalistic ideology and the possibility of establishing through political media, a Jewish national homeland.

During the period of the British Mandate, the Balfour Declaration, which recognized the eventual possibility of founding a Jewish national homeland, in Palestine, was affirmed to be the British government. The Jewish Agency, who then was the Chief representative of Zionist interests in the Holy Land, was entrusted with the issuance of visas to the Holy Land, thus resulting in an increased Zionist immigration from various parts of the world, which ultimately succeeded in superceding in numbers, the veteran Orthodox dwellers.

Orthodox Jewry all over the world and the Orthodox Community in the Holy Land in particular, immediately sensed in this stage of Zionist success, the threat of grave danger for the religious future of Jews. The Arab inhabitants began to exhibit open hostility to their Jewish neighbors. The British government failed to distinguish between the Orthodox community, who for generations in habited the Holy Land, and the newly arrived Zionist immigrants.

With the acquisition by the Zionist nationalists of the power to organize communities in Palestine, they formed the Vaad Haleumi Leknesset Yisroel (National Jewish Council Committee). This committee ignored the rights of the Orthodox veteran dwellers who did not recognize this validity of Jewish nationality, and whose identification as Jews was solely with their loyalty to their religious heritage. The religious inhabitants, on the other hand, shuddered at the prospects of spiritual disintegration of World Jewry, with the new rise to power of the Zionist nationalists.

The Orthodox inhabitants actively objected to being subject to the authority of the secularists. They appealed their cause to the League of Nations, who consequently granted them a "Right of exclusion" to the subjugation to the Vaad Haleumi, which rights provided that any Jew wishing not to be incorporated into the Vaad Haleumi, may remain lawfully independent if he so stated his wish in writing. Thousands of Jews did so.

Such was the case until November 1948, when the United Nations finally sanctioned the establishment of a Zionist State. We do not doubt that their success in finally realizing their goal was due in great measure to their having misled the world into viewing the Zionist cause as the Jewish cause. The formation of the Zionist state resulted in the automatic deprivation of the autonomy heretofore possessed by the Orthodox inhabitants of the Holy Land.

The Zionists grasped in the acquisition of their new powers, the opportunity to openly disassociate themselves from any identification with Jews as a religion. They systematically began to orient the minds of their generations according to the tenets of Zionist nationalism. Through the Ministry of Religions they employed part of the Rabbinate to assist them in their aims.

The religious Jews who by virtue of their faith, clearly contradicted Zionist nationalism, and who had lived peacefully with their Arab neighbors for generations, became unwillingly identified with the Zionist cause and their struggle with the Arabs. They requested the United Nations that Jerusalem be designated as a defacto international city. They appealed to the diplocatic corps assigned to Jerusalem -- but to no avail. They were hence confronted with the choice of either becoming a part of the Zionist State, which diametrically opposed the interests of Jews as a religion, or abandoning the land of which their forefathers were the first Jewish settlers.

We find it of supreme importance to emphasize that we are fearful of the consequences of the Zionist rebellion against the Creator, as stated expressly in Jeremich, "For it is bad and bitter your renunciation of G-d..." We wish not to be affected by the behavior of this government who in the name of Israel, persist in their renunciation and utter disregard of religious Judaism such as is clearly attested by their laws expressly permitting wanton autopsies (Law of Anatomy and Pathology, 1953), forcible desecration of the Sabbath (Law of Emergency Labor Draft 1967: PPS 1, 19; 27, 36), profanation of Holy Sites by retaining non-religious custodians, desecration of Holy Cemetaries by Safed, Beth Shearim and elsewhere, and countless more examples, proof of which is readily available.

Insofar as all human being find necessary the protection of their rights as human beings, we hereby request all those that find it within their power, to aid us in reacquiring the rights we possessed prior to the formation of the Zionist State*, to remain lawfully independent of the Zionist authority.

from the Jews against zionism website

[Buddhas Hand]

AS IT HAPPENS: Israel, Hamas trade blows in bloody Gaza conflict

• From: AP, AFP

• November 18, 2012 8:25PM

Smoke rises during an explosion from an Israeli forces strike in Gaza City. Israel bombarded the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip with nearly 200 airstrikes early Saturday, the military said, widening a blistering assault on Gaza rocket operations. Picture: Hatem Moussa Source: AP

THE Middle East is once again at flashpoint, as Israel and Hamas trade bloody body blows in Gaza and Tel Aviv.

8.24pm: Sirens have sounded across Tel Aviv for a fourth straight day as Israeli police confirmed two rockets had been intercepted over the city by the Iron Dome defence system.

''Two rockets were intercepted by the Iron Dome system,'' police spokesman Luba Samri told AFP on Sunday shortly after the sirens sent residents running for cover across the commercial metropolis and in nearby Bnei Brak and Ramat HaSharon.

7.59pm: Talks on a truce to end five days of violence in and around Gaza are underway, and a deal could be reached ''today or tomorrow,'' a Palestinian official says.

''There are serious talks to reach a truce, and it is possible that understandings will be reached today or tomorrow,'' the senior official said on Sunday, speaking on condition of anonymity.

The official's comments were confirmed by an Egyptian security source, who said: ''Egypt has continued meetings and intensive communication with all parties to reach a truce as quickly as possible.

''We have reached important understandings, but we still have a little way to go in order to complete the truce agreement in order to achieve security and stability and ... ensure it doesn't happen again.''

A source close to the negotiations said a series of meetings were being held in Cairo between the Palestinian factions, involving both Hamas politburo chief Khaled Meshaal and Islamic Jihad leader Ramadan Shallah.

''The organisations want to completely end the siege on Gaza and stop all the Israeli aggression and in return, all attacks on Israel will stop,'' the source said.

Overnight, talk of a truce agreement intensified after Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi said his government was in talks with Israel and the Palestinians and there were indications they could reach a truce ''soon.''

7.15pm: First pictures emerge of the aftermath of an Israeli air strike on an office of Hamas television channel Al-Aqsa in Gaza City on Sunday.

Gaza

Smoke rises after an Israeli air strike on an office of Hamas television channel Al-Aqsa in Gaza City on Sunday. Source: AFP

Gaza

Journalists from different agencies run after an Israeli air strike on an office of Hamas television channel Al-Aqsa in Gaza City on Sunday. Picture: AFP Source: AFP

PALESTINIAN-ISRAEL-GAZA-UNREST

Ajab al-Shorafa, a cameraman for Press TV network, arrives at the emergency room in Gaza City after an Israeli air strike on the building housing the offices of the Hamas-run Al-Aqsa TV station and several other news outlets on Sunday. Picture: AFP Source: AFP

Gaza

A Palestinian journalist inspects his work car in Gaza City on Sunday. Picture: AFP Source: AFP

7pm: Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniya's office said he had spoken by phone with Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi to discuss the ongoing violence.

Haniya's office issued a brief statement saying: ''During a 20-minute phone call between Prime Minister Haniya and Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi, Morsi described the efforts he has made to stop the aggression on Gaza.''

Hopefully there will be a peaceful resolution to this particular phase of the conflict sooner ,rather than later .

[Edler0023]

I believe the Israelis have started attacking from the sea too, yes?

[Dellins]

Well it took a while, but the anti-Semite card finally got played in this thread.

[Tearloch7]

Well it took a while, but the anti-Semite card finally got played in this thread.

[Mainly Mattias]

The History of US-Israel Relations

Part One

How the “special relationship” was created

Alison Weir

September 2011

While many people are led to believe that US support for Israel is driven by the American establishment and U.S. national interests, the facts don’t support this theory. The reality is that for decades U.S. experts opposed Israel and its founding movement. They were simply outmaneuvered and eventually replaced.­

Like many American policies, U.S. Middle East policies are driven by a special interest lobby. However, the Israel Lobby, as it is called today in the U.S.[1], consists of vastly more than what most people envision in the word “lobby.”

As this article will demonstrate, the Israel Lobby is considerably more powerful and pervasive than other lobbies. Components of it, both individuals and groups, have worked underground, secretly and even illegally throughout its history, as documented by scholars and participants.

And even though the movement for Israel has been operating in the U.S. for over a hundred years, most Americans are completely unaware of this movement and its attendant ideology – a measure of its unique influence over public knowledge.

The success of this movement to achieve its goals, partly due to the hidden nature of much of its activity, has been staggering. It has also been at almost unimaginable cost.

It has led to massive tragedy in the Middle East: a hundred-year war of violence and loss; sacred land soaked in sorrow.

In addition, this movement has been profoundly damaging to the United States itself.

As we will see in this two-part examination of the pro-Israel movement, it has targeted virtually every significant sector of American society; worked to involve Americans in tragic, unnecessary, and profoundly costly wars; dominated Congress for decades; increasingly determined which candidates could become serious contenders for the U.S. presidency; and promoted bigotry toward an entire population, religion and culture.

It has promoted policies that have exposed Americans to growing danger, and then exaggerated this danger (while disguising its cause), fueling recent actions that dismember some of our nation’s most fundamental freedoms and cherished principles.

All this for a population that is considerably smaller than New Jersey.[2]

The beginnings

The Israel Lobby is just the tip of an older and far larger iceberg known as “political Zionism,” an international movement that began in the late 1800s with the goal of creating a Jewish state somewhere in the world. In 1897 this movement, led by a European journalist named Theodore Herzl[3], coalesced in the First Zionist World Congress, held in Basle, Switzerland, which established the World Zionist Organization, representing approximately 120 groups the first year; 900 the next.[4]

While Zionists considered such places as Argentina, Uganda, and Texas,[5] they eventually settled on Palestine for the location of their proposed Jewish State, even though Palestine was already inhabited by a population that was 95 percent Muslims and Christians, who owned 99 percent of the land.[6] As numerous Zionist diary entries, letters, and other documents show, Zionists planned to push out these non-Jews – financially, if possible; violently if necessary.[7]

Political Zionism in the U.S.

In the 1880s groups advocating the setting up of a Jewish state began popping up around the United States.[8] Emma Lazarus, the poet whose words would adorn the Statue of Liberty, promoted Zionism throughout this decade.[9] A precursor to the Israeli flag was created in Boston in 1891.[10]

In 1887 President Grover Cleveland appointed a Jewish ambassador to Turkey, which at that time controlled Palestine. Jewish historian David G. Dalin reports that presidents recognized the importance of the Turkish embassy for Jewish Americans, “…especially for the growing number of Zionists within the American Jewish electorate, since the Jewish homeland of Palestine remained under the direct control of the Turkish government.”

Every president, both Republican and Democrat, followed this precedent for the next 30 years. “During this era, the ambassadorship to Turkey came to be considered a quasi-Jewish domain,” writes Dalin. [11]

By the early 1890s organizations promoting Zionism existed in New York, Chicago, Baltimore, Milwaukee, Boston, Philadelphia, and Cleveland.[12] Reports from the Zionist World Congress in Basle, which four Americans had attended, gave this movement a major stimulus, galvanizing Zionist activities in American cities that had large Jewish populations.[13]

In 1897-98 numerous additional Zionist societies were founded in the East and the Midwest. In 1898 the first annual conference of American Zionists convened in New York on the 4th of July, where they formed the Federation of American Zionists (FAZ).[14]

By 1910 the number of Zionists in the U.S. approached 20,000 and included lawyers, professors, and businessmen. Even in its infancy, when it was still considered relatively weak, Zionism was becoming a movement to which Congressmen listened, particularly in the eastern cities.[15]

The movement continued to expand, and by 1914 several additional Zionist groups had cropped up. The religious Mizrachi faction was formed in 1903, the Labor party in 1905 and Hadassah, the women’s Zionist organization, in 1912.[16]

By 1922 there were 200,000 Zionists in the U.S. and by 1948 this had grown to almost a million. [17]

From early on Zionists actively pushed their agenda in the media, one Zionist organizer proudly proclaimed in 1912 “the zealous and incessant propaganda which is carried on by countless societies.”[18] The Yiddish press from a very early period espoused the Zionist cause. By 1923 only one New York Yiddish newspaper failed to qualify as Zionist. Yiddish dailies reached 535,000 families in 1927

Alison Weir (born 1951 in Westminster) is a British writer of history books, and latterly historical novels, mostly in the form of biographies about British royalty.^{[1] [2][3]} Her works on the Tudor period have made her a best-selling author.^[4] She is the highest-selling female historian in the United Kingdom.^[wikipedia

[Special Ed]

An open question to people that disapprove of the Israeli strikes and politics. Lets say Israel just decided to not attack while Hamas was launching rockets. What solution do you have for Israel while they sit and get bombarded? And also which political solution could you force, if you had the power to rule in favor of Palestine.

Serious question. And if you would have israel suddenly 'give up land' how much and please source as to why. Where would they relocate to and who would be in charge of the new Palestinian state. How do you think a large Palestinian state would compare to Israel? Would the militas in the region lay down their arms and finally accept peace?

This is a hypothetical senario in which you make the solution in favor of Palestine. I'm curious to see which results people expect to have and the reasons for some disagreements.

[Tearloch7]

An open question to people that disapprove of the Israeli strikes and politics. Lets say Israel just decided to not attack while Hamas was launching rockets. What solution do you have for Israel while they sit and get bombarded? And also which political solution could you force, if you had the power to rule in favor of Palestine.

Serious question. And if you would have israel suddenly 'give up land' how much and please source as to why. Where would they relocate to and who would be in charge of the new Palestinian state. How do you think a large Palestinian state would compare to Israel? Would the militas in the region lay down their arms and finally accept peace?

This is a hypothetical senario in which you make the solution in favor of Palestine. I'm curious to see which results people expect to have and the reasons for some disagreements.

[GLASSJAW]

No matter what, you completely misused the word.

[Special Ed]

Cart before horse .. perhaps Israel should ask itself ..WHY ARE THESE PEOPLE CONTINUING TO SEND MAINLY FUTILE ROCKET'S AT US WHEN WE SO OBVIOUSLY ARE SUPERIOR IN EVERY WAY? ..

Once Israel asks and answers the above question honestly, there may be a chance for peace, tho Hamas must find a way to control the different disparate groups who actually fire many of the rockets ..

One answer is for Israel to attack Hamas benefactor, Iran, thus plunging the Muddle East into open conflagration, thus ensuring their own demise ..

Salt the land, and await God's decision on the next set of "tribes" he will match up ..

[Tearloch7]

And what's the answer to that question and solution that you have in mind is my question. Enlighten me on what Israel should be sayig and doing then how Palestine would react accordingly.

[Buddhas Hand]

This is NOT Alison Weir the british tudor historian. This is likely Alison Weir, the american activist. Keep an eye on emotion inducing vocabulary when reviewing articles, no matter how respectable they may seem with numbers and citations. They usually are keys to point that the writer is promoting a certain stance.