Will this increase or decrease the likelihood of terrorist actions in America, Europe and the rest of the world?

If you were a member of a family murdered in this conflict, would you be seeking revenge?

Should Tzipi Livni and Ehud Olmert, be tried for war crimes if or when this conflict comes to an end?

What will the price of oil be in 4 weeks time?

This video from Wednesday night's rally (in support of Israeli action) and protest (against Israeli action) outside the Israeli embassy.



Note which way the police face: on the protest side (black red white & green flags) they face towards the pro Hamas as if trouble is expected from the protestors. On the pro-Israel (blue and white/Union Flags) side they face away from the demonstrators as if trouble is expected from outside the protestors.

I think I read your repost of support a pro Israel demonstration was approximately 2,500 people. While yesterday's support for Palestinians was over 200,000 people. But the latter is propaganda. I would think there are many in Gazea who would like to be able to afford and free to come to this country for sanctuary.

Gausie, Again you point to the valuation system that some Israelis apply to themselves and to others.

the quotes in post 140 are succinct, to the point and much more likely to reflect the views of the general israeli populace

The reaity is that the sort of people who go to support or anti rallies are the sort of people who go to support or anti rallies. They are a self selecting group and tell you nothing about the for or against aguments or the rights or wrongs of the situation. It is the same with people who ring or email the BBC to complain about things. They are just the sort of people who do that sort of thing.

Haystack, You don't mean people like Gausie? 8-)

surprised none of you took the bait to ask what the views of the general Palestinian populace might be

Don't you think we know cynic? ;o(

The populace can't reply, you get banned!!!!

Cynic, I think the majority of readers read it with the disdain is merited.

The Israeli slant on the situation:

From http://israelinsider.ning.com/forum/topics/barry-rubin-ending-the-gaza

January 11, 2009

Last December, Hamas unilaterally ended its ceasefire with Israel and escalated the kind of cross-border attacks continually attempted even during the ceasefire. With massive public support, Israel struck back against a neighboring regime which daily attacked its citizens and called for its extermination.

For decades, Israel's history shows a general pattern: its neighbors attack, Israel responds, Israel wins the war, and the world rushes to ensure that its victory is limited or nullified. If, as sometimes happens, the diplomatic process really improves the situation and provides progress for peace that, of course, is beneficial.

Yet Israel's experience has shown that international promises made in return for its material concessions are often broken. Most recently, in 2006 the international community pledged to keep Hizballah out of south Lebanon and curb its arms' supply, failed totally, yet took no action in response to this defeat. Israel is understandably skeptical.

In addition, Israelis know that Hamas is totally dedicated to their personal and collective destruction. The group will not moderate, cannot be bought off, and will not respect any agreement it makes. As a result, the usual kinds of diplomatic tools--concessions, confidence-building, agreements, moderation resulting from having governmental responsibilities, will not work. Any solution short of Hamas's fall from power will bring more fighting in future.

What should happen is that the international community cooperates in the removal of the Hamas regime. It is an illegal government, brought to power by an unprovoked war against the Palestinian Authority (PA) which was the internationally recognized regime in the Gaza Strip. Hamas may have won the elections but it then seized total power, suspended representative government, and destroyed the opposition.

Moreover, Hamas is a radical terrorist group which openly uses antisemitic rhetoric and actively seeks to wipe Israel off the map. It oppresses the Palestinian population and leads them into endless war. It teaches young Palestinians that their career goal should not be as a teacher, engineer, or doctor but as a suicide bomber.

From a strategic standpoint, Hamas is a member of the Iran-Syria alliance which seeks to overthrow every Arab regime in the Middle East and replace it with an anti-Western, war-oriented, radical Islamist dictatorship. Hamas's survival is a big threat to both Western interests and to those of Arab nationalist regimes. Keeping Hamas in power is equivalent to an energetic Western diplomatic effort to have kept the Taliban regime in power in Afghanistan, despite its role in the September 11 attacks.

If, however, the world is not going to support Hamas's fall from office, Israel cannot bring about this result by itself. At the same time, the world will be making a big mistake if it pushes for a ceasefire at any price, thus encouraging future violence and terrorism, not only regarding Gaza but also in the region generally.

What then are Israel's options?

Two possible outcomes are rejected: Israel will not take control of the Gaza Strip again, and Israel will not accept a return to the previous situation in which Hamas repeatedly attacked Israel under cover of a ceasefire.

There are at least six major things Israel can obtain realistically:
The practical weakening of Hamas. Granted it will continue to be aggressive in future, its losses will reduce Hamas's ability to hurt Israeli citizens.
Deterrence, while retaining its longer-term goals, Hamas will be more reluctant to attack Israel lest it produce another such Israeli response.
Border control, a change from the situation in which Hamas can import weapons fairly freely to a stricter order in which humanitarian aid but not arms can come in.
The return of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, seized in a Hamas attack on Israeli soil and held hostage, lacking any contact with international humanitarian groups.
A reduction of Hamas's standing among Palestinians. Despite macho and religious rhetoric about Hamas's strength, Gaza Palestinians are more eager for a return of the PA; West Bank citizens, living under more moderate PA rule, realize that extremism is disastrous.
Regional perception of Hamas's defeat, lowering support for the Iran-Syria alliance and encouraging more moderate Arab forces to resist radical Islamism and Tehran's power.

Despite this being the best realistic program, Israel also knows significant factors that might mean it won't work entirely:
Hamas will break any agreement and not change.
The international community is weak and contains tendencies toward appeasing extremists to avoid trouble.
Egypt even when well-intended is not so efficient at controlling the border.

Thus, even this best-case scenario has problems. First, Hamas will return to building up its forces for future confrontations, teaching a whole generation that it should prepare to sacrifice itself to achieve a "final solution" of the Israel problem. In short, any outcome that leaves Hamas in place is at best a lull until the next round.

Second, it is quite possible that within days or weeks of any agreement, Hamas--partly to prove to itself and others how it remains unbowed--will return to firing rockets and mortar rounds into Israel as well as trying to carry out terrorist attacks across the border. In that case, Israel will have to respond much more seriously than it has in the past to such behavior. A world which guarantees the ceasefire better be prepared to remember Israel's legitimate interests in enforcing it.

Finally, as long as Hamas survives as rulers of the Gaza Strip, it will be impossible to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The PA will be too intimidated to make compromises and cannot even deliver its own people. There can be no Palestinian state with half the territory being controlled by an organization which will never accept an agreement and will do everything possible to wreck it.

"Saving" Hamas and making the main or sole priority pushing for a ceasefire at any price is a very short-sighted policy for the international community which will be paid for in future. If the Gaza war is going to be ended, it should be in the framework of solving the problems that let Hamas create the war in the first place.

*A different version of this article was published in The Age (Melbourne, Australia)

Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center and editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs Journal. His latest books are The Israel-Arab Reader (seventh edition), with Walter Laqueur (Viking-Penguin); the paperback edition of The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan); A Chronological History of Terrorism, with Judy Colp Rubin, (Sharpe); and The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East (Wiley).

Personal view, Gausie, I think the majority of readers read it with the distain merited.

You post a one off incident at a protest march here in your favour and totally egnore what Israel is doing... bombarding Palastine with USA ammo night and day! In fact you go so far as indicate which way people are looking in the film! Do you want some coverage of the Israli missile attacks???? Let us know?

Get real, we are not thick!

The Israelis and the Palestinians deserve each other, just ignore them and they will eventually settle their land dispute.

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=phTtykyzWm0&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B5b1aeMky90

Exec.

I printed the diatribe, which you pasted to the board earlier, for a closer look. I think it is deliberate Israeli propaganda to deviate public attention from what appears to be the present Israeli governments mission.

It completely ignores the fact that Israel, with the aid of America, during latter years, has completely ignored at least 60 United Nation mandates. Has by force, annexed Palestinians land, destroyed Palestinian habitation, uprooted the indigenous population, imprisoned those who it has defined militant terrorists without trial. Murdered Palestinian leaders, without trial, with their death squads.

Continued to attempt to suffocate Gaza and the West Bank.

Ignoring, as they please, apolitical international humanitarian agencies.

Often an excuse used by Israel for its actions is the Holocaust.

The comparison with the actions of the Nazis in Europe during WW2 is obvious and in many ways apt.

Here are a few points, which I think relevant.

These as approximated figures

Total deaths as the result of WW2 = 72,751,900

Total Holocaust deaths (for argument sake, lets consider them all to be of Jewish Faith) = 5,762,400

The latter approximates to 3.8% of the total deaths of the WW2 period.

The numbers are horrific, the methods of killing horrendous but the media attention given to the holocaust is disproportionate to the deaths of other recognisable groups.

Another point is that, I think if one examines the DNA of the people of Israel, it would be found that it is of various mixes.

The racial mix would be similar to that of Britain, and the countries of Europe and much of the traveled world.

Israel was formed by those who were united by a religion or an ideology and not a specific race, as many would lead us to believe.

Another irritating remark, which was made on another posting, is that the Palestinians were initially just wanderings tribes. I think this remark is applicable to all our ancestors.


The problem in the Middle East needs honest mediation, not violent abuse and attempt to subjugate one population by another.

Eventually, this will occur.

--->EXECLINE

Rather than waste my time ripping that post to shreds in a step by step manner, I just want to comment on one point that immediately jumps up from that post to illustrate the inequality of this conflict and the relative injustice of it all.

The Israeli slanted post asks for....

The return of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, seized in a Hamas attack on Israeli soil and held hostage, lacking any contact with international humanitarian groups.


...and hasn't Israeli propaganda made the most of this one single prisoner held by the Palesinian side? Perhaps they might like to trade him for the 10,756 Palestinian prisoners the Israelis hold in their jails (as of Nov 2008), many if not most, of whom were seized on Palestinian soil (the little they have left them with).

Regards,

THE COUNT!

There is a very intersting book called The Thirteenth Tribe. I covers a period of the Khazar Empire in eastern Eirope, somehwere near modern Turkey. There was a king there who had conquered various other states and wanted to bring them all together.

He reasoned that a common religion would be a good idea. He looked at various religions and chose Judaism. These converted Jews form the basis of eastern european Jews (Ashkenazim) when they moved to Polend after being concquered by Genghis Khan. The other section of Jews are Sephardim, who lived in Spain for many years and are the true ancestors of Israel.

The eastern european Jews are therefore not really Jews at all in the strict sense as you cannot be Jewish unless your mother is Jewish. Therefore the bulk of Jews now living in Israel have no legitimate claim to live there.

The writer of the book, Arthur Koestler is himself an Ashkenazim Jew.

Brocks, Thank you for your e-mail of support sent via Moneyam. I agree with some of the sentiments.

I not sure how you transgressed and appear banned.

I wonder if I will suffer the same fate or fete.

Regards

Fred

The cartoon manif this was a tennis match I would say you were 2 sets down 5-0 down in the thirdserving to stay in the match at love fortysecond serve with a broken racketand youve just developed cramp.good post THE COUNT

Tabby - you'd also say that MDX will be 35p by xmas. And MKS is a long.

And as for those poor oppressed turks who the greeks grabbed part of cyprus from - they have nothing whatsoever to do with this thread.