Second, it isn't Israel's land-...on what are you basing the assertion that it is?
That it belongs to them. Come on tins; you have to be reasonable: the land doesn't belong to Israel merely on your say so. I've already provided the sources on which I'm basing my opinion - if you can't do the same, then that's just dogma.
Wait, is this thread still going? I thought we resolved everything.
[...]
Ah, J. J. Phillips, I'm glad you're back in this thread. I think you might have missed my reply on the previous page: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1012231.msg11255554#msg11255554; in it, I answered your requests for sources and background information, and commented on the rest of your post in some detail - by the way, let me apologize in advance for the great wall of text.  Also, the previous post, for which, at the time, you didn't have the opportunity to answer in full, is now back at page 6; here's the link to the post, if you want to take a look at it again: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1012231.msg11065074#msg11065074 - I touched upon, and somewhat expanded a few of the same points in my latest reply though, so feel free to merge those, if you will. |
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I would like to continue in the campaign:
Bitcoin Address: 1KnRA3dbGsAV8cw64sckjFz6uAEXJf2JCo
Post Count: 1690
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Hi!  How BTC bitcoin developed in your country? Are there many people in your real life that you know that use BTC ? i'm from EU. i work in IT since 1996... a lot of people in my factory have hear about bitcoin.. but no one use it or is actively involved in to bitcoin. bitcoin has still a long way to do... I'm also from the EU (though from another country, it seems), and very few people I know in real life are aware of, and far less actually use, Bitcoin. I'm also not aware of any shops near me that accept Bitcoin. 
Hi! How BTC bitcoin developed in your country? Are there many people in your real life that you know that use BTC ? Not at all. Very few people use it and not many have heard about it. I think there was some speculation about 500k people in the world actively using it. Well, that's already more than the population of Iceland - not too bad.  |
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do you know other forum u know?
I read in a thread somewhere around here that https://letstalkbitcoin.com had some form of pay to post system; however, I have no idea how that worked in practice, or if it is still active. I suspect a few other (mostly small) forums will also occasionally have rewards for posting, probably as a way to bring in new content. |
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LuckyBit has re-opened its campaign, with new terms; however, updating the Simple Table to accommodate those terms might be a problem (at least if you want to keep it at one entry per campaign), since they practically create 4 different campaigns, with different durations, payouts, and conditions. I believe the most relevant alterations are the following: [...] How to enroll[...] (2). Adjust your account settings to match your enrollment. This means Signature, Personal Message (PM), and Avatar.[...]
Enrollment SlotsThere are four enrollment slots to choose from. Select the one that best suits your needs. You must have made the Wager Requirement within the past 7 days, using your application address! | Available | Slot | Term | Posts Required | Wager Required | Min Rank | Pay | | 10 | Supporter | 7 days | 10 | 0.002BTC | Member | 0.01BTC | | 8 | Affiliate | 28 days | 40 | 0.01BTC | Full Member | 0.08BTC | | 5 | Advertiser | 28 days | 40 | 0.05BTC | Senior Member | 0.15BTC | | 2 | BADASS | 7 days | 7 | 0.2BTC | Full Member | 0.05BTC |
Each Bitcoin Talk user may only take one BADASS slot per 28 days. The signature codes, PM codes, avatars, and current enrollments, including availability, are always updated in the first reply to this post. Lucky Bit staff members always have the option to use the "red" avatar we already feature instead of the required one and are not required to change their PM. [...] Also, it might be convenient to start identifying the campaigns that require users to have an avatar/personal message set, as is the case of LuckyBit. |
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Freedom for all the people.
Send all Muslims to the Middle East.
Region arrest denies mobility rights to the arrested (above, “Muslims” [BADecker]). Not only that, but why do you want to send all Muslims to the Middle East, BADecker? I know I'm going to regret asking this, but anyway... you do realize most Muslims have little or no connection whatsoever to the Middle East, apart from their fairy tale of choice, right?  |
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my favorite anime is inuyasha  Unfortunately, that anime has way too many fillers, I think. If they reduced it to about a third of the number of episodes, I would also consider it to be one of my favorites.
My favourite anime is Angel Beats. Great story, great music. It is worth checking out.
I liked, and laughed, a lot with Angel Beats too; but the story, although great, seems quite rushed - [spoilers follow!] the shadow like creatures that show up at one point, for example, could and, I believe, should have been better used to progress (or in this case end) the story. [/spoilers] Those minor complaints apart, I agree that it certainly is worth checking out.
Naruto, of course.
Wow. Did you register in a Bitcoin forum specifically to post that you like Naruto (first post!)? Now, that's dedication. |
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Another case of police abuse I don't think received nearly as much attention as it should have was that of David Chong. He was jailed by the DEA after being caught during a raid on a friend's house - he had apparently gone there to smoke marijuana. The DEA left him handcuffed in a windowless cell, for five days, with no food, water, or even a toilet he could use. With the agents ignoring his cries for help, and with no water, he had to resort to drinking his own urine. True to the usual culture of impunity, the agents responsible were given only very light sentences: letters of reprimand for most, and week long suspensions without pay for a couple of them. The story as covered by TYT: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vz6dNmeqrQQ.
 http://explosm.net/comics/3919 |
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Your body paralyzes itself when you sleep to keep you from acting out your dreams. However, it is possible to wake up while still paralyzed; many people who have experienced this claim they felt a malevolent presence nearby. This is where most alien encounter stories come from.
Are you talking about sleep paralysis? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleep_paralysisI've heard that this is also a possible "side effect" when you try lucid dreaming. Although it lasts only a short amount of time, it is very uncomfortable. I've also heard that one should not look at a mirror while in such a dream? While in a lucid dream? I don't remember ever trying to do so myself, but supposedly, the only problem with looking at a mirror while dreaming is you won't necessarily see yourself, but rather, a distorted image of yourself, which may startle you (and lead you to either waking up, or falling into a normal dream). As for sleep paralyses, in some cases (particularly when pathology is involved), it may apparently last quite longer than "a short amount of time": https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=965301. |
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I don't think the Palestinian position includes a return to the 1947 borders, but rather, to the 1967 borders (which is already, pretty much, the international consensus) - the negotiations I described above, for example (in point 2 of the large reply, just a few posts back, especially the Clinton Parameters and the negotiations at Taba), were based on this division, with a few minor adjustments to account for settlements and such (both sides agreed to this, though there were still a few other issues left to be resolved at those negotiations).
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[J. J. Phillips' post] I don't think Israel has any good choices. The terrorism won't stop no matter what they do. The barrier/fence/wall cut down on suicide bombings, but just led to more rocket attacks. I don't think Israel would get attacked less if they didn't respond (both militarily and by building settlements).
I doubt Israel gives 2 shits about international consensus. It's Israel's land so I doubt they care what Sudan has to say about it. First, that was a response to jaysabi's post, hence why I mentioned the international consensus; and the international consensus isn't just Sudan - it's almost everyone. But you're right, Israel doesn't care about that, or for that matter, international law, or anything like it (while the US allows them to get away with it, anyway). Second, it isn't Israel's land, by anyone's admission (including Israel) - on what are you basing the assertion that it is?
This is an interesting point. It's always been part of the negotiation that Israeli settlers won't be allowed to stay in what becomes Palestine, and yet it seems out of the question to expel Arabs from Israel. This makes sense, of course. Arabs know they're reasonably safe in Israel and have political rights. Everyone knows that Jews who remain in the new Palestine without Israel's explicit protection will be massacred.
But think about what this implies.
Yes, that's true. How then should Israel go about giving away their land to "palestinians" for a 2-state solution knowing full well it would result in mass Jewish murders? So, are we just supposed to pretend the occupied territories are a part of Israel now, that it can keep them or give them away as it wills? I ask this because no one recognizes that to be the case: not any international body, not any other country, and not even Israel itself - in fact, that's the position Israel's own Supreme Court has consistently maintained since 1967. Further, as I and others have mentioned before (and you can see more details in my response above, in point 2), the Palestinian position is that they are open to the idea of land swaps, which, in effect, would translate into the most populous Israeli settlements in the West Bank being annexed by Israel, and an equitable amount of Israeli land being offered in return to the Palestinian state. But, this is all mostly academic, of course, since Israel doesn't want the two state solution (or the one state solution), and has in fact been working very hard to prevent any such solution from ever taking place - my previous posts in this thread have paragraphs, after paragraphs detailing some of the ways they went about doing so (and providing sources where anyone can read more about it, if they are interested). Third, I've already addressed J. J. Phillips' assertion (which I don't think is true) in several posts (J. J. Phillips had used variations of that argument before), including in the one you quoted, though you omitted that part. In short, Israel has very good choices, like: not making the situation worse by attacking and terrorizing the Palestinian population, and actually moving to form a negotiated peace deal, instead of blocking it. I agree with you for the most part, the violence and the rockets need to stop. The only thing I would add here is the question, do you believe the Israel does nothing to perpetuate hostilities? I guess specifically I mean the expansion of Jewish settlements into what both sides have at times previously recognized as land designated as part of a future Palestinian state.
I don't think Israel has any good choices. The terrorism won't stop no matter what they do. The barrier/fence/wall cut down on suicide bombings, but just led to more rocket attacks. I don't think Israel would get attacked less if they didn't respond (both militarily and by building settlements). We've both argued our sides here. I respectfully disagree that building settlements isn't a provocation. I think militarily, Israel is provocative too, but this is a chicken-and-the-egg type of argument. Israel really doesn't have a choice but to respond militarily when they are attacked (for political reasons, moral is another question). Just as Israel could not respond militarily, Palestinians could just as easily stop firing rockets. Palestinian rocket fire into civilian centers is wrong, and is almost certainly a war crime - but it isn't only a response to the illegal Israeli settlements. In the last point of my answer above, I described at some length what some of the realities of the occupation mean to the Palestinian population: soldiers firing on civilians, sometimes killing them; Israeli courts failing to punish those actions; house demolitions of crime suspects (collective punishment of the families living there); torture of criminals, suspects and apparently even innocent people; very heavy handed response to any protest or demonstration (use of live ammo, for example); land annexation, not only with settlements, of important resource rich areas (mostly containing water sources and farmland), but also with the wall Israel is building, military bases and outposts that displace Palestinians, Israeli controlled checkpoints inside the occupied territories, etc.; settler violence and state cover up of that violence; mass arrests; administrative detention; extra-judicial assassinations; the sanctions and blockade of Gaza, leaving the population there in a desperate situation; the attacks on Gaza, that destroy a good deal of the infrastructure and kill thousands, worsening the effects of the sanctions and blockade regime; and so on. Rocket fire might receive more attention, but it pales in comparison to Israeli actions. And again, for you to have the right to use violence, you need to show you really have no peaceful option open to you; Israel has consistently failed here - my last two (large) posts go into considerable detail on why and how. But, even if you want to throw morality out the window, Israel should at least not use the indiscriminate Dahiya doctrine, and certainly shouldn't be telling its soldiers to fire on anything that isn't an IDF soldier, when in their periodical excursions to Gaza (which, going by the Israeli NGO Breaking the Silence, they pretty much did): https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1051663. Fourth, I don't know if you missed it, but: the Palestinian position is that they are open to the idea of land swaps
Well of course they are, now...they should have accepted the land offered to them in '47... Maybe; but how does that justify Israel blocking a peace deal now - 70 years later? What's the endgame here? |
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the Palestinian position is that they are open to the idea of land swaps
Well of course they are, now...they should have accepted the land offered to them in '47... Maybe; but how does that justify Israel blocking a peace deal now - 70 years later? What's the endgame here?
So what it is the "legitimate" claim for Israel as a state then? It seems to me the same situation: Israel declared itself a state in 1948 at the end of the British Mandate, and then it was accepted as a state by the international community. It seems just as arbitrary as Palestine, which has declared itself a state and is recognized by a majority of the world, both in terms of number of governments, and a vast majority of the population represented by those governments. I'm just trying to drill down as to what the specific difference is here, on a technical "what is a state" level.
Hmm. Good point. What do you think is a representative document in which Palestine declares itself a state? I'll take a look and see if leads me to accept their statehood. This is where I take the information about Palestinian declaration of state: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_Declaration_of_Independence One of the problems with the Palestinian declaration is that it is predicated on the 1947 partition borders. As we have already agreed, this is probably no longer applicable/possible, as too much has changed in the last 65 years for those borders to be workable. But from the Palestinian point of view, this is what they consider to be their state, and Israeli "occupation" of that area is a provocation. It seems to me to have any progress on this, the world needs to work towards helping the Palestinians accept that the original borders are no longer on the table, due to Arab aggression towards Israel following the 1947 plan. But I'm getting ahead of myself. The point here is that Palestine should be a state, and now both sides just need to be reasonable about what the borders should be. And one thing I find absolute is that Israeli settlement expansion is not reasonable, and this is entirely Israel's fault since the government encourages it. I don't think the Palestinian position includes a return to the 1947 borders, but rather, to the 1967 borders (which is already, pretty much, the international consensus) - the negotiations I described above, for example (in point 2 of the large reply, just a few posts back, especially the Clinton Parameters and the negotiations at Taba), were based on this division, with a few minor adjustments to account for settlements and such (both sides agreed to this, though there were still a few other issues left to be resolved at those negotiations). I agree with you for the most part, the violence and the rockets need to stop. The only thing I would add here is the question, do you believe the Israel does nothing to perpetuate hostilities? I guess specifically I mean the expansion of Jewish settlements into what both sides have at times previously recognized as land designated as part of a future Palestinian state.
I don't think Israel has any good choices. The terrorism won't stop no matter what they do. The barrier/fence/wall cut down on suicide bombings, but just led to more rocket attacks. I don't think Israel would get attacked less if they didn't respond (both militarily and by building settlements). We've both argued our sides here. I respectfully disagree that building settlements isn't a provocation. I think militarily, Israel is provocative too, but this is a chicken-and-the-egg type of argument. Israel really doesn't have a choice but to respond militarily when they are attacked (for political reasons, moral is another question). Just as Israel could not respond militarily, Palestinians could just as easily stop firing rockets. Palestinian rocket fire into civilian centers is wrong, and is almost certainly a war crime - but it isn't only a response to the illegal Israeli settlements. In the last point of my answer above, I described at some length what some of the realities of the occupation mean to the Palestinian population: soldiers firing on civilians, sometimes killing them; Israeli courts failing to punish those actions; house demolitions of crime suspects (collective punishment of the families living there); torture of criminals, suspects and apparently even innocent people; very heavy handed response to any protest or demonstration (use of live ammo, for example); land annexation, not only with settlements, of important resource rich areas (mostly containing water sources and farmland), but also with the wall Israel is building, military bases and outposts that displace Palestinians, Israeli controlled checkpoints inside the occupied territories, etc.; settler violence and state cover up of that violence; mass arrests; administrative detention; extra-judicial assassinations; the sanctions and blockade of Gaza, leaving the population there in a desperate situation; the attacks on Gaza, that destroy a good deal of the infrastructure and kill thousands, worsening the effects of the sanctions and blockade regime; and so on. Rocket fire might receive more attention, but it pales in comparison to Israeli actions. And again, for you to have the right to use violence, you need to show you really have no peaceful option open to you; Israel has consistently failed here - my last two (large) posts go into considerable detail on why and how. But, even if you want to throw morality out the window, Israel should at least not use the indiscriminate Dahiya doctrine, and certainly shouldn't be telling its soldiers to fire on anything that isn't an IDF soldier, when in their periodical excursions to Gaza (which, going by the Israeli NGO Breaking the Silence, they pretty much did): https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1051663. I think your analysis of the situation and the motivation of Israel is reasonable. I don't disagree with it, but I do also feel that this approach makes victims of people who aren't deserving in many cases. By lumping all Palestinians together, Israel looks to punish "them" by taking "their" land when the radicals commit violence against Israel. But the blanket use of force against "Palestinians" and not the specific individuals who commited the violence makes victims out of people who had nothing to do with the violence. I think this is where much anger comes from. And then the radicals use this as proof of how 'evil' Israel is and radicalize more people for the intifadas and the rocket campaigns. I'm not justifying the violence, but I'm saying that I don't believe the Israeli approach to it doesn't solve the problem, and actually makes it worse. It hasn't solved it for decades, and I guess at this point it only looks like it will when there are no Palestinian lands left, and then it still won't, because there will continue to be terrorist attacks.
As for the Palestinians stopping it themselves, I hardly know how they could. There are no resources in Palestine for police or courts or just general society. To the extent Palestinians have jobs, they travel to Israel for work, when they are allowed to cross the border. There are just no resources for a functioning society, and it is very easy to say "that's the price of being terrorists, because then Israel has to wall them off from everyone else" but this is also an overslimpification of what is happening (IMO). It creates victims of people who are innocent, and this creates anger and resentment, and then a radical group wants to use them as a proxy for their war against Israel, and it's easy to marshal that anger at that point.
It is preferable to me when Israel targets specific people. Propaganda-wise it doesn't seem to make a difference. When Israel targets specific leaders they're accused of going on an assassination campaign against Palestinian leaders. (Of course, they are, but this is supposed to be a good thing.) When Israel responds with a large bombing campaign or with import controls, they're accused of collective punishment. Regarding Palestinian resources,the Palestinians get a huge amount of foreign aid (billions of dollars a year). I haven't studied how they spend it. Here's my impression which people can try to prove wrong if they like: Palestinians spend some of the aid on schools that indoctrinate children to become Jihadis, some of the money on weapons to use against Israel, and most of the rest of the aid to secret bank accounts for Palestinian Authority officials. I'm basing the last part on memories of Arafat's wife, who I assume is somewhere in Europe being very rich. I would be very surprised if any of the money went to stop or punish Jihadis. That might be a condition of the aid, but it's a condition with a wink because no one can realistically expect it to happen. The only time in my memory that the Palestinians have done anything to combat terrorism is in 2006 when they had a civil war and fought each other. To really understand my point of view, it's important to recognize that I think the primary goal of the Palestinians is not to have a state, but to eliminate the Jews from their region. Under that assumption, their actions make more sense, and it's difficult to imagine a good strategy to counter it. If Israel doesn't respond at all, it will be destroyed. When Israel does respond, there are more people in the world who want Israel destroyed. The frustration I often show is due to my suspicion that I'll live to see the day that it'll happen, and that people around the world will celebrate it. It wouldn't surprise me in the least that an unfortunate amount of aid winds up in the personal accounts of the political leadership of Palestine. This is repeated everywhere in the world to poor nations the developed world supports. The solution to me is to stop providing aid (my view as a selfish tax payer), because our intervention entrenches tyrants who have the resources to impose their will. (1)I understand your point of view, I just disagree with it (largely, not entirely). I think there is definitely an element that wants to destroy Israel and there are people who use this anger for their own political advantage, but I also think this is a minority compared to the people who just want their own state and to live in peace. As I stated above, I think the (unreasonable) expectation to have the 1947 borders leads to a mentality of purposeful and willful "occupation" that is not necessarily justified. (2) The violence over this isn't aimed at "destroying Israel," it's aimed at driving out the "occupation." (I'm using "occupation" because I don't believe everything the Palestinians view to be occupied territory to be a legitimate claim.) But I think the distinction between the motivation of destroying Israel and ending the occupation to be important, as the former motivation is murderous, but the latter is defensive. Any population on Earth would, and has, violently resisted what they viewed to be an armed and hostile occupation. I think the majority of the Palestinian violence is of the latter motivation now, but I am not blind to the fact that there are still factions bent on the destruction of Israel. But their numbers will continue to dwindle, as they have since the aggressive wars against Israel began in 1947. -There is certainly a great deal of corruption, and indeed, the Palestinians themselves are the first to complain about this, as I noted above (in the polls part of the large post). But stopping aid in a "NGO economy", when they have little or no conditions to live by themselves, largely thanks to Israeli balkanization of the occupied territories, in addition to the sanctions and blockade of Gaza and continued illegal land grabs in the West Bank, could have dire consequences to the population living there - for example, at the worst of the blockade of Gaza "more than 80% of Palestinians in Gaza rely on humanitarian assistance, with UN food aid going to about 1.1 million people - three quarters of the population." In my view, a better approach, for you as a "selfish tax payer", would be to move the US to put pressure on Israel to prevent it stalling negotiations and avoiding a peace agreement that would allow a viable Palestinian state to emerge - the rest are temporary measures at best, or harmful at worst. (2) - "I think the (unreasonable) expectation to have the 1947 borders leads to a mentality of purposeful and willful 'occupation' that is not necessarily justified"? As far as I can tell, no one has that expectation. And, regardless of what expectations Palestinians might have, the "mentality [of living under occupation]" is justified by the facts of how the occupation actually works in practice. Further, the "expectations" they expressed in their negotiations so far seem, at least to me, to be quite reasonable and closely in line with the international consensus (see the negotiations at Taba, for example - and in fact, I should say "generous" instead of "reasonable", since in some points they are going beyond what international law actually requires of them).
By the way, jaysabi, thanks for mentioning the book "On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society" in a previous post - I actually didn't imagine firing rates were that low initially, and the length the soldiers would go to avoid killing others. I'll have to take a better look at that. |
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This is an interesting point. It's always been part of the negotiation that Israeli settlers won't be allowed to stay in what becomes Palestine, and yet it seems out of the question to expel Arabs from Israel. This makes sense, of course. Arabs know they're reasonably safe in Israel and have political rights. Everyone knows that Jews who remain in the new Palestine without Israel's explicit protection will be massacred.
But think about what this implies.
Yes, that's true. How then should Israel go about giving away their land to "palestinians" for a 2-state solution knowing full well it would result in mass Jewish murders? So, are we just supposed to pretend the occupied territories are a part of Israel now, that it can keep them or give them away as it wills? I ask this because no one recognizes that to be the case: not any international body, not any other country, and not even Israel itself - in fact, that's the position Israel's own Supreme Court has consistently maintained since 1967. Further, as I and others have mentioned before (and you can see more details in my response above, in point 2), the Palestinian position is that they are open to the idea of land swaps, which, in effect, would translate into the most populous Israeli settlements in the West Bank being annexed by Israel, and an equitable amount of Israeli land being offered in return to the Palestinian state. But, this is all mostly academic, of course, since Israel doesn't want the two state solution (or the one state solution), and has in fact been working very hard to prevent any such solution from ever taking place - my previous posts in this thread have paragraphs, after paragraphs detailing some of the ways they went about doing so (and providing sources where anyone can read more about it, if they are interested). |
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Master of Orion II is definitely one of the best of its kind (and I still have it installed ). However, the best 4x space strategy game I ever came across was Space Empires V; the only complaints I have against it are its poor graphics (by today's standards), and weak AI (though it has multiplayer options). I have recently started looking for another game of this type, and came across Cosmic Supremacy, which is an online based version of these games - it doesn't seem bad: you can "design" your own ships; there are a good number of technologies to research; fair amount of buildings available - but it seems quite limited, when compared to the games mentioned above. Still, if someone wants to give it a try: http://cosmicsupremacy.com (it's not browser based however, and does require a small download to work). Anyway, if someone finds a very good, online, massively multiplayer, feature rich, (preferably) browser based, game of this kind, let me know. |
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It's quite a stretch to go from "you broke the law, so you should go to jail", to "you broke the law, so I'm going to beat you up, maybe kill you in the process, and then I'm going to throw you in jail".
I didn't say what they did was right but most people like to jump on the cop hating bandwagon when many of these people have endangered others. And many others haven't; that apparently not being a sufficient reason for the police not to harm, or sometimes, kill them. And indeed, you didn't say it was right for the police to beat people up, but you're throwing a "the best way to stop cops from beating you up is don't break the law" like it's some sort of inevitability, or, dare I say, an understandable outcome - it isn't; it's dependent on training (or lack thereof) the police receive, and often enough, the culture of impunity they've got going. |
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Banned for being full member  Banned for emoji use. Banned for reviving this thread. Further banned for not banning the right person. |
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There are 2 sides to every story and all of these people did something that would get the cops on them in the first place. The best way to stop cops from beating you up is don't break the law.
It's quite a stretch to go from "you broke the law, so you should go to jail", to "you broke the law, so I'm going to beat you up, maybe kill you in the process, and then I'm going to throw you in jail". |
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This video doesn't show police physical abuse, but in the context of the protests going on in Baltimore, I thought it was an interesting addition (and I'm too lazy to create a thread specifically for it ): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RqFCqqG6nYk, "A Camera Prevents An Arrest - Baltimore Police admit that camera presence during an interaction with a young man prevented his arrest" (5m10s, video was shot on May, 2). A quote from one of the police officers: "he would have been going to jail if it wasn't for this guy with the camera, who is probably going to put us on Youtube saying we illegally detained a black man". |
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Israel has repeatedly denied reports of deliberate targeting of civilians during its wars in the Gaza Strip, those claims were once again proven false today with the release of a new report by Israeli veterans NGO Breaking the Silence. The report features testimony from more than 60 Israeli soldiers who confirmed that not only did they deliberately target civilians during the most recent invasion, but that they were explicitly ordered to do so.
“Whoever you see there, you kill,” is how one soldier summed up the orders. He said soldiers were told the civilians “knew they’re not supposed to be there” and therefore they were to kill anyone who wasn’t an Israeli soldier on sight. Soldiers went on to say that traditional admonishments to use “minimum force” were thrown out the window in the war, and that civilian homes were deliberately attacked “without any clear operational justification,” sometimes just because the military wanted to demonstrate their military control over the neighborhoods. http://news.antiwar.com/2015/05/04/israeli-troops-ordered-to-kill-civilians-on-sight-during-gaza-invasion/The following articles give somewhat of a more complete view, and contain more of the testimonies the soldiers (from several ranks, up to major) apparently gave: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/may/04/israeli-soldiers-cast-doubt-on-legality-of-gaza-military-operation, http://www.timesofisrael.com/israeli-ngo-accuses-army-of-violating-its-moral-code-in-gaza. It's not as if we don't already know of the Israeli Dahiya military doctrine 1 of course, but this seems to go beyond even that; a couple of quotes from The Guardian article, regarding the testimonies: "They include allegations that Israeli ground troops were briefed to regard everything inside Gaza as a “threat” and they should “not spare ammo”, and that tanks fired randomly or for revenge on buildings without knowing whether they were legitimate military targets or contained civilians." "Ahead of the conflict – in which 34,000 shells were fired into Gaza, 19,000 of them explosive – artillery and air liaison officers had been supplied with a list of sensitive sites to which fire was not to be directed within clear limits of distance. These included hospitals and UN schools being used as refugee centres, even in areas where evacuation had been ordered. 'Even then,' explains Shaul, 'we have a testimony we took that a senior brigade commander issued order how to get around that, instructing that the unit fired first outside of the protected area and then calling for correction fire on to the location that they wanted to hit. 'He said: 'If you go on the radio and ask to hit this building, we have to say no. But if you give a target 200 metres outside then you can ask for correction. Only thing that is recorded is the first target not the correction fire.'" Also, it's worth noting that the disregard for Palestinian lives isn't unique to the times the IDF decides to march into Gaza; civilians in Gaza and the West Bank live under constant occupation, that often sees soldiers and security forces firing against, and sometimes killing them, for no good reason. I gave a more detailed account with sources in a previous post I recently made (and a lot more cases are easy to find unfortunately): https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1012231.msg11255554#msg11255554. 1 - A leaked cable from 2008 describes the strategy, with comments from the current Israeli Chief of General Staff, Gadi Eizenkot: " 6. Eisenkot labeled any Israeli response to resumed conflict the "Dahiya doctrine" in reference to the leveled Dahiya quarter in Beirut during the Second Lebanon War in 2006. He said Israel will use disproportionate force upon any village that fires upon Israel, "causing great damage and destruction." Eisenkot made very clear: this is not a recommendation, but an already approved plan -- from the Israeli perspective, these are "not civilian villages, they are military bases." Eisenkot in this statement echoed earlier private statements made by IDF Chief of General Staff Gabi Ashkenazi, who said the next fight in Southern Lebanon would come at a much higher cost for both sides -- and that the IDF would not hold back." " 7. (SBU) Eisenkot stated that Damascus fully understands what the Israelis did in Dahiya, and that the Israelis have the capability of doing the same to Syria. He suggested the possibility of harm to the population has been Hizballah leader Nasrallah's main constraint, and the reason for the quiet over the past two years." |
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I think no one has posted the Bitnik Reload signature campaign yet: Bitnik Reload ( Thread) Payment period: Monthly. Minimum posts: 60 posts per month. Payments: L/H: 0.14 BTC per month. Escrow: Yes, Carra23 (also managing the campaign). Miscellaneous: Maximum participants: H/L: 7 slots. If majority of the required 60 posts is in non-English, Speculation, Games and Rounds, Investor based games, Auctions, Politics & Society, Off-topic sections, Alternative Cryptocurrencies, Meta or done in a few days, then you may be disqualified or denied re-enrollment. No other signature is allowed at the same time. You must have no negative feedback points. [b]Bitnik Reload[/b] ([url=https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1044784]Thread[/url])
[i]Payment period:[/i] Monthly.
[i]Minimum posts:[/i] 60 posts per month.
[i]Payments:[/i] L/H: 0.14[BTC] per month.
[u][i]Escrow[/i][/u]: Yes, Carra23 (also managing the campaign).
[i]Miscellaneous:[/i] Maximum participants: H/L: 7 slots. If majority of the required 60 posts is in non-English, Speculation, Games and Rounds, Investor based games, Auctions, Politics & Society, Off-topic sections, Alternative Cryptocurrencies, Meta or done in a few days, then you may be disqualified or denied re-enrollment. No other signature is allowed at the same time. You must have no negative feedback points.
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I am holding everyone in such "high" regard, no matter who I haven't pushed any capitalism VS communism really. First the term "capitalism" was not defined by free market lovers like myself. Secondly, of course no system is perfect. You simply have economical poles that attract a lot of people and other poles needing walls and machine guns to keep people from running away from them. Strangely enough people seem to love the feeling of being free. Of course is it really freedom? U.S. Police states, etc, etc... Still the nostalgia of communism is rarely felt from the people waiting hours in the snow for a loaf of bread "back in the good old days..." The main theme is : was communism responsible for, at least, 94 million deaths. Some here believe 94 millions is a low number. Replying "capitalism killed too" is a way of saying "Yes!" Thank you for all that reading material. No one here is denying "communism" was responsible for those deaths Wilikon. However, my point wasn't "capitalism killed too, so the article is silly"; the point was "communism saved lives too, so don't throw the baby out with the bath water" and "that article is silly". Also, you can argue you didn't wittingly push a "capitalism Vs communism" debate, but the article you quoted and which I was criticizing, and the poll it was partly based on, certainly did (although, I agree that, as with "communism", it's also questionable to what extent the current system resembles "capitalism" in any significant way): [...] communism was the leading ideological cause of death [...] Communism is a killer. And yet some still say they support the idea: According to a 2011 Rasmussen poll, 11% of Americans think that communism would better serve this country’s needs than our current system. [...]
Questions - Communism - March 12-13, 2011
1* Is the United States system of politics and economics morally superior to communism or is communism morally superior to the United States system of politics and economics?
2* In practical economic terms, do free market economies work better than communist economies or do communist economies work better than free market economies?
3* What system is better for middle class workers-- the United States system of politics and economics or communism?
4* Is communism a failed ideology?
5* In terms of world history, how important was the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe?
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