Has Netanyahu over played his hand?

[ViolentPanda]

Well of course that's true but it seems the Israeli's care less and less about "fig leaves either these days.

The state cares less and less because it isn't compelled to give a damn.

True but the question still remains, does Israel's policy towards the Palestinians equal cultural genocide? I am loathe to use such an emotive word but how else to describe the systematic attempt to destroy the physical, material and cultural identity of the Palestinian people. I have used the word ethnic cleansing and I think this is accurate. So what is the difference? That the Israeli's haven't liquidated the Palestinians? No they haven't but they have come pretty close to destroying them as a people. This is not extermination, it is physical and cultural dislocation. It is ethnic cleansing.

That depends on what you mean by "ethnic cleansing", and whether you're using it in the sense of the Russian Tartars being moved from one end of the Soviet Union to the other, or in the sense it was utilised in the former Yugoslavia.

Not yet but as we are witnessing right now, the process continues.

Of course it does.
If the state of Israel knows that the consequences for its actions are going to be miniscule to non-existent, and that it will be able to portray Palestinian vengeance as "terrorism", then it'll proceed along the same path.

Ok this is an argument that is powerful and leaves me struggling for a reply. You are saying don't give your enemies weapons with which to use against us. But surely there comes a point when what is should be described as what is? Gerald Kaufman put it brilliantly recently when he said that an IDF officer who shrugged off 500 civilian deaths as "mostly militants" was talking like a Nazi. How else to describe this callous disregard for civilian life?

There's a world of difference between accusing an individual (or a small group) of acting in a manner akin to the Nazis, and equating the actions of a regime with another.

 

[ViolentPanda]

trouble is that plenty is not a majority, netanyahu is elected by the majority and that's the bottomline. the majority of the population is content with the state terrorism.

Not quite. The nature of the power structures in the Knesset mean that the supporters of a minority can end up directing policy.
There's also the issue that constitutional amendments would probably be necessary in order to remove the "Jewish state" clause to arrive at a state that didn't feel empowered to rely on state terrorism to maintain its hegemony.

 

[dylans]

Are the Serbs Nazis as well, then?

I think they acted like Nazis yes.

 

[Random]

I think they acted like Nazis yes.

Fair enough, seeing as how the Nazi military and social policies were not all that much of an isolated incident. rather makes 'Nazi' a bit of an empty description, however, in light of how much Nazi behaviour there is about in the world.

And the term seems to get used in the hope of having the rhetorical equivalent of WMD. Iirc the Israelis themselves called Arafat the heir of Hitler; Saddam was the new Hitler just recently, of course... Rather debases the currency, and renders the 'Nazi' term about as effective as a teenager calling his mum a 'fascist'.

Looking at a more useful description, I'd say that Israel is rather more in the pattern of colonial states, based on settlement of expropriated land; rather like the earlier Outremer experiment, also supposedly based on Biblical justification, heh - or maybe rather like the French incursion into Arab land, starting in the 1830s. Hopefully for the Jewish population there's be a rather softer landing, not involving a total repatriation of settlers and their descendent, as happened to the Pieds Noir in the 1960s (or like what happened to the white settlers in Kenya).

I imagine that Likud and their ilk would rather end up like a successful settler state, such as Australia or the USA. The main difference, though is that the indigenous Arab population is far more numerous, better organised, armed and educated in western ways of government and warfare than the First Nations or Aboriginals ever were.

 

[ymu]

Looks like he's calling in the crazies.

A final building permit for the Shepherd Hotel project was signed last Thursday, before Netanyahu flew to Washington for talks with Obama. The decision means work can start at any time to demolish it and to build 20 new apartments for Jewish settlers in its place.

"What it means politically is that it is one very important project that can torpedo the peace talks," said Hagit Ofran, a settlement expert at the Israeli group Peace Now. "It is in the hands of the settlers to decide when to bring the bulldozers ... It is a very dangerous step."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/mar/24/barack-obama-israel-settlement-plan

 

[little_legs]

13 strikes tonight. fucking hell.

they also know when to hit, in the wee hours of friday, the holy day for muslims.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/8600285.stm

 

[little_legs]

beeb is reporting that belligerent netanyahu has cancelled a trip to washington where he was meant to take part in the nuclear security summit

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/8610595.stm