Luckycarbon : "These 2 groups have people have literally been fighting since before known written history."

Not true, only since around 1900 - read your history. The Jews were expelled from Israel in 635 a.d. and never had anything but a token presence until the 1930s with the advent of Zionism and European Nationalism.

Sha-ron.... phone-hell
Sha-ron.... phone-hell
Sha-ron.... phone-hell

One entry found for oligarchy.


Main Entry: ol·i·gar·chy
Pronunciation: 'ä-l&-"gär-kE, 'O-
Function: noun
Inflected Form(s): plural -chies
Date: 1542
1 : government by the few
2 : a government in which a small group exercises control especially for corrupt and selfish purposes; also : a group exercising such control
3 : an organization under oligarchic control

Ahh jonc, love that countrys rail system there in sweden. Built to haul nazi tanks, steel sold to nazis and nazi POW's back to smelting plants for disposal. shiatty history for your nation but damn fine bikinii team you got there. Stick the the blue eyed blonds and boob jobs, leave thinking to those with enough knowledge to know that wholesale slaughter is wrong and you should not let an angry neighbor engage in it, jew or arab or german.

Bumper Sticker I'd like to see on Westbank:

Jenin Middle School
MY HONOR STUDENT SON BLEW UP YOUR KIDS WHOLE FARKIN SCHOOL!

I know the guy who runs the site. You may not approve of some uhm.. antiamerican content

While I see both sides of the debate, my one real issue is that there are no people known as palestinans. The region that is now Isreal has been under the control of more countries than you can shake a stick at but not one was called Palestine with an Arabic leadership. The current Arabic population is either Jordanian, Egyptian or Turkish depending where the families originated.

Palestine's only existed since 638AD, so yeah - I guess it's not been around that long.

LudovicoTechnique, pharohs (arabs) enslaved jews.

Lalalala

Interesting question. Recently, a number of immigrants from a certain Eastern European country rife with warfare spread throughout various locales in Europe. The EU was very careful in its' delegation of the immigrants, permitting a few here and a few there. Simply put, the nations didn't want the immigrants.

And it's the same thing in the Middle East. The surrounding countries don't give much of a rat's ass about the Palestinian people, which is why they've been living in refugee camps for so long.

The actions of 1967 by all countries basically screwed over the Palestinians; sadly, neither their former countrymen nor their religious brethren have seen fit to open their arms and begin anew.

Armchair:
Thank you, I realized a faux pas I committed. Original post by me read "The current Arabic population is either Jordanian, Egyptian or Turkish depending where the families originated."

That should be changed to "The current Palestinian population is either Jordanian, Egyptian or Turkish depending where the families originated."

06-24-02 03:48:31 PM Ranxerox
Why is it that whenever someone mentions Palestinians, they automatically assume that they are Islamic? Then they proceed to paint this issue from the Muslim mindset. Hasn't anyone ever heard of Christian Palestinians?


I have not. Is there one?

thanks Vman, your country has some pretty nice history as well. When it comes to killing innocent people you're without any doubt ranked first.

Ranxerox: Good question. Here's another: does anybody know if Christian Palestians have been implicated or have claimed responsibility for any of the bombings?

Turks are not Arabic

Luckycarbon, you are correct, but I was not referring to the Beginning of the Entire Mess(tm). Rather, the events that set off the current intifadeh.

ArmchairDissident:

"Why do people keep saying this!! There was a Palestinian state! It was governed by the Ottoman Empire (remeber them ? - doubt it) until it was shattered during WWI !"

Wrong. There has never been a palestinian state. The area has been Israel twice, but it has never been palestine except in name only. The Romans named the area (which includes most of modern Jordan) while they governed it. You were right that the Ottomans governed the area, but that doesn't make it an independent state, only a province of an empire. The UN proposed a Palestinian state, but the palestinian arabs rejected it out of greed and stupidity. Jordan then took the area.

Luckycarbon: Who was the first greatest? Let me guess . . . Jimmy Swaggart? Nah. I know, it was Rev. Baker. No! I have it!!! It has to be Al Sharpton!

Tarvuz, you are correct, however 98% of the population is Muslum.
http://www.turkishembassy.org/countryprofile/religionandsecularism.htm

Lalalala: Because just as there are different denominations of Christianity, there are different denominations of Islam. The countries you mentioned have different denominations than the Palestinians. Not sure what (denomination) they are, though.

Ain't religon grand?

I have not. Is there one?

Approximately 8% of the Palestinian population is Christian.

Zzeuss, there are lots of them. What about the bell-ringer that got gunned down in front of the Church of the Nativity, in Bethlehem? Devout, but retarded (that's why he ignored the soldiers). Currently deceased.

CmdrWacko so what if palestinians had a kind of a state sometime in a past? before that israelis probably lived there and before that neanderthals and before that dinosaurs...

That would be because it describes the root of the problem. After WWI the arabs in Palestine were told they would be given an independant state in return for aiding Britain in removing the Ottoman Empire. At the same time, they'd promised Zionists in the West a homeland of Israel in Palestine in return for money to aid the same war effort.

At the end of the war Britain couldn't keep Both agreements; and conceeding instead to allowing originally a limited immigration of Jews into Palestine. During the Nazi rise to power, the number of jews immigrating increased dramatically - despite protests from the Palestinians. You see - the Jews had to leave Germany, because the Germans didn't want them. No one else in Europe wanted them either, so they said "Hey! We'll carve up Palestine for you".

The rest - as they say - is history.

Jonc at least we try to make the world a better place. History shows that the middle east has always been a breeding ground for violence, what do you suggest we do, without Nazi funding to build our rail system, and amtrack stock falling like enron? You think taking the money out of teh middle east will solve the problem? look at other poor overpopulated lands and that will give you some idea of how they would react if the US stopped buying oil from the region. Rwanda and Somalia come to mind but hey ethiopia is doing well right? and no Nazi's take the cake on death of innocents, but then they had help from great nations like yours which is why I assume you rank them higher then the US, you wanna talk about making money with no regard for human life check your trading partners in the 30's and 40's. You post distortions and misreprentations for fact, perhaps the american education system is doing better then I thought if your an example of our compitition.

06-24-02 04:13:34 PM PlatinumDragon

Approximately 8% of the Palestinian population is Christian.


And how many of these are suicide bombers?

Also, it looks like shrub finally made a stance on the issue:

Bush calls for end to Arafat's rule
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/middle_east/newsid_2063000/2063983.stm

HowlingFrog, Sharon was visiting the Western Wall, the most holy site in all of Judism. The Aqsa Mosque or Temple Mount is in the same area. Are we to assume that Islamics can deny access of Jews to their holiest place of worship because it's a little too close to Islam's third holiest place, even though the Jews were there first? How is this fair?

Maybe I should set up a starbucks on top of the big black thing in Mecca. Then I could go ape shiat and blow everyone up when some Islamics dare to defile my Starbucks with their infidel Islamic worship.

Bilbo Wrong. There has never been a palestinian state. The area has been Israel twice, but it has never been palestine except in name only

I'm quite confident that you will find that I am, in fact, quite correct. Whilst Isreal has "existed" twice, I do believe that you'll find that the second time it was Judea, as a province of Palestine - which was then held by the Persians. The whole area of palestine then become a muslim country (in so far as that word had any real meaning in the 638AD( after Muslim arabs invaded Palestine in 638.

Under Ottoman rule, of course, the term "country" then becomes polluted, as it's split into four states.

Regardless of the play on semantics - Palestine has existed as an arabic entity since 638AD. The reason that Britain (initially Britain, with the League of Nations - not the UN) initially proposed (in secret) the idea of an "independant" Palestine was as independance from the Ottomans.


The UN proposed a Palestinian state, but the palestinian arabs rejected it out of greed and stupidity.

That's a matter of opinion. The UN proposed a 'council' of sorts with 10 seats - 2 of which would have been Jewish. This - the arabs argues - would give them disproportianate (?) power. And it's this disproportion that the arabs disagreed with.

Whether it's greedy or stupid - that's dealing with opions.

LudovicoTechnique
Ancient Egyptians & Persians, being the ancestors of the Arab Muslims are considered of the same peoples, they haven't radically changed in society or genetics to warrant not calling them the same people.

Jews left Egypt after being enslaved by the Pharaohs (Arabs) went east into Persian territory (Arabs) where they conquered the territory on the West Coast of the Middle East which would become the Kingdom of Israel which they defended against their neighbors (Arabs) vehemently until 1st Alexander then 2nd the Romans came wandering through and killed Muslims & Jews with equal fervor. Jews live persecuted in the Roman empire for a long time and spread their religion through the Roman empire to other parts of the 'civilized' world. 740 AD there's a significant enough population in the Khazar empire that the Judaism is declared the official religion. The Khazar empire was just North of current day Iran which was, yes, that's right, Arab and by now in truth Muslim.

So you see if you read your history you'd notice that the Jews have been fighting the Muslims and their Arab ancestors (their people) for 3000 years (1004bc - 2002ad) and counting.

Appologies - I double-checked my books! Britain proposed the councils. The UN did indeed put forward the separation plan.

But the reasons for the Arabs rejecting that as well - is probably more clear-cut than the rejection of the British proposals. The separation would have given far more land (proportiantly) to the Jews, then to the Arabs - and a lot more arable land. This was because the UN anticipated a mass immigration of Jews into the new Israel - which had earlier been promised back to Palestine.

On a much more serious note (then the pictures I posted earlier).
Even before I started reading the forums here in fark.com I knew very well that the general opinion in America was that Israel is right and the Palestinians are wrong. The situation in Sweden, and to my knowledge, in the rest of western Europe, is the opposite. This despite the fact that we share the same religion, pretty much the same culture and that most of the Americans were ones Europeans.
So what causes us to have such totally different opinions regarding the middle east conflict?
After reading stories from a large variety of American newspapers, as well as English, Danish Norwegian and German it gets quite obvious we're all just thinking whatever the reporters wants us to think. Because seriously, how much do we really know about what's going on over there?
Most of us have never even been in the region (I have a few times but that made me none the wiser).
You can read an article about the same incident in Sweden and in the US and still get 2 different stories. Probably both of them are right as well as wrong. We believe whatever we're supposed to believe, we absorb the information we're fed and form our opinion based on that. What I'm basically doing here is trying show the news as we see them, and I will therefore post a few pictures as they can be seen in an European newspaper. I'm not sure but these pictures were probably taken by Palestinians:

Two palestinians driving were stopped by Israel troop. One of them was immedeatly taken away in a military jeep.

The other one, Mahmoud Salah, is hand cuffed.

Forced down on the street.


Stripped naked in search of guns or explosives.

Executed.

Vman what makes for example an African country with large oil resources poor in the first place? Pretty much all oil rich countries are poor except for Norway and the U.S. Do you know what separates those two countries from the rest of them? Neither of them have been unfortunate enough to have to deal with the U.S. foreign department or the CIA.

Heh heh.. Jonc, did they dress him again and re-pose him in the 'forced' down position before executing him? Looks more like they just stopped a couple of guys and searched them for explosives. Nice propaganda, though.

You heard it here folks: PEACE IS NOT NEUTRAL in this situation. Peace favors Israel because they just inch their settlements forward THEREFORE simply calling for peace will not work.

by the way, the last picture was wrong.. here's the correct one:

Jonc: well said, but those pictures...

I mean, really...

you can't be serious

Hey Johnc:

The 'forced down in the street' is exactly the same picture as 'executed'. How do you explain that?

The Jews need to build a temple on a certain place that the Palestinians still occupy in order for the Messiah to come, at least that is what they believe. I don't know that you guys understand how important Jerusalem is to the Jewish people, they must have possession of it fir the Messiah to come.

BTW this is not what i believe, this is what other Jews believe.

The Jews need to build a temple on a certain place that the Palestinians still occupy in order for the Messiah to come, at least that is what they believe. I don't know that you guys understand how important Jerusalem is to the Jewish people, they must have possession of it for the Messiah to come.

BTW this is not what i believe, this is what other Jews believe.

43%
Bigjoel Traditionally, the United States supports democracies (even imperfect democracies) over dictatorships and theocracies. Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East, so , they get the support.

I have to disagree, we do not traditionally support democracies. Since WWII we have sided with a lot of undemocratic governments, many with military dictatorships.
Batista's Cuba, Somoza's Nicaragua, Armas's Guatemala, Pinochet's Chile, Duvalier's Haiti. Also in the Middle East, we have sold or given military support to Iran and Iraq, (Iran Contras). So no, we do not support Isreal because they are the only Democracy in that area. It goes farther and much deeper than that. If we go back far enough, the united states was furious when President Truman recognized Israel as a state. We did not see it as democracy expanding.

Jonc - Wow. That was pretty ham fisted and pathetic. You could take pictures from a bunch of Cops episodes, add a few dire captions, and make it look like the American police brutally execute helpless african americans in the street all the time.

Looks like Abox and Volcano owe Jonc a apology

Jonc, I like it! Let's put it on Broadway!

Jonc - Here's the robot removing the bomb that was strapped around his waist.

Yah, I apologize for accusing you of faking execution photos.

I'll apologize when Johnc can prove where he got the photographs from, it would help if they had an official source.

Otherwise the pics could be from anywhere . . .

Are you an American?

Take this simple quiz....

3 hijacked planes divebomb into buildings in your country, after which you:

A: Ask why this has happened and appeal to your government to change its foreign policy as it is only putting your life in danger.

B: Accept your president's explanation that we were attacked because the "towelheads hate our freedom".

C: Believe everything your politicians tell you, beat up anyone who looks Arab, sympathize with israelis as they are also "standing tough against terrorism" and denounce anyone who disagrees with you as an antisemite hippie traitor terrorist.

Exploitedclass Given two nations, one democratic, the other not, the US had sided with the democrats. Now, given two nations (or factions) one Communist and the other not, the US sides against the Communists.

In the example of Iran and Iraq, the soviets sided with Iran,so the US with iraq.

I see your point, I should have been more clear.

Obviously the work of the Judean People's Front. Ah, well, they asked for it.