#96

If you had to choose, on which side would you live?

There is only one side that is more devoted to killing the other side than they are saving their own.

"At least Trump is trying to create some potential long term benefits to equalize our massive growing trade deficit and transfer of jobs that both parties have spent decades doing nothing to correct or reverse."

Can you do me a fave and explain why it is my best interest to pay more for something? And why I should care about a trade deficit?

#106

I read a report today where Israel has a plan for a post-Islamist Gaza. It appears to be modelled on the Marshall Plan from WWII.

It worked out very well for Germany. There is no reason it would not work in Gaza.

#105

So, let's do this within this community of interest. At the same time the UK created the conditions for the establishment of a Jewish state and a Palestinian state in the Levant, they also established the Muslim states of Pakistan and Bangladesh.

Was that wrong as well?

"Why is it Palestine's duty to accommodate Jews?"

Now it's my turn to correct you. There was no Palestine. Never has been a Palestine.

There has been a Judea, so the question might as easily be phrased, why is it Israel's duty to accommodate Palestinians? Especially when it seems like the vast majority of Palestinians want to eliminate the Jews.

#79

You say you were military...I would have reported in a hot minute.

Nidal Hasan. You're one of them.

Dudes who get gushy for Islam.

But...I'm sure you can pick up a job with Hamas. Maybe even get a virgin or two out of the deal.

Like ya bois in ISIS did.

"Much like the South, by choosing to exist, chose war against the Union."

Yeah. remind me the last time Mississippi launched a Katusha rocket barrage on northern aggressors.

"Jews claim the land as theirs."

I don't have a claim. The people who owned the land gave it to them.

They also gave land to the people who call themselves Palestinians. But the Palestinians took umbrage with the notion of sharing. With the notion of having to accommodate Jews.

"Defending themselves from a foreign invasion is still what Palestinians are trying to do."

Foreign invaders fighting off foreign invaders?

"This is the choice Israel made when she chose to be born of war in 1948."

You really need a history lesson. You're basically saying that, by choosing to exist, Israel chose war. Never mind that the owners of the land divided it as they saw fit, or that Israel had a historic claim to the land, or that the Arabs are the descendants of the people who moved into the area hundreds of years after the fall of Judea during the Islamic conquest.

The people who refer to themselves as Palestinians have little claim to the land. They lost the vast majority of it as a function of wars they started. Or do you want to honor the Vatican if they every point out that the Levant was once part of the Roman Empire.

"We bulldozed German villages, said it was a new country, and told the Germans they can never return to the land?"

We used bombers instead of bulldozers. And the Federal Republic of Germany didn't create itself. And tens (hundreds) of thousands of Germans were forcibly removed from their land and told not to come back. Some by the western allies. Far more by the eastern allies.

"Because it was never a plan for peace. It was always a war of aggression and occupation."

That was definitely the objective of the Palestinians and their Arab allies.

"You completely buy into the ethnic cleansing that Israel is doing."

It is no more ethnic cleansing than what the western Allies did to Germany in WWII after that country decided to implement their final solution to the Jewish question.

Maybe you regard that as ethnic cleansing as well. I don't. Because the actions taken against Germany were a response to the aggression Germany was inflicting on the rest of Europe.

"They already did that. Then fought and lost and surrendered."

It doesn't look like anyone in Gaza is surrenduring.

Just imagine if one day, the Gazans said, "you know what? ---- Israel. Let's focus on making us better."

A pipe dream, I know.

"Accept the partition plan" means surrender territory to the European invaders."

First, the Arabs were invaders themselves, entering the region in the time of the Islamic conquest. Second, they surrendered the territory well before 1948. First to the Christian Crusaders. Then the Kurds under Saladin. Then to the Ottomans. The Brits were simply the last owners of the region before divesting themselves of their Imperial holdings.

"Like the National Socialists, Zionists came up with a final solution to the Palestinian question."

If their goal is to extirpate the Arabs in the region, they're doing an awful job of it. Making them citizens and whatnot.

"Israel has a right to re-take all of that land, because it comprises the historic Kingdom of Israel."

Sure.

So do the Italians. It was once part of the Roman Empire.

So do the Turks. It was part of the Ottoman Empire for 400 years.

I guess technically maybe France does as well. The Kingdom of Jerusalem was mostly Frenchies.

But you're right. The Jews are the only ones who can claim a non-colonial claim to the region.

"Why did that happen?"

Because they didn't want to share their country with a population with whom they shared little ethnic or cultural identities. Like the National Socialists, they came up with a final solution to the Jewish question.

"Israel picked this fight. I don't see why you bother denying it. Hamas is a response to Israel, not the other way round."

You must be joking.

It was the Palestinians and their Arab allies who rejected the partition plan, attacking the new state of Israel. One can only imagine what the world would look like today if the Arabs had accepted the partition plan. Like Israel did.

"What's "Palestine?". Define it like an Israeli."

Great catch Snoofy! There is no such thing as Palestine. Never has been.

What I meant to say was those who refer to themselves as Palestinians, also a relatively new term.

"Oh, a hypothetical."

It's not hypothetical at all. First, the destruction of Israel is more important to Hamas than the creation of a Palestinian State. They've said that.

Second, we have the historical precedent of each and every Arab country ethnically cleansing their Jewish populations. Why would a levant under Hamas or some other Palestinian group be any different?

"The Israeli are direct in outright stating that all Arabs should be exterminated from the region."

I'm not aware of that. There are plenty of Arab and Palestinian citizens in Israel. They're mostly the descendants of those who didn't try to wipe the Jews off the face of the planet.

Oh, and even if they were to state that, how is it different than what the Arabs did to the Jews in every last Arab country. Arab countries used to have massive Jewish populations. They were all exterminated or driven out.

"Israel is committed that a Palestinian state doesn't exist and will never exist."

And Palestine is committed to extirpating the Israeli state that does exist.

It's kinda tough to reconcile with an adversary that wants to finish what Hitler started.

"Israel Celebrates Holiday By Killing 60 Palestinians"

That's nothing compared to how Palestinians celebrated October 7th.

As a side, did anyone take a moment and pause in remembrance of German Nakba day on May 8th?

The US operates a series of grocery stores on military bases. For Easter, I was doing a Prime Rib. The cost per unit was about twice at the military grocery store as it was at the local butcher shop. I won't blame anyone, but the meat from the German butcher is fantastic, and so much less expensive.

"I've never heard this outside Arabia."

Maybe it's just a Military thing. Just like what used to be referred to as the middle east is now southwest Asia.