Europe submits voluntarily

[Jayjay]

Check your math. US population is roughly 320 million. Israeli population is about 8 million. That's 40:1, not 1000:1.

1.6 million are Arabs living in democratic Israel. Those have the highest standard of living, not to mention freedom than any other Arab people in the region!.

How is that relevant? 2.3 million Palestinians are living in West Bank under occupation, with no voting rights or right of movement with Israel. Another 1.7 million are squeezed in Gaza, although that's more of a Hamas territory. If you want to start counting how many Arabs are living happily under Israeli rule, you'll see that most of them really aren't.

This should be repeated: How the fuck is that relevant? Your debate tactic seems to be to pick one stupid sound-bite you read on some right-wing bullshit website, and when it's shown wrong, you trot out another completely unrelated sound-bite.

 

[angelo]

Facts? The fact is that the death of Europe is in sight. Still hazy and not yet inevitable, but nevertheless visible and drawing closer. Europeans believe in human rights, tolerance, openness, peace, progress, the environment and pleasure. But it's forgotten that all those things sprang up from Judaism and Christianity. All that is not tolerated by Islam. It was W. Churchill who said : appeasement is like feeding a crocodile hoping that it will eat you last.

 

[angelo]

1.6 million are Arabs living in democratic Israel. Those have the highest standard of living, not to mention freedom than any other Arab people in the region!.

How is that relevant? 2.3 million Palestinians are living in West Bank under occupation, with no voting rights or right of movement with Israel. Another 1.7 million are squeezed in Gaza, although that's more of a Hamas territory. If you want to start counting how many Arabs are living happily under Israeli rule, you'll see that most of them really aren't.

This should be repeated: How the fuck is that relevant? Your debate tactic seems to be to pick one stupid sound-bite you read on some right-wing bullshit website, and when it's shown wrong, you trot out another completely unrelated sound-bite.

Who the fuck voted for Abbas then? On I get it! The charter of : from the Jordan to the sea. How stupid of me. The Jews must disarm and let the terrorist take over, to hell to all the Jews! Sorry, I read that post wrong!!

 

[angelo]

For the record though. Those 2.3 million Arabs have a defacto state. The reason why there are Israeli security there is to stop the constant terrorist attacks, to protect Israeli inhabitants!

 

[untermensche]

They didn't fail. They were immediately attacked and massive work to undermine them began the second they were elected.

In other words, they failed. You're simply rationalizing what you perceive to be the reasons for the failure.

What I perceive is what happened.

Israel and the US immediately freaked out and nullified the free election.

And began attacking the Palestinians militarily and economically and making threats.

It was also a chance for Hamas to show that they can run Gaza peacefully, and that Israeli withdrawal leads to peace. They had no desire of that and instead use gaza as a rocket launching platform, and they permanently squandered any hope of democratic Palestinian state.

Hamas offered Israel a 10 year cease-fire. Israel refused.

Because Israel does not want peace. It wants war. That is the only thing it is better than the Palestinians at. And it works very hard to ensure that is what it gets and ignores every opportunity to move things in another direction.

 

[bilby]

Facts? The fact is that the death of Europe is in sight. Still hazy and not yet inevitable, but nevertheless visible and drawing closer. Europeans believe in human rights, tolerance, openness, peace, progress, the environment and pleasure. But it's forgotten that all those things sprang up from Judaism and Christianity. All that is not tolerated by Islam. It was W. Churchill who said : appeasement is like feeding a crocodile hoping that it will eat you last.

You may need to read up on the difference between 'fact' and 'paranoid fantasy'; surprisingly, they are not the same thing.

Churchill was talking about appeasement of Nazi Germany - a product of the Christianity that you claim causes "human rights, tolerance, openness, peace, progress, the environment and pleasure".

Europe in January 1940 (when Churchill said that in the Commons) was very much endangered by Nazism. Europe today is not in any way endangered by Islam. The comparison is insane. The OKH had about 1.75 million men under arms in early 1940 in the Rhineland alone; If every single asylum seeker entering the EU over the last decade was a young man, and they ALL joined a well trained and disciplined armed force, they would STILL not be a comparable threat. And that's before we even think about the 1940 strength of the Luftwaffe or the Kriegsmarine.

Also, giving aid to destitute refugees is not comparable in any way to conceding territory to a powerful armed force.

Your argument is not based on facts. it is based on a lie so large that it is hard to disbelieve - Joseph Goebbels would be proud of your ability to spin a quarter of million unarmed and homeless civilians into a threat equal to that of one and three quarter million well armed, well equipped and well trained soldiers with a powerful industrial nation behind them.

You might also bear in mind, before making the ludicrous claim that "the death of Europe is in sight", that the Nazis were defeated.

Even in the HIGHLY unlikely event that every single one of these refugees was itching to join an army to defeat Europe, they would still lack about 90% of the numbers, 100% of the armaments, 100% of the logistical support, 100% of the strategic planning, and 100% of the air support required by the last people to try to take over Europe - and that attempt didn't (quite) succeed.

Believe you me, you REALLY don't want to bring in facts to this discussion; they are very much inimical to your position.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Hitler was also elected. Whether some fascist political entity like Hamas or the Nazi party can get elected via campaign promises or demonizing their opponents or whatever other means is irrelevant. What's important is that Hamas government utterly failed in delivering any of their promises, ended up starting a minor civil war, purged their political opponents from Gaza, have not allowed new elections since and has subjected Gaza to several devastating wars with Israel. And that's been going on almost ten years, with no end in sight.

Why is it that some people seem to think that having elections once is enough? You're supposed to do it at regular intervals. Democracy is a lot less about electing the leaders you want, than it is about being able to peacefully get rid of leaders you don't.

"Failed" assumes they intended to. I see no reason to think they had any intention of actually honoring their promises. Islamists do not accept democracy anyway.

- - - Updated - - -

They didn't fail. They were immediately attacked and massive work to undermine them began the second they were elected.

It was a chance for Israel to actually reach out to an elected government.

But Israel has no desire for that.

NONE.

Reach out to what? Hamas made it clear that they were choosing the path of war. They got war.

- - - Updated - - -

Check your math. US population is roughly 320 million. Israeli population is about 8 million. That's 40:1, not 1000:1.

Don't go polluting this 'discussion' with facts.

Facts are of no importance here; what matters is to pick a side and dogmatically defend it regardless of any 'facts' or 'reality' that people might try to throw at you.

Talk about projection!

- - - Updated - - -

1.6 million are Arabs living in democratic Israel. Those have the highest standard of living, not to mention freedom than any other Arab people in the region!.

How is that relevant? 2.3 million Palestinians are living in West Bank under occupation, with no voting rights or right of movement with Israel. Another 1.7 million are squeezed in Gaza, although that's more of a Hamas territory. If you want to start counting how many Arabs are living happily under Israeli rule, you'll see that most of them really aren't.

This should be repeated: How the fuck is that relevant? Your debate tactic seems to be to pick one stupid sound-bite you read on some right-wing bullshit website, and when it's shown wrong, you trot out another completely unrelated sound-bite.

It's rarely Arabs that die in the rocket attacks--those 1.6 million Arabs should not be counted when considering those being killed by the rockets.

 

[untermensche]

They didn't fail. They were immediately attacked and massive work to undermine them began the second they were elected.

It was a chance for Israel to actually reach out to an elected government.

But Israel has no desire for that.

NONE.

Reach out to what? Hamas made it clear that they were choosing the path of war. They got war.

All they did was get elected.

That was enough to be attacked by Israel that phony supporter of democracy.

 

[angelo]

Reach out to what? Hamas made it clear that they were choosing the path of war. They got war.

All they did was get elected.

That was enough to be attacked by Israel that phony supporter of democracy.

Israel is not a democracy but Gaza and other Arab nations are, is that correct?

 

[DrZoidberg]

Don't you think that's just a feature of Christian countries being predominantly democratic while Islamic ones are less so? Whenever I hear stuff like that I just look up the state of things in Turkey. In most cases it's just like here.

The last I checked, Turkey was still run by an islamist party that's suppressing any dissenting opinion. I don't see any comparison to western democracies, unless we go back to McCarthy era USA or something.

That's bullshit. Yes, Erdogan is a conservative, much like American Republicans. Turkey has a lot of laws to enforce secularism that Erdogan's party have eroded. Ie more freedom and less control. Turkey still has a law forbidding Islamist parties. Which is one reason it fails to count as a true liberal democracy. But then again France also has similar laws (against religious parties). And they get a free pass (=racism).

The other reason Turkey fails the test is their treatment of Kurds. Which is a disgrace and takes a lot of explaining. But Turkish society is very free, open and liberal. I have a whole bunch of artist friends who moved the last couple of years from Berlin to Istanbul. It will be (if it isn't already) the most happening place in Europe attracting the coolest people from around the globe. Liberal and hedonistic to the extreme. So it can't be that bad to live there. These artists are not bound by geography. They can live and work anywhere.

Edit: Turkey has a couple of openly gay saunas in Istanbul. These have been going strong since the eighties. If Turkey is such an Islamistic nightmare I find it hard to explain the existence of those gay saunas.

 

[untermensche]

All they did was get elected.

That was enough to be attacked by Israel that phony supporter of democracy.

Israel is not a democracy but Gaza and other Arab nations are, is that correct?

Hamas is the only legitimately elected government in the Arab world.

But Israel only pays lip service to democracy. It believes in democracy only as long as Israel is predominately Jewish.

And it doesn't want democracy for the Palestinians.

 

[bilby]

Israel is not a democracy but Gaza and other Arab nations are, is that correct?

Hamas is the only legitimately elected government in the Arab world.

But Israel only pays lip service to democracy. It believes in democracy only as long as Israel is predominately Jewish.

And it doesn't want democracy for the Palestinians.

What does this have to do with Europe?

 

[untermensche]

Hamas is the only legitimately elected government in the Arab world.

But Israel only pays lip service to democracy. It believes in democracy only as long as Israel is predominately Jewish.

And it doesn't want democracy for the Palestinians.

What does this have to do with Europe?

The short story is that Muslims are not all just a pack of wild dogs.

 

[DrZoidberg]

Facts? The fact is that the death of Europe is in sight. Still hazy and not yet inevitable, but nevertheless visible and drawing closer. Europeans believe in human rights, tolerance, openness, peace, progress, the environment and pleasure. But it's forgotten that all those things sprang up from Judaism and Christianity. All that is not tolerated by Islam. It was W. Churchill who said : appeasement is like feeding a crocodile hoping that it will eat you last.

Lol. I've forgotten how those sprang from Judaism and Christianity. Pretty sure that I never learned it to begin with. On your quote. It was about Nazism. An idea sprung from Christianity, with a sprinkle of Darwinism on top. So much for your theory.

Love your flare for the dramatic. It's not death. It's evolution. There's constant change. Always has been. Always will be. This is good. Things tend to change for the better. This would happen with or without Muslim immigrants.

 

[Jayjay]

How is that relevant? 2.3 million Palestinians are living in West Bank under occupation, with no voting rights or right of movement with Israel. Another 1.7 million are squeezed in Gaza, although that's more of a Hamas territory. If you want to start counting how many Arabs are living happily under Israeli rule, you'll see that most of them really aren't.

This should be repeated: How the fuck is that relevant? Your debate tactic seems to be to pick one stupid sound-bite you read on some right-wing bullshit website, and when it's shown wrong, you trot out another completely unrelated sound-bite.

Who the fuck voted for Abbas then? On I get it! The charter of : from the Jordan to the sea. How stupid of me. The Jews must disarm and let the terrorist take over, to hell to all the Jews! Sorry, I read that post wrong!!

Who said anything about disarming? I was addressing your claim that the fair treatement of the few Arab citizens of Israel somehow justifies the poor treatment of the Arabs living in the occupied territories. It doesn't.

 

[Jayjay]

For the record though. Those 2.3 million Arabs have a defacto state. The reason why there are Israeli security there is to stop the constant terrorist attacks, to protect Israeli inhabitants!

If Palestine is a de facto state, why are there Israeli inhabitants in West Bank at all? They are occupiers, and they are legitimate targets for resistance. If bunch of immigrants moved to your neighbourhood illegally against your wishes, didn't follow the laws of your country, built walls to keep you out of the best land and set up checkpoints on roads you use, you'd be pretty pissed off about it too.

 

[Jayjay]

In other words, they failed. You're simply rationalizing what you perceive to be the reasons for the failure.

What I perceive is what happened.

What happened is that Hamas failed to deliver what they promised. So they started a civil war.

Israel and the US immediately freaked out and nullified the free election.

And began attacking the Palestinians militarily and economically and making threats.

No, they didn't. At worst, Israel withheld the Palestinian tax money for a while, but that's hardly warrants Hamas starting a civil war and suspending democracy.

The US and Israel didn't nullify any election results. Nobody stopped Hamas from taking over and ruling the country, it's just that Hamas's policies were inadequate. There was no military reaction, an the economic reaction from Israel which involved withholding tax money collected on behalf of PA is hardly a devastating blow. Just last year when Palestine joined the International Criminal Court, Israel did the same thing. But that only lasted for a month or so and only achieved to made Israel look like the bad guy. Hamas could have easily countered Israeli economic pressure with diplomatic means like Abbas, but of course, Hamas wasn't really interested in running Gaza like a real country, it wanted to escalate the conflict.

It was also a chance for Hamas to show that they can run Gaza peacefully, and that Israeli withdrawal leads to peace. They had no desire of that and instead use gaza as a rocket launching platform, and they permanently squandered any hope of democratic Palestinian state.

Hamas offered Israel a 10 year cease-fire. Israel refused.

No, Israel hasn't refused any ceasefire. It's a long-standing Israeli policy to return silence with silence. As long as Hamas isn't firing rockets or mortars, Israel isn't firing back. It's that simple. If Hamas wanted a 10-year ceasefire, they could achieve it unilaterally by ceasing fire.

The faux "offers" that Hamas has made are all words and no actions to back them up. And that's a red herring anyway. Can you imagine, what Israeli opinion towards withdrawal from West Bank would be if the withdrawal from Gaza had given them ten years of peace? Can you imagine where Gaza could be economically if Hamas didn't drag it into a shooting war every other year? How do you think Israel could justify a blockade or controlling Rafah crossing if there hadn't been any violence in past decade or so? It's an opportunity to get what they want that Palestinian completely squandered. Palestinians could easily have made Gaza a positive example of what could be, while continuing the armed resistance in West Bank.

What you fail to see is that Israel doesn't want war in Gaza. It wants the land in West Bank.

 

[DrZoidberg]

What I perceive is what happened.

What happened is that Hamas failed to deliver what they promised. So they started a civil war.

Israel and the US immediately freaked out and nullified the free election.

And began attacking the Palestinians militarily and economically and making threats.

No, they didn't. At worst, Israel withheld the Palestinian tax money for a while, but that's hardly warrants Hamas starting a civil war and suspending democracy.

The US and Israel didn't nullify any election results. Nobody stopped Hamas from taking over and ruling the country, it's just that Hamas's policies were inadequate. There was no military reaction, an the economic reaction from Israel which involved withholding tax money collected on behalf of PA is hardly a devastating blow. Just last year when Palestine joined the International Criminal Court, Israel did the same thing. But that only lasted for a month or so and only achieved to made Israel look like the bad guy. Hamas could have easily countered Israeli economic pressure with diplomatic means like Abbas, but of course, Hamas wasn't really interested in running Gaza like a real country, it wanted to escalate the conflict.

It was also a chance for Hamas to show that they can run Gaza peacefully, and that Israeli withdrawal leads to peace. They had no desire of that and instead use gaza as a rocket launching platform, and they permanently squandered any hope of democratic Palestinian state.

Hamas offered Israel a 10 year cease-fire. Israel refused.

No, Israel hasn't refused any ceasefire. It's a long-standing Israeli policy to return silence with silence. As long as Hamas isn't firing rockets or mortars, Israel isn't firing back. It's that simple. If Hamas wanted a 10-year ceasefire, they could achieve it unilaterally by ceasing fire.

The faux "offers" that Hamas has made are all words and no actions to back them up. And that's a red herring anyway. Can you imagine, what Israeli opinion towards withdrawal from West Bank would be if the withdrawal from Gaza had given them ten years of peace? Can you imagine where Gaza could be economically if Hamas didn't drag it into a shooting war every other year? How do you think Israel could justify a blockade or controlling Rafah crossing if there hadn't been any violence in past decade or so? It's an opportunity to get what they want that Palestinian completely squandered. Palestinians could easily have made Gaza a positive example of what could be, while continuing the armed resistance in West Bank.

Create your own Palestine conflict thread. We don't need to make this yet another.

 

[Jayjay]

"Failed" assumes they intended to. I see no reason to think they had any intention of actually honoring their promises. Islamists do not accept democracy anyway.

Yup. That's why it amazes me how anyone who thinks himself liberal or freethinker can possibly bend over into a pretzel defending groups like Hamas. Sometimes, terrorists can reform with time, like the IRA. But Islamists all over the world just seem to be getting worse.

1.6 million are Arabs living in democratic Israel. Those have the highest standard of living, not to mention freedom than any other Arab people in the region!.

How is that relevant? 2.3 million Palestinians are living in West Bank under occupation, with no voting rights or right of movement with Israel. Another 1.7 million are squeezed in Gaza, although that's more of a Hamas territory. If you want to start counting how many Arabs are living happily under Israeli rule, you'll see that most of them really aren't.

This should be repeated: How the fuck is that relevant? Your debate tactic seems to be to pick one stupid sound-bite you read on some right-wing bullshit website, and when it's shown wrong, you trot out another completely unrelated sound-bite.

It's rarely Arabs that die in the rocket attacks--those 1.6 million Arabs should not be counted when considering those being killed by the rockets.

Arab civilians vs. Jewish civilians are statistically more likely to be victims of rocket attacks.

 

[Jayjay]

The last I checked, Turkey was still run by an islamist party that's suppressing any dissenting opinion. I don't see any comparison to western democracies, unless we go back to McCarthy era USA or something.

That's bullshit. Yes, Erdogan is a conservative, much like American Republicans. Turkey has a lot of laws to enforce secularism that Erdogan's party have eroded. Ie more freedom and less control. Turkey still has a law forbidding Islamist parties. Which is one reason it fails to count as a true liberal democracy. But then again France also has similar laws (against religious parties). And they get a free pass (=racism).

The other reason Turkey fails the test is their treatment of Kurds. Which is a disgrace and takes a lot of explaining. But Turkish society is very free, open and liberal. I have a whole bunch of artist friends who moved the last couple of years from Berlin to Istanbul. It will be (if it isn't already) the most happening place in Europe attracting the coolest people from around the globe. Liberal and hedonistic to the extreme. So it can't be that bad to live there. These artists are not bound by geography. They can live and work anywhere.

Edit: Turkey has a couple of openly gay saunas in Istanbul. These have been going strong since the eighties. If Turkey is such an Islamistic nightmare I find it hard to explain the existence of those gay saunas.

The liberal city-dwellers in Turkey are not the majority. And you have to undestand that Turkey used to have regular military coups whenever Islamists got too big, but that's in the past and the initially moderate AKP has turned into more and more autocratic at each turn. It might not be an islamist nightmare yet, but it's certainly moving towards that direction.