Whoops somebody got the PR Spin all fucked up on this one

[plural]

Apparently it wasnt a massacre,
but a glorious victory of the palestinian resistance

Jenin 'massacre' reduced to death toll of 56

JENIN, West Bank
Palestinian officials yesterday put the death toll at 56 in the two-week Israeli assault on Jenin, dropping claims of a massacre of 500 that had sparked demands for a U.N. investigation.

The official Palestinian body count, which is not disproportionate to the 33 Israeli soldiers killed in the incursion, was disclosed by Kadoura Mousa Kadoura, the director of Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement for the northern West Bank, after a team of four Palestinian-appointed investigators reported to him in his Jenin office.

[Two weeks ago, when European and particularly London newspapers were reporting estimates of "hundreds" massacred, Israeli sources in Washington said they expected the Palestinian toll to reach "45 to 55."]

Click here for the complete text

Paul Martin - Washington Times

thanks to ikilled007 for the link

Comments

[city-glitter.livejournal.com]

Ya'll hear that? 56 Palestinian lives is equal to 33 Israeli ones. Oh no, that's not inequality. That's the way the BIBLE set it down. Okay. I feel much better about this whole thing now and will throw my lot in with the Israelis because that's what our GOVERNMENT thinks I should do. While we're at it...have you heard that abortions make baby Jesus cry?

[ikilled007.livejournal.com]

It means Israeli training, weapons, and tactics are superior to Palestinian training, weapons, and tactics.

[city-glitter.livejournal.com]

That's obvious. That's not my point, however.

[plural.livejournal.com]

umm dahlin
it didnt say equal
it said not disproportionate

the difference is significant
primarily as before the numbers were being
claimed as a massacre

500+ palestinians to 33 israelis

while 56 is not equal to 33
[as i am sure you noticed]
it is far more proportionate
than 500

what the auther was trying to imply
is that in a very heated gunfight
if you lose 33 men to kill 56 enemies
it isnt wholesale slaughter
but brutal combat

while i regret any loss of life
a combatant dying is a war
is very different than a civilian dying

[city-glitter.livejournal.com]

I read it as implying that Israeli lives are more valuable. Mountains could me moved in modern diplomacy if someone were just willing to call a spade a spade, such as I'm doing here.

[estrie.livejournal.com]

does calling a spade a spade involve going out and finding the truth yourself so that you can know for sure what a spade actually is?

[city-glitter.livejournal.com]

Calling a spade a spade involves gathering all the evidence you can, looking from every perspective, and deciding what's right and wrong according to your intuition and convictions.

[plural.livejournal.com]

darling,
if you only had
the slightest idea
of how obfuscating the words
and antique the mannerisms
used in international diplomacy
are
you would be amazed that
any two countries could agree
on the color of the sky
[for the record]
[it was established]
[as cerulian blue]
[by the Augustine treaty of 1658]
[but only twenty-two countries ratified it]

I can see how
it could be read such
and it is possible
that the author even believes it

i feel two ways about it

on one hand, i view all human life
as valued and any loss saddens me

but on the other hand, i understand
human nature, and our preoccupation with
killing each other. as such I look at it
like this. One a battlefield, combatants lives are equal, and civilians lives are equal, the combatants volunteer to risk their lives in the attempt to take the lives of their enemies, civilians merely attempt to live and not get killed by either side.

When we are talking about civilian deaths, it is always tragic, whether israeli or palestinian.

I will admit, my bias here, I do feel that the lives of the palestinian combatants (and only combatants, not civilians) are worth less than those of Israeli Combatants.

How can I make sure a moral judgement?
Because from my experience in this matter, which is substantial, I feel very strongly that the palestinians are the aggressor and that the israeli are engaged in an intense war of self-defense.

I really and value the differences in views that we both hold. and make this statement not to reopen the larger arguement of who own has the right to the land, or who

[city-glitter.livejournal.com]

So. Why don't we just cut the crap and acknowledge that all human beings were created equal and that the only appropriate action is to make sure everyone gets what they need...and as much of what they want as possible. We can start by ensuring that the weaker people in a given area aren't oppressed.

[plural.livejournal.com]

that sounds like an excellent idea

however, Israel has offered extremely generous terms on multiple occasion, all of which give the palestinians a state and more importantly a lot more than they currently have.

If the palestinians were willing to accept that they might be better off not getting 100% of their demands, and settling for 90% of them, this situation would have been over long ago.

Instead they choose to slaughter innocent people in the streets. This is a choice.

You can look at the situation, see israeli tanks, soldiers and helocopters, and say that the palestinians are the weaker people. Indeed militarily they are weaker. But that doesnt mean that they are right.

Osma ben Ladin, was a militarily weaker opponent, who felt that his people were oppressed by the American Imperialism. Does the fact that he was weaker, justify his act of aggression and murder?

The core of the matter, relates to aggresion. If the palestinians people, ceased acting in an agressive manner, and chose to negotiate honestly, this situation would again, have been long ago resolved peacefully (i define honest negotiation as attempting to find a compromise where one gets as much as one can but realizes that you have to give up something to get what you want).

[city-glitter.livejournal.com]

"however, Israel has offered extremely generous terms on multiple occasion, all of which give the palestinians a state and more importantly a lot more than they currently have."

I missed that. Please supply evidence.

[plural.livejournal.com]

by evidence do you mean further information or direct links.

In the last meeting between Barak and Arafat. Israel offered over 90% of the west bank land, much of east Jerusalem and the rights of statehood. They also offered in exchange for cooperation fighting terrorism, aid and assistance to the palestinian state.

While the right of return was not granted, nor was all of the land offered to be returned. You can not argue that what was offered would not be a significant improvement to the condition of the palestinian people

[city-glitter.livejournal.com]

I can also argue that ten dollars a month is an improvement over the current Absolute Jack Shit given to Natives in this country, but who would be comforted?

[plural.livejournal.com]

yes you could and you would be correct.

but you distort the issue. To correspond the israeli offer which concedes to the palestinians the vast majority of their demands, with offering an american native ten dollars a month, is pure showboating and rhetoric.

If we offered the Native Americans, 90% of their land back, a soveriegn government, and assistance to organize and run their governement, would that not be a considerable improvement over their current situation? Yes.

To say otherwise would be foolish. What you are saying, is that it is perfectly acceptible for a group of people to slaughter innocents as long as every one of their demands is not met in full.

This betrays the very concept of justice. Justice would not be served by evicting every american, and turning the land back to the Native Americans. This would be just another injustice, an injustice to the people who are innocently attempting to live their lives and had nothing to do with the original sin. Two injustices do not make justice.

Absolute freedom mocks justice, Absolute justice denies freedom. There must be a compromise somewhere in between.

[estrie.livejournal.com]

media most places is very pro-palestinian, anyhow...
to get straight facts is difficult.

[nutmeg.livejournal.com]

Wow...

I think you can call any one pro-anything if you are radically against one side. Because the media is certainly not pro-palestianian in my opinion.

And in my opinion it certainly isn't proliberal either but all the ultra conservatives harp on how liberal media skews our viewpoints.

When the media consistently says how many israelis were killed and ignores or barely mentions palestian deaths, which is what I hear regularly, I would not call them pro palestinian.

No side is right here. Both are wrong. And so are we.

Re:

[estrie.livejournal.com]

hmm, it occured to me at some point that it probably very much matters where a person's news comes from.
the bbc seems to be quite pro-liberal and pro-palestinian.
i'm not saying anybody in particular is right. in fact i feel everybody's actions are very not right according to my own moral code which has never been put to the test. and that is why i, personally, fear religion.

[ikilled007.livejournal.com]

The media is so leftist it's insanity to claim that it's not. Just an idea of how bad it really is: Bias: A CBS Insider Exposes How the Media Distort the News is the recent book by Bernard Goldberg (a lifelong leftist):

From the review:

Book Description
Think the media are biased? CONSERVATIVES HAVE BEEN crying foul for years, but now a veteran CBS reporter has come forward to expose how liberal bias pervades the mainstream media. Even if you've suspected your nightly news is slanted to the left, it's far worse than you think. Breaking ranks and naming names, Emmy Award-winning broadcast journalist Bernard Goldberg reveals a corporate news culture in which the close-mindedness is breathtaking, journalistic integrity has been pawned to liberal opinion, and "entertainment" trumps hard news every time. In his three decades at CBS, Goldberg repeatedly voiced his concerns to network executives about the often one-sided nature of the news coverage. But no one listened to his complaints-or if they did listen, they did nothing about the problem. Finally, Goldberg had no choice but to blow the whistle on his own industry, to break the code of silence that pervades the news business. Bias is the result. As the author reveals, "liberal bias" doesn't mean simply being hard on Republicans and easy on Democrats. Real media bias is the result of how those in the media see the world-and their bias directly affects how we all see the world.

In fact, just look at the language you used:
"And in my opinion it certainly isn't proliberal either but all the ultra conservatives harp on how liberal media skews our viewpoints."

We hear words like "right wing", "conservative", "ultra-conservative", "far right wing" all the time, but how often do the media (or you) use words like "leftist", "ultra liberal", "extreme left wing" etc.? You'll NEVER hear those words on the news or read them in any mainstream news publications.

It's a credit to how pervasive and common the media bias is that the average person doesn't even recognize it anymore.

[nutmeg.livejournal.com]

I hear the word liberal on the news often. And Ultra conservatives CALL Themselves ultra conservatives to set themselves apart from groups they view as too far center but are otherwise identified as "conservative" The word liberal is used most often as an insult when it is used in the media.

Of course media is biased, so is any thing any human says, because by neccessity we can not be other than subjective. It really depends upon the medium and which specific unit of the medium we are talking about. But a blanket statement that says that media is leftist (And if you haven't heard that word in the media where in the world did you hear it?... or did you make it up).... or conservative is going to be false. Some stations are liberal some conservative, some newspapers, some websites, some radio stations, etc...

(And sorry for the tanget, plural)

Re:

[ikilled007.livejournal.com]

Actually, there is overwhelming evidence that the media IS leftist. Here's one school of thought:

Journalism graduates are educated in journalism and all that communications stuff. They don't have a powerful grasp of the hard sciences, of economics, of history, of literature, etc. And they tend to be do-gooders, so to speak. "Make the world a better place" kind of people, nothing wrong with that. The problem comes in when they report on issues they have no grasp of. They might well know what the current events ARE, but they don't understand the context or the history or the inter-relationships therein. And so when an environmental group throws out some statistic or other like "We're killing off 100,000 species a day in the rain forerst" or some such tripe, they give equal time and/or actual credence to it. Same with domestic economic issues. The news stories push an agenda, usually, "Government must act to ensure that [X]...." That's already a liberal bias ingrained into the format.

Further, did you know that over 80% of the media admit to being registered Democrats or voting Democrat regularly?

The is absolutely a liberal bias in the mainstream media -- even some media liberals like Goldberg have confessed to such.

How anyone would even try to dispute this is beyond me.

[nutmeg.livejournal.com]

How anyone would even try to dispute this is beyond me.

This precludes any debate.

So I won't.

Re:

[ikilled007.livejournal.com]

Smart girl ;)

[city-glitter.livejournal.com]

The American media certainly isn't leftist.

Re:

[ikilled007.livejournal.com]

Yes, the mainstream American media are overwhelmingly leftist, Fox News Channel being the only exception.

[city-glitter.livejournal.com]

Not even close. Where are you getting that from?

[ikilled007.livejournal.com]

Well, here it is again:

http://www.livejournal.com/talkread.bml?journal=plural&itemid=215840&thread=782368#t782368

[estrie.livejournal.com]

you make it sound like the palestinians aren't also doing hugely wrong and cruel things because of their religious beliefs.
their martyrs blow themselves up believing that by doing so, that is, by killing jews, they will be assured a place in heaven.

[city-glitter.livejournal.com]

And young Israeli soldiers shoot Palestinians under the pretense that they have the faintest bit of right to the land.

are we counting who does more bad things...?

[estrie.livejournal.com]

a couple quick points/replies --
• The reason I bring up action justified by religious conviction at all is because you mention it in your first response. Soldiers, for the most part, kill who they're told to kill.
• I can't pretend to really know the entire history of the middle east, but to imply that the palestinians actually have any more right for the land than anyone else does for that land or any other land seems a little presumptuous as well, unless you are arguing from a religious view point in which case there is no point in debate.

Re: are we counting who does more bad things...?

[city-glitter.livejournal.com]

1) This is why I'm not inclined to admire those in the "service," as I'm told I should. Yeah, do whatever the government tells you to. That takes balls. It was a popular defense at the Nuremburg trials.

2) They have more right to the land because of the simple fact that the Israelis are attempting to displace them in large numbers after they've been there for some time.

[plural.livejournal.com]

I agree, that a person in the service is required to disregard an unlawful or immoral order, and that simply following orders is no excuse.

as for your second point, it is historically inaccurate, Israel did not displace the vast majority of the palestinians, nor does its official policy seek to. I will admit that there are instances where for security reason or other purposes a village was evacuated or moved, we could argue the validity of these actions but they count for only a tiny fraction of the palestinian population. The vast majority of the palestinians fled Israel, voluntarily, before Israel was created in 1948. They saw that a jewish state was being created and did not want to live in it. This would be the same as a french person fleeing france now to avoid living under a government ruled by LePen. There were no Israeli soldiers rounding them up and putting them on boats, because, Israel didn't exist.

You could blame the UN for creating a Jewish State, but remember that at the same time they also created a palestinian state beside it. A palestinian state which was stillborn and occupied for 19 years by their arab brethren

You could argue that they have a right to self governance, but historically they have never done so, in 1948 the palestinian state was destroyed at the same moment it was created, by the its Arab Neighbors, they attempted to destroy israel in the same manner and failed.

Israel did not deprive the palestinians of self governance, the arabs, and more specifically the Arab legion of Jordan did. Israel did not capture and occupy palestinian lands in 1967, it captured and occupied Jordanian lands.

And if you look to all the documents and treaties from the time period, negotiations for peace, they all refer to israel returning the land to the jordanians, not to the palestinians. The concept of a palestinian state has only recently been re-introduced to the international stage in the last twenty years, when Jordan and the Arab states finally accepted that Israel was there to stay and that the militarily could not take back the land.

[city-glitter.livejournal.com]

What entertains me so much about the entire situation is that people crapped their pants when Hitler recommended resettling Jews in Madagascar...but Israel is fine. Why is that? Because it's in the Talmud?

Israel is currently attempting to displace, and is indeed killing, large numbers of Palestinians. Furthermore, AMERICAN Jews are insane enough to think they can suddenly appear on the shore's of Tzena's Land and have nice pieces of Palestinian land. That is crap.

It is an attempt at theocracy every bit as vile as any fundamentalist Islamic government, supported by Americans who see no other way to use religion to influence world conditions.

[plural.livejournal.com]

I think that anyone who believes that Hitler desires would have been satisfied by relocation needs to review the history. Hitler didnt attempt to expel the jews from his country and others, he attempted to exterminate them.

And yes, Madagascar would not be acceptible, even if the UN suggested it. The land of israel is my peoples ancestral home, a land that we were forcibly expelled from and never stopped desiring to return to. Since the jews were finally expelled by the romans in the early ADs every government that has ruled the land, has one persectuted the jews living there and two refused to allow jews to move there. The british turned back thousands of refugees, denying them the opportunity to enter palestine, after every country in the world refused them. Many of these refugees ended up dying in hitlers death camps. People who escaped and we sent back because of politics.

That you compare Israel to a fundamentalist government, illuminates both your bias, and your lack of understanding of the situation.

Israel is first and foremost a democracy. It is an ethnic state, and does have significant laws which relate to the religious beliefs of the majority of that ethnicity.

Islamic Fundamentalist states, repress their citizens, abuse their women, and inflict harsh penalties upon those who do not stictly follow their religious beliefs.

Israel allows for all forms of religious devotion, short of satanism. It people and women, are free to persue life with liberty.
And most importantly equal justice under the law.

An Israeli arab friend of mine, owns a small agricultural business, one year he bought seeds from a large israeli company. The seeds were defective, the company offered to refund the

post got cut, continued here

[plural.livejournal.com]

The seeds were defective, the company offered to refund the money he paid for the seeds, but no more. He felt that he had a right to be compensated for the lost of profit he suffered because he did not have a product to sell. He sued them in an israeli court, and won. I was talking to him about this, and he said, that even with the hardships of being an arab in israel, he would not choose to live under Arab rule, because in an Arab country, he would never have won that lawsuit, and recieved justice.

Those are his words not mine, and I will not defend them but they opened my eyes greatly.

Israel is not supported out of american interests in the region. American interests in the middle east are dominated by Oil, Israel has almost no oil. but America continues to support it, even though it causes them great difficult with those that have the Oil. Particularly Saudi Arabia.

Why does America support israel then, if it is not in its best interest.

For two reasons, One is obviously the American Jewry, and the other because Israel is a democracy, and is the only country in the region which has consistantly be a friend to America. Israel bombed Iraqi factories, creating nuclear and biological weapons twenty years ago. Everyone knew they were there, but because of Isreal, when Iraq invaded Kuwait, they did not have nuclear weapons to use.

There are many other reasons of course, some noble, some not. I truely wish that you could somehow see beyond your bias, realize that it is a completely confused and screwed up situation that doesnt have any easy answers.

Am I biased? absolutely, I feel that Israel, its men women and children have a right to exist, in that place, and live in peace.

I also feel that based on history, not on religion, the Jews have an equal claim to the land as any other party.

I believe very strongly that the palestinians should have their own state, but I am not willing to sacrifice the state of israel to give it to them, nor am i willing to support the creation of a state dedicated to destroying us. Only if there can be peace, can there be a palestinian state.

Re: post got cut, continued here

[city-glitter.livejournal.com]

While Hitler certainly did attempt to exterminate the Jews, there was an early phase in which he spoke of resettling them on Madagascar. If only he had done that instead...

I think it's about time you sat down and accepted that Judaism is essentially a religion. It's time to stop perceiving yourselves as God's Chosen People, to live in the modern world and deal with the fact that you aren't better than anyone else.

"Your ancestral home." I believe we've gone over this before. If I returned to my ancestral home in Saxony and demanded the land back, I would be laughed out of court. And yes, my family was forced to leave: my paternal grandfather was pinned as a Nazi and was quite eager to get out of Germany towards the end of the war. Yet I can content myself with what my family has earned and collected since then, rather than running off to faraway deserts to snatch land away from largely unsuspecting civilians.

The Holocaust became the travesty it was because of the same sort of head-in-the-sand politics that exacerbate the situation in the Middle East today. A single life lost for such foolish eugenicist barbarianism was bad enough...but there was no need for it to be on such a scale. The Holocaust is nearly as much the fault of those who turned their heads as it is those who did the killing.

The Israeli government is quite fundamentalist. Although the appearances are that the government is run by reform and moderate Jews, the important fact to remember is that Israel was a nation formed on the basis of a religion. And as long as the Israeli government continues to justify their actions by claiming it's their right as Israelis, they qualify as fundamentalists. And that nation qualifies as a theocracy. There's not room for a sheet of paper between church and state.

How do you define democracy?

As a born citizen of the country strangely considered by most to be the foremost example of democracy in the world, I find it easy to look at the Constitution, our set of ideals, and the way things are...and find discrepancies. Obviously not every vote counts. Obviously not every individual is equal to his neighbor or his Congressman. Obviously not every American enjoys the rights to which they are entitled by their very existence as a human being. And the only difference between us and Israel is that we're committing our crimes on a much larger scale.

This reminds me very much of several hundred conversations I've had with my father, generally culminating in my being screamed at. While some of the details of the Islamic fundamentalist states are certainly repugnant, look at the essential nature of Israel. It is a nation formed on the basis of a religion. If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it might very well be a duck.

The reasons behind our supporting Israel are as transparent as Saran Wrap, and I have stated them four or five times over the course of this and past debates on these manners.

Of course, there's what I've forgotten to mention up until now...which is that we're Israel's bitch. It's very sad, really. The "greatest nation on Earth" controlled by fear and said nation's inherent religious fundamentalism to kowtow to a sad little piece of land that would be absolutely nothing if we and our allies hadn't fed it weapons and protection over the past fifty years or so. It's embarrassing. It's definitely in our best interest, because we're AFRAID.

Of course you're not willing to sacrifice the state of Israel. That's where you're from. I wouldn't expect you to be. Nevertheless, you and your countrymen are out of line and I look forward to the day your tyranny and the desperate, foolish lashings-out of Palestinian and other Arab "martyrs" is peacefully ended. Whether you coexist with the Palestinians, or each of you have your own state, I don't care. The current situation is intolerable from a human rights perspective, and I believe in my heart that it's only a matter of time until everyone realizes it and comes to a consensus that it isn't worth the lives.

[estrie.livejournal.com]

For every Jewish settlement, there are ten non-Jewish settlements in an area previously agreed to be free of any settlements.

[nutmeg.livejournal.com]

And most of all, I do not apologize that I am unable to achieve all of these things, in only ten lines.

Nor should you in your own journal! Oh my goodness.

I may disagree with you but for goodness sake say all you want in what ever manner you want, especially in your own journal.

[softwhisper.livejournal.com]

oh, pish tosh. If one is going to argue a point, it should be done well. He's obviously *trying* to. I'm offering tips. I'm sorry that seems to offend you.

[plural.livejournal.com]

I happen to argue my points very well, even if I do not conform to ideals of debate or even of writing. People understand my position and my point of view, for me this and my understanding their point of view, is more important than arguing the point.

Here's a solution.

[softwhisper.livejournal.com]

Both sides have done right, both have done wrong. I say let's just solve the problem by making the area one big parking lot.

Re: Here's a solution.

[estrie.livejournal.com]

my town could use a couple more of those...