They will become democracies and elect Hamas.
Then we will protest the election and ask them to step down.
When they do not step down then we will cut off any help or negotiations and
Israel will blockade the people and try to starve the elected government out
of office.


OH WAIT!


That already happened.

Never mind.

:1orglaugh

Failing to even acknowledge that Israel is stealing land pretty much sums you up bro.

Pro Jew all the way.

No, I just see that part of the equation as inevitable. I never said it was right, there are obviously egregious wrongs on both sides, and both sides will have to make some changes and concessions if there's to be any lasting peace over there. It's either possible or it's impossible, but the only way for it to be possible is if people on both sides make it possible. It's really that simple.

Maybe the youth of the ME can figure out a resolution? That is, assuming their minds haven't been completely and irrevocably poisoned by their parents and elders.

That was but a fart in a steel bucket compared to what's happening across seven or eight countries right now.

I don't know if whatever resulting changes these protests bring about (if any) will be "better" than what's in power now. All I can say is look at what things they're asking for. Beyond that I've left it up to everyone here to chime in and say what they think is going on and what they think might happen.

Me, I'll pretty much just like to enjoy my own peace and not see the world enter into WWIII anytime soon.

Well, the rulers of the countries in question have long sought to keep most of their countries wealth and not to share what they do not absolutely have to with the general population.

The Royal families shit on the peasantry too long and too much. Now the Peasants are revolting.

This is about economic circumstance mainly ...

You still have not stated that Israel is stealing land.

Go ahead and type it out like this : "yes, Israel is stealing land".

If you can't type that out then you are pro Israel all the way.

Um, no, because it's not that simple and you know it.

This big giant 6-decade-long-mess (that has roots stemming back to BC and beyond) is chock full of grey areas, with very little black and white. I'd rather talk about solutions rather than quibble about inevitables. Stealing implies ownership, and it seems that ownership of that land according to history is not definite but very much in question. "We were there first" doesn't seem to hold much credence in this case since if one goes back far enough in history the case can be made for the other side's claim as well.

No, I won't be pigeonholed into being bias for one side or the other. My agenda is peace, and I invariably have always come down on any side that does something to set that agenda back, and that includes Israel.

Eat shit and die.


:1orglaugh

Meh - this is not "organic" - the countries where the US needs dictators removed (like Mubarak, who opposed a war on Iran and the Palestinian blockades) are going to see "results" - the others will quash the uprisings.

All the CIA does is literally walk around handing out 50 dollar bills for people to "rise up".

...

Ah, the eatshitanddie maneouver, I did not see that coming. Damn, you got me.



Paul asked the question earlier should the muslims just give up the fight and go elsewhere? Well, the flipside of that argument is the question some Jews often ask: If you were a tiny country surrounded by millions of people that hate you and will stop at nothing to exterminate you wouldn't you make moves to protect your people?

Well, wouldn't you?

I don't agree with everything they've done to accomplish that but I do know one thing: arguing endlessly about who's to blame and who is stealing and who blew up this cafe full of people or that bus station etc isn't going to solve it, it's only going to snowball the hate.

I'm hoping there is at least some glimmer of hope in all this protesting going on in the ME. As in maybe the youth of the region are finally fed up with all the old world bullshit thinking that's kept much of them living as near savages for so long.

Call me a dreamer, call me a "jew lover", call me whatever you have to. (Trust me, if any jews come in here and spout arguments that I don't agree with I'll be the first one debating them for it, and I won't be trotting out the "eat shit" argument either), I choose to hope against all hope that there are at least some people over there who are enlightened in their thinking enough to see what I see... that if you want peace the answer is simple: stop fighting, stop hating, and start working on solutions.


Btw, look at the responses some of these countries have to even the more peaceful protest marches. Tear gas, bloodshed, more killing. That tells me the old world establishment is afraid. Afraid of change, afraid of enlightened thinking, afraid of people actually having a few more of the basic civil rights we in other parts of the world take for granted.

Change is coming. Sooner or later, but I have a feeling it's definitely coming. Good or bad, I have no idea. Probably a mix of both if I know anything about how things work in the world.

Cheers.

its been 11 years, whats that map look like today?

If enough countries in the region go Democratic and pro getting Israel out of the ME, by using oil as the weapon. Cutting them off isn't an option. Saudi produces so much oil that keeps the World turning, will Russia back the US and Israel or Arab Countries?

Some of the posts here are not thinking very deeply into this. The general populace of these countries hate Israel, for good reasons. If enough get together and use their Democratic will, the outcome might be very different than the wishful thinkers imagine.

It's easy to buy a few rich Princes and dictators and get them to carry out your wishes. Tougher to buy a whole country. Many of those rulers were puppets of the West and citizens of the West got the benefit. The downside was Israel doing as it pleased and a few million Palestinians got fucked. :Oh crap

In today's NY Times:

MANAMA, Bahrain — Thousands of jubilant protesters surged back into the symbolic heart of Bahrain on Saturday as the government withdrew its security forces, calling for calm after days of violent crackdowns.

It was a remarkable turn after a week of protests that had shifted by the hour between joy and fear, euphoric surges of people power followed by bloody military crackdowns, as the monarchy struggled to calibrate a response to an uprising whose counterparts have toppled other governments in the region.

“All Bahrain is happy today,” said Jasim al-Haiki, 24, as he cheered the crowds in the central Pearl Square, aflutter with Bahraini flags. “These are Bahrainis. They do what they say they will do!”

The shift in this tiny Persian Gulf nation, a strategic American ally, was at least a temporary victory for the Shiite protesters, who had rejected a call to negotiate from Bahrain’s Sunni monarch until the authorities pulled the military off the streets.

But the events here were being watched with trepidation in neighboring Saudi Arabia, an adjacent Sunni monarchy with a restive Shiite population, and rippling across the region, where an extraordinary few weeks of antigovernment protests have ricocheted from northwest Africa to the Middle East.

Antigovernment demonstrations erupted again on Saturday in Libya, Algeria and Yemen, with each of those governments turning to violence to stop the protests. The worst carnage was in Libya, where security forces fired on protesters in Benghazi, the country’s second-largest city, killing dozens and pushing the death toll after three days of demonstrations to over 100.

In Algiers, protesters were quickly routed by hundreds of baton-wielding police officers. In Yemen, after both sides clashed in a hail of bottles, shoes and rocks, government supporters opened fire on antigovernment demonstrators, wounding at least four.

In Bahrain, the day started out with a lull, as both sides appeared to have been rattled by the violence of the past week, in which at least seven people were killed. The leaders of the major opposition parties called off the protests for Saturday, telling the public to stay home in an effort to lower the temperature.

But in what appeared to be a measure of who controls the movement now, the people ignored their ostensible leaders. Marchers set out from villages and the city center and by midday converged on Pearl Square.

The police met them with tear gas and rubber bullets. Young men collapsed in the road and others ran for cover, but people kept coming.

The police fired again.

Then the government blinked, perhaps sensing that the only way to calm a spiral of violence that claimed more lives with each passing day was to cede the square to the protesters.

The police left so suddenly and so completely that it took a minute for the protesters, still rubbing the tear gas out of their eyes, to realize they once again controlled the square.

By early evening, tens of thousands of people were pouring into the square, waving flags, some dropping to the ground to pray, and others shouting congratulations to each other. Marching past pools of blood on the road, they savored a moment of bittersweet jubilation, a mix of disbelief and sheer joy that they had prevailed, tempered with sadness for those who had been killed.

“Of course we are happy,” said Hassan al-Freidi, 53. “But I want to tell you: not yet. Today we’re mourning and honoring our martyrs; it is about joy and mourning. But it’ll only be about joy when we get our rights. And I know this day will come. Bullets do not scare us.”

The protesters won the battle on Saturday, although it was still not clear where it would all lead. The government had relinquished the square before, on Wednesday, only to return with a deadly assault on Thursday. On Friday, the army opened fire on a group of about 1,000 peaceful demonstrators trying to walk into the square.

.....

To the north, Kuwait also has a Sunni monarchy and a restive Shiite population. The big fear among Sunni governments is that Bahrain, once part of Persia, could become another Iran, where the Islamic revolution of 1979 produced a bellicose Shiite theocracy.

But the Shiite protesters here insist their revolt is secular and democratic. When the protests started on Feb. 14, in a so-called Day of Rage modeled after events in Egypt and Tunisia, demonstrators called for a constitutional monarchy, an elected cabinet and a constitution written by the people, as opposed to one imposed by the king.

After two protesters were killed in the first two days, both shot in the back by the police, an infuriated and reinvigorated opposition added a new demand: an end to the monarchy.

Interesting stuff there. While a lot of people even in this thread insist it's more of the same religion-based uprisings (much like in Iran's past etc) many of the protestors themselves seem to insist their cause is secular in nature.

I wonder who to believe?

Well it seems you don't have the back bone that the Palestinians have. They won't march off to where ever to please the Jews. Fighting with an army won't work, fighting with oil power will.

If the Arab World gang up and use their oil power do you propose the Jews should just pack their bags and move out?

Of course when you open your doors to a family of Palestinians, or donate a ton of money to them being resettled we will take you seriously. Or should they just Fuck Off to anywhere but near Winnipeg and not expect any help from you?

Not much to be found today, I did find this.

http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-..._6842487_n.jpg

Guess it's changing so fast it's pointless to draw a map.

Bahrain is about religion, Sunni against Shia.

Libya is tribal.

While the Arab World is split Israel is safe.

I'm not sure where all this attitude is coming from Paul.

But okay, point by point, here it is: "marching off" and "having no backbone" -- well, would you say all the people from Kosovo who ran for their lives and later emigrated to Canada are all spineless cowards for moving away from their homeland in search of a better safer life?

Think before answering.

You put a lot of faith in "oil", maybe too much? If as you say all the Arab nations were to gang up on Israel in attempts to oust them from the ME I can tell you it would be the start of WWIII and in all likelyhood the end of all of us. The US isn't going to sit idly by, you know that. Neither would it's allies, the UK, France, Canada, AUS, etc. And of course then Russia and China and a few others would have to take part.

What a wonderful suggestion there Paul.

As to your last and most ignorant statement to me to date I'll say this: You obviously don't know Winnipeggers. During that aforementioned Kosovo crisis for example we collectively donated tons of aid money, items, blankets, etc. And yes, many people here opened their doors to regugees, not just here but all over Canada. I had a few of them in my computer training course back in the late 90's and gave rides to and from their home to a few of them on many occasions.

But as to the Palestinians, their situation isn't the same as that of Kosovo is it? They aren't all innocent refugees with no place to go are they? Perhaps if back in the 70's and 80's they had just left Israel alone things would be different today? I don't know, I'm asking. Perhaps if there'd been less fighting going on all those years and less suicide bombings and terrorist attacks we'd have a slightly different-looking map of the region today? You tell me, you seem to be the expert.

The one given that remains is that Israel isn't going anywhere. You either accept it and deal with them or you eventually start a war.

Or keep the petty bickering going for another 30 years, the Palestinians continually attacking and provoking, the Israelis nipping away more and more land in attempts to shrink the problem.


You seem to argue for more war. I'm arguing for peace. Your argument just perpetuates and advocates further hatred. Mine supports putting aside past grievances and the notion of getting down to finding more equitable solutions.

Personally I'd have liked to have seen Israel offer to let all Palestinians live within it's borders in the same manner they're accustomed to, as equal citizens of their country. But that's never been possible has it Paul? Why? Because of the hatred. How can you trust people who hate you enough to kill you? Answer is: you can't.


I gave you one snide remark at me Paul, don't let there be another.

Cheers. :D

1948, 1956, 1967, 1973 They got their collective asses kicked each time.