How many dead Palestinians ....

I think the Palestinian parents would want their child to be Palestinian and not Israeli.

My brother has in-laws living in Israel. The father is Jewish but the mother isn't so the children are not Jewish. They are, however, Israeli nationals and have both served National Service in the army.

A non Jewish person can't marry a Jew in Israel without converting so most of them get around it by flying to Cyprus for the ceremony and then flying back for the celebrations.

Thought provoking article by an atheist Jew in the Independent. It sums up how I feel about the whole horrific thing pretty much.

But here's an even shorter summary: @Big_Wild_World: @Independent These 2 guys outline all you need to know about the ongoing Palestinian Israeli tribal dispute & it's all bad news.

Excellent thatbags but depressing.

Peter Schwarts's letter is the most comprehensive account I have read, providing a joining-up-of-the-dots of the Israel/Gaza conflict, from a historical perspective to the present day. Full of clarity and fact, and ultimately great sadness.

Thanks for flagging it up B.

"The difference in Jordan was good Arab leadership that recognised that Israel was not going way and war for ever was not a good development policy."

"We should be clear that, given the opportunity, the Arabs would drive the Jews into the sea and that was true from day one. There was no way back from war once a religious state was declared. So Israel, once committed to a nation state in that location and granted that right by other nations, has had no choice but to fight. In my view, therefore, neither side has any shred of moral standing left, nor have the nations that supported both sides."

Chilling stuff.

Excellent article, thatbags

Thanks Bags

More 'perspective': report of rockets being launched from hospital car park in Gaza into Israel

Is that the fault of all the Palestinian people? How many Israeli citizens have been hurt by these rockets?

Over 1,500 Palestinians have been killed, their children traumatized, their infrastructure virtually destroyed, their homes reduced to rubble.

Thanks for that bags, very informative and depressing.

I know, eloethan, that is the bummer about the whole thing – the effects of the behaviour of those in power on the innocent and powerless. Tribal warfare was ever thus.

The Israelis built bomb shelters and an effective defence system to protect the civilian population. Hamas used foreign aid to build tunnels to infiltrate Israel and Egypt. We should ask why Hamas gets no support from Arab Muslim countries in the area. Rational argument won't outweigh so many pictures of injured children. Appalling.

By "this behaviour" thatbags I assume you include Israel's continuing encroachment on Palestinian land?

A very comprehensive article.
The writer repeats that the creation of the state of Israel was a mistake - there are some Jews who hold that Jews shouldn't have their own government in the Holy Land until they are all keeping the religious laws. Some think Jews shouldn't live there at all.
He's right to say the current govt. is destroying Judaism.

So the pointless killing goes on and on. I have a vision of a dead Palestinian child and a young Holacaust victim supporting each other and looking down from wherever they are, with tears streaming down their poor dead faces, on the continuing horrors taking place in this so-called Holy land. Will it never end? No amount of smug complacency from Israel or religious ranting from Hammas will take away the stain of the atrocities being carried by both sides in that poor, shattered land.

In answer to your question, eloethan, yes, though my understanding, which could of course be faulty, is that the Arab Palestinians (those in power) refused to live in peace with Jews after the 1967 war though that option was open to them and what the Israelis (those in power) agreed to. As I understand it, the Arab Palestinians in power refused to make peace so that ever since then they have been, essentially, still at war. They do not accept a state of Israel.

Israel has spent much of its defence funds on protecting its civilians from rocket attacks from neighbouring countries (the Iron Dome which intercepts most rockets, though not all) Gaza appears (that word is important) to have spent its defence funds on setting up rocket launches from civilian bases in the hope of using its people as a shield.

I also wonder if creating a state of Israel was a mistake. It does rather look like it, but I suppose it seemed the right thing to do after the Holocaust and god knows how many previous years of anti-Semitism in Europe and elsewhere.

But the bottom line is that the Palestinians (in power) are just as much in the wrong as the Israelis. There is never a good side and a bad side in stories like this. It's a horrific mess of historical grievances and religiously encouraged prejudices.

Here's an thought-provoking talk from a former Israeli soldier who now works for peace
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=93hqlmrZKd8

Bags, I've had 24 hours off GN as I've been away. Thanks for your links, and comments on this thread.

Last week was like the Apocalypse. It was night and there were rockets coming in from the sea, fire from tanks and F-16s dropping bombs everywhere. (David Nott, British volunteer surgeon in Gaza)

The US is pushing for sanctions against Russia for supporting the rebels who downed the airliner over Ukraine - and what are they doing about Israel ... why re-supplying them with ammunition of course.

US re-stocks Israel

An argument that Israelis are not the primary aggressors and that we are all living in Israel but some of us haven't realised it yet, but which is not condoning war crimes by either side.

Israel are the illegal occupiers and the ones holding the Palestinians in prison-like conditions- there is no escaping from those realities.