It used to be like this:
Nothing but potato.
Posted on 12/28/2004 3:28:39 AM PST by white trash redneck
A 150-member Israeli aid delegation canceled its mission to Sri Lanka on Tuesday, after the country - one of the hardest hit in the Asian tsunami disaster - refused to accept the Israeli team, Israel Defense Forces officials said.
However, Israel is sending supplies at Sri Lanka's request, including 10,000 blankets contributed by the IDF, tents, nylon sheeting and water containers. The IDF Home Front Command is organizing aid preparations.
The Israeli humanitarian organization Latet ("To give") is sending a separate aid package Tuesday. It is filling a jumbo jet with 18 tons of supplies worth $50,000, at Sri Lanka's request. The group is considering sending additional aid shortly.
Sri Lanka said on Tuesday the death toll from the tsunami had risen to about 15,000 people, including at least 200 foreign tourists. Sri Lankan military spokesman Daya Ratnayake said more than 1.5 million people had been displaced from their homes - around 7.5 percent of Sri Lanka's population.
About 26,000 people were confirmed dead Tuesday in the wake of the tsunami that slammed into coasts from India to Indonesia two days before, with some estimates nearly doubling that toll.
The aid delegation that had been set to depart for Sri Lanka on Tuesday included medical teams and representatives of the IDF and Defense Ministry, who were planning to provide humanitarian assistance and participate in search-and-rescue operations.
The delegation was planning to assemble a medical facility comprised of specialist doctors, and set up emergency, internal medicine and pediatric departments, as well as laboratory and X-ray facilities in the southern part of Sri Lanka.
A far smaller team landed in Sri Lanka on Monday night, headed by four doctors from Hadassah University Hospital, Ein Karem in Jerusalem. The team was carrying medicine and baby food.
The doctors - who specialize in rescue operations, trauma and pediatrics - were also checking the viability of setting up a field hospital in the area, and advised Israel to send a larger team, such as the one Sri Lanka rejected.
"We will advise Israel and the Foreign Ministry... to send something more massive," said Dr. Avi Rivkind, director of Hadassah's trauma unit. "We will try to use our... broad experience in dealing with terror attacks and rescuing masses to help in this disaster as well."
Israel is weighing the option of sending similar delegations to Thailand, where more than 1,000 people have died, and India, where more than 4,000 people have died, but has yet to make a final decision on the matter.
Health Min. team leaves for Thailand A Health Ministry contingent left for Thailand on Monday night to aid in the rescue efforts there after around 1,000 people, including tourists, were killed on the islands of Phuket and Phi Phi. The contingent includes doctors, nurses and four members of the IDF, Israel Radio reported.
Israel has also offered its assistance to India. Mofaz passed on the offer to Indian authorities through Israel's military attache Colonel Moshe Krawitz.
Mofaz offered aid of two kinds - a search-and-rescue team from the Home Front Command, as well as consignments of food and medicine.
A ZAKA rescue-and-recovery team left for the disaster areas Monday night armed with its equipment, including materials and tools for identifying bodies, as well as body bags.
"We are waiting for any instruction," Yehuda Meshi Zahav, the director of the organization, said Monday.
Website administrators can swap the image for unauthorized posters.
Their server software senses if the request is authorized and, if not, substitutes a tattle-tale or an offensive pic like in this case.
Thanks.
But see Jerusalem Post:
Sri Lanka Ambassador Diffa Digeratna said Tuesday morning: "We are very thankful to the government of Israel for providing those facilities to Sri Lanka."
He said that due to logistical constraints and "the lack of accommodations in Colombo" (the capital), his government had requested that Israel send a reduced delegation.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1104204632909
Interesting.
It used to be like this:
Nothing but potato.
I hadn't read the Post yet this morning. Thank you for the update. It is good to see that Israeli aid, whether from teh IDF or not, is not truly being refused.
There is absolutely NO reason why India or Sri Lanka should be anti-jewish or anti-isreal.....beats logic.
I have to admit, I almost fell out of my chair laughing when I saw the picture. That was hilarious
"No, but I understand the sentiment. American fast-food joints have RUINED the french fry. It used to be different.
It used to be like this:"
And to add insult to injury the Americans are blaming the French for it. LOL!!
I agree. Anti-Israel would only make sense for political or commercial reasons, certainly not religious or cultural reasons.
"There is absolutely NO reason why India or Sri Lanka should be anti-jewish or anti-isreal.....beats logic."
I have no reason to disagree.
"Looking at a hierarchy of suffering some people just can't see the truth. "
No, what people are seeing (to their disgust) is that while these people suffer, a nation is refusing the assistance of another nation. A nation, I might add, that is very capable of lending such assistance.
The same happened when Iran was hit by an earthquake--they refused US help. If these nations wish to do that, they ought to quit the griping.
As for Israel giving money to put in a Tsunami alert system---Sri Lanka and India and Thailand didn't heed warnings from the US Tsunami centre at Honolulu (BTW, the US doesn't charge for such warnings) These nations were far more concerned with tourist dollars than common sense---and look at the price they paid.
archives
January 9, 2004
Iran refuses Israel's aid
Editorial
When the massive earthquake levelled the town of Bam, in Iran, killing an estimated 30,000 people, the world's aid agencies and governments moved into action to offer what they could of humanitarian aid. A question immediately arose about whether the fundamentalist Islamic government of Iran would welcome assistance from the United States, the "great satan" with whom Iran has had ill relations since 1979. No sweat, came the response, Iran will accept aid from any country – except the "Zionist regime."
Iran's astonishing refusal to accept assistance from Israel is a tangible statement on the contempt with which Israel is detested in that country, a hatred that is commonly held throughout the Muslim world.
The hatred of Israel is so intense that Iran's theocratic rulers will actually sacrifice the lives of its own citizens just to snub the "Zionist entity." We don't need to review the whole history of the region to appreciate the nuance of this refusal. Iran's leaders hate America, but are willing to accept humanitarian support from it. Israel, on the other hand, is considered so utterly contemptible that even potentially life-saving assistance is unwelcome. Others can parse the meaning of this rejection and find complex explanations perhaps, but there is no answer really beyond plain and visceral hatred of Jews and their national state.
This is no issue of mere principle, either. History has made Israel one of the world's top sources of expertise in disaster relief and crisis management. Saving lives – and rehabilitating disabled people who might otherwise die – is an area where Israel, sadly, has been forced to develop state-of-the-art procedures. To reject Israel's assistance is to reject the best expertise in the world. It will no doubt have the effect of allowing Iranian earthquake victims to die unnecessarily.
As disturbing and self-defeating as Iran's choice is, the world's silent reaction to it has been deafening. There was almost a twittering of excitement that American aid workers would be allowed into Iran, as though this symbolized some wonderful new epoch in international relations. Iran's decision should have brought the Islamic regime in Tehran to a new low in international esteem, but North American and European observers and governments have made almost no criticism of Iran's rejection of Israeli help. This is not such a great surprise. Western leaders have been turning a blind eye to Arab and Islamic anti-Semitism for decades.
There are, however, two small silver linings in all this. Israeli aid workers have proven themselves the better humanitarians, seeking ways to "smuggle" Israeli aid in through non-Israeli non-governmental organizations such as the Red Cross. Israeli agencies like Latet will not allow the decency and humanity inherent in relief efforts to be extinguished by anti-Semitism.
More significant in the long term may be the historical impact of major natural disasters on political conditions in a country. Failure to respond adequately or to oversee the fair and equitable distribution of foreign aid has ended more than one regime. The botched response to a massive earthquake several decades ago in Nicaragua is credited as a lynchpin in setting off the conditions for a revolution. The vulnerability or arrogance shown by a government in a time of genuine national emergency can solidify or destroy its hold on public support or tolerance.
Before the earthquake, hopeful observers had suggested that Iran is on the verge of a democratic breakthrough. The arrogance of Iran's refusal to accept Israeli aid reinforces the fundamental fact about Iran's Islamofascist regime: ideological hatred trumps the security of Iranian citizens. Because protecting the safety of its citizens is a government's top priority, the rejection of Israeli assistance goes to the very heart of the legitimacy of Iran's government.
If any good is to come of this disaster, let it be that the base inhumanity of Islamic fundamentalist regimes like Iran's are seen for what they are by foreign observers and, ideally, by Iranians themselves, who are chafing, and dying, under totalitarianism.
Latest news suggests over a hundred IAF officers and men may have perished at an Indian airbase in Malucca.
I just saw a report on that, and I'll try to go and get the article.
maybe the good lord has spoken to the Muslims.
They really had no realistic way of implementing the warnings anyway.
Well, there is that. I believe Americans invented the superior Crinkle-Cut fries, though these days everyone serves the inferior, French-style shoe-string variety.
Still, it was American food-cops who insisted that McDonalds stop cooking them in beef tallow...a moment that marked the end of American fry superiority.
Don't even get me started on that nasty Belgian habit of putting mayonnaise on french fries. [vomit] That's an abomination.
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