Posted on 04/04/2002 3:49:02 PM PST by newsperson999
Well it looks like we voted against Israel once again..I don't care what you say..Bush and the US are hypocrites when it comes to the war on Terrorism,you Bush lovers crack me up...I have lost major respect for the man today...You people are in denial
(April 5) - In his surprise speech yesterday, US President George W. Bush demonstrated what has become an axiom of international relations: Israel is the only country whose right to defend itself is not self-evident, but subject to strict international limits. The transplantation of this axiom into the post-September 11 world order is a tragedy, not just for Israel, but for the US.
Over the past month alone, Israel lost 125 of its citizens to terrorism, almost twice the proportionate toll the US suffered on September 11. Yet Israel is not doing what the US did in Afghanistan. Far from it. Though the US did not deliberately kill a single civilian, thousands of innocent Afghans reportedly died in aerial bombardments designed to oust the Taliban and crush al-Qaida.
The lion's share of Israel's fighting, by contrast, has been done on the ground, with greater care to prevent civilian casualties than any other army facing a similar threat would employ. While it is possible to argue that Israel could do a better job of implementing its own ideal, the contrast between the Israeli and Palestinian ideals could not be more stark: Israel tries to minimize civilian casualties, while the Palestinians try to maximize them.
The past week, for example, was a happy one for Hamas. "Forty were killed and 200 wounded - in just two operations," one Hamas leader told The New York Times with a smile. These operationsâ were the massacres of families attending a Pessah Seder in Netanya and in a restaurant in Haifa.
As the leader of the free world and the war on terrorism, Bush's job is to support Israel to the hilt, not stand hovering with a stopwatch. It is rank paternalism to suggest Israel must be lectured to about "distinguishing between the terrorists and ordinary Palestinians" and told long-term security depends on peace.
As usual, we will swallow such insults and be thankful the US, alone in the world, supported our right to self-defense for seven whole days without succumbing to international pressure to say "stop!" We will also draw comfort from the fact Bush scored Yasser Arafat for his "failure" to crush terrorism and "betrayal" of his own people.
But Bush's ratcheted-up rhetoric against Arafat does not change the fact he is being given yet another last chance. It is even possible this is truly Arafat's last chance and when he fails again, the US will end his exemption from the Bush Doctrine and support his ouster.
The question remains, however, how many more Israelis and Palestinians must die on the altar of another last chance for Arafat?
If the Bush administration really cares about saving these lives, not to mention the integrity of its war on terrorism, the Bush Doctrine must be explicitly applied to Arafat. That doctrine is, as Bush told the UN in November, "No national aspiration, no remembered wrong can ever justify the deliberate murder of the innocent." Its corollary must be that the US will not recognize any leader of any people, Nobel Peace Prize notwithstanding, who is dripping with such innocent blood.
In his remarks yesterday, Bush rightly declared, "No nation can negotiate with terrorists." But then he misstepped with his explanation: "For there is no way to make peace with those whose only goal is death." Actually, the goal of terrorism is not death, but victory. Terror is not an irrational spasm but a calculated means to achieve concrete aims.
Just after September 11, Hamas decided to stop all its terror attacks because, as a member of its five-man steering committee told The New York Times, "Our resistance in Israel might be confused with what had happened in the US." If Bush wants to stop terrorism, he must not sow utter confusion between Israel's and America's struggle against terrorism; the two must be indistinguishable. This is not just a matter of strategy, but a description of reality. If terror wins anywhere, it will spread everywhere.
The idea that Bush should accept your out of context simple-minded interpretation of scripture as his mideast policy is silly.
The idea that disagreeing with anything Israel does is therefore "cursing Israel' is also silly.
God Himself disagrees with many things Israel does throughout the Bible.
I wouldn't be settin my cap for him to do nothin.
And,..........EXACTLY, with whose MONEY does the U.N. Vote with??
Al-Qaida 'Coffee' who?
That's where you went wrong. Bad source
I don't think the timing of his request for Israel to withdraw was an accident.
I am getting tired of you people doubting our president's judgement every time
he does something different than the obvious
He's got good reasons for doing what he is doing with a whole lot better intel, than we have.
And I think it is very un-Christianlike to doubt this man's knowledge of the Bible or his commitment to Israel.
That is something!
Imagine an American President putting OUR interests first instead of another nation's interests!
Thanks to James Baker for doing the job down in Florida defending the integrity of the vote so that Bush got his chance to serve!!! I really admire James Baker a man President Bush counts as a close friend.
I think Bush's actions bought Israel as much time as possible to clean up the terrorist strongholds...in spite of the Arab world becoming more and more inflamed...and now his apparent reversal, to pacify the Arabs somewhat... while Israel takes her time in pulling back.
Bush get's credit for not being totally hardline but for listening and responding to the voices of the opposition.
The critics will find fault no matter what Bush does, but I think in the end this will be a plus for Bush politically.
I also believe that this gives Bush and Israel the chance to gain the high moral ground. One more suicide bomber after Powell gets there and both Bush and Israel will have the justification to remove Arafat once and for all. After all, the UN, EU, et all won't be able to say we didn't try...They did vote, unanimously, to accept the U.S. plan.
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