"That was the sanest statement on this whole thread"

I agree. Don, many of us join you in praying that the Holy Spiri will give us wisdom.

Kevin said: "If you are looking for an assessment of the conflict that is fair to Israel, you are looking in the wrong place. The practice of eviscerating the Zionist strawman is alive and well here."

Of course you did not comment on the content of the blog posting which was very moderate and realistic in its assessment. Wow. Speaking of "strawmen"!

Why should your request to deal with the issues be honored when you yourself do not deal with the issues. You insult Palestinians and then you expect to be taken seriously. Pathetic. Truly pathetic.

We've experienced several apparent software glitches in the past few weeks, so it wouldn't surprise me if some comments didn't show up.

Thank you for the link, Rick.

D

jonabark, go to the top of the thread and select "Options." From the drop-down menu that will appear, you can select to have the comments arranged in different ways--oldest first, newest first, etc. You should then be able to scroll down and find the comments you seek; they are still here.

The following article should give some perspective:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/ar...

As is the practice of defending war crimes by "conservatives".

Was the ignoblus thread removed? Were my comments unacceptable? I know I say provocative things, but thought I was well within the boundaries here. Anyone?

I do know that . And I figured out hat the posts were still there.
the 1st time I tried newest it didn't work. I have a slow connection
so get these things from time to time. Thanks for your answer. I
should have removed the post.

That was the sanest statement on this whole thread -- I've read newspaper commentaries to this effect. And even if Satan is at work, as some here have suggested, it helps to keep in mind that he often uses things that are, in fact, true.

oops

That is silly. I have had close Jewish friends before I became a
Christian , while , and after leaving orthodox faith. All of them
were equally Jewish. What I am saying in regard to Israel's policies
and history is not directed at Jews or Judaism and my views are
shared by many Jews. Though I have grave reservations about any
divine covenant that gives some people the right to kill others I
also understand the forces that led to the creation of Israel as a
Jewish State. Kadima claims the settlements should be legitimized and
I think that is a violation of the UN rulings that established
Israel. I oppose the use of violence against Israel , and while
sympathetic to genuine self -defense, I oppose the frequent
illegitimate use of violence by Israel.

Most of the leaders of Kadima were from Likud. That is a fact. Are
you denying that? I realize and accept that I made a mistake in
misnaming the current leadership. It was an unintentional and
admittedly dumb mistake that had no intent to deceive. I try to be
accurate and understand your disagreement with my ideas. However, any
notion of anti-Jewish sentiment on my part is mistaken. When I have
encountered this I have often challenged it and called it for what it
appeared to me to be. I understand that it can be hard to take
people at their word online, but I have tried to be open and clear
about my thinking.

I do think BrentH's comments, if one can read them without becoming thoroughly incensed and nauseated, can actually be useful, if only because they illustrate the intractable nature of attitudes toward the Middle East situation. I don' t for a minute believe that perpetual war between Israel and Palestine is truly inevitable. But the situation won't ever be solved so long as both sides and their supporters continue stereotyping and demonizing the other side.

Obviously, if "the vast majority" of Palestinians are "incorrigibly racist and pathologically suicidal" and are "in Satan's thrall," then it can do no good to learn to know them or to try and understand their situation, or to comprehend that they really do have the same wishes and desires for themselves and their loved ones as we do. Better to bomb them and keep them at a distance--keep them as an abstraction, as BrentH has done.

On the other hand, if indeed the Israelis are only interested in perpetuating a sense of moral superiority born out of the long history of antisemitism, or if they are just neo-colonialists bent on dominating a region that doesn't really belong to them, then, too, it will be hard to see them as individuals whose hearts beat exactly the same way as ours do.

And so the finger pointing, and thus the bombing, continues. If this truly is the will of God, it cannot be the God of the Hebrew scriptures or the God revealed in Jesus Christ. It fmust be the will of some other, and demonic, "god." How can we, instructed by Jesus to become peacemakers, melt hearts that have become petrified, one by one, both Israeli and Palestinian? I truly believe that's our job as peacemakers. I don't have any idea how to do it, but I pray that the Holy Spirit will give us wisdom.

Peace

I apologize in advance for this long post, but since you have made a point of denying the long history of U.S. support for Saddam Hussein, I am posting it here for your education and edification. (But just to be fair, the U.S. also aided Iran during that war when Ollie North sneaked into Bagdad and sold airplane parts. And, yes, our own CIA actually did help to place Saddam in power.)

September, 1980. Iraq invades Iran. The beginning of the Iraq-Iran war.

February, 1982. Despite objections from Congress, President Reagan removes Iraq from its list of known terrorist countries.

December, 1982. Hughes Aircraft ships 60 Defender helicopters to Iraq.

1982-1988. Defense Intelligence Agency provides detailed information for Iraq on Iranian deployments, tactical planning for battles, plans for air strikes and bomb damage assessments.

November, 1983. A National Security Directive states that the U.S would do "whatever was necessary and legal" to prevent Iraq from losing its war with Iran.
November, 1983. Banca Nazionale del Lavoro of Italy and its Branch in Atlanta begin to funnel $5 billion in unreported loans to Iraq. Iraq, with the blessing and official approval of the US government, purchased computer controlled machine tools, computers, scientific instruments, special alloy steel and aluminum, chemicals, and other industrial goods for Iraq's missile, chemical, biological and nuclear weapons programs.

October, 1983. The Reagan Administration begins secretly allowing Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Egypt to transfer United States weapons, including Howitzers, Huey helicopters, and bombs to Iraq. These shipments violated the Arms Export Control Act.

November 1983. George Schultz, the Secretary of State, is given intelligence reports showing that Iraqi troops are daily using chemical weapons against the Iranians.

December 20, 1983. Donald Rumsfeld , then a civilian and now Defense Secretary, meets with Saddam Hussein to assure him of US friendship and materials support.

July, 1984. CIA begins giving Iraq intelligence necessary to calibrate its mustard gas attacks on Iranian troops.

January 14, 1984. State Department memo acknowledges United States shipment of "dual-use" export hardware and technology. Dual use items are civilian items such as heavy trucks, armored ambulances and communications gear as well as industrial technology that can have a military application.

March, 1986. The United States with Great Britain block all Security Council resolutions condemning Iraq's use of chemical weapons, and on March 21 the US becomes the only country refusing to sign a Security Council statement condemning Iraq's use of these weapons.

May, 1986. The US Department of Commerce licenses 70 biological exports to Iraq between May of 1985 and 1989, including at least 21 batches of lethal strains of anthrax.

May, 1986. US Department of Commerce approves shipment of weapons grade botulin poison to Iraq.

March, 1987. President Reagan bows to the findings of the Tower Commission admitting the sale of arms to Iran in exchange for hostages. Oliver North uses the profits from the sale to fund an illegal war in Nicaragua.

Late 1987. The Iraqi Air Force begins using chemical agents against Kurdish resistance forces in northern Iraq.

February, 1988. Saddam Hussein begins the "Anfal" campaign against the Kurds of northern Iraq. The Iraq regime used chemical weapons against the Kurds killing over 100,000 civilians and destroying over 1,200 Kurdish villages.

April, 1988. US Department of Commerce approves shipment of chemicals used in manufacture of mustard gas.

August, 1988. Four major battles were fought from April to August 1988, in which the Iraqis massively and effectively used chemical weapons to defeat the Iranians. Nerve gas and blister agents such as mustard gas are used. By this time the US Defense Intelligence Agency is heavily involved with Saddam Hussein in battle plan assistance, intelligence gathering and post battle debriefing. In the last major battle with of the war, 65,000 Iranians are killed, many with poison gas. Use of chemical weapons in war is in violation of the Geneva accords of 1925.

August, 1988. Iraq and Iran declare a cease fire.

August, 1988. Five days after the cease fire Saddam Hussein sends his planes and helicopters to northern Iraq to begin massive chemical attacks against the Kurds.

September, 1988. US Department of Commerce approves shipment of weapons grade anthrax and botulinum to Iraq.

September, 1988. Richard Murphy, Assistant Secretary of State: "The US-Iraqi relationship is... important to our long-term political and economic objectives."

December, 1988. Dow chemical sells $1.5 million in pesticides to Iraq despite knowledge that these would be used in chemical weapons.

July 25, 1990. US Ambassador to Baghdad meets with Hussein to assure him that President Bush "wanted better and deeper relations". Many believe this visit was a trap set for Hussein. A month later Hussein invaded Kuwait thinking the US would not respond.

August, 1990 Iraq invades Kuwait. The precursor to the Gulf War.

July, 1991 The Financial Times of London reveals that a Florida chemical company had produced and shipped cyanide to Iraq during the 80's using a special CIA courier. Cyanide was used extensively against the Iranians.

August, 1991. Christopher Droguol of Atlanta's branch of Banca Nazionale del Lavoro is arrested for his role in supplying loans to Iraq for the purchase of military supplies. He is charged with 347 counts of felony. Droguol is found guilty, but US officials plead innocent of any knowledge of his crime.

June, 1992. Ted Koppel of ABC Nightline reports: "It is becoming increasingly clear that George Bush Sr., operating largely behind the scenes throughout the 1980's, initiated and supported much of the financing, intelligence, and military help that built Saddam's Iraq into [an aggressive power]."

July, 1992. "The Bush administration deliberately, not inadvertently, helped to arm Iraq by allowing U.S. technology to be shipped to Iraqi military and to Iraqi defense factories... Throughout the course of the Bush administration, U.S. and foreign firms were granted export licenses to ship U.S. technology directly to Iraqi weapons facilities despite ample evidence showing that these factories were producing weapons." Representative Henry Gonzalez, Texas, testimony before the House.

February, 1994. Senator Riegle from Michigan, chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, testifies before the senate revealing large US shipments of dual-use biological and chemical agents to Iraq that may have been used against US troops in the Gulf War and probably was the cause of the illness known as Gulf War Syndrome.

August, 2002. "The use of gas [during the Iran-Iraq war] on the battle field by the Iraqis was not a matter of deep strategic concern... We were desperate to make sure that Iraq did not lose". Colonel Walter Lang, former senior US Defense Intelligence officer tells the New York Times.

This chronology of the United States' sordid involvement in the arming of Iraq can be summarized in this way: The United States used methods both legal and illegal to help build Saddam's army into the most powerful army in the Mideast outside of Israel. The US supplied chemical and biological agents and technology to Iraq when it knew Iraq was using chemical weapons against the Iranians. The US supplied the materials and technology for these weapons of mass destruction to Iraq at a time when it was known that Saddam was using this technology to kill his Kurdish citizens. The United States supplied intelligence and battle planning information to Iraq when those battle plans included the use of cyanide, mustard gas and nerve agents. The United States blocked UN censure of Iraq's use of chemical weapons. The United States did not act alone in this effort. The Soviet Union was the largest weapons supplier

I'm sure Jesus was thrilled to see the Zionists appropriate Palestinian land with trickery and subterfuge and when that didn't work with the Irgun and Stern Gang. And I'm sure he was thrilled at how the Zionists went about establishing their state with land appropriated from the Palestinians. And what must really please Jesus now is how the Zionists show their love and compassion to their "enemies". Did Jesus say we were to love our enemies? Turn the other cheek? Oh, I forget the Zionists live by another moral code, promulgated by their "spiritual" ancestor Jacob. And we shouldn't forget the other tenet that is a cornerstone of their moral philosophy - eyes for an eye, teeth for a tooth.

And of course, the United States government, as the worlds leading "Christian" moral authority, supports Israel's Zionists completely.

And another insult, to boot -- I'm an evangelical by your standards, and so are many people who post here. But we don't uncritically subscribe to conservative ideology, in part because we believe that it violates Scripture.

Brent, my comments were not inflammatory. Stating that an entire nation is "incorrigably racist and pathologically genocidal" is demonstrably a racist comment. There's simply no way to get around that.

If you want us to stop accusing you of making racist remarks, then refrain from making racist remarks. It's that simple.

Well Sir Ethical, I do agree with you that there is a misconception around Hamas. They have indeed been weighted down by politically loaded words, so that people are either afraid of them or confuses them so they ignore the whole issue. But I think that Hamas would better be described as a Freedom Fighting Organization/A Political Party. Unlike the Muslim Brotherhood, who is responding to what they see as tarnishes in Islam, Hamas may be wrapped with Islamic wording but they are at their core fighting for principles of freedom and justice. Whether you agree with their tactics or not it does provide for a deeper understanding of the conflict to not get rooted in the "terrorist" name calling. Yet who wants to humanize our enemies right. It is so much easier to back all Muslim people into the corner of being wife beating, rocket shooting, holocaust denying animals. Maybe even Osama Bin Laden has a family and friends, and didn't grow up one day wishing to kill people. Maybe if we were not hard headed enough to actually listen to our enemies they could show us the log in our own eye. Sorry that was kind of a rant.

How silly - that Iraq "looks pretty good" - despite the fact that violence continues and that all that exists thus far is a puppet government maintained in much the same way as our South Vietnamese proxies were, for as long as we cared to expend massive amounts of blood and treasure.

And how arrogant to repeat the canard that when our imperial adventurism fails - as all imperialism and colonialism is doomed to - that it is all the hapless victims' fault who we subjected to our hubris, who never even asked for it.