Israel: A Negative Model

[bemildred]

Edit: this if about Sri Lanka and the LTTE, just so you know where it's coming from.

Israel has degenerated into heartlessness, real cruelty toward the weak, the poor, and the suffering. Israel displays indifference to the hungry, the elderly, the sick, and the handicapped, equanimity in the face of, for example, trafficking in women, or the exploitation of foreign workers in conditions of slave labor, and in the face of profound, institutionalized racism toward its Arab minority. When all this happens as if it were perfectly natural, without outrage and without protest, I begin to fear that even if peace comes tomorrow, even if we eventually return to some sort of normality, it may be too late to heal us completely. David Grossman (The Rabin Memorial Lecture, Nov. 4, 2006, in the presence of Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert)

It might make sense to buy weapons and military technology from Israel but only the congenitally inane would take political advice from a country that has been immersed in a conflict for more than half a century, with no end in sight. Israel has not only brought untold misery to the Palestinian people; she has also endangered her own health and future, as a nation. Her refusal to look at the root causes of the conflict and address them politically, her insistence on reducing the entire issue to a battle against terrorism has brought her not victory but an endless war and unending insecurity. Israel does provide a lesson and an example in what not to do when dealing with an ethnic issue.

Last week PM Ratnasiri Wickramanayake visited Israel and had a bilateral discussion with Prime Minister Ehud Olemrt. The government media made much of the visit and even more of a supposed piece of advice from Mr. Olmert: ‘Do not give into terrorism because it will only bring destruction to your country”. Israel of course never gave into ‘terrorism’, never permitted any considerations of human rights, public opinion or international community interferes with her relentless battle with ‘terrorism’. She had never cared about the costs of that war, economic or material, either to the enemy or to her own people. For more than half a decade Israel waged a total war against the Palestinians in the name of battling terrorism.

What have been the results of this policy? The war still continues; the suicide bombers still come. Israel’s borders are not secure and there is no internal security either. The harsher the Israel policy gets the more dogged becomes Palestinian resistance. Both nations are caught in a vicious cycle of death and destruction seemingly with no end because the moderates are not strong enough to impose possible compromises on the polity and the society.

http://www.asiantribune.com/?q=node/10261

[Jim Sagle]

1. David Grossman seems kinda fucked up in the head.

[bemildred]

4. Yeah, clearly he's a very violent dude. nt

[pocoloco]

2. Plus the United States has legitimized their torture.

Can't complain now that we do it.

[oberliner]

3. Military says 27 Tamil rebels, 2 soldiers killed in Sri Lanka fighting

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka - A series of battles along the front lines in northern Sri Lanka killed 27 ethnic Tamil rebels and two government soldiers, the military said Friday.

Meanwhile, air force jets hit a rebel warehouse filled with explosives in the fourth straight day of government airstrikes against the Tamil Tigers' de facto state in the north, the military said.

The violence was part of a heavy increase in fighting in the country's civil war in recent months. The government has vowed to crush the rebels by the end of the year, but diplomats and other observers say the army is facing more resistance than it expected.

Government troops killed 10 rebels in fighting Friday in the Welioya, Jaffna and Mannar areas, the military said.

Battles on Thursday killed 17 rebel fighters and two soldiers, the military said.

http://sg.news.yahoo.com/ap/20080329/tap-as-gen-sri-lanka-civil-war-1st-ld-wr-d3b07b8.html

Where is the Sri Lanka/Tamil Tigers forum?

Since 1983 about 70,000 people have been killed in that conflict.

In the same time period, about 7,000 have been killed in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

The US has sent money and provided training to the Sri Lankan military.

[bemildred]

5. "Where is the Sri Lanka/Tamil Tigers forum?"

You got me. There is no Congo forum, no Darfur forum, no Colombia forum. I guess people just care more about some things than others. I pay attention to the civil war in Sri Lanka because it relates to one of my hobby horses, the technical obsolescence of conventional military force. But this came up under Middle East-Israel. I thought it was interesting that some guy writing in Sri Lanka for Sri Lankans thinks the way Israel handles the Palestinians is an example of what not to do.

[oberliner]

6. I do find it interesting to read that perspective

Incidentally, I'm fairly certain the author in the OP is a woman. One website I encountered accused that person of being a racist because of some of what they had written about the Tamil Tigers.

I recall making a number of posts in the main forums here a while ago regarding that conflict and the response was minimal to say the least.

Out of curiosity, do you think the Tamils ought to have their own independent state? And do you consider the LTTE to be a terrorist organization? Do you think that the US should continue sending aid to the Sri Lankan government? What, if any, action do you favor to help bring an end to the conflict?

[bemildred]

7. I generally expect such posts to sink like a stone.

Sri Lanka and the LTTE is not a widely held interest.

I tend to think we are all racists at heart, it's a constant struggle even for the best of us. When the government gets on the bandwagon of bigotry, we all get screwed.

I tend to favor local autonomy rather than a proliferation of independent states, that is federal or confederal arrangements. What most people want is the right to run their own affairs without outside interference and to get on with their lives. And the fact is there are times you are better off with friends and allies rather than a bunch of enemies all around you, and there are issues that are best addressed in larger regional contexts, e.g. the environment and economic infrastructure. That seems to be what this person thinks too WRT the Tamils. One ought not forget the muslim minority in Sri Lanka either. Of course any good nationalist finds that sort of thinking anathema.

Edit: the Balkan area is a perfect example of getting screwed in perpetuity because you are unable to recognize and defend your regional interests because you all are fixated on your hatred of each other.

I think the approach suggested in the OP is the right one, but it will still take time. Some problems you don't so much fix as just outlive them by doing the right thing and hanging in there. Love is fragile, hate goes on forever.

[bemildred]

8. The one commenter seems to agree with you about her gender.

I suspect he/she is in a better position to know than I am.