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Israel is not secular. By definition in its Declaration Of Independence it identifies itself as a "Jewish State".
De jure a religious state. De facto, as secular as we are, and a proportion of our population mischaracterizes us as a Christian nation when we are de facto a secular state also. Not so in the surrounding states that Israel has to contend with, where the irrationality and the mysticism and the intolerance run with roiling turbulence from the President to the Professor to the Plumber to the Prostitute.
De jure a religious state. De facto, as secular as we are, and a proportion of our population mischaracterizes us as a Christian nation when we are de facto a secular state also. Not so in the surrounding states that Israel has to contend with, where the irrationality and the mysticism and the intolerance run with roiling turbulence from the President to the Professor to the Plumber to the Prostitute.
Do you even realize or have a clue that by generalizing 1.6 billion muslims like that, you have no difference to the isis fanatics in your way of thinking?
How about Great Britain's colonial rule of India among other places, as well as the atrocities committed in an attempt to maintain rule? Or their support for the apartheid South African government? (Margaret Thatcher used to refer to Nelson Mandela as a terrorist.)
How about the U.S.'s involvement in a little fracas in Southeast Asia?
How about the U.S.'s secret bombing of neutral Cambodia?
How about the puppet governments the U.S. has installed and/or supported in Latin America, including coups specifically instigated by the CIA.
How about the CIA instigating a coup against the democratically-elected prime minister of Iran in 1953 and installing a dictator? In fact, how about the U.S.'s overall involvement in Middle East internal politics throughout the 1950s and beyond by way of covert CIA operations?
How about the U.S. secretly selling arms to our "good buddies" in Iran in the 1980s in order to secretly fund an effort to overthrow the democratically-elected government in Nicaragua.
How about the U.S. invading Iraq in 2003 under the false pretense of Iraq having "weapons of mass destruction."
Shall I go on?
You seem to have forgotten about China and Russia...
Do you even realize or have a clue that by generalizing 1.6 billion muslims like that, you have no difference to the isis fanatics in your way of thinking?
Do you have eyes that see, ears that listen? When you hear or watch news out of the Islamosphere you generally hear stories of grinding poverty, sexual abuse, depraved violence conspicuous displays of wealth by rulers, and endemic corruption. Stories of real accomplishments are rare.
And I am waiting for you to blame the West somehow for this. Israeli settlements or operations such as Protective Edge and Cast Lead do not cause all of those pathologies.
Do you have eyes that see, ears that listen? When you hear or watch news out of the Islamosphere you generally hear stories of grinding poverty, sexual abuse, depraved violence conspicuous displays of wealth by rulers, and endemic corruption. Stories of real accomplishments are rare.
And I am waiting for you to blame the West somehow for this. Israeli settlements or operations such as Protective Edge and Cast Lead do not cause all of those pathologies.
Well, I suppose I will have to repeat the same question I asked the other poster to you.
Do you even realize or have a clue that by generalizing 1.6 billion muslims like that, you have no difference to the isis fanatics in your way of thinking?
Also I didn’t mention Israel in my post. I am just replying to the racist and islamophobic posts. If that bothers you, than that’s your problem.
I think you are making some broad, unsubstantiated, claims. Also what direct threat do these nations have that Israel counters? It seems like the only thing unifying them is the hatred of Israel, and because we support Israel the US.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Marc Paolella
Broad, unsubstantiated claims. Let's stop the nonsense and let's take off the blinders.
Lets just look at the last few weeks, and forget about the past few hundred years, because there is not enough server space in North America to contain all the accounts.
So tell me why we should not support the only state in the region that has a secular, civilized, Western styled society and that is willing to take up arms to keep some semblance of sanity in the region. Without which the entire region collapses into sectarian Armageddon. And that's just what they are doing to each other, I won't get into what they want to do to us. Or actually, I will. September 11th is what they want to do to us, only including all the rest of the buildings.
So decapitating what was only a pretense of freedom of speech in the first place? A violent and savage act of the state against its own people.
Iran is one of these situations that make me sad. It used to be a secular nation and women were well educated.
I think it will be secular again. I think that for the most part the Iranian people LOVE the United States and Americans but the sanctions can make us an easy target for propaganda and unifying the masses. One thing I have learned is that the Israel/Palestine situation seems to be the one thing that unifies a heck of a lot of Muslims. I remember one day we were working late and I went out to grab food. One of my friends who is educated and that I have known for years tagged along. He is a Muslim from Sudan but he rarely talks about his religion except when fasting. We get in my car and all of a sudden he starts talking about the US support for Israel. It was literally out of the blue. I was floored and because this was when Darfur was in the forefront of the news it made it even odder. I was thinking of how this is even important to him? Where is he getting this from? Is it from his mosque?
To me it seems that our support of Israel is some kind of unifying factor among a lot of people that really have nothing in common. I mean the Palestinians are not that well liked but get support in the Israeli conflict.
Here we have a country violently assaulting its own citizens who may be homosexual or TG:
Excerpt:
I think our relationship with Saudi Arabia will change in the next 10 years. Right now we are strategic allies. I mean we do not even use Saudi Oil that much right now but we protect the Persian Gulf traffic. This is a weird situation because one of the main beneficiaries of this oil is China. Conversely it also provides us a strategic advantage in a conflict with China. Arguably we also benefit with oil suddenly being priced in US dollars. You can take single instances from any country and use it to beat the war drums.
Summary: The military shuts down the press while the country is at war with the Houthi rebels, whose slogan, according to Wikipedia, is:
What does this have to do with Israel? The US has been working with Saudi Arabia to assist its fight against the Iran-backed Houthi rebels. This support is being questioned though.
So just when Arabs were starting to appreciate the Jews who have been providing humanitarian relief and changing what were closed and turned off minds, we have a return to savagery in the offing.
Syria is a mess but I am not sure what direct threat to the US Israel is countering there? I mean ISIS rose as a result of US actions. I am not sure what Israel has to do with this really. If they can bring stability to Syria they may actually be worth those billions of dollars a year.
What does this have to do with Israel? How is Israel countering this? It seems that the billions of dollars that the US doles out to Irael, Egypt and the Palestinian authority should be put in the the US education system since you do not seem to know that the US is closer to Indonesia than Israel is...
Do you even realize or have a clue that by generalizing 1.6 billion muslims like that, you have no difference to the isis fanatics in your way of thinking?
It could be 1.6 billion, or 16 billion, or 16 trillion. The population figure for a tyrannical theocratic regime does not change the nature of that tyrannical regime. Iran is an objectively and verifiably backward, violent, Neanderthal theocracy regardless of the number of inhabitants. Most of the other regimes in the Middle East are the same, if not worse. So if you have information to the contrary that does not involve citing an irrelevant statistic such as population, I'm all ears.
It could be 1.6 billion, or 16 billion, or 16 trillion. The population figure for a tyrannical theocratic regime does not change the nature of that tyrannical regime. Iran is an objectively and verifiably backward, violent, Neanderthal theocracy regardless of the number of inhabitants. Most of the other regimes in the Middle East are the same, if not worse. So if you have information to the contrary that does not involve citing an irrelevant statistic such as population, I'm all ears.
You didn’t say anything about regimes in your previous post. You labeled every single person who live in the middle east as irrational, intolerant mysticists. Here is your previous post.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Marc Paolella
De jure a religious state. De facto, as secular as we are, and a proportion of our population mischaracterizes us as a Christian nation when we are de facto a secular state also. Not so in the surrounding states that Israel has to contend with, where the irrationality and the mysticism and the intolerance run with roiling turbulence from the President to the Professor to the Plumber to the Prostitute.
Iran is one of these situations that make me sad. It used to be a secular nation and women were well educated.
I think it will be secular again. I think that for the most part the Iranian people LOVE the United States and Americans but the sanctions can make us an easy target for propaganda and unifying the masses. One thing I have learned is that the Israel/Palestine situation seems to be the one thing that unifies a heck of a lot of Muslims. I remember one day we were working late and I went out to grab food. One of my friends who is educated and that I have known for years tagged along. He is a Muslim from Sudan but he rarely talks about his religion except when fasting. We get in my car and all of a sudden he starts talking about the US support for Israel. It was literally out of the blue. I was floored and because this was when Darfur was in the forefront of the news it made it even odder. I was thinking of how this is even important to him? Where is he getting this from? Is it from his mosque?
To me it seems that our support of Israel is some kind of unifying factor among a lot of people that really have nothing in common. I mean the Palestinians are not that well liked but get support in the Israeli conflict.
I think our relationship with Saudi Arabia will change in the next 10 years. Right now we are strategic allies. I mean we do not even use Saudi Oil that much right now but we protect the Persian Gulf traffic. This is a weird situation because one of the main beneficiaries of this oil is China. Conversely it also provides us a strategic advantage in a conflict with China. Arguably we also benefit with oil suddenly being priced in US dollars. You can take single instances from any country and use it to beat the war drums.
What does this have to do with Israel? The US has been working with Saudi Arabia to assist its fight against the Iran-backed Houthi rebels. This support is being questioned though.
Syria is a mess but I am not sure what direct threat to the US Israel is countering there? I mean ISIS rose as a result of US actions. I am not sure what Israel has to do with this really. If they can bring stability to Syria they may actually be worth those billions of dollars a year.
This is my statement that you are replying to:
"Also what direct threat do these nations have that Israel counters?"
So what exactly is Israel doing here?
I am seeing a pattern here. You seem to think that Israel is associated in some way to every atrocity in the world.
What does this have to do with Israel? How is Israel countering this? It seems that the billions of dollars that the US doles out to Irael, Egypt and the Palestinian authority should be put in the the US education system since you do not seem to know that the US is closer to Indonesia than Israel is...
What all of this has to do with Israel is that Israel is the single, solitary, sole, sane country in a region of insanity, sectarian hatred, theocracy, fundamentalism, tyranny, and abuse of populations on a mass basis. Israel is like us in a lot of ways, and totally unlike an Iran, thankfully. It only makes sense for us to be an ally with a country that shares most of our values.
And being an ally requires us to supply military aid so that the single, sane, country in an insane region can remain in existence. They are surrounded by wolves who would execute them in a second, if they had the power. The same wolves who would destroy Western culture, given the chance. We are not going to give them that chance. And part of that is making sure we have a military ally that expands our own military capabilities in the region.
So I argue that it is morally correct to be an ally of Israel, a secular western-style rational state. And it is pragmatically correct to help them to remain strong with military aid. WE ARE GIVING IT TO OURSELVES. WE ARE DEFENDING OURSELVES. We should be thankful they are there because without Israel, the region is a hopeless morass of misery, mysticism, tyranny, authoritarianism, and theocratic hell.
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