It boggles my mind that, after yet another year of bloodshed, torture and death that people still decide to step up the violence in the world. Yes I am talking about the idiots who have just killed over 200 people in the Gaza Strip. What is the matter with them?! They have murdered innocent people!
But let us start with a bit of background. 1945, the Jews have just come through the worst atrocity their culture has faced, and one of the worst Humanity has ever faced. Everybody was behind the Jewish people as they discovered what appalling lengths the Nazis had gone to execute "the Final Solution". When we only lost 325,000 people to the war, they lost 6 million. 6 million men, women and children snuffed out. It is too terrible to comprehend.
But of course religion rears its ugly head. Apparently, God made a covenant with the Jewish people, and said that Israel should be their holy land, theirs and theirs alone. Well, there's nothing wrong with this, except...
They launch war. They defeat the British soldiers and take over Israel as their own country, expelling the people that had previously called it home. The surrounding countries retaliate, but Israel shrugs off their attacks, using money and weapons that, in their supreme stupidity, have been donated by the Americans and the British. Now, not only do people die needlessly on both sides due to the ongoing, seemingly random strikes against surrounding countries, but also it has turned global as "Islamic" fundamentalists retaliate against Western powers for even allowing Israel to exist.
It's insanity, bred from greed and stupidity. It lost all meaning the moment it became religious. It is hard to determine whether both sides are fighting for territory, political or religious reasons. Many different groups use different excuses, but it is such a needless loss of life, when totalitarian governments kill their own people, when old empires start to flex their muscles in the quite reaches where noone pays them any attention, people die of disease and poverty every day, and Humanity continues to slowly unravel as its component parts turn on each other. And over a piece of land that is only significant because it is mentioned in a HOLY TEXT!
Obviously my knowledge has gaping holes where I have not understood the story fully, but this I can glean: there is a storm brewing in the Middle East, and we haven't even begun to see the terrible extent of the damage it will wreak. We have started something terrible, and good lord we shall certainly pay when it blows up in our face. Madness seems to be engulfing the world. How the hell is it ever going to end?
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well i'm not an expert on the issue but i feel too much blame is placed on the arabs here. although they are mainly the aggressors, it would be untrue to say the jews weren't at all at fault here. i think it all falls down here where you declare a state religion, is there really any need? today the conflict should end, as the poltical side of things is not nearly as heated as the religious aspects as you said. There doesn't seem to be a possible resolution at the moment but i think the arab countries surrounding isreal should do more to stop any extreme views spreading, and also palestine needs a strong and stable non-hamas government.
Tbh, I think too much emphasis is put on who is to blame as an entire religion. It isn't the fault of the Jew or Arabs, it is the governments and those few dogmatic individuals preying on people's hate and spreading their own views, almost always outside of the teachings of the religion but in the name of it.
But this violence only besets more violence. The segregation alienates these two groups from one another, and when attacks are carried out under the banner of Palestine or Israel, it causes hate towards that group, instead of towards the individuals. I can understand the fear and anger of both groups, but I don't think the problem can ever come anywhere near fixing itself until the majority of inhabitants of the area see the similarities between themselves and their so called "enemies", realise the violence is due to individuals and not an area/religion and are no longer kept rfom each other, increasing this feeling of alienation.
Well i'm rambling but those are my 2 cents.
what a cosmopolitan world you envisage pete;)
Hmmm...I was under the impression that it was the Allied governemnts after WWII who decided to create Israel as a home for the Jews, seeing as they came from that area originally, after the horrible atrocities that were committed during the actual war. I never knew that the Bible mentioned anything of it.
But I don't get why Israel feels the need to bomb Hamas at this moment - OK, I haven't been following the news as closely as I perhaps ought to, but I don't recall anything that caused Israel harm in the past couple of weeks.
But it is really sad that religion plays such a part in this; indeed, that religion still exists in what is meant to be an enlightened modern world. I have seen graffiti saying "Jihad 4 Israel" all over the place, and it is sickening that, despite all the bloodshed already, people still want to retaliate violently. Surely a better option is for open discussion between Hamas and Israel, for currently they are refusing dialogue?
It's not that there was any real "peace" in the Middle East over the past few months. You just had to follow the story a lot closer that the average listener. Sky News, BBC News, and any other British news channel dedicated to a primary focus on British news, will only return to such violence when mass murder has been committed. Any other murders will still occur in "dribs and drabs" in between. Apparently, in this case, a ceasefire had been brokered - by Egypt - between Israel and Hamas (one that lasted six months up until December 19th). Minor violations occurred between the signing of the truce and these airstrikes (proof that a ceasefire is not a total halt to bloodshed), until this truce expired, and now, we have yet another conflict doomed to be fairly long-term.
I don't know what the precise reasoning between this most recent outbreak of attacks was, but there will there will clearly be no "new year's" resolution to the fighting. The actions of both sides are deplorable. I heard on the news this morning that at least one senior political figure from an Arab state (Libya, if memory serves me correctly), supported the retaliation of Hamas. Responses like these only prolong the difficulties.
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