the USA, Israel, and national interest

hmmm

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1251260/Team-11-Europeans-killed-senior-Hamas-leader-claims-Dubai-police-chief.html

it's interesting to see history mayne's allegiance to power strengthen with every passing year

p sure hamas represent "power" too trace!

sure it does, yes, it's just the same isn't it

well, no, it's kind of worse tbh...

honestly your transformation from socialist high-grounder to centre-right "realist" has been something to behold

i guess; though, really, i don't think this has anything to do with socialism.

i've never, ever, put stuff in terms of being in favour of or against "power", which seems to me amoral chomskyism and always has. and i've definitely always thought hamas were a bunch of wrong 'uns.

i never said you did put stuff in those terms, quite the opposite; however to ignore power relationships in the case of israel and its neighbours is to ignore what makes them tick

and to ignore the laws of a country because you think those laws are corrupt is to essentially adopt a terrorist mindset

finally, to carry out extra-judicial killing is to do the same

fuck hamas but i hope these are the only mossad agents who look like that cos it's nagl

You sure that Gail is a genuine female? She looks like a he to me!

- Tina, Devon, UK, 16/2/2010 8:48
Click to rate Rating 27

play fair! as a high-minded (revolutionary?) socialist i was presumably all about suspending respect for the rule of law anyway? where would robespierre have got, if he had followed the law?

would dubai have extradited the guy, do you think? id have been all for that.

evil must be eliminated!

p. bloomberg
old man
glendale, ca

- p. bloomberg, glendale, ca usa, 16/2/2010 0:50
Click to rate Rating 45

(tbh the hit was probably a crowd-pleasing exercise, idk: just can't get too worked up about it; israel has done a lot worse and what it does on a daily basis with the checkpoints and the settlements creates more problems for itself.)

I also find it a little hard to get worked up about this. I don't think it's good policy, it's just not high on my list of things to get upset about that Israeli agents may have assassinated a weapons buyer from a "political party" that deliberately targets civilians with rockets.

that's fine and your prerogative - but it's a bit rich for the united states and GB to maintain that this kind of behavior is setting standards for decent sovereign conduct in the middle east

by any means necessary?

there were signs of five or six electric shocks on his legs, behind his ears, on his genitals and heart.

A British man in Israel with the same name as an alleged member of a hit squad that assassinated a top Hamas militant in Dubai said his identity had been stolen.

Melvyn Adam Mildiner said he was 'angry, upset and scared' over what he called a misidentification.

He spoke as the Foreign Office confirmed the British passports used in the killing were fraudulent.

those were two different quotes, first is about how the assassinated was tortured, second is about alleged identity theft on the part of the assassins

how about this deal?

http://articles.latimes.com/2010/jan/12/world/la-fgw-iran-bomb-scientist12-2009jan12

initial reporting seemed to place credit/blame on the US & israel, but, well, mebbe not

http://www.politico.com/blogs/laurarozen/0110/Who_killed_Massoud_Ali_Mohammadi_.html

I'm sure he was really nice to the Israeli soldiers he kidnapped and murdered.

by any means necessary?

erm... no

it's a bit rich for the united states and GB to maintain that this kind of behavior is setting standards for decent sovereign conduct in the middle east

well, no. i don't see them as paragons of virtue either.

I kinda get when people complain about Israel doing awful things to civilians, but I really don't get the fuss about this. Is it just that there hasn't been legitimate bad news about Israel lately so you guys are settling?

my only point is that the US's massive military aid and strategic partnership with israel is supposedly justified by israel being an outpost of reasonable behavior in a land of kerrazy kerruption - whatever you think of this most recent incident for some reason israel never seems to have to actually live up to this billing

I think this recent incident is about as reasonable as any first world country in the world. I suspect the same stuff goes on with every other country.

I'm sure he was really nice to the Israeli soldiers he kidnapped and murdered.

what does this have to do with anything? this is a rule of law vs. savage vengeance question.

also, glad to hear you guys are cool with international hit squads stealing your identity, can you send me your social security numbers?

I'm not okay with an international hit squad stealing my identity. I also believe that kind of thing is totally par for the course for international hit squads. Maybe I'm super naive tho. Maybe only Israel is doing this kind of thing and every other country in the world has suspended their espionage/assassination programs.

I don't like it when anybody does it, end of story.

I wasn't trying to make a big deal out of this or anything (obviously it's small potatoes in the larger context of Israel and its policies and problems)

my only point is that the US's massive military aid and strategic partnership with israel is supposedly justified by israel being an outpost of reasonable behavior in a land of kerrazy kerruption - whatever you think of this most recent incident for some reason israel never seems to have to actually live up to this billing

lol w/e

Lamp that's basically the photo caption for every Israeli PM since Rabin

my only point is that the US's massive military aid and strategic partnership with israel is supposedly justified by israel being an outpost of reasonable behavior in a land of kerrazy kerruption - whatever you think of this most recent incident for some reason israel never seems to have to actually live up to this billing

― Tracer Hand, Tuesday, February 16, 2010 11:29 AM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark

seems weird to hold this up as a constraint on israeli behavior when nobody, pro- or con- that support, believes that "billing" really? they don't support israel because it's got better state structures than its neighbors, they support it because it's israel, period. constitutional gov't may function as evidence, to some, of the israelis' enlightenment contra the region, but it's not the reason its western supporters, gentile and jew, really care, is it?

as a pro-peace kind of guy, i'd judge this by its overall efficacy in bringing about a peaceful status-quo, not as to its judicial-ness, extra, or not. and on that point, who knows? i sure don't. maybe murdering hamas higher-ups is a step backward, but hamas itself is a step backward too. i doubt mahmoud abbas is complaining, if that even matters.

the very composition, borders, structures, histories, etc, of ANY state on the eastern mediterranean is hopelessly fucked up by any reasonable standard, so using legalism as a benchmark doesn't strike me as wrong, just meaningless. dubai? what IS dubai, even? but yes, any better situation would have to be build on the present one, so one ought to not make it worse...

http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/j/msnbc/Components/Photos/060213/060213_cheney_vsml_2p.widec.jpg

"i'd judge this by its overall efficacy in bringing about a peaceful status-quo, not as to its judicial-ness"

http://www.rightpundits.com/wp-content/photos/Benjamin_Netanyahu_1.jpg

"lol, w/e"

my only point is that the US's massive military aid and strategic partnership with israel is supposedly justified by israel being an outpost of reasonable behavior in a land of kerrazy kerruption - whatever you think of this most recent incident for some reason israel never seems to have to actually live up to this billing

― Tracer Hand, Tuesday, February 16, 2010 11:29 AM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark

very not-perfect would be my view of israel. i don't think it's supported because it's a gleaming beacon of perfection, and i don't think its supporters are perfect either. this doesn't lead me into thinking everything is much of a muchness, though.

what is... dubai??

what is... lyfe?

what is... art??

lol cheney.jpg! exactly? maybe it won't help anybody. cheney-style BS sure didn't. the fact that it was "extra-judicial" doesn't strike me as the issue. like i was trying to say before, that's a very fraught standard -- what one is legally permitted to do, and where, is basically senseless in the "neigborhood" (rly hate it when US speakers use that term, btw). who or what is it that would grant this legal permission?

you should just say it was the wrong thing to do.

I feel like killing anyone is the wrong thing to do and I think that in a perfect world there would be no wars. <3<3<3

cant believe were even discussing this in a world where notorious anti-semite andrew sullivan is allowed to continue blogging

Guys, guys:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/picturegalleries/worldnews/7222508/Palestinians-dressed-as-the-Navi-from-the-film-Avatar-stage-a-protest-against-Israels-separation-barrier.html

lol @ that shit. kind of nice to see one of TNR's careless whispers get repudiated so thoroughly. like it will matter...

xp

i hate that dumbasses keep calling people anti-semites since whenever someone does something actually anti-semitic now, i have to deal with, "Oh my god, you're just saying that because you're a paranoid Zionist who will say anything to win an argument," when sometimes saying that Jews are Nazis is actually an anti-Semitic thing to say.

yeah, it seems like getting concerned about the "legality" of this (vs the ruthlessness) is like thinking that tax evasion is really why capone deserved jailtime

yeah i agree with you but the problem is that the law is kind of your only lever against things like covert assassination

that or ninjas

...and the israeli body politic has concluded that covert assassination is your only lever against rockets hitting the suburbs.

(note i am making no judgment here about the quality of that conclusion, nor the exact location of those suburbs...)

yeah i agree with you but the problem is that the law is kind of your only lever against things like covert assassination

― Tracer Hand, Tuesday, February 16, 2010 6:08 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark

as opposed to blatant assassination? again, it's not like the dubai police were going to do israel a solid and bring him in.

http://www.google.com/mapdata?CxWF_-ABHf7iDwIg____________AQwthf_gATX-4g8CQI4CSLkBUgJJTJABBMoBAmVu

yup, sderot is not a settlement

can't believe andrew sullivan wants to assassinate the jews

luckily leon wieseltier will stand up for jews on the internet