87 Comments
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Thank you Mr Hedges! So true ... the cruel punishment that will follow now, without mercy and without reactions (see the statement of the White House).

And especially for this: “To be a Jew means always being with the oppressed and never the oppressors,” Edelman said. (I read a lot about the 'treatment' of Jews and others by the 3rd Reich - born in Austria - and had a long time to think about the HORROR of it, I never ran into information about Mr Edelman - WHAT A POWERFUL STATEMENT - I wish we all could see it like this!!)

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founding

Thank you Chris Hedges. Violence begets violence, always. My heart breaks for the children raised under the shadow of hatred

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There is no reason for us to continue to support Israel as a terrorist organization. Yes, we go against Hamas and other organizations in the ME for fighting back against terrorism that even we have been a part of, just for politics and money, saying those people and organizations are bad forces against peace, but what does that say about everything we have gotten involved with since Korea, for wrong reasons with nothing really to win, and we haven't won anything despite all the people we have lost and those who come home with problems but the government, especially the Veterans Administration just denies, and we just keep on doing it. So who is the real terrorist, here?

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We didn’t heed Eisenhower’s warning about the U. S. Military Complex. Sadly, he was right.

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Glad that you finally see this. The media has done a great job of not reporting all the terrorist attacks Israel has committed against Palestinians just since January, killing at least 400 people. The refugee camp of Jenin looked exactly like the Warsaw ghetto with videos of women and children being marched out, hands up with guns pointed to their heads and bull dozers behind them destroying their meager, poverty stricken street. This was a few months ago. The governor of the West Bank called to wipe out the village of Huwarra, with a couple of unserious condemnations from the US while settlers terrorism continued. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wONIMlCgu_o

But that's just this year. what about last year and the 75 years before that? When Israelis soldiers attack and kill worshippers in prayer, it is called a conflict.

This is the most barbaric country in the world who also calls itself a victim, in order to hide its barbarism. Let's not forget that these idiots have a growing nuclear arsenal and have never signed a non -proliferation treatay.

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Oh, believe me, I've known these things for a long time. It started actually after I got out of the Army and started looking back and around at what we've been doing for so long for no good reason except politics and money. I realized that all I and so many others accomplished so well and endured was all for nothing, except our presence in South Korea which has provided safety for them. But I think even that could have been resolved back in the later 1970's. I came to realize that our connection with Israel and the Saudis has been all about controlling the ME. We controlled Iran from the 1950;s until 1979 when the people got up the courage to kick us out, so Iran became the bad guy just because, even though they haven't been a threat to the world for over 250 years...they just want to be an independent people not dictated to by outside politics and religion. We are as much the bad guy around the world as some of those we call "enemies".

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All true but I think the gross crimes of Israel have been so more covered and protected than any other country.. Consequently, when I try to tell the average person that Israelis are the terrorists, they think I'm disgusting. Happens over and over,despite all the evidence I offer.

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I know...it's the same with me...

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Thank you, Chris, for another angry and eloquent evisceration of the corrupt, violent, greedy overlords of the earth.

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What an effing crock. I bet Israelis having previously adopted this victim virtue signaling luxury belief are regretting it now. A murderous terrorist is a murderous terrorist. There is zero explanation or justification.

Hamas targets Israeli citizens and then runs and hides behind Palestinian citizens. If you are incapable of admitting that and understanding the difference, then you have no credibility commenting on the situation.

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What a hasbara crock Frank. Israel was built with 'terrorism" and Zionists have passed the "terrorist" torch down generation after generation. Ben-Gurion, Sharett Eshkol, Meir, Rabin, Begin, Shamir, Peres, Barak, Sharon, Olmert, and Netanyahu. All war criminals and most terrorists too. Ben Gurion himself bound Israel Nationalism/Zionism with Military Patriotism. After the UN vote for a Israeli Statehood Ben Gurion said " this is just the beginning" (78% was not enough). Then carried out the well planned ethnic cleansing and massacres called the NAKBA. Irgun, Stern, Lehi, Palmach, and Haganah became the IDF, Mossad and Shin bet.

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Antisemitic terrorist sympathizers have blood on their hands.

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Zionist Terrorists have more Frank. Anti Ethnic Cleansing Zionist critics are not Anti Semitic. Nor are anti Zionist Jews Self Haters! Zionism on the other hand is fascism and a Jewish only nation state can only be described as a racist state! 75 years of occupation can only be a terrorist state! Why should Palestinian's help in their own dispossession. Netanyahu demanded the pre condition for a "fair" peace "they must recognize Palestine as a Jewish Nation State". Kissing his ring afterwards was a recurring dream!

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They're all semites, Arabs and Jews.

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What took you so long Frank? Nearly a minute passed by reading this thread before Groucho’s duck dropped down. May you have many duck droppings. Of course the secret word is anti-semitism, rendered meaningless ( no mean feat ) by the monosynaptic pathway between any criticism of Israel and the craven mewling about it. You people called both Tutu and Mandela anti-Semitic for simply sympathizing with the plight of Gazans. You should be ashamed. Lots of your fellow Jews are. Why not you?

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The people that fought in the Warsaw ghetto Uprsing are a moral compasses that Israelis should take note of. In particular may I suggest Mordechai Anielewicz. Give the Palestinians a chance. Give Peace a chance.

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The Israeli govt. has now cut off the already undrinkable water supply (water treatment facilities are routinely bombed by the Israelis in Gaza--a war crime) of 2.3 million Gazans. No water for the sick, elderly, children, babies, or anyone... I hate using the word "genocide,"but look at what's being done...

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Israeli General Matti Peled, as related by his son Miko in "The General's Son" came to essentially the same conclusions as Leibowitz, rejecting Zionism and predicting the effects of occupation. Both father and son espouse[d] the single secular state, recognizing that religious autocracy can never be democratic.

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I hope Chris would comment on the response I got from my Jewish friend after she read this article:-

“This is historically inaccurate and is spewed repeatedly by anti semitics. There was no ethnic cleaning and no occupation by Zionist. Ironically the cleansing was by the Arabs in 1948 when they expelled all Jews.”

This is why our world is so divisive. Everyone has their own version of the facts. I have no idea where she gets her information from but if you hear something enough times it becomes your reality. Trump and his MAGA followers are a testament to this fact.

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She gets it from Israel's Ministry of Truth. As Ben Gurion said Hasbara is/will be our most important tool! "Don't talk in "mixed" company" has worked like a charm on ignorant Evangelicals.

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This is taught to Jewish children in Hebrew School from day one, class after class, year after year. The Palestinians are erased. There is only a Zionist version of reality.

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I agree. You can’t change the facts unless you were never given the facts. Humanity is doomed if we cannot ALL get along

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Your friend is spewing the tired old Zionist propaganda. For the facts, see the book "The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine" by Israeli (Jewish) historian, Ilan Pappe.

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founding

Why is this inaccurate, even Haaretz published several pieces about the 'ethnic cleansing' and there are 2 current websites (that are not run by Palestinians!!) that will also tell you the TRUTH, but you MUST WANT to know the truth!

https://www.972mag.com/

https://www.btselem.org/

And THIS does not exist: 'their own version of the facts' (it can only be 'stories' NEVER facts!!)

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Thank you for that. That was obvious ly my sentiment!

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founding

Propaganda has great effects specially on ignorant people or brain damaged ones. Unforgiving nature always follows its course and that is what Mr. Hedges reminds us :

"The next stage of this struggle will be a massive campaign of industrial slaughter in Gaza by Israel, which has already begun. Israel is convinced greater levels of violence will finally crush Palestinian aspirations. Israel is mistaken. The terror Israel inflicts is the terror it will get".

The sad part is that the ethnic cleansing Zionists are not only digging the grave for Israel but doing a great reputation damage to the intelligent diaspora.

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As LBJ said about the race riots "what did you expect after having your foot on their neck for hundreds years"? Dying a humiliating slow death by a thousand cuts means you have nothing to lose. So much for IDF Col. Eitan's description of the future Gaza "they will be drugged roaches in a bottle". The bottle has been broken by Samoud steadfastness!

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I understand totally why this finally happened. Now that it has, there are lots of questions:

1. This looks at first blush like a failure of Israeli Intelligence. Was it really? Or was the idea hatched to let it happen, in order to accomplish the genocide that Netenyahu has clearly threatened and, as Chris has stated, has already begun?

2. Of course, the US would have to sign onto the genocidal response, which the Zionist/ US propaganda machine has, basically, already done. The ahistorical and ludicrous ‘unprovoked’ meme has been relentlessly used in every response I have seen come out of our inverse-totalitarian blob. So fast, one has to wonder about the possibility of prior knowledge of the ‘sneak’ attack amongst our elites, which would have had to have come from Israeli intelligence.

3. Making no assumption about whether this attack was truly a surprise to Israeli authorities, once the ‘shock and awe’ part of the operation was complete, what is Hamas’ strategy going forward? It may have expected a revolt to organically occur in the West Bank. If that has happened in a major way, I haven’t heard about it. West Bank Palestinians have a far more difficult position given the chopped-up nature of the places in which they now live, and their subjugation not only by Israel, but also the Palestinian Authority, which long since has been an Israeli cat’s paw. If Hamas counted on this, it was overly optimistic

4. Was it counting on Syria, Lebanon or Hezbollah joining in? Syria and Lebanon are so weak they cannot even defend themselves from Israeli depradations, made possible, of course, by the power and might of the US Empire. Will Hezbollah do something? So far, it is hanging back.

5. What about Iran? Given the geography, it would have a very difficult time doing anything except showering Israel with missiles, which seems very unlikely UNLESS Israel proceeds with its genocide, as announced by Netenyahu. Was that the idea behind the Hamas sneak attack? Or is it the desired result of the Israeli response to an attack it knew was coming, in order that its long-desired destruction and genocide of Iran, after such an intervention by Iran to prevent the Israeli genocide in Gaza, might finally proceed with US approval?

6. Iran is now a Russian and Chinese ally. Do the denizens of the great court of the US Empire, which includes the denizens of Israel, suppose that Russia and, to a lesser extent, China, would not respond to these events in kind, or close enough to ‘in kind’ to take the situation well past the brink, given the almost certain US reaction to THEIR reactions?

There is a theory out there that World War III has already begun. It just didn’t start with an omnicidal thermonuclear exchange, as many of us, including myself, thought it would begin. And end. As the great satirist Tom Lehrer expected, in an hour and a half. We are working up to it, slowly. Given that a permanent Cuban Missile Crisis has apparently been created just in the Ukraine-centered conflict alone, it seems to me those theorists are correct. World War III HAS begun. It is just a matter of time before the omnicidal thermonuclear exchange that will end it. The events that are the subject of Chris’ essay and the responses to it have, I am afraid, shortened that time considerably.

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Shortly after I posted this, Hezbollah issued a strong statement indicating that it was joining the battle. Meanwhile, Russia, which evidently has a strong relationship with the IDF, is leaning the other way. I stand, or sit, corrected. Except re: the the conclusion that we have all taken a significant step forward towards oblivion.

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founding

Good analysis and frightening too. To compound the problem we have an idiot living in the white house (hope not for too long) who is already sending military aid to poor Israel which has no means of defense, and our media is already starting to spread lies. The Wall Street Journal affirming that Iran helped for the surprise attack with no evidence at all.

Yeah, WWIII have already started.

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The terror Israel inflicts is the terror it will get.

That's succinctly it, sir.

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This is not going to end well. Matter of fact, I think it's just the beginning of anothet christian holy war against the Muslim world population.

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Truth is the most basic of common goods. As the late senator and professor Daniel Patrick Moynihan once said, everyone is entitled to their own opinions but not their own facts.

When we accept lies as facts, or illogic as logic, we lose the shared reality necessary to tackle our common problems. We become powerless.

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Slaughtering civilians intentionally is the definition of terrorism and inexcusable for any reason. I don’t agree with Israeli policy but do you really believe they intentionally target civilians? Do they have rogue soldiers that commit atrocities? Sadly yes. To equate this appalling massacre with anything the Israelis have done is immoral. I appreciate Chris Hedges but reaching for some type of moral explanation in the face of this event is a mistake.

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OK. So I have many relatives in Israel, and, at one time, many years ago, it was Israel, right or wrong.

In the Torah God prohibited the destruction of the fruit trees of a conquered people, so when the first thousand year old olive grove was destroyed by the Israeli forces because the grove belonged to a Palestinian, I thought, yeah, that's it. Fine to murder people, right? After all, it's war. Done all the time. But the thousand year old olive grove? That's a crime. Unforgivable.

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founding

Torah commands that the faithful should kill any living being human or domestic animal and burn with fire the cities of the land that worships a god different that the One of Israel. (Deuteronomy 12-16.)

This is the problem with the fundamentalists of all religions that believe in the literal meaning of their scriptures and apply those precepts for their material profit and the loss of their humanity.

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