The photo is of children at a Hamas run summer camp learning about firing terrorist misssles.

Are you sure that's not a pinata, Brian from Toronto?

Obvious troll is obvious.

As-salaamu alaikum

-Omni

Troll? I thought Waterfall's comment was quite funny.

Trolololol

As-salaamu alaikum

-Omni

Palestinians support killing Jews because they have been indoctrinated by their schools and imams.  This has been going on for decades and peace with Israel seems very distant until this indoctrination stops.

The Palestinians were supposed to stop, according to the Oslo Accords, that returned the PLO to Palestine.   But it didn't and and no one made an issue of it.

I find it is very sad.

Brian is not a a troll for reporting a true story.

I wondedr,

if we had lived under siege for our entire lives (and the lives of our parents and grandparents).

if we had lived in deplorable conditions because of choices others had made.

if we had been denied an education that allowed us to research the issues and make open decisions

if we had been told for our entire lives that this was the fault of one specific country.

What might we say if asked about finding a way to live with the people of that country???

ANd the indoctrination against peace happens on both sides.  Just as it has in countless other places over the course of history.  (Ireland jumps to mind).  BOTH sides need to change their rhetoric and their approach.

If some outside force decided my fate for me, fuck yes I would fight against it.  We can decry what is going on over there, we decry the justification people are making, but we cannot deny that it is both a reality, and one that we ourselves would most likely partake of if we were in their shoes.

If your home, your city, your province, were sliced in half to provide space for people who ​already lived there​, in addition to boatloads more of 'them' (whoever is being used for this example), by some outside party which you had no say in, I'm sure you'd be pretty ticked off as well.

This isn't a religious problem, this is a case of a physical, national, and emotional problem with religious trappings being used to justify something that really doesn't need religious sanction to be justified.

As-salaamu alaikum

-Omni

Brian from Toronto,

1.  What would you like people to take away from the article?

2.  What do you take away from the article?

Certainly there are aggressive and rejectionist Israelis.  No argument.  Ones who chop down Palesintians's olive trees, that type of thing.

But there are also Israeli's desperately seeking peace.  Who went out with the Palestinians to make sure they were able to harvest their olives unmolested.  The Peace Now group.  The people who really, really tried to make the Camp David accords work.   But on the Palestinian side, it is uniform rejection.  There is no peace camp, no variety, no other opinions.   Camp David failed, another intifada.

Yes, the formation of Israel was an injustice, so what do you suggest?  The obvious answer to almost all Palestinians (and apparently to UCC) is: Israeli's have to leave the Middle East.  There is no other way to make the Palestinians happy.

EO,

how do you know there are no Palestinians working for peace?  Have you lived there and asked them?

I think EO has the right take-away when he writes:

"Palestinians support killing Jews because they have been indoctrinated by their schools and imams.  This has been going on for decades and peace with Israel seems very distant until this indoctrination stops."

One of the most important and neglected provisions of the Oslo accords is the requirement for the Palestinian side to cease its anti--Israeli incitement.

As long as the Palestinian leadership continues to preach that Israel is evil and illegitimate, as long it continues to propagate antisemitism, peace doesn't stand a chance. 

Even in the unlikely scenario that the two sides sign a piece of paper, peace won't follow. "Idealistic" young Palestinians will continue to try to make things right by strapping on bombs or firing missiles to kill Jews.

So what should we do to support peace?

Personally, we can support groups like One Voice which work toward peace on both the Palestinian and Israeli side.

Institutions - such as our government and the UCC - can urge the Palestinian side to engage in peace education: to stop naming streets, schools, and soccer teams in honour of terrorists.

To cease antisemitic and anti-Israeli incitement in Palestinian mosques and media.

To celebrate the millennia of Jewish history in the land and to acknowledge the legitimacy of the Jewish state.

The Canadian government is already doing a good job in this regard, but institutions such as the United Church - which like to regard themselves as champions of peace - in fact contribute to the demonization of Israel and thus to the continuation of the conflict.

Step One for the UCC - if it actually wants to promote peace - should be to stop circulating the Palestinian Kairos document, which is a wonderful example of demonization in religious clothing.

What is your understanding of UCC theology as it fits in regarding the middle east?

Can one point out what one believes to be wrong's done by the government of Israel without being antisemitic?

I read the news.  I read the results of opinion polls, like the one quoted.   Another factor stopping Palestinians from working for peace is peer pressure (up to and including killing supposed collaborators).

There were some Palestinians working for peace in the earlier days.  But since Arafat walked out of the Camp David talks and started the second intifada, the feelings are so bad that the peace camps on both sides have suffered badly.  

Furthermore, if you read the Israeli press, you can see there is wide range of opinion, with different people arguing furiously with each other.   There is no equivalent in the government controlled Palestinian press.    

I have no comment on UCC theology, I don't know much about it.   But UCC is blinding itself to certain facts.  Such as the ones Brian brings up here.

When you glorify terrorists, name streets after them, make it so that every young Palestinian should aspire to kill, there can never be peace.

The Israelis are not perfect, but there is much wider range of opinion there.  

Canada is no better. We have streets named after and monuments to terrorists in most cities. Except the terrorists won and succeeded in subjecting the original residents to an occupation that resulted in massive death and sexual abuse in residential schools.

As a Kantian (which is the dominant form of ethical reasoning in the UCC) it is irrelevant to me how good or how bad others. What is important is whether or not what I do is right. I and others who are Kantian will thus denounce actions by the Israelis or the Palestinians that are wrong, regardless of the reasons. So it does not mean I ignore certain facts, it just means that I do not believe they are justifications for others to do bad. 2 wrongs do not make a right.

Interesting enough when a women carried a sign at Toronto Pride, declaring solidarity with Palestinians Queers. A Toronto politician used it as proof as hate speech against Israel. Not knowing that Palestinians queer face both the prospect of being killed by Israelis and Hamas. It does not matter to the Palestinian queer if he or she is killed by one or the other. Dead is dead. However Hamas uses the conflict with Israel in order to justify oppression and murder of it's own people. Thus to get rid of Hamas the Queer sees it necessary to act against Israeli if she is given a chance.

If you are going to consider the settlement of the Americas as a terrorist act (and you could), then I cannot argue with you.   This is type of argument that UCC types fall back on continually.  It adds nothing to the discussion about Israel and Palestine, IHMO.  It just serves to distract, to get away from the discussing the Middle East.

Over and over again, on this site, I hear, "we are just as bad."  It is the stock response to just about every foreign policy issue going.   It stops the conversation dead.  You simply cannot have a discussion once this response comes up.  

So are you planning to leave North America?   What are we supposed to do?   Do you seriously believe that in all of history the settlement of the Americas is the only case where one group drove out another?   This has happened repeatedly, over and over in history.  If you keep harping on this as an argument, one cannot have a serious discussion about anything.

Which is pretty much where I am coming to on this site.  I am trying to stick to facts, to be calm, but these conversation-stoppers keep coming up.

Europeans settle the Americas.  Therefore we should not criticize Palestinians for being terrorists.  That is your argument?  I give up!!!!

Maybe I'm getting cynical in my old age.

It was once said that newspaper's "reinforce the prejudices of the working man".

The argument being that the workers were dissatisfied with their lot in life, and they felt a little better if they could find another group with even less power in society to "blame" for their troubles. (kicking the cat).

New immigrants to a country has always been a popular target - although I note in recent times a group with even less power is a popular target - refugees.

The real winners have been the wealthy who, by virtue of their wealth, own and control just about everything that influences the worker's lives. It often seems to me that the philosophy is, "you keep grumbling - and we'll feed the validity of your grumbling - at a price."

I still think this is an accurate, if cynical, view.

But, sadly, it does not end there.

News is more pervasive than ever. Folks get their news from media that didn't exist when I was a child.

They can now choose to select a media that confirms all prejudices - not just the "working man".

For example, if you are "left wing and intellectual" and live in England there is your paper - the Guardian.

You want to read just that which confirms your views, right?

The end result is that we've become isolated from one another and locked into an adversarial  style of debate.

Take the Israel/ Palestine  conflict.

How often have we seen here on Wondercafe links to newspapers and articles that support the writer's point of view only?

Where is the balance within the individual? Answer - it's becoming non-existent.

Just as we read only media that supports our stance, we grow increasingly intolerant of the other point of view - and the folks that hold that point of view.

ie. You list your atrocity - and I'll reply with mine.

Perhaps before any of us pick up any newspaper we need to reflect on questions such as balance - are we just content to read and feel a certain smugness that the views expressed mirror our own?

If so, then both society and our spirit will be invariably damaged IMO.

We quit telling people they are right or justified. We quit saying "this is your land". We quit telling Israelis they are right to hate and we quit telling Palestinians they are. We quit polling them and asking, "how much do you hate the other guy?" We, the world, pays attention and not to rhetoric or excuses... (excuses are like arse-holes, we all have one)....we insist on better.... we demand better.... we oppose what is wrong no matter who does it.... we work for peace, we do not work for war or strife... we do not add to it...and  working for peace means without guns and bombs.

We ask, as I have done, "how does one held in ghettos, (WWII) then hold another?"

Another asks, "how do you not be thought of as a thug with a rock in your hand?"

It means working together and not lining up on a side, other than the side of peace...

I own a t-shirt that says there is one race of people, the human race....

Yes !

Where do I get the t-shirt?

A lot of human conflict seems to revolve around iterations of "LEAVE MY PATCH OF DIRT ALONE!"

I say we help our fellow human being with this dastardly & pernicious addiction.  Free them of their dirt addiction!  Free the will-less from their addiction to countries!

Agape must be free to thrive!

This message brought to you by the Amnesty from Amnesty Department of the Ministry of Sanity Dept.

The concept of ownership, property, and money could be traced to as being the roots of most human grief and strife.

As-salaamu alaikum

-Omni

I just pointed out that Canada ( and likely all countries) glorifies violence. Palestine is no different. 

"Canada is no better. We have streets named after and monuments to terrorists in most cities."

Serious question: Who exactly do you have in mind? And what terrorist acts did they commit?

"I just pointed out that Canada ( and likely all countries) glorifies violence. Palestine is no different."

Remarks like this make me wonder whether you even live in Canada.

But even supposing it were true that the Canadian government and the opposition were in the habit of glorifying terrorists, as Fatah and Hamas are, and supposing the Canadian media were filled with incitements to hatred, as Palestinian media are, still there would be this all-important difference: In the Palestinian territories, honouring of terrorists is likely to encourage more terrorism.

In Canada, supposing Lord Dufferin were a terrrorist (picking a name out of a hat),   naming Dufferin St after him is unlikely to inspire any one to go out and kill someone. 

Correct?

In Halifax Cornwallis Junior High, a public school named after the city founder who ordered the mass killing of Mi'kmaq people is changing it's name. But only after 23 years of lobbying by Mi'kmaq .  and 240 years after he use to pay men for each scalp they gave him.  

I would expect it will also take time for Palestinians to do the same

Also just a few years ago (20 or so)  Montrealer's were promoting violence and doing   violence against First nation due to a dispute over land for a golf course.

Do you not thing that the cities many statues to war criminals, and the many schools, and streets named after them made it seem more permissible. 

s

Okay. Good. You've given one example. But you wrote: "We have streets named after and monuments to terrorists in most cities."

I think the important word here is "most." After all, you're arguing that "Canada is no better" than the Palestinian territories. So far you haven't even attempted to back up that statement.

Because here's the thing: if in fact, Canada has monuments to terrorists in most cities, you're the only Canadian who's even aware of it.

So as incitement these statues are a miserable failure. 

You ask whether these supposed monuments to terrorists incited "(20 or so) Montrealer’s [into] promoting violence and doing   violence against First nation" people 20 years ago during the Oka crisis as you claim.

Obviously not. No one even knew - or knows - that such monuments exist.

Also, if "Canada is no better," I assume this means that the government and the opposition parties regularly honour terrorists, and if the CBC and other media regularly praise terrorists and broadcast incitement against some identifiable group. Really? If so, you're the only Canadian who's aware of it.

Nor has there been much terrorism in Canada. You go back 20 years to attempt to find a (dubious) example of terrorism that could conceivably be laid at the door of Canadian society. 

Israel has suffered terrorist attacks this week, with rockets being fired from Gaza at Israel's civilian population.

So again, in the Palestinian territories, incitement is a far more pressing issue than in Canada.

There is simply no comparison.

So why don't you just admit that you got carried away? It happens to the best of us. No one ever said that Canada was perfect or that Palestinians are evil. But Palestinian society does have a problem with Jew-hatred and with the celebration of terrorism, and anyone interested in peace needs to recognize this as a problem that needs to be dealt with.

Ok I should have said all cities, and I should have said Canadians instead of Canada. Basically Canadians are only less hateful because of the time we have been at peace. However I do not believe what the Palestians are doing is right, just understandable. Likewise what the Israeli's are doing is understandable. It is however wrong to kill and promote war as a solution to anything. However the people in the territories have less choices than do the Israelis.

Brian of Toronto,

All over North America town and roads are named after those who slaughtered aboriginal peoples and those who led troops into battle. Aren't we glorifying violence and war?

Paris has streets named after French military leaders, Berlin after German ones, the most famous street in Helsinki, Finland named after a Finnish military leader....

Pointing at someone else and saying, "See..." is something we do. It is also something others could do to us.

What we see is the legacy of British Colonialism and the legacy of "I am better/smarter/stronger... than you and I should manage your affairs for you". It is something done in this country to aboriginal peoples.

We do not look that different, when we really get to looking...

One race, human....

PilgrimsProgress,

Here....

http://www.oneracehuman.info/

SG,

The discussion is about whether Canada is similar to the Palestinian territories in respect to inciting terrorism.

Differences:

Palestinians frequently commit terrorist acts against Israelis. It is a serious on-going problem. Canada has no problem remotely like this.

Palestinian leaders frequently glorify terrorists, naming streets and schools after them. Canadian politicians do not.

It's been claimed that this has happened in Canada, but so far exactly one example has been given. Care to add some others? And if you do, please specify exactly what terrorist acts these individuals committed.

Also, please show that Canadian are aware of these terrorist actions. After all, the issue is incitement. In the Palestinian territories, terrorists are being glorified precisely because they're terrorists - "shahids" - martyrs to the cause of killing Jews and destroying Israel. And such honouring of terrorists encourages further terrorism.

If indeed there are monuments to terrorists all over Canada, Canadians are unaware of them, and therefore, these supposed monuments aren't incitements.

I could go on, but I'm not sure there's a point. A hotdog is like a meteor; they're both made of atoms.  Nonetheless, I don't think a hotdog and a meteor are the same thing.  Judging from your postings, you seem to disagree.

For example, you seem to make no distinction between a terrorist action - such as deliberately murdering a family of five, including the mother, father and three children, aged 11, 3 and 3 months, to take a real world example from this March – and a defensive war such as defeating the Nazis.

If you’re uninterested in making such distinctions, clearly there’s no point talking to you. This refusal to distinguish between hotdogs and meteors leads you into moral incoherence and, in this discussion, into antisemitism – when you make a defamatory comparison between Nazis and Jews, as you do in this remark:

“We ask, as I have done,

'"how does one held in ghettos, (WWII) then hold another?'"

Jews in the Nazi ghettos, such as the Warsaw ghetto, were systematically starved to death or shipped off to be murdered in the death camps in the hundreds of thousands.

There has been no attempt to exterminate the Palestinians - except in the fevered imaginations of antisemites or in the fantasies of people who refuse to distinguish between a meteor and a hotdog.

Nor is Gaza even isolated. There is an open border between Gaza and Egypt. And to end its diplomatic isolation in the world, Gaza simply has to renounce terrorism and its ambition to murder Jews and wipe Israel off the map.

Do you believe the Jews of Europe were attempting to wipe Germany off the map?

Jews have not become Nazis. Your suggestion that they have is objectively antisemitic. I expect, though, that you don’t mean to defame Jews but are merely parroting words you’ve heard but not understood.

Brian, putting everything aside for a moment; do you, or do you not, condemn the terrorist actions of the state of Israel?

As-salaamu alaikum

-Omni

Thanks, SG!

That is not what I am trying to say. I believe Canada is not similar to the terrottories. However if we faced the same conditions as the territories did we would have  similar  responses.

Do you understand the difference in the two?

Alex,

I think in part you're saying that all people everywhere are capable of the same sorts of actions. I think that's undoubtedly true.

But you also seem to be saying that every society, if subject to similar stresses, will develop a culture of hatred supported by both the elite and the grassroots - as the Palestinians have done in their hatred of Jews.

And that all societies will develop a cult of death, in which the terrorist becomes the greatest hero - again as the Palestinians have done, with the added twist that they most especially worship suicide-murderers.

And, therefore, Canada would also go this route

If you think abut it, I think you'll see that - fortunately - this just isn't true. Have you ever heard of a Tibetan suicide bomber? Does the Dalai Lama preach that the Chinese are the descendants of apes and pigs?

Or how about the South Africa? The apartheid analogy slanders Israel of course, but it also slanders the African National Congress, which - unlike the Palestinian militants - rejected terrorism and adopted a policy of following the rules of war. Nor did the ANC promote anti-white racism.

As for the Palestinian death cult - perhaps best captured in Hamas’s boast that ‘the Jews love life while we love death’ – surely you don't think that all societies go that way under stress, do you?

Moreover,  the idea that people are inevitably driven to hatred and murder is unfair to many Palestinians.  Their voices may  have been silenced, but surely many Palestinians consider terrorism, not just a tactical error, but an abomination. Surely there are many who are just as revolted by Hamas, by the Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade, and the rest of the terrorist crew as is anyone sitting here in Canada.

Like everyone else, Palestinians make choices. If there’s going to be peace, Palestinians need to turn away from Jew-hatred and the glorification of  terrorism.  People who support peace need to encourage them in that direction. We can’t just shrug our shoulders and say, well it’s nasty stuff but it’s inevitable – that way lies another 100 years of war.

Really Brian.....

Hasn't your kind of prejudice killed enough teenagers this week?

Troll

That's today's justification is it?

Brian, if you intend to hang around, you should know that Witch is quite the opposite of a Troll.  Sure sometimes his answers may be smart ass (which generally leads to lulz), but they all have purpose beyond eliciting an emotional response.

As-salaamu alaikum

-Omni

Canadian terrorists? The British and French for paying MicMac to kill other tribes, and turn  body parts for payment.

Frontenac for using troops to destroy crops, and to kill native peoples, including whole villages..

Dollard des Ormeaux for leading a force to disrupt native trade routes (but he got caught - so he's a hero).r.

Jan A. Macdonald for deliberately allowed the Plains Cree to starve after forcing them onto reservations.

My ancestors who took part is many terror raids against British settlers in New England. Ever hear of the Deerfield Massacre? One of mine was there.

Every hear of bomber raids on civilians in World War Two? (Yes, I know both sides did it.)

Never heard of the Society of Hunters? (Probably not).

How many Israelis want to kill Palestinians - and reject a two-state solution? (So far as I know, Israelis reject a Palestinian state at all - so there goes the two-state solution.)

Are Israeli children taught t o love Palestinians? Does Israeli have a history (and present) of kicking Palestinians out of their homes, and then taking their land without payment? Do the Palestinians blockade Israel?

Want a solution, EO? Okay. Israel depends heavily on the US for aid and for weapons and diplomatic support. All the US has to do is to tell Israel what it must agree to - and do the same to Palestine. Then guarantee Israelis protection in return for cutting back on weaponry.

But it won't. One has to assume the US does not want peace in that region. It wants ,military and economic dominance. That's the problem.

War ​IS​ terrorism.  You know who are terrorists?  Every nation that has ever engaged in military action.

As-salaamu alaikum

-Omni

Terrorism is always what the guy you DON'T like does

well there is a long history of Tibetan violence involving both sides. That is why the Dalai lama spends so much time preaching against violence.

the fact that the Dalai Lama preaches anti-violence ad anti-hate, is something that speeks to his character, which is exceptional in humanity.

 http://www.thestar.com/article/346763

Canada does have a problem that is similar but this country has systems in place that have, so far, been effective at reducing the pressure.  In this country the 'powers that be' are forced by our Charter of Rights and the Supreme Court to negotiate with disenfranchised groups.  As long as Canadian citizens have legal redress and hope of resolution they will not feel compelled to wage war for their rights.

This country has seen acts of political terrorism in my lifetime.  Violent acts that resulted in the loss of life and the imposition of Marshall Law on all citizens.  Terrorism arises when a segment of the population believes, with observable justifications, that they are being marginalized and ignored by the governmental power structures.  

Canada has reasonably reduced acts of terrorism through legal recourse and negotiations but anyone who thinks we are some how made of superior stuff than the Palestinians is either very naive, historically ignorant or a hypocrite.

LB

----------------------------

Terrorism is the price of empire. If you do not wish to pay the price, you must give up the empire.

     Pat Buchanan

Brian,

I thought you might be interested in a report tonight (Wednday) that a Christian pastor in Iran has just been condemned to death by Shariah law for refusing to recant his conversion from Islam. 

my GOD.  i guess we should invade.

No, don't be ridiculous.   You are just trying to evade the problem.

This points out there is a current of Islam that is exceedingly intolerant of other religions.  (Wahabbi's mostly, although there are some in Shiite Iran too, and they are the ones in power, much to the unhappiness of most Iranians).    We need to acknowledge it, which most people on this site refuse to do.

We need to acknowledge it if only because it has a direct bearing on the Is/Pal problem.

Islam as a religion is approximately 600 years younger than Christianity.

In 1411 how tolerant was Christianity of other religions?  I am not sure a direct line CAN be drawn, but it is a question that makes me wonder.

And then you add in millenia of disputes over "whose" territory is being used (remember that tradition traces the roots of the Arab people to Ishmael, the discarded son of Abraham).  And then you add in outside forces from Egypt to Assyria to Babylon to Macedonia to Rome to the Modern Era...

ANd we wonder why an easy solution escapes us?  I would suggest the Middle East is in fact more complex to Ireland.  And we all know how "easy" a solution to the Irish problem was to find

All very true. 

In fact, until very recently, even Catholics and Protestants were reluctant to marry each other.

However, there seems to an idea out there that we should allow vast numbers of these people of immigrate to the West.   That would be like bring back Christians from 1100 AD, and nope, I don't want them.   If we are going to let the immigrate, their problem becomes our problem.

Nobody on this site seems to want to admit that. 

Let me take another approach.   We have a lot of Sikhs living in BC, and I personally have no problems with that.  

They too have a recent religion and a few are quite fundamentalist.   From time to time you will read about someone burning a Sikh Temple, which invariably turns out to be some kind of inter-sect dispute.

However, with single exception of the bombing of an Air India plane plotted in Canada in (1989?  the 1990's?) there has been no terrorism.  Now you could say that the intersect dispute is terrorism if it gets to the stage of burning buildings, but as long as it stays within their sect, it really does not bother me.

Sikhs are not committing acts of terrorism against the West.   This is makes just a slight difference!  

It is very unfortunate because I know the number of people who are prepared to be violent is very, very small.   Some will argue that there were Christian fundamentalists bombing abortion clinics in the US.    I find that dreadful, but the number of cases was just a blip compared to recent Islamic terrorism.

Bin Laden really made a mistake.   Suppose he had put that money is sending missionaries instead.   I am willing to bet any money he would have gained some converts out of that....

The truth is, Wahabbism (and a closely related variant, called Salafism) are not compatible with our society.   Those sects are misogynist in the extreme, totally intolerant of homosexuals, other religions, and other Muslims that they figure are not up to snuff.  

Now before the onslaught of responses calling me a bigot and hateful, consider that non-Muslims are not even allowed to set foot in Mecca.

Mecca is in Saudi Arabia, home to Wahabbism.

Religion is not the cause of any of these problems. It is one of the means by which people react to their problems.

Roman Caholics in Quebec became extremely reilgious  only AFTER the British conquest. That led to a popular religious intolerance (as opposed to an official one) that lasted through my childhood and beyond.