With the Internet enabling writers to seek out the most remote and specialized sources, plagiarism will get much worse. Few big-name non-fiction authors do their own research any more. They employ teams of researchers and "fact checkers" who scour Lexis-Nexis, Dow News Retrieval, Google and the like, for others' research, recast it in their own words and present it as original thinking. Few of us have the time, resources or inclination to fact check or source check the stuff top-earning writers like Coulter use (Lexis, for example, costs $75 a day or $250 a week for credit card access to its …
All 41 comments by...
decampe
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The media is replete with reports about Iran financing Hezbolla, providing high tech weapons and tactical support to the tune of some $5-6 billion. Hezbolla's fighters have been decimated and large portions of its weapons stores have been expended, rendering it pretty much unfit to press any fight until and unless Iran rearms it. Something Iran is furious about. Professor Beeman's thrust at neocons (I am NOT a necon, as a long time active liberal I'm the farthest thing from it), begs the question. Iran's finger prints are all over this nasty war. Saying otherwise is like fatuously claiming that I.G. …
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Imran's argument might fly if Hezbollah was a sovereign nation that was purchasing its arms from Iran. It is not. Hezbollah is a terrorist organization and effectively a wholly-owned subsidiary of Iran. Its weapons came from Iran and Syria; its funding largely comes from Iran (except for the money it makes by drug factories in the Bekaa Valley). Its command and control comes from Iran. This is not prattle from our brain-dead Bush Administration. Iran's support of Hezbollah has been widely reported.
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We know the total and the disribution of deaths in Israel because the Israelis reported them. In Lebanon we know only about civilian deaths (and not even the true facts about those). We have no idea of the numbers of Hezbollah operatives who were killed, because Hezbollah is not part of a national government but rather a secretive terrorist organization that has hidden all the facts about itself, how many deaths, how many wounded, how many Lebanese civilians wounded because Hezbollah purposely used Lebanese civilians as shields, giving not a damn for how many civilian deaths, women and children, they caused. …
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Re Accesslaw's comments: To me it is fantasy to think that Hezbollah is a stand alone organization. Whether you call it terrorist or freedom fighter, Hezbollah is armed with the best weapons, war-technology and defensive systems money can buy. This is an army any high-tech state would be proud of and it is not funded by guys with tin cups begging on street corners. If, as Beeman says, Hezbollah is a charitable institution, it is one that hands out butter while using the people it supposedly helps as human shields. At best, Hezbollah gives not a damn for Lebanese citizens except …
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Frankly, for all I care, you can put laurel wreaths on the heads of everyone in Hezbollah and anoint them with patchouli oil. They would still be murdering scum who target women and children and other innocent civilians with vicious anti-personnel weapons intended to maim and kill as many as possible. As I said above, they fired 4,000 anti-personnel misslies at Israel and did not aim a single one at a military target. By their own words, they give not a damn for human life. There's not an ounce of difference between Nasrallah and bin Laden. The historical monster who most …
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Imran: Hezbollah attacked Israel not the other way around, or have you forgotten? In the process Hezbollah murdered eight Israeli soldiers and kidnapped two. Hezbollah was then shocked, shocked that Israel responded with heavy artillery and bombs and did not just bend over and meekly negotiate a prisoner swap. Regarding what Hezbollah wants. Top of their list is the return of the "heroic" terrorist Samir Kuntar, the only Lebanese prisoner that Israel held prior to this war. Kuntar, together with four other Lebanese nationals, back in 1979, came by boat into the northern Israeli city of Nahariya and first killed two …
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So, let me get this straight, after 27 years the Lebanese, represented by Hezbollah, out of the blue decided to kidnap two Israeli soldiers to get the murderer Samir Kuntar back? What a crock. Regarding Israel knowing where Hezbollah was, I have no idea, not being in on their intelligence briefings. We do know this, the moment Hezbollah started firing its rockets it was clear that the firing locations were in the middle of civilian areas. So what would you have Israel do, stand there while Hezbollah dropped rockets indiscriminately into its cities? Regarding Israel giving back "occupied territories" what is …
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Geocopy: Where exactly in the Hersh article in the New Yorker is there a mention of Israel testing GBU-28 depleted uranium bunker busters on behalf of the U.S. military? I must have missed it.
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Geocopy, I find your parenthetical additions to the Hersh story to be as disengenuous as the doctored and faked Reuters and AP photos of bomb deaths and damage. Let me give you a hint: when you ascribe statements to a well known journalist like Seymour Hersh, you probably ought to check first to see whether or not he actually made them. If English is not your native tongue, maybe you ought to get someone who speaks it fluently to translate the article for you. Because you've added a whole bunch of stuff that Hersh never said. He didn't use the words …
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Spinoza750: And the difference between you and bin Laden is?
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Thanks Hyjinx22, I couldn't have said it better myself. What amazes me is after I have spent nearly 40 years toiling in liberal causes from the anti-war movement of the '60s and the Free Speech Movement in Berkeley to decades as a labor journalist working for organized labor, as a political activest in the middle of the struggle for fair play for the aged, blind and disabled, for the working poor, for the candidates who spoke against Nixon and Reagan and the Bushies, I get called a Right Winger by this moron because I don't subscribe to his view that Israel …
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accesslaw: You ask who says Saad bin Laden was released by the Iranians to work with Hezbollah in recruiting terrorists? Well, to those I cited above (the NY Post and the German Die Welt) add ABC TV Network news, the Sunday Express of India and the London Daily Mail, CNN and the Calgary Sun. (I'd add Israel Fax to that list but you'd probably shriek "bias.") I believe the name of the President of Iran is "Ahmadinejad" not "Abjabad" as you said above (unless that Farsi translation is bad as well). And if Ahmadinejad was mistranslated when he was reported to …
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OK, we've argued this to death: who's right, who's wrong, who started it, is Hezbollah or Israel right or wrong. It leads only to more "I'M right," "No I'M right." arguments without end. What now? Can we move past this argument to the nub of the issue, which is what do we do now? What will ensure long-term peace in the region? What will ensure safety and prosperity for all the parties, Israel, Lebanon, the Palestinians? I believe that secure borders, self determination for all parties, and economic security are the fundamental needs. That's a very general statement though. As always, …
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Accesslaw: I read the discussion in informationclearinghouse of Ahmadinejad's speech and how it was purportedly misunderstood by those translating it. Unfortunately the informationclearinghouse website is a jumble of really bad English, so that the translation they offer and their own explanation reads like ancient Etruscan translated into English by someone whose native language is Klingon. In other words it's a mess. But the best I can get out of that jumble it is that informationclearing house claims Ahmadinejad was really only saying "whoever accepts the legitimacy of this regime [Israel] has in fact, signed the defeat of the Islamic world. Our …
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Big surprise, Galloway despises Israel, how about telling us something new.
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cabdriverinchicago: "Israel is way out of hand."? Israel got out of Gaza, was in the process of getting out of the West Bank, and negotiated plans for a Palestinian state. The response from the Palestinians was 1,000 Isralis killed by terrorists in three years, kidnappings of their soldiers by hezbollah and Hamas, new murders of Israeli settlers and 4,000 rockets launched by Hezbollah indiscriminately into Israel at civilian targets. Yeah, that sure looks like it's Israel that's out of hand. Imran: Silencing what critics? I mearly said that in his incredibly angry rant, Galloway said nothing new, nothing to move the …
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Can I read that as saying you would not accept any solution that includes the continued existance of Israel, regardless of where the borders are placed?
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OK, so cabdriverinchicago believes that the road to peace means adopting a modern, liberal notion of Israeli citizenship and extending it to the Arabs of Israel, taking in some of the Palestinian refugees from 1948 and ceasing to obsess about the demographic problem. He/she also says it means a viable Palestinian state along side Israel. A question for cabdriverinchicago : Can you clarify what changes this would mean for Israeli Arabs, who are already represented in the Knesset? Do you mean granting citizinship to Arabs on the West Bank and in Gaza? What do you mean by taking in some Palestinian …
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Well said, dizz
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Again, what do you propose, Imran?
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Interesting. Probably some negotiable items among those proposals. And in return: Secure borders for Israel. Enforced by international peacekeepers. An end to all terrorist attacks upon and within Israel, including an end to firing of katusha and other rockets from Gaza and Lebanon.. Soverign Lebanese state control over all civil and military functions of Lebanon, including full enforcement of UN Resolution 1701 calling for disarming of Hezbollah. Return of all Israelis held captive by Hamas, Hezbollah, etc. An end to all acts and expression of anti-Semitism and hate speech against Israel and Jews.
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Well, I had a whole response here and it vanished during editing. Trust me, I was eloquent. I guess the nub of what I was saying is that the only way to attain long-term peace is to get past the anger and hate on both sides. Accept the fact of Israel's existance. Accept that the Palestinians want out from under what they perceive as Israeli domination. Accept that peace requires negotiation (with enemies AND friends) and successful negotiation requires compromise. The US has been ham fisted. The UN has been impotent. Radicals among the Arabs and Iranians have seized the opportunity …
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Thanks, I wondered what in the world had happened to that post. It was there, I hit a key to edit it and then it was gone. I appereciate your reposting it. I can't imagine how it got emailed to you. I hadn't finished editing it but the remaining things are mostly typos so I'll leave it as is. Regarding your comments about Jews seeing you as a goy or Christian and therefor ipso facto anti-Semitic. I would never make such an assumption and the vast majority of Jews I know would not. I know there are those with strong antipathy …
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I do not engage in such tirades. I respect Islam and Muslims who practice it. But I am intensely wary of those who use their religion (some fundamentalist Christians,some radical Islamists, and even some Jews) as a cudgel against others. In the US for a whole variety of reasons (anger at Al Qaeda among the ones most prominent), Muslims are facing hate and persecution that they have not experienced before., at least not at such an intensity. For a country that pretends to be the moral conscience of the world, that's despicable. As I said, I have been active on the …
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OK, so now cabdriverinchicago's cards are on the table: he says Israel must unconditionally depart from the West Bank. (I'm not going to argue the issue of the wall either way. Israel saw it as a ugly but necessary solution to constant inflitration, clearly the Palestinians revile it. But the issue may be moot anyway as the thrust of attack seems to have shifted to indirect fire from rockets etc.) The settlements in the West Bank have been a central point of debate for a long time. If Israel did unconditionally leave what reciprical guarantees would they get that peace (meaning …
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Jewish racism like the anti-Semitic holocaust cartoon fest right now in Tehran?
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accesslaw: My jaw dropped when I read this nonsense about Ahmadinejad being misunderstod, he who cannot even bring himself to say "Israel," calling it instead the "Usurping entity." He is the man who said said in a speech denying the Holocaust to thousands of people in the Iranian city of Zahedan, according to a report on from Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting. (Quoted on CNN): "They have invented a myth that Jews were massacred and place this above God, religions and the prophets. The West has given more significance to the myth of the genocide of the Jews, even more significant …
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Ethnic cleansing as Israeli government policy? Israeli expansionism? This is nonsense. About 1/5th of Israel's populaiton is Muslim/Arab, with minorities of Druze and Christians. They are citizens, they vote, they can serve in the army. What individuals may have said in the past regarding so-called "clensing" (did they use that word?) is their opinion, not policy. Regarding expansionism and "Greater Israel," Israel has withdrawn from the Gaza Strip and was in preparation to withdraw from the WB until this latest war (started by Hamas and Hezbollah as a direct counter to the peace effort). If the country was truly seeking a …
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And which "militarily defenseless" country are you speaking of? Certainly not the People's Republic of Hezbollah, with better weaponry, better communications, better trained fighters and a bigger military budget than most of the world's small countries. Hiding behind skirts: Which beligerant in this war purposely set up its offensive weapons, missile launchers, etc. in the middle of civilian areas so that any retaliation was bound to kill and injure a lot of civilians, including many wearing "skirts"??? If you picked Hezbollah you win the cigar. Which beligerant in this war has acted to obstruct Israel's withdrawl from Gaza and the West …
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Your calling the Israelis "Israeifascists" is about the gutter level of debate I'd expect of people like Ahmedinijad who delights in sponsoring a Holocaust cartoon fest. It is interesting to see apologists for the world's Arab terrorists -- people who turn their own children into suicide bombers -- attacking Israel as fascists. When you use such language remember that in the 1940s many of the leaders of the Arab states and the Palestinians collaborated with the Nazis and spoke of extending the Nazi genocide to Jews in Palestine. As Alan Dershowitz has noted there was a "close relationship betweenHaj Amin al-Husseini, …
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OK, I'm curious, how did you include a link and make the type bold? Did you use HTML tags?
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Cabdriverinconfusion: Maybe your skull is too thick for this to get through. Israel does NOT have expansionism as a national policy. If Israel had such a policy then the "Greater Israel" you seem so paranoid about would today include half of Lebnon, the Sinai and Syria all the way to Damascus. It does not because though Israel captured those lands in defensive wars of the past they have returned them all. Where is the expansionism? Israel has left Gaza and was in the process of withdrawing from the West Bank when Hamas and Hezbollah decided they couldn't stand to have a …
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accesslaw: I'm impressed at the virulence of your hate for Israel and Jews. There are, after all, only 13 million Jews in the whole world while there are about 1.5 BILLION Muslims. There is one small Jewish state compared to 46 countries with majority Muslim populations (if you count the countries that are at least 20% Muslim, there are 66). Israel occupies just 20,330 sq km, 1/81 the size of Iran. Israel's 6.35 million population is less than 1/12th that of Egypt. Yet to you and many of the others here, tiny Israel is the greatest threat to world peace since …
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No, the figure includes only Israel proper at 20,330 sq km. The West Bank includes an additional 5,640 sq km and Gaza is 360 sq km. I agree negotiation rather than war is the way to ultimate peace. I personally believe (speaking for no one but myself) that a workable peace settlement should include a return to Israel's pre-1967 borders (with some small exceptions such as a DMZ in the Golan and South Lebanon), they must be secure borders, though, with solid agreements to quell cross-border attacks. Despite the charges of expansionism, Israel has repeatedly offered similar secure border deliniations only …
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Ok cabdriverinchicago, your skull may be thinner than I suspected. My time in Israel was briefer than yours, but I've also watched this develop for a long time (I'm a few years older than Israel). I was particularly affected by a recent editorial in Ha'aretz, which I saw as an excellent discussion of the frustration many Israelis feel over the current situation. It said they tried military force and were seen as aggressors, they tried partnership and it was seen as appeasement, they tried withdrawl and it was seen as weakness and surrender engendering only another round of attacks. You are …
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That's actually fairly close to what I see as the solution. I imagine that secure borders for Israel with some sort of internationally guaranteed action to prevent cross border incidents would be acceptable to most Israelis and to many Palestinians. Would Israel's Arab neighbor states (and quasi states like Hezbollah) and outfits like Hamas find this acceptable?
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I suspect those are generally possible, though I cannot see it happening without supervision by an international force with some teeth, at first at least. Israel for sure doesn't want rocket or mortar bases on the Golan again or Hezbollah's rockets within range of its cities. Hezbollah, for all its bravado, clearly had its fighting capability badly wounded and would probably like a ceasefire to recouperate. I believe, though, that the central player here is Iran which has been emboldened by the US's stupidity in Iraq and that it will take more than simple negotiation to back them off. But unlike …
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accesslaw: I, on the other hand have concluded that you see everything through the filter of belief that Israel is an aggressor, an expansionist state, a usurper and thief of Palestinian land and economy. Frankly, you and I are not going to agree, not on the issues, not on which news sources are factual, not even on the timeline of history in the region. I am as wary of news sources like CNN and Fox and Little Green Footballs as you are. I am just as wary of Arab language sources like Al Jazeera, which has its own biases. But through …
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accesslaw: I'm sorry, I'm not informed enough on this regulation to comment. Perhaps someone more knowledgeble can present the Israeli perspective. It is, of course, in Israel's interests to see the Palestinians prosperous peaceful and democratic. But what else is operating here I don't know enough to say. Comments from others? By the way, it appears that this thread has run its course on the ITT website. We are now buried among the "more" list of stories. So I suggest we leave things here. To its credit, this discussion has laid out the positions on both (several?) sides pretty well. There …
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Same song again. My refrain is also the same. As I said, I believe this thread has run its course.
Posted to Examining Irans ties to Hezbollah
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