Tzipi Livni is Israel's foreign minister and Acting Prime Minister. I wonder what will be written on her tombstone. Just that, perhaps. Watching her on television the last few days, I can oddly enough understand why a man could be driven to violence. She says Israel is going to retaliate when her citizens are attacked. The current toll shows over 500 dead Palestinians and over 2000 injured. And Israel? 5 dead so far. Five. Do the words disproportionate response mean anything to her? She goes on about the long battle against terror. With Israel's well-funded military power, do they expect us to believe that they really can't root out the dishevelled Hamas' militant arm? She talks about how Israel tries to avoid civilian casualties. Yes, of course that's evident. And about how Hamas is responsible for everything that's befallen the Palestinians. True, Hamas is no saint as organisations go. So strike at their militant arm. Not the part that set up hospitals and parks and libraries. Why were they chosen in a thumping victory by the Palestinian people? Maybe, foolishly so, since they have invited the wrath of the militarily-far-superior Israel.
The European Union is gathered along with the UN to try and sort out the crisis. While sipping on expensive French mineral water, in their gold-leaf luxury suites. (I've seen this, believe me, when I used to work as a journalist in Prague. Excess in the name of problem-solving.) Bernard Kouchner, one of the founding members of Medecins sans Frontieres and France's current Foreign Affairs minister said it quite clearly: We cannot sit around giving lip service to the Middle East. Don't give us history lessons. We already know what the issues are. We need action. And we need to be human.
While opinions fly back and forth, there are dead bodies everywhere. An insistent Israel won't back down. Hamas has nowhere to go. Palestinians are caught between two sides whose eyelids are being held up by toothpicks.
I'm no expert on the Middle East. But I've interviewed politicians and diplomats and I'm hearing the same tired old tune. And I've seen how the American government plays flip-flop where Israel is concerned. And I know that unless world leaders get off their bullshit carousel, there will be another Lebanon-like disaster. And the blood will be on all our hands.
Here's a sensible voice that emerged from Rabbi Lerner in the Times.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article5446519.ece
Tzipi Livni, try reading that while you choke on your French mineral water.
The European Union is gathered along with the UN to try and sort out the crisis. While sipping on expensive French mineral water, in their gold-leaf luxury suites. (I've seen this, believe me, when I used to work as a journalist in Prague. Excess in the name of problem-solving.) Bernard Kouchner, one of the founding members of Medecins sans Frontieres and France's current Foreign Affairs minister said it quite clearly: We cannot sit around giving lip service to the Middle East. Don't give us history lessons. We already know what the issues are. We need action. And we need to be human.
While opinions fly back and forth, there are dead bodies everywhere. An insistent Israel won't back down. Hamas has nowhere to go. Palestinians are caught between two sides whose eyelids are being held up by toothpicks.
I'm no expert on the Middle East. But I've interviewed politicians and diplomats and I'm hearing the same tired old tune. And I've seen how the American government plays flip-flop where Israel is concerned. And I know that unless world leaders get off their bullshit carousel, there will be another Lebanon-like disaster. And the blood will be on all our hands.
Here's a sensible voice that emerged from Rabbi Lerner in the Times.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article5446519.ece
Tzipi Livni, try reading that while you choke on your French mineral water.
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