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Israel
Oct 8, 2023 12:01:26 GMT -5
via mobile
Post by Marshall on Oct 8, 2023 12:01:26 GMT -5
Nice, Alan.
We’ll see.
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Dub
Administrator
I'm gettin' so the past is the only thing I can remember.
Posts: 19,890
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Post by Dub on Oct 8, 2023 12:04:34 GMT -5
The Wittes piece is brilliant. Thank you, James. That’s exactly why I haven’t shared my many thoughts here in this thread.
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Post by Village Idiot on Oct 8, 2023 19:05:16 GMT -5
What if, just for a while, we could go inside ourselves and imagine a world that was free of hatred and prejudice and revenge and war. Hold that vision in your mind for a while and imagine how good that would feel. It might seem so impossible and so pie-in-the-sky that it wouldn't be even worth the few minutes it would take up in your busy life. But I don't believe it's a waste of time. I believe it's closer than we think and not only that; it's inevitable. We are not going to destroy ourselves. The collective consciousness of humanity is growing weary of war and conflict. When the tipping point is reached, it will happen. We CAN recognize the spark of divinity in each other and let all the other stuff go. It's going to happen. We got this. I am with you on that, Alan. I don't believe it's a waste of time either. I do believe there are people in this world who are capable of taking a step back and taking a calm look a the world.
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Israel
Oct 8, 2023 19:29:50 GMT -5
Post by Cornflake on Oct 8, 2023 19:29:50 GMT -5
Alan, I'd like to think you're right. I'll have to give it some thought.
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Post by Rob Hanesworth on Oct 8, 2023 21:20:43 GMT -5
What if, just for a while, we could go inside ourselves and imagine a world that was free of hatred and prejudice and revenge and war. Hold that vision in your mind for a while and imagine how good that would feel. It might seem so impossible and so pie-in-the-sky that it wouldn't be even worth the few minutes it would take up in your busy life. But I don't believe it's a waste of time. I believe it's closer than we think and not only that; it's inevitable. We are not going to destroy ourselves. The collective consciousness of humanity is growing weary of war and conflict. When the tipping point is reached, it will happen. We CAN recognize the spark of divinity in each other and let all the other stuff go. It's going to happen. We got this. Sort of brings to mind John Lennon's "Imagine."
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Post by Village Idiot on Oct 8, 2023 21:22:14 GMT -5
I was imagining the same thing.
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Post by millring on Oct 9, 2023 6:37:08 GMT -5
What if, just for a while, we could go inside ourselves and imagine a world that was free of hatred and prejudice and revenge and war. Hold that vision in your mind for a while and imagine how good that would feel. It might seem so impossible and so pie-in-the-sky that it wouldn't be even worth the few minutes it would take up in your busy life. But I don't believe it's a waste of time. I believe it's closer than we think and not only that; it's inevitable. We are not going to destroy ourselves. The collective consciousness of humanity is growing weary of war and conflict. When the tipping point is reached, it will happen. We CAN recognize the spark of divinity in each other and let all the other stuff go. It's going to happen. We got this. It's a beautiful post and a heart-warming thought. But I suspect that we only have that ability to imagine (like John Lennon) because we were raised in a culture so removed from the fight for survival -- and we've bought into theologies and philosophies so far removed from transcendent truth (we love Walt Disney and and hate John Calvin) -- and we've been trained by the fiction of our movies and our books and our cultural narratives -- that we have adopted this imagining as the current substitute for religion. And everything that once was true of our previous guiding religions (the good of moral guidance and the bad of irrational thinking) is now true of these imaginings -- including the need to excommunicate and punish those who will not adopt it (which is why, ironically, it will lead to more -- not less -- war). As we explored in a previous (barbarians) thread, we live in interesting times. Technology and capitalism has allowed us an opulence and abundance never previously even dreamed of. Fewer people starve, we have longer life expectancy, fewer people live under regimes of superstition. So it's easy to believe the current mass-misunderstanding that evolution is creating a superior mankind that will overcome the natural world and its struggle to survive. But it is a false narrative. Despite what PBS Nature, Disney, and our Sunday Schools have taught us, evolution is neither directional, nor intentional. We aren't getting better. We will always fight our natures, and our natures may not be evil as some religions would have us believe, but they are selfish because they have to be. At the same time as we are deluded by our ever-improving life expectancies and easier lives, we are also probably more collectively apocalyptic than ever before. When I was young it was the religious who were empowering themselves with the apocalyptic -- standing on street corners and telling us the end is near. Now it's the pagan/"scientist" who is empowering himself by standing at the university lectern and on the nightly news and telling us that the end is near. I don't think either is true, but neither do I think we're going to improve ourselves out of the reality that life is and always will be a struggle. But it's nice to imagine. And our fictions can give us mental reprieve from the daily struggle.
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Israel
Oct 9, 2023 7:53:54 GMT -5
Post by Marshall on Oct 9, 2023 7:53:54 GMT -5
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Israel
Oct 10, 2023 15:54:43 GMT -5
Post by Cosmic Wonder on Oct 10, 2023 15:54:43 GMT -5
The analysis I’m reading is saying there is no way Hamas could have done this without support of Hezbolla and Iran. If that view holds, it seems only a matter of time until Israel tees off on Iran. With US assets in the region, keeping this contained seems problematic.
Mike
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Israel
Oct 10, 2023 20:35:48 GMT -5
via mobile
Post by millring on Oct 10, 2023 20:35:48 GMT -5
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Israel
Oct 10, 2023 21:17:22 GMT -5
Post by james on Oct 10, 2023 21:17:22 GMT -5
Point of information.
As far as I can tell....
BLM has been through some organizational turmoil in recent years. The Newsweek report is about statements on the Twitter account of @blmgrassroots. A small group, unaffiliated and apparently somewhat at loggerheads with the original organisation, their Twitter follower count is 1,200.
(The BLM Global Network Twitter account (@blklivesmatter), although not particularly active, has about a million followers).
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Dub
Administrator
I'm gettin' so the past is the only thing I can remember.
Posts: 19,890
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Israel
Oct 10, 2023 23:57:46 GMT -5
via mobile
Post by Dub on Oct 10, 2023 23:57:46 GMT -5
I thought the real Newsweek folded and the name was picked up by some outfit with less scruples. Did I misunderstand?
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Israel
Oct 11, 2023 5:17:27 GMT -5
Post by millring on Oct 11, 2023 5:17:27 GMT -5
I thought the real Newsweek folded and the name was picked up by some outfit with less scruples. Did I misunderstand? There are plenty of other sources beyond Newsweek if you want to look into it. My friends on facebook are conflicted as to whose side they are on. Some from the extreme left are still posting photos of Gilda Muir with quotes about the unlikelihood of negotiating peace with those whose mission it is to kill you, while others from the same extreme left are standing, like BLM, in solidarity with Palestine and the terrorists. I've always thought we had more interest in keeping Israel as a more western-thinking friend in a hotbed of hate-America sentiment, but when even the American Jewish population votes consistently otherwise -- in favor of Palestine -- I don't hold out much hope for Israel.
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Israel
Oct 11, 2023 7:44:18 GMT -5
Post by Marshall on Oct 11, 2023 7:44:18 GMT -5
My friends on facebook are conflicted as to whose side they are on. Some from the extreme left are still posting photos of Gilda Muir with quotes about the unlikelihood of negotiating peace with those whose mission it is to kill you, while others from the same extreme left are standing, like BLM, in solidarity with Palestine and the terrorists. You need better friends.
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Post by Cornflake on Oct 11, 2023 9:57:05 GMT -5
When this thread began, we didn't know the extent of the atrocities Hamas had committed. Both sides have their faults but Hamas needs to be slammed. It needs to be slammed for essentially the same reasons that Putin needs to be slammed. The world needs to say: You can't do that.
I feel sorry for the innocent on both sides who will have to suffer.
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Israel
Oct 11, 2023 10:00:55 GMT -5
Post by Cornflake on Oct 11, 2023 10:00:55 GMT -5
As for the role of Iran, there's the most recent report from the Times.
"The United States has collected multiple pieces of intelligence that show that key Iranian leaders were surprised by the Hamas attack in Israel, information that has fueled U.S. doubts that Iran played a direct role in planning the assault, according to several American officials.
These key Iranian officials did not know the attack was coming, according to the intelligence. The United States, Israel and key regional allies have not found evidence that Iran directly helped plan the attack, according to the U.S. officials and another official in the Middle East.
While they would not identify the Iranian officials who expressed surprise at the attack, the U.S. officials said they were people who typically would be aware of operations involving the Quds Force, the Iranian government's paramilitary arm that supports and works with proxy forces.
U.S. officials said the intelligence investigation was continuing and could turn up evidence that Iran or other states were directly involved in the Hamas operation. Senior officials said they were keeping an open mind, reviewing old intelligence reports and looking for new information.
Iran has provided large numbers of weapons and support to Hamas over many years. U.S. officials have made clear that they believe this makes Tehran broadly complicit in the attack. But that was a different issue than direct knowledge and involvement, they said.
A senior U.S. intelligence official told members of Congress in a briefing on Tuesday that there was no direct link between Iran and the Hamas attack, U.S. officials said. The official provided few details but told lawmakers that U.S. agencies had intelligence contradicting assertions that Iran had helped plan the attack.
The United States and its allies regularly track and monitor meetings between Quds Force leaders and their proxies and allies, including Hamas. But officials say there is no evidence that those meetings were used to plan the attack in Israel. While officials concede that there could have been other secret meetings that Western intelligence did not track, for now they have found no evidence of such meetings."
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Israel
Oct 12, 2023 6:16:22 GMT -5
Post by millring on Oct 12, 2023 6:16:22 GMT -5
The nightly news and the local news is FULL of stories and interviews saying "I'm not defending what Hamas is doing.....but" Just like the link James provided. They want us to know that (according to them) Israel is at fault.
So, yes, they are defending Hamas.
Additionally, the news is making the story that Israel is at fault because its intelligence was caught by surprise. Every story has an anti-Israel slant in the name of "balance".
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Post by james on Oct 12, 2023 8:07:20 GMT -5
The Benjamin Wittes link I posted did not say "I'm not defending what Hamas is doing.....but" or "Israel is at fault".
In general, I'm not interested in entering this discussion here.
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Post by millring on Oct 12, 2023 9:06:21 GMT -5
The Benjamin Wittes link I posted did not say "I'm not defending what Hamas is doing.....but" or "Israel is at fault". I re-read it. You're right and I am wrong.
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Israel
Oct 12, 2023 9:39:23 GMT -5
Post by Cornflake on Oct 12, 2023 9:39:23 GMT -5
"You're right and I am wrong." I've been there frequently.
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