To the author of http://ingaza.wordpress.com
To the author of http://ingaza.wordpress.com/2009/02/04/next-time-it-will-hurt-more/: you mistranslated the writing in the first two pictures that have writing in them, and you obviously misunderstood what the soldiers who wrote them meant. Perhaps I can give you a better understanding of why the soldiers left this specific writing on the wall. Maybe it will also explain to you a little of why this sorry war happened.
The words photographed on those walls are the words of a song. This song is called "Hatikva". It is the Israeli anthem. It speaks of 2000 years of yearning for a homeland, and of being in a homeland without being subject to oppression. It embodies the collective mindset of the Israeli people, who deeply believe that our existence as a free people is seriously threatened by Hamas. Every rocket that Hamas had fired (and continues to fire) on Israel has a major effect on the Israeli collective mindset. It hits right where it hurts. It awakens our deepest fears. It strengthens our collective remembrance of being a people without a homeland, subject to the mercy or cruelty of whichever country we are refugees in, without being able to do anything about it. And it immediately awakens the protective instinct that Israeli existence is based on.
The soldiers who wrote the Israeli anthem on those walls were speaking their mind. They were not saying "we will destroy you", they were saying to you "you won't destroy us". The IDF soldiers in Gaza, just like most other Israelis, truly believe that Israel's existence is threatened by the Hamas.
If this cycle of violence is to ever end, you must understand that Israeli aggression, however terrible, is rooted in very deep fears.
The Israeli public has a mental weakness: it cannot stand being helpless. Israel cannot tolerate being fired upon without striking back. More than 10 years ago, Hamas came violently into the Israeli consciousness by killing Israeli women and children on Israeli buses. Hamas consistently claims that its goal is to destroy Israel. Hamas is holding an Israeli soldier captive for over 2 years without providing the red cross any access to him. It is seen by Israelis as a cruel and vicious organization, which did not hesitate to break the kneecaps of Gaza citizens who opposed it, and it has continuously fired Qassam rockets at Israel for over 8 years.
The Hamas has been waving a red cloth at a raging bull, and you are surprised that the raging bull has attacked.
Hamas keeps waving this red cloth by continuing the fire missiles on Israeli cities. What can you do to make Hamas stop waving this red cloth?
25 comments:
I love the way you think your explanation of the graffiti being the national anthem makes any of this any better. Nice job avoiding any of the article's actual content.
How did you miss that? Were you too busy cutting Star of David shapes into Gaza's agricultural land with tanks during Cast Lead for you to have time to read the first half of the article about the baby cooked with white phosphorus?
Israel's 63-year-old military occupation is the only red cloth that matters. It is a giant roll of red cloth next to a red thread you focus on and complain about.
HAMAS is the latest fig leaf that Israel uses to excuse its brutal colonialism. Before that, it was "Arafat". Before him the "PLO". Israel delegitimizes itself.
@Nigel - I didn't miss the article's main point. The suffering and pain of the people of Gaza is beyond comprehension.
I think that lessening the pain requires more understanding from BOTH sides.
Most of the people of Israel are blind to the pain caused by the IDF to the people of Gaza. They do not want to see how much suffering our army has caused. It is much more comforting to fool yourself into believing that your side is "the good guys", and that the other side is responsible for all the pain on both sides.
But one of the things that both Israelis and Palestinians share, is this blindness.
Both sides are so obsessed with seeing the other side as evil, they miss the fact that the people on the other side are only human, and that they suffer too.
The purpose of my post was not to diminish Israel's responsibility for the suffering, but to explain that the Israeli actions are mostly rooted in the very human emotion of fear.
You have a lot of patience. But can't you see, the author of that blog is not interested in dialog. He's a propagandist and is no different from all other propagandists everywhere in the world. You were trying to conduct a high quality discourse but can't you see, it's useless with those like the author of that blog.
@vanguard:
I agree that the common view of Israel in the Arab world is that we are The Satan himself.
And it seems that we are also in agreement that this view of Israel is misguided, and does not reflect who we really are.
Also, I suspect that both you and I want peace.
Our disagreement is apparently on whether Israel can do anything to change how we are perceived by the Arab world.
I have come to learn that there are many intelligent people in the Arab world who are extremely frustrated by the violence - yet still think we are the devil. I believe that we can do much to change their view of us.
The first step to achieving such change, in my opinion, is to try to understand the other side, and figure out why so many intelligent people have such a great misconception about us. I have taken that step, and if you wish, I will be glad to conduct a conversation with you about that and explain my views further.
@Vanguard -
You said ""I'll bet those Arabs are local, Israeli boys - who have nothing to lose by being one of the few.". Actually, the listening I did on this blog was mostly to the opinions of Egyptian citizens. Listening to them was a profound experience - because I was extremely surprised at some of their opinions. But the first time I really listened to Arabs was when I met face-to-face with people who define themselves as Palestinians, and who live in places like Bethlehem, Gaza, Ramallah, etc. That was not an easy thing to do (for either side) but it was an enriching experience as well.
You mentioned "negotiating" together with "listening". The way I see things, listening is very different from negotiating. When you're negotiating, you're trying to achieve some sort of compromise. When you're listening, you're trying to understand how the other person sees things. BTW, there is a difference between listening to the collective opinion of a group ("they"), and listening to the individual opinions of people (even though individuals often adopt most of the ideas of the group they identify with).
Listening to individuals has taught me a great deal, but it is not easy. In fact, in order to actually listen, I have to constrain my immediate impulse and refrain from shouting my own opinion. I have to forcefully stop myself from trying to prove that I am 100% right and that that other side is 100% wrong. Experience has taught me that I am not always 100% right, so it's probably a good thing to do in many cases.
I'd like to ask you a few questions (and note that I am genuinely interested in understanding your point of view: being "not afraid to listen" should apply to my conversation with you, just as it applied to my conversation with Arabs):
* Do you object to listening to individual Palestinians - i.e., not as "negotiations", but in order to learn how the others think or feel?
* Why do you think that I slander the settlers? Is there anything specific I posted that gave that impression?
* You suggest that the solution is annexation. What benefit do you think would come out of that?
* Your words project a sincere concern about the situation here. Do you live in Israel? If not, where does that concern come from?
Looking forward to your response.
-IB
@Vanguard - When I was actively posting on this blog (a few years ago), several very interesting discussions emerged. My description of the blog (i.e., "a discussion between myself and several honest, talented young Muslim Arabs") refers mostly to those discussions. They started with a comment I posted on the blog of an Egyptian blogger (Zeinobia), inviting her to a civilized discussion:
http://thoughts-from-israel.blogspot.co.il/2006/07/call-for-dialogue.html
If you click on the link in my post to her blog, you can see the comment I left there (which was not deleted), the following comment - left by a visitor to her blog (swearing at me), and Zeinobia's very decent response. Unfortunately, you can't see the picture that Zeinobia posted, it's no longer there.
You can read some later parts of the conversation here: http://egyptianchronicles.blogspot.co.il/2007/06/palestine-facts-on-ground.html and in various other places throughout my blog, but I don't recommend that you do that, because it will probably get you even more upset about me.
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I followed your request to read paragraphs 6 and 7 of your post about the first Gulf War. You had asked for my feelings following that, so here they are:
1. First of all, I'll let you know how I felt before reading that post: I felt offended. I was offended because your comments contain a lot of personal attacks on me and my views. You claim that my views are wrong and dangerous, and you call my opinions and education misguided. This is not pleasant to read. If you would like to try to change my views - I am open to that, but being offensive towards me is not achieving your goal.
2. When I read your post, it helped me understand you better. I felt that you have found a sense of self worth, and that it derives from a very strong belief in the divine powers of the Rabbi. I sensed that your belief in the Rabbi is a fundamental part of your current being, and that you will be extremely agitated by differing opinions.
3. I noticed that we have a factual disagreement regarding the number of Israeli casualties from the Scud missiles. When I read your words that "no Israelis died" from those missiles, I vaguely recalled memories from news broadcasts at that time, reporting that someone was killed. I did some Googling and found his name, but I think that getting into an argument about facts would be sort of pointless.
4. When I realized we'd probably disagree on the facts (which, unfortunately, happened to me every time I tried to have a meaningful discussion with an ultra-orthodox Jew), I felt a drain of energy, and a lack of enthusiasm to continue the discussion in this direction. I would actually be more interested in finding out where we DO agree on things.
I cannot spend a lot of time answering right now, so I will answer in parts, splitting my response into small bits - each relating to a specific part of your response.
>> In the Persian Gulf war - one old man died - but that was because of a gas-mask problem - but not because of a Scud.
This is where we get into factual disagreement. The sources I found on the Internet (and my vague memory from a TV news report on the day this happened) say that, in addition to the person you refer to, there was a casualty from a direct Scud hit. Here is a Facebook page someone set up in his memory: איתן גרונדלנד ז"ל - הרוג מלחמת המפרץ 1991
.
And now is where we might get into a dead-end in our discussion of this topic, because you would naturally say that either this page is a forgery, or that it was set up by people who were mislead by the leftist Israeli media, or find some other explanation as to why it is incorrect. And I'm not claiming to know for sure that the factual statement is correct: it might not be, I don't know. I didn't speak to the person who set it up, I don't know the deceased or his family, I wasn't near the house when the Scud hit it, I just found evidence that is in line with my personal recollection of events (which may be faulty - and, who knows - maybe when I saw the news report over 20 years ago it was all a setup by the media).
But it is natural for me to accept that this person was killed by a Scud, just as it would be very natural for you to refute this, because that claim stands against everything you believe in.
I don't expect the Facebook page to convince you - I'm just pointing out that you and I have two completely different grasps on the world around us. We perceive reality differently. Now the challenge is: how do we establish meaningful dialogue in such a situation?
I do not have any way to verify the validity of that story. So let's move on to a direction that may be more productive.
Let me relate to another sentence you wrote:
>> I do not hate because someone is not of my kin. God made all of us, and all of us have a purpose in life. But I do hate that which is evil and meant to do harm to me or my people.
I'd like to ask you a couple of questions.
The first: supposing that someone does lobby to sell pork in Israel - would you still consider that person to be "my people"? Would you still hate those who mean to harm him?
The second: supposing that a Jew (let's call him Reuven) accidentally did significant harm to another Jew (let's call him Yossef). Let's suppose that Yossef misunderstood the situation, and thought that Reuven hurt him on purpose. Yossef was so hurt by Reuven, that he decides to hurt Reuven back and means to do him harm. Would you consider Yossef to be evil? Would you hate him?
So your answer to my 2nd question would be: (1) Yossef is not evil, but his deed is wrong (2) You should not hate Yossef - and if you do find yourself hating Yossef, then this is a signal to you that you should be looking inwards to find the part of yourself that needs improvement. Am I correct?
If so - then in this example we see things the same way.
Assuming I understood correctly, then may I ask if your answer would still be the same if Yossef was called Joe, and he was an American Christian?
As for the Swiss watch, then my answer is absolutely yes: I certainly do believe that a modern Swiss watch is the result of an evolutionary process of the knowledge of the Swiss watchmaking company. The people in that company started making watches many years ago. Trial and error helped that company improve on its designs over the years, with the best concepts from older watch models being adopted into newer models, with ideas that have proven flawed either eliminated entirely or corrected, and with revolutionary new ideas coming into light every few years.
Evolution is not randomness. Evolution is a process of constant improvement.
Regarding your last question - why do I not accept that a Creator exists? My personal belief is that there is some form of Purpose and Order in the Universe, but that this Order is much too complex to be reduced to the notion of a human-like "Creator" who has a linear "will" and "thinks", "designs" or "gets angry". I think that the Order in the Universe is too complex for humans to grasp, and that all we can do is strive to improve our understanding of it bit by bit. I believe that humanity as a whole is more intelligent than any single human. I believe that the intelligence of humanity is the outcome of the combination of our human minds with each other through ever-improving technology, and that as a result of that improvement humanity is getting smarter. And the more we, as a collective, are getting smarter, we improve our understanding of the Universe and the Order within it. That sort of improvement may very well be a Purpose of the Universe. When humanity had a certain level of collective intelligence 3000 years ago, the model of a "Creator with a will" was useful, and it was the best model that humanity could grasp. But the advances made over time have made it possible to improve that model and bring it to the next stage.
For me, the "Creator" model is too simplistic, and does not satisfy my desire to understand what I see around me.
This is probably not the answer you were expecting - but that's how I see things.
>> Do I hate him as you seem to want to imply? No. He too was created for a purpose on this earth.
But you said earlier that I do hate that which is evil and meant to do harm to me or my people.. In our hypothetic example, Joe means to harm a Jew. So why you wouldn't consider Joe to be evil, and why would you not hate him?
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>> you think we religious Jews have a simplistic view of God that is anthropomorphic
To me, sayings like "God gave..." or "God commanded ..." seem to have an anthropomorphic nature.
I am sorry to see that my words have upset you again.
I watched the first few minutes of the video you refer to, but have lost my patience with it after seeing so called "images" of Herzel's handwritten Hebrew notes. Well, Herzel didn't know Hebrew, so that image made the entire video questionable for me. I have more important things to do than watch such rude propaganda tactics, sorry. (Don't worry: I have not been able to be patient with Arab-made videos showing stupid propaganda about Israel and Jews either).
Besides that, I'm not sure how I can answer you. We see the world so differently, that I can't think of anything to say that you would understand.
I have witnessed Israeli evil first hand, but you seem to think that my opinion was formulated by the media. I have seen the cycle of violence from within, yet you think it doesn't exist. I have had face to face conversations with honest Muslims, yet you believe they are all liars. You probably experience similar frustration with my words as I do with yours, because to you the Torah is divine and to me it is a historic document. To you Jews seem a superior race, but when I hear your words it reminds me of stories I have heard about concentration camps. My views are not the result of our flawed education system - they are the result of years and years of being inquisitive, reading, learning, experimenting, and also actively participating in the creation of stuff (including active participation in the opening of the floodgates of technology). But more than that, my views of people from other cultures comes from spending time with people from those cultures. I have friends, workmates or business associates from many places around the world - some are Jewish, some are Christian, some are Hindu, some are Muslim, some have no religion. They live all over the world, in places like NY, California, Texas, China, Canada, Korea, England, France, Germany, Italy, Switzerland, Greece, Spain, Australia, Israel and even Gaza and the West Bank. I have developed software together with Arabs who are Israeli citizens. I have enjoyed some interactions, and did not like others. My interactions were in personal situations, business, education, work and military. Books, the media and my schooling have obviously influenced me, but my opinions about people come mostly from the interactions I have had with those people. You are entitled to think that I am misguided, but I do not share that opinion, and I do not think you can convince me otherwise. You ask why I listen to Muslims, but you are not willing to consider my answer as valid.
Our discussion seems to have returned to its starting point. I am not sure if either one of us has learned anything from it, but I do wish you well, and since it seems my words have angered you, I hope you find this a useful opportunity for looking inwards as you had suggested.
All The Best,
-IB
I supported the disengagement from Gaza even though I did not think it would bring peace (I see it as "too little, too late"). I have had my share of army duty there, and was glad to know I wouldn't have to continue doing that. I did not enjoy having to play an active role in putting the Arab residents of Gaza through degrading procedures, and I did not enjoy leaving my family in order to risk my life to protect Jews whom I view as violating the basic human rights that those Arabs deserve (even though you don't think they deserve basic human rights).
As for the divinity of the Torah, you suggest an amusing proposition, but I do not think that it is possible to scientifically determine divinity. Science does not allow you to determine if a claim is true or false. All Science can do is help you model reality in small steps: you suggest a theory, and put it to the test again and again by comparing predictions generated by your theory to reproducible observations. As long as you haven't disproved the theory, it is valid. The more tests you find which don't disprove your theory, the stronger your theory is. But once you disprove it, you have to modify your theory. Interestingly, two contradictory theories can co-exist at the same time and be equally true - as long as neither of them has been disproved.
Unfortunately, "divinity" is not a concept that is useful for making predictions, because an all-powerful entity can always mess with test results: whatever the outcome of our experiments, we could always claim that God decided to set that outcome. As such, "divinity" cannot be disproved, and is not something that can be tested scientifically.
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