not everybody here follows the party line. and the party line is very ugly regarding ukraine and as i pointed out very inconsistent when compared to israel. because the israel genocide came along and meeershimer doesn't like it one has to ask why is that. why can't netanyahu commit the same horrors that are acceptable for putin? seems fishy. pointing this out is spewing insults.?
not everybody here follows the party line. and the party line is very ugly regarding ukraine and as i pointed out very inconsistent when compared to israel. because the israel genocide came along and meeershimer doesn't like it one has to ask why is that. why can't netanyahu commit the same horrors that are acceptable for putin? seems fishy. pointing this out is spewing insults.?
I think you put the onus on Russia because you don't get the whole picture and that picture will tell you that the US is simply using Ukrainian lives to bring Putin down and undermine Russia's influence in the world. Why all our Middle Eastern wars? Why Iraq? Biden certainly pushed that one down the throats of his colleagues using his position as chair of the foreign relations comm. Saddam had weapons of mass destruction he said, and people like Judith Miller who worked for the NY Times published the same lies knowing her source had a stake in wanting Saddam gone. We lied our way through all our Middle Eastern wars, destroying countries, leaving rubble in the wake of those wars as we destroyed the lives of their people, many of whom died, or were displaced. Read about them from someone who will provide you with an honest perspective and you'll come to understand what we want in Ukraine and realize the lives of others matter little to us, since our politicians are there mostly to serve themselves. We are supplying weapons to assist Israel in implementing a genocide, killing mostly children, innocents, and there are those who will say that's okay. Did you see our representatives applaud Netanyahu's every word, a man who belongs in jail, and would be if he were no implementing this genocide. They are applauding a genocide, the death of women, children, men, the young and the old. Their living space, an outdoor concentration camp true, but home nonetheless and now it is in rubble. Where do they go if they should survive? Please remember we are supplying the bombs that are killing them, and Israel demands it. The world is sick.
If the Americans think they can bring Putin down they are even more stupid than they look. American Presidents can only dream of the sort of support Putin has from the public.
I would say also this. His popular support in Russia largely flows from the fact that he took the Russian bear on his back and carried it away from the absolute depths of economic, medical, military, and cultural destruction and degradation left in the aftermath of the utter collapse of that Nation and society. To be sure he was of necessity an authoritarian. I don’t think Western citizens can fathom the depths of human destruction and despair Russia found itself after approximately 80 years of communist degradation. He is not universally popular. But most of that nation recognizes the path forward he forged for his people. I don’t admire him but I do recognize his surprising achievements.
From your phrasing, I cannot tell if you’re intentionally omitting the American role in exploiting Russia’s precarious beginning as a non-communist state, where it looted, and appropriated rights to vast holdings of the former regime. However feeble the Russian state was when Gorbachev dissolved the Soviet Union, it was far from the hollowed out shell that was the result of a decade of western “influence.” The IMF was intent on making Russia a client-state.
Boris Yeltsin was the easy mark for Clinton and his band of hustlers. When Yeltsin grasped the damage that he had allowed, he appointed Putin to right the listing Russian ship. Putin clearly is an authoritarian, because thieves and trained con artists don’t respond to civility.
Eloquently put. Yes, I agree with your assessment. What the West also fails to take into account is that the Russians like a strong leader. Any understanding of their history explains why. It also explains the paranoia of the Soviets in terms of controlling outside its borders.
Also having spent a bit of time in Russia, it is important to understand the trauma Russians suffered when the Soviet union fell, to which Putin referred and has been consistently misquoted.
Yes terrible things happened to some under the Soviets but, for most Russians, particularly females, there was more opportunity, a good education, a reliable job, a home, and security. The loss of that is still mourned by many Russians even though most would not want to return to the Soviet era.
One can admire Putin for his principles and his commitment to his nation and his people. No-one is perfect. Even the much admired Churchill was at times a racist thug and responsible for atrocities and war crimes.
traumatized people are willing to traumatize others. you give them the excuse for a criminal war of aggression against ukraine. that is why there are laws and rules so that people don't just let their traumas determine their actions.
Well, they did once, in Afghanistan using the Mujahideen, that bogged Russia down for years and years. Mission accomplished, but this time our antics won't work and I'm glad of it.
exactly, that's why it is so ridiculous when dissidents that are "rescued" from putin seem so silly when they say that they want to bring democracy to russia even if it costs them their freedom. the russians as you clearly see love their zar putin. they love it that he wants to expand their empire to include ukrainians. the ukraianians don't love it but the russians and the meershimer enthusiasts love putin's empire builiding
putin doesn't want the headache of ukraine. no he wanted an easy landgrab of course. it turned into a headache. are you aware that it was putin who invaded ukraine? it seems so obvious but yet the meershimers can't see it. the rest of the world sees it but the meershimers can't. and i guess the RT employees can't either, or aren't allowed to see it.
Since there is no evidence for any of your claims we can only assume you are a biased Ukrainian or a biased disaffected ex-Russian. I read many military experts and the consensus is that Putin is doing what he said he would do, protecting his borders and ethnic Russians in what is called Ukraine, near the Russian border. There is zero evidence for empire building and since Ukraine for virtually all of its existence was Russian, to take all of it, which is not the plan, would not be empire building but protecting borders and reinstating historical givens.
By all means, when you can provide evidence of empire building be sure to let us know.
Yep, we decide he didn't win because we backed the opposition who would benefit us if in office, so lets show our opposition since we are the policemen of the world and because we care about people so much we'll impose sanctions, even though we'll make the people's lives miserable. We're willing to do that because we love democracy that much, and really care. Chavez too, and I cried when he died of cancer.
The thing about sanctions is that it doesn't work. Countries that are sanctioned often find ways of not dealing with the west or producing a product in their own country.
It's like being told off by a teacher when she/he made a mistake and you correct them!
I think many countries turn away because of this nonsense.
Chavez I remember went through hell fighting the USA off.
Sanctions worked to end apartheid in South Africa. I think it depends on how self-sufficient the country is and the reason why sanctions are imposed. Sanctions against Russia and Iran are pure hypocrisy while sanctions against South Africa were not and sanctions against Israel would not be.
Israel is rotting from within and always has been. It was founded in hatred, irrational paranoid fear, elitism, racism and colonial fascism and was always doomed.
Asserting that there is or has been a genocide in Gaza is false. Even if one accepts at face value the number of civilian deaths, it’s not a genocide. And no one can in good conscience accept Hamas’ numbers as honest. Even the UN admitted that.
Second, the IDF does not target Palestinian civilians, unlike Hamas indiscriminately firing thousands of rockets at Israeli population centers.
Third, Hamas’ terrorist strategy is to keep and use military assets in heavily populated areas. Hamas leaders desire large numbers of Palestinian civilian casualties. They have admitted this. The recently deceased Haniyah explicitly said so.
Fourth, the IDFs military operations seek to minimize civilian casualties and have and have done so far better than any military anywhere at any time.
Fifth, the Nazi Holocaust murdered 60% of European Jews. So have some perspective when you speak of a genocide in Gaza.
You can't except that a people that were subject to a genocide in the 1940's under Hitler is implementing one of their own, well, sorry but that is what Israel is doing. You provide information so distorted in order to reassure yourself. The total death toll has not been determined since many of the dead lie under the rubble, and no doubt most are children, and women. Hospitals usually determine the overall death toll, but Israel destroyed those. However tens of thousands of deaths have been accounted for and mostly women and children, babies, sad. "Second, the IDF does not target Palestinian civilians, unlike Hamas indiscriminately firing thousands of rockets at Israeli population centers." Have you seen the rubble Gaza has become? Have you not heard of the thousands killed in hospitals Israel has bombed? You are totally divorced from reality. If there is anyone who needs perspective, and granted more difficult for you, but it is you. Sorry but I can't help you avoid the reality of what Israel is doing and in so doing will pay a heavy price on many levels.
Jews are not a people and most Jews, real and fake, in what is called Israel and Occupied Palestine were never subjected to genocide under Hitler.
A lot of the Israeli colonists are from Russia and places which were never occupied by the Germans. Many of the recent Jewish colonists are from the US, UK, Canada, even Australia and none of them experienced genocide under Hitler.
Jews are not a people? I'm confused by what you say since I know that about 150 thousand holocaust survivors entered Israel when it became a state in 1948. There were many, some 500 thousand who entered the country from the twenties through the 1930's. Also, the Zionist movement established in the 1800's wanted a state of their own referencing the prejudice they were subject to. There were millions of Jews who lived in Russia and many of them were killed by Hitler. We're talking about a war and Hitler didn't stay put in Germany, and Poland also suffered, both Jews and non Jews died in camps set up in Poland, AUSCHWITZ! Of course immigration to Israel continued through the years.
Well, if Jews were a people then every religion would make a people. They do not, so why would Jews.
And to be a people there must be a common language and history and there is not. Jews comprise all races and hundreds of nationalities. What they share is the religion and that is no different to any other religion.
Put an American, French, Ethiopian, Scottish, Indian, Israeli Jew in a room and they have nothing in common but the religion. They all speak different languages except the American and Scots and no-one understands Scots speaking English anyway.
More European Jews, fleeing holocaust went to the US than to Israel and about as many went to Australia as went to what is called Israel. Plenty went to Canada and the UK.
Yes, I know the history of Jewish colonists in Palestine. It started in the 1830's and really took off when Zionism was invented in the 1890's.
Yes the Zionists, atheists and political fascists exploiting Jews wanted a state of their own but not for Jews. They just provided money and labour.
How did Hitler kill millions of Jews in Russia when the German invasion failed? Tens of millions of non-Jews died in Russia because of the German invasion so why single out Jews?
Jews have no right to claim a grain of sand on planet earth just like any other religion. No religion has a right to a homeland or self determination. Israel was founded on lies as you know.
And since most Israelis are not Jews or not real Jews, it is farcical for Israel to claim it represents Judaism and its followers. Nearly a quarter of Israelis are Muslims or Christians and many of the rest are atheist/secular which means they are not followers of Judaism and therefore not Jews. Not real ones anyway.
Although there are no Israelis because Israel passed a law in 2018 saying there is no Israeli nationality, just Jewish. So Israel does not really exist. And since Israel has no declared borders it all remains Palestine.
Well, I guess to settle your issue with this question perhaps you should look into the genetics of it all, since DNA testing will identify you as Jewish whether you're a religious Jew, or not.
By all means give me a scientifically, genetically, medically substantiated explanation as to how any religion could create DNA specific to followers. Over to you.
It's a people of a land genetically connected who adopted certain religious beliefs. Don't blame me since I never knew someone who was Jewish who said they were something else even if they didn't practice the Jewish faith, like an aunt who probably never saw the inside of a synagogue.
It is not a people of a land genetically connected. Judaism was invented in what is now Iraq. Some Hebrew tribes wandered into Palestine and set up camp 3000 years ago. The Egyptians made a note when the tribe of Judah appeared in Palestine. Carved it in stone.
At that point the Egyptians had been writing, carving in stone, about Palestine and Palestinians for 2000 years. Palestine and its people were ancient when Judaism was invented.
Jews were never native to Palestine and like all religions have spread around the world. The only thing Jews share is the religion.
The religious beliefs were invented in Iraq, then part of Mesopotamia. There is no Judaic connection to Palestine in any real sense. Yes some Jews lived there for a time but so what? Christians ruled Istanbul and a lot of Turkey for more than a thousand years but have no right to it. Muslims ruled India for 600 years but have no right to it.
You can be a lapsed or non-practising religious, including Jew. You cannot be an atheist/secular Jew, Christian or member of any religion. That is impossible.
Since Zionist/Jewish agendas have corrupted the entire DNA testing process on ancestry sites it is all meaningless. And it is genetically and scientifically impossible for a religion to create a genetic marker.
I have studied it. I know that what they call Jewish DNA appears in Muslims, Hindus, Christians and atheists. Ergo, there is no Jewish DNA. How could there be?
It is impossible when a religion is invented to magically create a genetic marker. All that can happen with high rates of intermarriage is that some genetic markers are passed down but rates of genetic deformity increase and the group dies out.
All religions in some form have practised high rates of intermarriage and none of it makes a people. What it does is create mental and physical deformity.
Every human alive today is descended from the same relatively small group of distant ancestors. There are not even racial differences of import let alone religious.
At a thousand years we each have more than a million ancestors. At conception we get, randomly or at least in unknown ways, some of millions of possible DNA markers.
Spend time with German Jews and they look like Germans. English Jews look English. Spanish Jews look Spanish. Indian Jews look Indians. It is a serious joke for anyone to believe that DNA testing can identify a Jew.
I mean, how could a genetic marker pop up when someone converted to Judaism? It is scientifically ridiculous.
Thanks, my point exactly. It is an ancestry site looking to make money from gullible people. There is no Jewish DNA. It is scientifically impossible. There are genetic links to some Jewish groups but that applies to all religions.
All of the ancestry sites are funded and promoted by the Zionist agenda seeking to make people believe that magically, Jews are a people. They are not.
It is a scam. I know my family ancestry and have done two tests and one completely missed my Greek ancestry and the other picked up the Greek and missed other things. There is no Greek ancestry either. DNA does not do nationalities or religions. It can make connections with areas where some people connected to you have lived but it cannot be accurate beyond 6 generations.
The value of these DNA tests is finding a first, second, third cousin who has information which is of use to you. The substance of the tests also depends hugely on how many people from a particular group have done the test. If you have certain ancestors and less than 1 percent have done the test you won't get far. If millions of people do the test you will.
And then there is the data showing a decrease of 600,000 Jews in European censuses taken in 1939 and then 1949? Lies, damned lies and statistics.
We have no idea how many Jews died in WWII and there is some evidence that the figures used include every single Jew who died in Europe over the period, of any cause.
We do know tens of millions died in holocaust experiences in WWII and most of them were not Jews.
Also of note is that the Zionists were warning of 6 million Jews dead in Europe if their plans to colonise Palestine were not supported, from 1900 onwards, long before Hitler.
Nothing about this issue can be trusted because it is subject to Zionist/Israeli/Jewish agendas and censored and that includes Statista.
Roslyn why is this so important? Everyone I know who is Jewish that had a DNA test were identified as being Jewish. My cousin is married to a woman who was always told my her Jewish mother that her father was Italian. When she took her DNA test she was 100 percent Jewish. Why her mother lied I now know, but won't go into here. Yeah he was Jewish. In reference to who died in the holocaust, well, although many Jews died those that were non-Jews, like the Poles, and Gypsies were kind of ignored in that regard. The Zionist got the land of Palestine solely due to a colonial mindset that said Arabs don't count. When the Ottoman empire fell, Palestine, a part of greater Syria in the Ottoman empire was given to them, and with their colonial mindset saw it as a land without a people. No it wasn't.
It is important because it is just more lies to pretend that followers of Judaism magically make a people. The Zionists invented that to justify their State in Palestine. Of course it matters. Jews are not a people.
Do you know how DNA is handed down? If you did you would know it is absolutely impossible for it to be religious.
Also, never underestimate the ability of vested agendas to corrupt any process, including ancestry DNA testing. It is a joke. Genetically such tests might or can create connections going back six generations. That is 150 years. At a thousand years we each have a million ancestors so it is impossible to identify such connections.
People think ancestry tests identify nationalities which is as ridiculous as believing they identify religions. Genetics is a new and deeply flawed science.
As to those you know who had the DNA test, I would humbly make the point that the same DNA would turn up in followers of other religions and atheists as well. The Zio agendas have it stacked.
You cannot be 100% Jewish. That is ridiculous. Such a claim would make any intelligent person know something was wrong. It is total rubbish.
Jews comprise all so-called races and hundreds of nationalities so it is utterly impossible for there to be a Jewish gene. It is a scam.
Go and talk to Jews, real and fake in what is called Israel. You can tell the German ones, the Ethiopian ones, the Iraqi ones, the French, Spanish, Italian - they look nothing alike. Ashkenazi and Sephardim, totally different.
I mean how do you get the same genes in a totally black Ethiopian and a blue-eyed blonde from Germany? You don't. You can't.
Yes, agree Gypsies and others, are overlooked. More Gypsies died on a per capita basis than followers of Judaism and tens of millions of Christians and Muslims died.
Palestine has always been a separate country. It was not part of greater Syria except that the areas were occupied by the Ottomans. Palestine has an ancient and specific history.
but i totally agree that the US is wrong, very wrong, immoral really to help netanyahu commit genocide. i am just saying meershimer lost the right to complain about netanyahu if he says putin is fine.
of course he doesn't want ukraine. that's why he has sent hundreds of thousands of russians to die in ukraine. he thought he would get this nice plum with something he called a special military operation. he imprisoned people just for calling it a war. do you believe what you are saying? i don't believe you believe what you are saying.
Some more "immorality" from the past. I put that in quotes because it's an incredible understatement. It is not meant to negate your feelings about Ukraine and the horror that is going on there, but to broaden your perspective on the US role in generating the massacre in Ukraine. That is, be aware of our past and what we are capable of doing, and maybe it will broaden your perspective of what the US is capable of implementing.
you have no credibility at all if you can say that the US is generating a massacre in ukraine. this while you are justifying the war criminal putin. either a useful idiot or a worker for RT
or you can't see the obvious similarities. colonizing is the hint i will give you. grabbing other people's land. killing to achieve your objectives. too subtle i suppose
japan recently did a commemoration of the bombing of its two cities in 1945. they didn't invite either israel or russia and belorussia. maybe i am not the only one who compares putin and netanyahu. are you interested in their perspective?
Vladimir Putin is an old-fashioned American liberal. He believes in reason, good will, working things out, and agreements despite having zero evidence that any such reciprocating belief exists in the West.
Putin’s illusions have caused him and Russia extraordinary difficulties. Russia is currently at war in Ukraine, although Putin still doesn’t seem to realize it, referring to it as a “limited military operation” despite the obvious fact that Russia is at war with NATO which includes the US.
It is sad that Putin, a person with good intentions, doesn’t have his counterparts in the Western world.
Now it comes to light that the British and Ukrainian governments planned to assassinate both Russia’s President Putin and Defense Minister Andrei Belousov at the Navy Day parade in St Petersburg.
In my columns I have several times mentioned that Putin and Trump are candidates for assassination. The recent attempt on Trump, which has been removed from the “news,” has now been matched by the statement of Russia’s Deputy Foreign Minister, Sergei Ryabkov, on Russian national television that Belousov called US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and squashed the assassination plan, explaining, apparently, that World War III would be the result.
Maria Zakharova, spokesperson for the Russian Foreign Ministry said: “There is no doubt that the assassination attempt was planned with the participation of the Anglo-Saxon masters of Kiev.”
Still, Putin wants to negotiate the end of the Ukrainian conflict. How precisely do you negotiate with people who are trying to assassinate you?
fran, you can't imagine that ukraine wants its sovereignty regardless of what the US wants, or has done. putin thinks ukraine should be his colony and ukraine wants its sovereignty. what is so hard to understand here? it's the most normal thing in the world to want sovereignty. i want it for myself, you i am guessing want it on a personal level for yourself. turning ukraine into a pawn or puppet of the US is very ugly really, but meershimer has made people lose that natural ability to see ugliness when they see it. realpolitik uber alles
yes, i think you can, but the meershimer folks will probably look at your history and if for instance you have a husband who doesn't want to grant you sovereignty or maybe even a parent from long ago then i am afraid iit will not be ok for you to have sovereignty. so sorry.
The answer is no, they can't. Because of actually really real material conditions that exist and affect our lives and not whatever the fuck fake madeup bullshit you are on about
Putin has clearly stated for more than a decade, and still, he has no problem with Ukraine as an independent State, but it cannot be a part of Nato. Nothing unreasonable about that.
Ukraine is a pawn of the US and has been for more than a decade. That is fact.
What do you mean they want their sovereignty? Who is they? Ukraine has been fighting a civil war since 2014 due to a US backed color revolution. Things happen because of history, like dude try to use your brain like a tiny bit harder please I'm begging you
yes you see ukraine as full of nazis. with your keen eyes can you see the fascists in russia by any chance? have you read about any corruption in russia maybe? just a wild guess, you haven't read about fascists and corruption in russia
i think he is so used to seeing the faults of the US (granted very many to see) that he sees none or none of consequence in putin. putin can colonize ukraine, or continue to keep ukraine in colony status following centuries of russian history. this could be just silly, but for ukraine it has horrible consequences when meershimer types come along and say let's not help ukraine because ukraine is weaker and bec the US has many sins in its history. totall;y ignoring tht the person they are justifying is a war criminal many times over.
If the Russians had wanted to take Ukraine they would have done what the Americans did in Iraq, within days, take out all utilities, water, power, rail, the lot. They did not do that and only began to attack such things when the idiot Ukrainians, no doubt on orders from US/Nato minders started doing it.
putin thought it would be a cakewalk. well a cakewalk that would require war crimes, but so what, what are a few 1000 war crimes for the kgb boy. but of course ukrainians are idiots or pawns. they could not possibly be as smart or as informed about their history with russia as you are with your info from RT and meershimer
You are repeating propaganda. Any knowledge of the history of this war and Putin's statements and actions show that he worked hard to prevent it happening, then worked hard to stop it and was thwarted at every turn by the Americans who wanted the slaughter in the hope it would depose Putin, it won't, and destroy Russia, it won't.
As to war crimes, if that were a criteria then both Israel and Ukraine would have been dismantled already.
You have clearly never read or listened to anything Putin has said. He is not a fool. Only a fool would think it would be a cakewalk and Putin tried to prevent the war from happening and then tried to stop it. All foiled by the Americans.
lovely how you make it between russia and the US. who cares what the ukrainians want. they are just pawns, puppets, have no brains, and the brains they have are used to put their people into the meat grinder. and russia didn't invade them, isn';t attacking them daily. the evil one is the US. if the ukrainians were a little smarter they would realize this. when they are sitting without electricity many hours of the day they think it has been caused by the russians. how stupid of them. they didn't read meershimer or the posters here.
When the right wing Ukrainian Arianism ideology is supported by the state openly and en masse between 2014 and 2022, that gives a lot of time to brainwash a population. Same amount of time (1933 to 1939) it took Adolf to brainwash German people to join him in starting his wars.
I have described earlier in another post why Russian attack on Ukraine cannot be considered as agressive but reactive and hold water in the court of international law.
To summarize, UKR did not abide to the UNSC approved Minsk accords and in early February 2022, as reported by OSCE observers on the ground, has started to massively shell Donbas. Prior to that, in March 2021, UKR passed legislation (contravening the UNSC law) forcing the government to regain control of lost regions (including Crimea), by all means necessary.
Russia recognized Donbas and Lugansk (see the Kosovo legal precedent established by the US), and invoking article 51 of the UN Charter responded to UKR armed attacks by sending the Russian Army to force UKR to a settlement.
The Ukrainians are suffering because their leaders are corrupt. No other reason. If Canada or Mexico were stupid enough to do what the Ukrainians did and have done for more than a decade, the Americans would have done worse to them than the Russians have done in Ukraine.
Tough having a powerful neighbour but only absolute idiots are stupid enough to enter into military alliances with their enemies and work to destroy them.
And let us not forget the Ukrainian neo-Nazi fascists working to murder and repress ethnic Russians in Ukraine. Under UN regulations the Russians have every right to go in and protect them.
no dear, ukrainians are suffering because they live in a bad neighborhood. their neighbors acquired 11 time zones over the last 2 or 3 centuries and ukraine also was in their empire then. now it is trying to assert its independence. but you are so brainwashed that the US is evil and russia is good that you accept their empire lustings as a good thing. it is unbelievable but i guess with the help of meershimer you cannot let go of this view.
Only a fool would say Russians were good and Americans were bad. This is why it is important to rely on facts. Whatever flaws the Russians may have they are benign compared to American hegemonic wars and slaughter over half a century.
And the facts make it clear the Russians wanted peace and to be a part of Europe after the Soviet Union fell and the Americans would allow neither.
It is very clear from words and actions that the Russians are protecting their borders, do not want to annexe all of Ukraine, are protecting ethnic Russians in Ukraine and have tried to avoid this war and to stop it.
Ukraine has been a part of Russia for most of its existence. It gained independence after 1991 and that was clearly a stupid idea. Ukraine needs to work with Russia to survive and only fools think otherwise.
No one is saying Putin has no flaws, but if one looks objectively starting in 2014, and one is familiar with our neocon polices I'm not looking kindly at the US, and by that I don't mean it's people. Read about how we used the Mujahideen to bring down Russia in the 1980s in Afghanistan. Yeah another cold war struggle with Russia and we made it slide from it's perch with a lot of death and real consequences for us, like 9/11. Always consequences. I seem great similarities between the two in regard to our paying others to bring down Russia.
putin thought he would have an easy time of grabbing ukraine. it was supposed to happen with a cute little military operation. of course he amassed thousands of tanks and soldiers, just in case. and then even that wasn't enough. i think by now it is allowed to be called a war. not sure, but for a while he was putting people in prison for calling a war a war. so admirable, no wonder you justify and admire him
ah yes, i understand, the US history justifies anything putin does now. i see. but i think russia has had plenty of bloody history before putin. so the US can hardly keep up with all of the gulags, the torture, the land grabs. i guess you are not familiar with russian, pre soviet and soviet and post soviet, history. or maybe you are but do noit want to remind others of it.
i don't know why you mention gaza to me. i am not for netanyahu's genocide in gaza and as i have said already i am totally against the US supporting this genocide which is what we have been doing. but i know that ukrainians want sovereignty. if their sovereignty aligns with US plans that doesn't concern them. they have known russian horrors for centuries. they do not see the US as onesidedly as most people on this site. The US is not the main source of evil for them and they do not think they are pawns of the US but that they know what they want. whether they can get what they want (freedom from the russian empire lustings) depends on getting western help. but they are going for what they want. your view of them as simpleminded pawns being played by the US is insulting besides wrong.
The only sovereignity Russia was denying Ukraine was that of joining NATO. Like Austria nowadays... Or as UKR agreed to be after 1991 and had ensrined in its Constitution until 2019... You know, like Mexico has done to appease the US, or like Ireland has done in 1923 to appease the UK...
i wonder how many people on this site get their marching orders, i guess their typing orders from RT? they are so determined to prove the aggressor country is the innocent victim. i don't believe this is by chance only, that is it is only the useful idiots or whatever lenin's phrase was. i think it is a combination of sincere useful idiots and workers for RT.
People are trying to teach you extremely verifiable history and context and you are shoving your head in the sand and pushing your two middle fingers up and out while showing your entire ass
Far less civilians have died in UKR in 2.5 years of war than in 10 months in Gaza and West Bank.
Also, Putin, for saving children got an arrest warant from ICC, while Bibi, for killing over 20,000 children and women is applauded 58 times by the joint US Congress.
If you do not know enough to differentiate then there is probably little to be said, but here goes.
The situation between Ukraine and Russia has nothing in common with that between Israel and Palestine.
Ukraine is an independent country with a large population of ethnic Russians who were being attacked by the Government and the Russians sought to protect them. Ukraine entered into a military alliance with the US/Nato who have clearly stated their plan to break up Russia, i.e. destroy it. Ukraine had great power behind it and was a clear and present danger to the Russians.
The Russians have sought to avoid civilian casualties and made many efforts to firstly not begin the war and then to end it.
The Russians do not seek to exterminate the Ukrainians, they just seek to defend and protect their borders by ensuring Ukraine remains neutral. That is not unreasonable.
Palestine is a country crushed under colonial rule and occupation which ranks as one of the most sadistic, savage and bestial in modern history. Israel has total power over the Palestinians, occupies all of their country, continues to dispossess them, has a stated goal to exterminate or expel them and is committing genocide against the native people of the land it has stolen.
The Palestinians are powerless beyond their limited ability to fight their evil oppressors and to continue their resistance. Israel is massively armed and backed by the US and other Western nations and is the one responsible for all violence.
There would be no Hamas, no Palestinian Resistance, no October 7 if Israel had not been founded in genocidal ethnic cleansing, rape, theft and murder in 1947/48 and had then spent nearly 80 years subjecting the Palestinians to a level of sadistic cruelty which makes even the Nazis look benign.
So, in Ukraine we have a State which has formed a military alliance with others who wish to destroy Russia. Imagine how the Americans would act if Mexico or Canada entered into a military alliance with China? The Russians want a neutral Ukraine and do not want to annexe Ukraine.
And in Palestine, we have an occupying State, Israel with clearly articulated goals of extermination or expulsion of the native people and eradication of their country, their nationhood, culture, history and existence.
We have also seen Israel actively target civilians, nearly half of them children, resort to rape of men, women and children, torture, abuse and continued dispossession throughout all of Occupied Palestine not just Gaza.
The war in Ukraine is unfortunate and caused by Ukrainian, American and Nato stupidity and arrogance.
The war Israel wages against Palestine is nearly a century old and is a crime of enormous proportions, caused by arrogance, bigotry and Israeli, Zionist, American stupidity.
They have stupidity and arrogance in common but nothing else.
Your history attaches much more autonomy to Ukraine that it hasn’t had since 2014. Victoria Nuland and John McCain were on hand for the crime, and Nuland actually told the neo-Nazis who their next leader would be.
I was doing a comparison with Palestine against Israel. Yes, I agree with you that Ukraine is a US puppet being used to attempt to destroy Russia.
As Israel is a US puppet being used to attempt to destroy Iran and Taiwan is on the path to being used in the same way to destroy China.
Only a fool keeps doing the same things and expecting a different result. The Americans have been doing the same things and failing in bloody misery (for others mainly) for decades. When do they learn?
Palestine is a country crushed under colonial rule.....lIsrael occupies all of their country.....has a stated goal to exterminate or expel them and is committing genocide against the native people of the land it has stolen.”
Wrong on all counts. What you call Palestine is not a “country”, never has been or considered historically, culturally or politically. To say that Israel “occupies” it in any sense is nonsense. Even in Gaza. Israel completely left Gaza in 2005 after a brief period of military occupation and administration because of the ‘Palestinians’ then recent terroristic provocations in prior years. You have no proof for the statement that has a “stated goal” to “exterminate” them, though there are clear statements from Hamas’ ‘government’ (it’s in its own political charter) to exterminate both the nation of Israel and Jews in general. None of ‘its’ land is “stolen”. The Jews were present there before the Philistines (from which the word Palestinian derives) moved in. There were very few ‘native’ Palestinians in the lead up to 1947-48 events, as the folks who call themselves Palestinians now, were then, Jordanians, Lebanese, Syrians, and near surround itinerant Arabs. And you should ask yourself why so many of those itinerant Arabs in 1948 welcomed in the Arab armies to the newly minted nation of Israel to destroy it; and then consider why any of those Arabs should be ceded back any of that ancestral land. Many of the British nationals who welcomed King George’s military occupation of the colonies in colonial America lost “property” in the wake of the revolutionary war. We don’t now call them “dispossessed “, do we? Neither are those Arabs who welcomed in the Arab armies in 1948 before their defeat by the nascent Israel armed forces. Starting wars have serious consequences for the people who start them and catastrophic consequences for those who start and LOSE them. Much less 4-6 of them depending on how one accounts for them as “wars.” Mearsheimer is excellent on the history of NATO and Ukraine. His footing in the ME and Israel is far less sure.
I would love someone like you to explain to me how a military colonial ruler can subject the native people of the land it has taken by force, to a sadistic, savage and bestial rule for nearly 80 years and be surprised when they resist.
Yes, sure, I know Israelis think Palestinians are subhuman, some sort of weird cockroach animal, but that is deranged. The Palestinians are human beings who have suffered the longest holocaust in modern history and one of the most murderous and cruel military colonial occupations in all of history. They have no rights, no vote, no hope so why would they not fight the Israelis to the death, theirs or their oppressors?
Any understanding of history and human nature makes it clear that unless Israel exterminated 16 million Palestinians on planet earth, the resistance will never end, it will just become more determined, more violent, until Palestine and its people are free.
I mean, think about it, the French and Polish Resistance did that despite German atrocities in reprisal so why would not the Palestinians?
Israel DID NOT leave Gaza in 2005. It removed illegal Jewish settlers and planted them still illegally in other parts of Occupied Palestine. It removed illegal military bases and then surrounded Gaza with warships on the sea side and an electric fence on the land side and proceeded to shoot any man, woman, child, dog which came near the fence. IT IS A PRISON.
And as Amira Hass, Haaretz corrected the same lies from israelis recently, ISRAEL DID NOT LEAVE GAZA. It is the Israeli colonial rulers who issue ID cards to every single Palestinian including those in Gaza. They are handed to the stooge PA to distribute but every single Palestinian is recorded and ID's by their military colonial rulers, ISRAEL.
And if Israel did not control Gaza how could it, as it stated and did, cut off all power, water, food, medicine, internet, phones etc., in the Gaza concentration camp? I await your explanation with keen interst.
Israel was, is and always will be an illegal colonial enterprise in Palestine,.
More than 100 Palestinians were killed and dozens injured, Saturday morning, after Israeli occupation forces bombed the “Al-Tabi’een” school, which houses displaced people in the Al-Daraj neighbourhood east of Gaza City.Local sources reported that the occupation warplanes bombed the school while Palestinians were performing the dawn prayer, and they were specifically targeted after the Takbeer of the dawn prayer. Eyewitness reports say limbs – arms, hands, feet and heads of those performing prayers were scattered around the school’s prayer hall in what is described as one of the worst massacres committed by the Israeli army yet.
For your education. Amira Hass, Haaretz, correcting Israelis repeating the same disinformation you have done.
Feb 12, 2024 5:37 pm IST
S., who lives in a Gaza border community, asked me several questions that I've heard from others, too. With his knowledge, I'm publishing an initial reply here to his letter. He wrote:
"I'm a regular reader of Haaretz and of your articles. As a resident of a Gaza border community, I'm trying to understand your take on what has happened in the Gaza Strip since the disengagement. Why, in your opinion, did the strongest resistance emerge from the place where Israel canceled the occupation?
PLEASE NOTE. The Israeli occupation was not canceled. Israel continued its highhanded control of the lives of the Gaza Strip's residents and Gaza's development options.
"For years, people have been shouting that all the major problems stem from the occupation. And here a small experiment to cancel the occupation was conducted. The Palestinians could have built themselves a model mini-state there. Instead, they preferred to invest the money in a war against Israel. Do you have an explanation for that?"
Shalom Reader S.,
PLEASE NOTE. First of all, the Israeli occupation was not canceled. Israel continued its highhanded control of the lives of the Gaza Strip's residents and Gaza's development options, well after Israel dismantled the settlements and army bases located there. Second, as per the Oslo Accords, to which Israel is a signatory, the Gaza Strip is not a separate entity but an integral part of the Palestinian territory occupied in 1967.
According to the Palestinians, and according to international opinion, this territory was supposed to become the Palestinian state. The facts that Israel severed the Gazan population from the West Bank's and that Israelis have continued to treat an isolated Gaza, which is 365 square kilometers in size and lacks resources, as a separate entity, are in themselves evidence of Israeli control over it – and of Israeli chutzpah to boot.
I can't quote what I've written in hundreds and perhaps thousands of articles. So I'll be brief: Prime Minister Ariel Sharon neither consulted with the leadership of the Palestinian Authority about the disengagement, nor did he coordinate its implementation with that limited self-rule government, which in 2005 was not split yet between Fatah and Hamas. Sharon followed a gradual track that Israel outlined from the early 1990s, while doing a good job of concealing its severity and significance during the Oslo process: creating a regime of prohibitions and restrictions on the Palestinians' freedom of movement, while creating Palestinian enclaves. On January 15, 1991 Israel began this comprehensive policy, and its immediate result, which worsened over the years, was cutting off the population of Gaza from the West Bank and from the world.
Sharon continued his predecessors' work. The draconian siege imposed by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on Gaza in 2007 was a quantitative change, but not a change in essence. This consistent policy indicates the forethought behind the action: not an experiment to cancel the occupation, but one of the ways to prevent the establishment of the Palestinian state based on the plan that the Palestine Liberation Organization and the international community saw before their eyes.
PLEASE NOTE. The continued Israeli domination over the Gaza Strip, up until October 7, was manifested in several ways.
The first is its total control of the Palestinian population registry, which includes Gaza's residents. It is Israel that decides who is permitted to carry the ID card of a resident of Gaza or the West Bank. Every detail – including place of residence – registered in the ID card, which the PA technically issues, requires Israeli approval. Even natives of Gaza, whose residency status Israel revoked before 1994, cannot renew it without Israel's approval.
The severance from the West Bank (and from Israel) critically damaged the capabilities for economic development in the Gaza Strip. In any case, Gaza has been in a state of economic deterioration or stagnation since 1967 due to deliberate steps that Israel adopted. Israel controls not only the border crossings but also Gaza's aerial and maritime space, which means it doesn't permit Gazans to exercise their right to freedom of movement via the sea and air.
Israel also uses this control to restrict the Palestinian fishing industry, prevent Palestinians from using the gas reserves discovered in Gazan waters and control the wireless frequencies necessary for technological development. By controlling imports and exports, it restricts the ability and feasibility of domestic production. Israel continues to control income from customs payments. Egypt – whether for fear that the Gazans will settle there, political opposition to severing Gaza from the West Bank or obedience to Israeli dictates – hasn't opened the Rafah border to free movement of Palestinians and foreigners.
Whether deliberately or inadvertently, Sharon's unilateral move weakened the PA, which adhered to the negotiations route. Thus, he awarded a prize to the Hamas movement, which claimed that only the "armed struggle" that it practiced during the Second Intifada, while improving its military capabilities – could force the Israeli army to withdraw, not negotiations and a signed agreement.
That's what many Palestinians thought and still think. It's no wonder that several months after the disengagement, in January 2006, Hamas won a majority of the seats in the election for the Palestinian parliament (but not a majority of the votes of the electorate).
First we have to answer the question as to why Israel did everything possible to thwart the establishment of the small Palestinian state in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. Then we can move on to trying to explain why the residents of the besieged and cut-off "mini-state" that it shaped in Gaza felt like lifetime prisoners, at a time when their brothers in the West Bank live under the violent rule of the expanding settlement enterprise. And afterwards, at the first opportunity, we'll talk about the illusion or about the delusion or about the armed struggle project.
The first mention we have of the country of Palestine and the people who were Palestinians comes from ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs more than 5000 years old. Palestine was ancient when Judaism was invented.
We then have thousands of years of records, reports, drawings, paintings, then photos of Palestine, the country and its people.
This deranged claim Palestine never existed is so childish it can only be ignored.
Name of the country which exported Jaffa oranges to the world in the 19th century. PALESTINE.
Name of the country Zionists and Jews invaded in 1947 in a genocidal slaughter. PALESTINE.
Name of the country the UN recommended with no legal validity, be partitioned in 1947. PALESTINE.
Name of the country where major battles were fought in WWI and WWII. PALESTINE.
Name of the country Zionists were advertising for Jewish colonists in 1890's. PALESTINE.
Name of the country Jews were planning to set up a colony in 1830. PALESTINE.
Name of the 6 million native people crushed under Israeli military colonial rule and denied all human and civil rights. PALESTINIANS.
says who? i am sure netanyahu didn't criticize putin's invasion because he knew he was doing the same thing to the palestinians, constantly stealing their land, slowly but surely. putin did it very quickly and suddenly and now netanyahu is also doing it at a much quicker pace. but of course you can just claim there is no equivalence. the meershimers here are quite primed to agree with you
not clear that his question is addressed to me. but if it is, yes putin and netanyahu are equivalent in their death dealing. they want the land of the other people. and they don't care how they get it.
Team Biden's blend of unwarranted aggression in Ukraine, and undue deference in Palestine, are united by thousands of preventable casualties. In both instances the policies were at best delusional, if not patently dishonest, and cruel. That is the objectively real and moral consistency driving Prof. M's critiques of US policy in both instances.
Mearsheimer is wrong on so-called Israeli genocide, but correct on the causes and reactions of Russia in Ukraine and the West’s (NATO’s) role in fomenting Russia’s reaction to its effort to bring Ukraine into NATO. Ukraine is quite different from some of the Baltic states coming into NATO. Different strategically, politically, culturally and economically. Ukraine is Russia’s Cuba. It’s that simple.
not everybody here follows the party line. and the party line is very ugly regarding ukraine and as i pointed out very inconsistent when compared to israel. because the israel genocide came along and meeershimer doesn't like it one has to ask why is that. why can't netanyahu commit the same horrors that are acceptable for putin? seems fishy. pointing this out is spewing insults.?
I think you put the onus on Russia because you don't get the whole picture and that picture will tell you that the US is simply using Ukrainian lives to bring Putin down and undermine Russia's influence in the world. Why all our Middle Eastern wars? Why Iraq? Biden certainly pushed that one down the throats of his colleagues using his position as chair of the foreign relations comm. Saddam had weapons of mass destruction he said, and people like Judith Miller who worked for the NY Times published the same lies knowing her source had a stake in wanting Saddam gone. We lied our way through all our Middle Eastern wars, destroying countries, leaving rubble in the wake of those wars as we destroyed the lives of their people, many of whom died, or were displaced. Read about them from someone who will provide you with an honest perspective and you'll come to understand what we want in Ukraine and realize the lives of others matter little to us, since our politicians are there mostly to serve themselves. We are supplying weapons to assist Israel in implementing a genocide, killing mostly children, innocents, and there are those who will say that's okay. Did you see our representatives applaud Netanyahu's every word, a man who belongs in jail, and would be if he were no implementing this genocide. They are applauding a genocide, the death of women, children, men, the young and the old. Their living space, an outdoor concentration camp true, but home nonetheless and now it is in rubble. Where do they go if they should survive? Please remember we are supplying the bombs that are killing them, and Israel demands it. The world is sick.
If the Americans think they can bring Putin down they are even more stupid than they look. American Presidents can only dream of the sort of support Putin has from the public.
I would say also this. His popular support in Russia largely flows from the fact that he took the Russian bear on his back and carried it away from the absolute depths of economic, medical, military, and cultural destruction and degradation left in the aftermath of the utter collapse of that Nation and society. To be sure he was of necessity an authoritarian. I don’t think Western citizens can fathom the depths of human destruction and despair Russia found itself after approximately 80 years of communist degradation. He is not universally popular. But most of that nation recognizes the path forward he forged for his people. I don’t admire him but I do recognize his surprising achievements.
From your phrasing, I cannot tell if you’re intentionally omitting the American role in exploiting Russia’s precarious beginning as a non-communist state, where it looted, and appropriated rights to vast holdings of the former regime. However feeble the Russian state was when Gorbachev dissolved the Soviet Union, it was far from the hollowed out shell that was the result of a decade of western “influence.” The IMF was intent on making Russia a client-state.
Boris Yeltsin was the easy mark for Clinton and his band of hustlers. When Yeltsin grasped the damage that he had allowed, he appointed Putin to right the listing Russian ship. Putin clearly is an authoritarian, because thieves and trained con artists don’t respond to civility.
I am not intentionally omitting that. There certainly was considerable self dealing in the West’s (post fall of the Soviet Union) actions.
Eloquently put. Yes, I agree with your assessment. What the West also fails to take into account is that the Russians like a strong leader. Any understanding of their history explains why. It also explains the paranoia of the Soviets in terms of controlling outside its borders.
Also having spent a bit of time in Russia, it is important to understand the trauma Russians suffered when the Soviet union fell, to which Putin referred and has been consistently misquoted.
Yes terrible things happened to some under the Soviets but, for most Russians, particularly females, there was more opportunity, a good education, a reliable job, a home, and security. The loss of that is still mourned by many Russians even though most would not want to return to the Soviet era.
One can admire Putin for his principles and his commitment to his nation and his people. No-one is perfect. Even the much admired Churchill was at times a racist thug and responsible for atrocities and war crimes.
traumatized people are willing to traumatize others. you give them the excuse for a criminal war of aggression against ukraine. that is why there are laws and rules so that people don't just let their traumas determine their actions.
nsakum
You have been here on substack for a while now.
Have you looked anything up or are you so secure in your 'propagandized' version of Russia?
STOP messing around on here and go away or read something other than MSM (Mainstream Media)
hey jenny, the people here who you are not chasing away are repeating putin talking points. is that the source of truth for you?
He is a LOT more cogent than anyone else.
jenny you get the first prize from RT. it is a putin doll, you will reallly like it
Oh wonderful. I look forward to unpacking it.
Well, they did once, in Afghanistan using the Mujahideen, that bogged Russia down for years and years. Mission accomplished, but this time our antics won't work and I'm glad of it.
exactly, that's why it is so ridiculous when dissidents that are "rescued" from putin seem so silly when they say that they want to bring democracy to russia even if it costs them their freedom. the russians as you clearly see love their zar putin. they love it that he wants to expand their empire to include ukrainians. the ukraianians don't love it but the russians and the meershimer enthusiasts love putin's empire builiding
WHO started this war in Ukraine?
Putin is NOT stupid he doesn;t want the headache of Ukraine.....US knows they will back off and leave the Europeans to sort it all out!
putin doesn't want the headache of ukraine. no he wanted an easy landgrab of course. it turned into a headache. are you aware that it was putin who invaded ukraine? it seems so obvious but yet the meershimers can't see it. the rest of the world sees it but the meershimers can't. and i guess the RT employees can't either, or aren't allowed to see it.
As the largest country in the world Russia does not need land. It does however need protected borders to fend off US/Nato aggression.
Putin invaded Ukraine for the same reason the Allies invaded in WWII, to come to the aid of others and to protect borders.
Since there is no evidence for any of your claims we can only assume you are a biased Ukrainian or a biased disaffected ex-Russian. I read many military experts and the consensus is that Putin is doing what he said he would do, protecting his borders and ethnic Russians in what is called Ukraine, near the Russian border. There is zero evidence for empire building and since Ukraine for virtually all of its existence was Russian, to take all of it, which is not the plan, would not be empire building but protecting borders and reinstating historical givens.
By all means, when you can provide evidence of empire building be sure to let us know.
Well said and meanwhile in Venezuela the US decides Maduro didn't win although their were many foreign 'watchdogs' during the election.
OIL
Yep, we decide he didn't win because we backed the opposition who would benefit us if in office, so lets show our opposition since we are the policemen of the world and because we care about people so much we'll impose sanctions, even though we'll make the people's lives miserable. We're willing to do that because we love democracy that much, and really care. Chavez too, and I cried when he died of cancer.
The thing about sanctions is that it doesn't work. Countries that are sanctioned often find ways of not dealing with the west or producing a product in their own country.
It's like being told off by a teacher when she/he made a mistake and you correct them!
I think many countries turn away because of this nonsense.
Chavez I remember went through hell fighting the USA off.
Sanctions worked to end apartheid in South Africa. I think it depends on how self-sufficient the country is and the reason why sanctions are imposed. Sanctions against Russia and Iran are pure hypocrisy while sanctions against South Africa were not and sanctions against Israel would not be.
IF a country is NOT self sufficient the Chinese will come in and help them.
At this time USA is one of the few countries without high speed rail..why?
Israel is dying .....BDSM is working.
Israel is rotting from within and always has been. It was founded in hatred, irrational paranoid fear, elitism, racism and colonial fascism and was always doomed.
Asserting that there is or has been a genocide in Gaza is false. Even if one accepts at face value the number of civilian deaths, it’s not a genocide. And no one can in good conscience accept Hamas’ numbers as honest. Even the UN admitted that.
Second, the IDF does not target Palestinian civilians, unlike Hamas indiscriminately firing thousands of rockets at Israeli population centers.
Third, Hamas’ terrorist strategy is to keep and use military assets in heavily populated areas. Hamas leaders desire large numbers of Palestinian civilian casualties. They have admitted this. The recently deceased Haniyah explicitly said so.
Fourth, the IDFs military operations seek to minimize civilian casualties and have and have done so far better than any military anywhere at any time.
Fifth, the Nazi Holocaust murdered 60% of European Jews. So have some perspective when you speak of a genocide in Gaza.
You can't except that a people that were subject to a genocide in the 1940's under Hitler is implementing one of their own, well, sorry but that is what Israel is doing. You provide information so distorted in order to reassure yourself. The total death toll has not been determined since many of the dead lie under the rubble, and no doubt most are children, and women. Hospitals usually determine the overall death toll, but Israel destroyed those. However tens of thousands of deaths have been accounted for and mostly women and children, babies, sad. "Second, the IDF does not target Palestinian civilians, unlike Hamas indiscriminately firing thousands of rockets at Israeli population centers." Have you seen the rubble Gaza has become? Have you not heard of the thousands killed in hospitals Israel has bombed? You are totally divorced from reality. If there is anyone who needs perspective, and granted more difficult for you, but it is you. Sorry but I can't help you avoid the reality of what Israel is doing and in so doing will pay a heavy price on many levels.
Jews are not a people and most Jews, real and fake, in what is called Israel and Occupied Palestine were never subjected to genocide under Hitler.
A lot of the Israeli colonists are from Russia and places which were never occupied by the Germans. Many of the recent Jewish colonists are from the US, UK, Canada, even Australia and none of them experienced genocide under Hitler.
Otherwise I totally agree with your sttements.
Jews are not a people? I'm confused by what you say since I know that about 150 thousand holocaust survivors entered Israel when it became a state in 1948. There were many, some 500 thousand who entered the country from the twenties through the 1930's. Also, the Zionist movement established in the 1800's wanted a state of their own referencing the prejudice they were subject to. There were millions of Jews who lived in Russia and many of them were killed by Hitler. We're talking about a war and Hitler didn't stay put in Germany, and Poland also suffered, both Jews and non Jews died in camps set up in Poland, AUSCHWITZ! Of course immigration to Israel continued through the years.
Well, if Jews were a people then every religion would make a people. They do not, so why would Jews.
And to be a people there must be a common language and history and there is not. Jews comprise all races and hundreds of nationalities. What they share is the religion and that is no different to any other religion.
Put an American, French, Ethiopian, Scottish, Indian, Israeli Jew in a room and they have nothing in common but the religion. They all speak different languages except the American and Scots and no-one understands Scots speaking English anyway.
More European Jews, fleeing holocaust went to the US than to Israel and about as many went to Australia as went to what is called Israel. Plenty went to Canada and the UK.
Yes, I know the history of Jewish colonists in Palestine. It started in the 1830's and really took off when Zionism was invented in the 1890's.
Yes the Zionists, atheists and political fascists exploiting Jews wanted a state of their own but not for Jews. They just provided money and labour.
How did Hitler kill millions of Jews in Russia when the German invasion failed? Tens of millions of non-Jews died in Russia because of the German invasion so why single out Jews?
Jews have no right to claim a grain of sand on planet earth just like any other religion. No religion has a right to a homeland or self determination. Israel was founded on lies as you know.
And since most Israelis are not Jews or not real Jews, it is farcical for Israel to claim it represents Judaism and its followers. Nearly a quarter of Israelis are Muslims or Christians and many of the rest are atheist/secular which means they are not followers of Judaism and therefore not Jews. Not real ones anyway.
Although there are no Israelis because Israel passed a law in 2018 saying there is no Israeli nationality, just Jewish. So Israel does not really exist. And since Israel has no declared borders it all remains Palestine.
On top of this: Israeli's flleeing from the holocaust were not allowed entry into the USA!
Well, I guess to settle your issue with this question perhaps you should look into the genetics of it all, since DNA testing will identify you as Jewish whether you're a religious Jew, or not.
By all means give me a scientifically, genetically, medically substantiated explanation as to how any religion could create DNA specific to followers. Over to you.
It's a people of a land genetically connected who adopted certain religious beliefs. Don't blame me since I never knew someone who was Jewish who said they were something else even if they didn't practice the Jewish faith, like an aunt who probably never saw the inside of a synagogue.
It is not a people of a land genetically connected. Judaism was invented in what is now Iraq. Some Hebrew tribes wandered into Palestine and set up camp 3000 years ago. The Egyptians made a note when the tribe of Judah appeared in Palestine. Carved it in stone.
At that point the Egyptians had been writing, carving in stone, about Palestine and Palestinians for 2000 years. Palestine and its people were ancient when Judaism was invented.
Jews were never native to Palestine and like all religions have spread around the world. The only thing Jews share is the religion.
The religious beliefs were invented in Iraq, then part of Mesopotamia. There is no Judaic connection to Palestine in any real sense. Yes some Jews lived there for a time but so what? Christians ruled Istanbul and a lot of Turkey for more than a thousand years but have no right to it. Muslims ruled India for 600 years but have no right to it.
You can be a lapsed or non-practising religious, including Jew. You cannot be an atheist/secular Jew, Christian or member of any religion. That is impossible.
Since Zionist/Jewish agendas have corrupted the entire DNA testing process on ancestry sites it is all meaningless. And it is genetically and scientifically impossible for a religion to create a genetic marker.
I have studied it. I know that what they call Jewish DNA appears in Muslims, Hindus, Christians and atheists. Ergo, there is no Jewish DNA. How could there be?
It is impossible when a religion is invented to magically create a genetic marker. All that can happen with high rates of intermarriage is that some genetic markers are passed down but rates of genetic deformity increase and the group dies out.
All religions in some form have practised high rates of intermarriage and none of it makes a people. What it does is create mental and physical deformity.
Every human alive today is descended from the same relatively small group of distant ancestors. There are not even racial differences of import let alone religious.
At a thousand years we each have more than a million ancestors. At conception we get, randomly or at least in unknown ways, some of millions of possible DNA markers.
Spend time with German Jews and they look like Germans. English Jews look English. Spanish Jews look Spanish. Indian Jews look Indians. It is a serious joke for anyone to believe that DNA testing can identify a Jew.
I mean, how could a genetic marker pop up when someone converted to Judaism? It is scientifically ridiculous.
https://www.genealogyexplained.com/jewish-dna-test-ancestry/
Thanks, my point exactly. It is an ancestry site looking to make money from gullible people. There is no Jewish DNA. It is scientifically impossible. There are genetic links to some Jewish groups but that applies to all religions.
All of the ancestry sites are funded and promoted by the Zionist agenda seeking to make people believe that magically, Jews are a people. They are not.
It is a scam. I know my family ancestry and have done two tests and one completely missed my Greek ancestry and the other picked up the Greek and missed other things. There is no Greek ancestry either. DNA does not do nationalities or religions. It can make connections with areas where some people connected to you have lived but it cannot be accurate beyond 6 generations.
The value of these DNA tests is finding a first, second, third cousin who has information which is of use to you. The substance of the tests also depends hugely on how many people from a particular group have done the test. If you have certain ancestors and less than 1 percent have done the test you won't get far. If millions of people do the test you will.
Estimated pre-war Jewish population and estimated number of murdered Jews per country during the Holocaust from 1930 to 1945
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1070564/jewish-populations-deaths-by-country/
And then there is the data showing a decrease of 600,000 Jews in European censuses taken in 1939 and then 1949? Lies, damned lies and statistics.
We have no idea how many Jews died in WWII and there is some evidence that the figures used include every single Jew who died in Europe over the period, of any cause.
We do know tens of millions died in holocaust experiences in WWII and most of them were not Jews.
Also of note is that the Zionists were warning of 6 million Jews dead in Europe if their plans to colonise Palestine were not supported, from 1900 onwards, long before Hitler.
Nothing about this issue can be trusted because it is subject to Zionist/Israeli/Jewish agendas and censored and that includes Statista.
What about the Polish people and Romanians?
Who died in WWII? Some were Jews, most were not.
Roslyn why is this so important? Everyone I know who is Jewish that had a DNA test were identified as being Jewish. My cousin is married to a woman who was always told my her Jewish mother that her father was Italian. When she took her DNA test she was 100 percent Jewish. Why her mother lied I now know, but won't go into here. Yeah he was Jewish. In reference to who died in the holocaust, well, although many Jews died those that were non-Jews, like the Poles, and Gypsies were kind of ignored in that regard. The Zionist got the land of Palestine solely due to a colonial mindset that said Arabs don't count. When the Ottoman empire fell, Palestine, a part of greater Syria in the Ottoman empire was given to them, and with their colonial mindset saw it as a land without a people. No it wasn't.
It is important because it is just more lies to pretend that followers of Judaism magically make a people. The Zionists invented that to justify their State in Palestine. Of course it matters. Jews are not a people.
Do you know how DNA is handed down? If you did you would know it is absolutely impossible for it to be religious.
Also, never underestimate the ability of vested agendas to corrupt any process, including ancestry DNA testing. It is a joke. Genetically such tests might or can create connections going back six generations. That is 150 years. At a thousand years we each have a million ancestors so it is impossible to identify such connections.
People think ancestry tests identify nationalities which is as ridiculous as believing they identify religions. Genetics is a new and deeply flawed science.
As to those you know who had the DNA test, I would humbly make the point that the same DNA would turn up in followers of other religions and atheists as well. The Zio agendas have it stacked.
You cannot be 100% Jewish. That is ridiculous. Such a claim would make any intelligent person know something was wrong. It is total rubbish.
Jews comprise all so-called races and hundreds of nationalities so it is utterly impossible for there to be a Jewish gene. It is a scam.
Go and talk to Jews, real and fake in what is called Israel. You can tell the German ones, the Ethiopian ones, the Iraqi ones, the French, Spanish, Italian - they look nothing alike. Ashkenazi and Sephardim, totally different.
I mean how do you get the same genes in a totally black Ethiopian and a blue-eyed blonde from Germany? You don't. You can't.
Yes, agree Gypsies and others, are overlooked. More Gypsies died on a per capita basis than followers of Judaism and tens of millions of Christians and Muslims died.
Palestine has always been a separate country. It was not part of greater Syria except that the areas were occupied by the Ottomans. Palestine has an ancient and specific history.
IF this is NOT Genocide....what the hell is.?
Imagine a country coming into the USA and taking all the white Evangelicals out!
It is a genocide.....sorry to burst your uninformed bubble.
but i totally agree that the US is wrong, very wrong, immoral really to help netanyahu commit genocide. i am just saying meershimer lost the right to complain about netanyahu if he says putin is fine.
READ, read and read. Putin does NOT want Ukraine. He is a smart man and even the Europeans don't want it. Just Blackrock and other chemical companies.
of course he doesn't want ukraine. that's why he has sent hundreds of thousands of russians to die in ukraine. he thought he would get this nice plum with something he called a special military operation. he imprisoned people just for calling it a war. do you believe what you are saying? i don't believe you believe what you are saying.
Some more "immorality" from the past. I put that in quotes because it's an incredible understatement. It is not meant to negate your feelings about Ukraine and the horror that is going on there, but to broaden your perspective on the US role in generating the massacre in Ukraine. That is, be aware of our past and what we are capable of doing, and maybe it will broaden your perspective of what the US is capable of implementing.
https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2017/10/the-indonesia-documents-and-the-us-agenda/543534/
you have no credibility at all if you can say that the US is generating a massacre in ukraine. this while you are justifying the war criminal putin. either a useful idiot or a worker for RT
Well, why don't you go after Mearsheimer, since he expouses the same opinion, as do many hear. By the way, why are you on this sight?
To compare the two you don't understand either one.
or you can't see the obvious similarities. colonizing is the hint i will give you. grabbing other people's land. killing to achieve your objectives. too subtle i suppose
You are not interested in anyone's perspective other then your own and you are attached to it like a religious fanatic. Believe what you want.
japan recently did a commemoration of the bombing of its two cities in 1945. they didn't invite either israel or russia and belorussia. maybe i am not the only one who compares putin and netanyahu. are you interested in their perspective?
Putin Relies on Reason Which the West Has Abandoned
By Paul Craig Roberts
PaulCraigRoberts.org
August 10, 2024
Vladimir Putin is an old-fashioned American liberal. He believes in reason, good will, working things out, and agreements despite having zero evidence that any such reciprocating belief exists in the West.
Putin’s illusions have caused him and Russia extraordinary difficulties. Russia is currently at war in Ukraine, although Putin still doesn’t seem to realize it, referring to it as a “limited military operation” despite the obvious fact that Russia is at war with NATO which includes the US.
It is sad that Putin, a person with good intentions, doesn’t have his counterparts in the Western world.
Now it comes to light that the British and Ukrainian governments planned to assassinate both Russia’s President Putin and Defense Minister Andrei Belousov at the Navy Day parade in St Petersburg.
In my columns I have several times mentioned that Putin and Trump are candidates for assassination. The recent attempt on Trump, which has been removed from the “news,” has now been matched by the statement of Russia’s Deputy Foreign Minister, Sergei Ryabkov, on Russian national television that Belousov called US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and squashed the assassination plan, explaining, apparently, that World War III would be the result.
Maria Zakharova, spokesperson for the Russian Foreign Ministry said: “There is no doubt that the assassination attempt was planned with the participation of the Anglo-Saxon masters of Kiev.”
Still, Putin wants to negotiate the end of the Ukrainian conflict. How precisely do you negotiate with people who are trying to assassinate you?
US scapegoating as usual.
Have you any idea how many countries would like to see the US wiped off the map?
of course it is so easy to negotiate with a man who invaded your country. who attacks civilian targets every day. that's not hard at all.
fran, you can't imagine that ukraine wants its sovereignty regardless of what the US wants, or has done. putin thinks ukraine should be his colony and ukraine wants its sovereignty. what is so hard to understand here? it's the most normal thing in the world to want sovereignty. i want it for myself, you i am guessing want it on a personal level for yourself. turning ukraine into a pawn or puppet of the US is very ugly really, but meershimer has made people lose that natural ability to see ugliness when they see it. realpolitik uber alles
I want my sovereignty, too. I am ashamed to be an American. Can I just opt out? Like, call myself a country? Bonnieland?
yes, i think you can, but the meershimer folks will probably look at your history and if for instance you have a husband who doesn't want to grant you sovereignty or maybe even a parent from long ago then i am afraid iit will not be ok for you to have sovereignty. so sorry.
The answer is no, they can't. Because of actually really real material conditions that exist and affect our lives and not whatever the fuck fake madeup bullshit you are on about
Putin has clearly stated for more than a decade, and still, he has no problem with Ukraine as an independent State, but it cannot be a part of Nato. Nothing unreasonable about that.
Ukraine is a pawn of the US and has been for more than a decade. That is fact.
What do you mean they want their sovereignty? Who is they? Ukraine has been fighting a civil war since 2014 due to a US backed color revolution. Things happen because of history, like dude try to use your brain like a tiny bit harder please I'm begging you
nsakun. I don't think Ukraine KNOWS what it wants frankly. Have you actually looked and read about the corruption and Nazi's in Ukraine?
yes you see ukraine as full of nazis. with your keen eyes can you see the fascists in russia by any chance? have you read about any corruption in russia maybe? just a wild guess, you haven't read about fascists and corruption in russia
I guess you think there are no facists in the USA.
Give me a break you are now a satellite country of Zionism and you will go down with them
can you provide a counter to Mearsheimers points here?
do you really think he is a Putin shill or are you just trolling? anything valid to contribute?
i think he is so used to seeing the faults of the US (granted very many to see) that he sees none or none of consequence in putin. putin can colonize ukraine, or continue to keep ukraine in colony status following centuries of russian history. this could be just silly, but for ukraine it has horrible consequences when meershimer types come along and say let's not help ukraine because ukraine is weaker and bec the US has many sins in its history. totall;y ignoring tht the person they are justifying is a war criminal many times over.
If the Russians had wanted to take Ukraine they would have done what the Americans did in Iraq, within days, take out all utilities, water, power, rail, the lot. They did not do that and only began to attack such things when the idiot Ukrainians, no doubt on orders from US/Nato minders started doing it.
putin thought it would be a cakewalk. well a cakewalk that would require war crimes, but so what, what are a few 1000 war crimes for the kgb boy. but of course ukrainians are idiots or pawns. they could not possibly be as smart or as informed about their history with russia as you are with your info from RT and meershimer
You are repeating propaganda. Any knowledge of the history of this war and Putin's statements and actions show that he worked hard to prevent it happening, then worked hard to stop it and was thwarted at every turn by the Americans who wanted the slaughter in the hope it would depose Putin, it won't, and destroy Russia, it won't.
As to war crimes, if that were a criteria then both Israel and Ukraine would have been dismantled already.
You have clearly never read or listened to anything Putin has said. He is not a fool. Only a fool would think it would be a cakewalk and Putin tried to prevent the war from happening and then tried to stop it. All foiled by the Americans.
is he saying we shouldn’t help? I would imagine the best way to help Ukraine would be to negotiate a fair peace if they have no chance of victory.
Russia has been trying to negotiate peace.....each time this happens the US says no.
lovely how you make it between russia and the US. who cares what the ukrainians want. they are just pawns, puppets, have no brains, and the brains they have are used to put their people into the meat grinder. and russia didn't invade them, isn';t attacking them daily. the evil one is the US. if the ukrainians were a little smarter they would realize this. when they are sitting without electricity many hours of the day they think it has been caused by the russians. how stupid of them. they didn't read meershimer or the posters here.
BIG question for you nsakun: Why are the Ukranians puppets.
Maybe you should take a LONG look at Victoria Nuland.
When the right wing Ukrainian Arianism ideology is supported by the state openly and en masse between 2014 and 2022, that gives a lot of time to brainwash a population. Same amount of time (1933 to 1939) it took Adolf to brainwash German people to join him in starting his wars.
so now ukrainians who have been invaded are equated with germans who did the invading. oh so clever so clever you are
I have described earlier in another post why Russian attack on Ukraine cannot be considered as agressive but reactive and hold water in the court of international law.
To summarize, UKR did not abide to the UNSC approved Minsk accords and in early February 2022, as reported by OSCE observers on the ground, has started to massively shell Donbas. Prior to that, in March 2021, UKR passed legislation (contravening the UNSC law) forcing the government to regain control of lost regions (including Crimea), by all means necessary.
Russia recognized Donbas and Lugansk (see the Kosovo legal precedent established by the US), and invoking article 51 of the UN Charter responded to UKR armed attacks by sending the Russian Army to force UKR to a settlement.
nsakun cannot cope with facts. Too much brainpower needed to get around facts. Easier to stick with boolshit propaganda.
The Ukrainians are suffering because their leaders are corrupt. No other reason. If Canada or Mexico were stupid enough to do what the Ukrainians did and have done for more than a decade, the Americans would have done worse to them than the Russians have done in Ukraine.
Tough having a powerful neighbour but only absolute idiots are stupid enough to enter into military alliances with their enemies and work to destroy them.
And let us not forget the Ukrainian neo-Nazi fascists working to murder and repress ethnic Russians in Ukraine. Under UN regulations the Russians have every right to go in and protect them.
no dear, ukrainians are suffering because they live in a bad neighborhood. their neighbors acquired 11 time zones over the last 2 or 3 centuries and ukraine also was in their empire then. now it is trying to assert its independence. but you are so brainwashed that the US is evil and russia is good that you accept their empire lustings as a good thing. it is unbelievable but i guess with the help of meershimer you cannot let go of this view.
Only a fool would say Russians were good and Americans were bad. This is why it is important to rely on facts. Whatever flaws the Russians may have they are benign compared to American hegemonic wars and slaughter over half a century.
And the facts make it clear the Russians wanted peace and to be a part of Europe after the Soviet Union fell and the Americans would allow neither.
It is very clear from words and actions that the Russians are protecting their borders, do not want to annexe all of Ukraine, are protecting ethnic Russians in Ukraine and have tried to avoid this war and to stop it.
Ukraine has been a part of Russia for most of its existence. It gained independence after 1991 and that was clearly a stupid idea. Ukraine needs to work with Russia to survive and only fools think otherwise.
No one is saying Putin has no flaws, but if one looks objectively starting in 2014, and one is familiar with our neocon polices I'm not looking kindly at the US, and by that I don't mean it's people. Read about how we used the Mujahideen to bring down Russia in the 1980s in Afghanistan. Yeah another cold war struggle with Russia and we made it slide from it's perch with a lot of death and real consequences for us, like 9/11. Always consequences. I seem great similarities between the two in regard to our paying others to bring down Russia.
https://www.democracynow.org/2004/6/10/ghost_wars_how_reagan_armed_the
nsakun. Excuse me BUT who are the war criminals here? It certainly isn't Russia.
Russia could have decimated Ukraine but it hasn't.
Try looking at the Donbas region and tell me they don't want to be part of Russia.
putin thought he would have an easy time of grabbing ukraine. it was supposed to happen with a cute little military operation. of course he amassed thousands of tanks and soldiers, just in case. and then even that wasn't enough. i think by now it is allowed to be called a war. not sure, but for a while he was putting people in prison for calling a war a war. so admirable, no wonder you justify and admire him
Putin a war criminal?
Look at your bloody history!
ah yes, i understand, the US history justifies anything putin does now. i see. but i think russia has had plenty of bloody history before putin. so the US can hardly keep up with all of the gulags, the torture, the land grabs. i guess you are not familiar with russian, pre soviet and soviet and post soviet, history. or maybe you are but do noit want to remind others of it.
Russia is invading the Donbas region for a reason the same reason the US would have if Nukes and weapons were put on the Mexican border1
i don't know why you mention gaza to me. i am not for netanyahu's genocide in gaza and as i have said already i am totally against the US supporting this genocide which is what we have been doing. but i know that ukrainians want sovereignty. if their sovereignty aligns with US plans that doesn't concern them. they have known russian horrors for centuries. they do not see the US as onesidedly as most people on this site. The US is not the main source of evil for them and they do not think they are pawns of the US but that they know what they want. whether they can get what they want (freedom from the russian empire lustings) depends on getting western help. but they are going for what they want. your view of them as simpleminded pawns being played by the US is insulting besides wrong.
Ukrainian sovereignty was violated in 2014.
The only sovereignity Russia was denying Ukraine was that of joining NATO. Like Austria nowadays... Or as UKR agreed to be after 1991 and had ensrined in its Constitution until 2019... You know, like Mexico has done to appease the US, or like Ireland has done in 1923 to appease the UK...
i wonder how many people on this site get their marching orders, i guess their typing orders from RT? they are so determined to prove the aggressor country is the innocent victim. i don't believe this is by chance only, that is it is only the useful idiots or whatever lenin's phrase was. i think it is a combination of sincere useful idiots and workers for RT.
People are trying to teach you extremely verifiable history and context and you are shoving your head in the sand and pushing your two middle fingers up and out while showing your entire ass
yes, yes, so grateful from teachings from RT
Far less civilians have died in UKR in 2.5 years of war than in 10 months in Gaza and West Bank.
Also, Putin, for saving children got an arrest warant from ICC, while Bibi, for killing over 20,000 children and women is applauded 58 times by the joint US Congress.
If you do not know enough to differentiate then there is probably little to be said, but here goes.
The situation between Ukraine and Russia has nothing in common with that between Israel and Palestine.
Ukraine is an independent country with a large population of ethnic Russians who were being attacked by the Government and the Russians sought to protect them. Ukraine entered into a military alliance with the US/Nato who have clearly stated their plan to break up Russia, i.e. destroy it. Ukraine had great power behind it and was a clear and present danger to the Russians.
The Russians have sought to avoid civilian casualties and made many efforts to firstly not begin the war and then to end it.
The Russians do not seek to exterminate the Ukrainians, they just seek to defend and protect their borders by ensuring Ukraine remains neutral. That is not unreasonable.
Palestine is a country crushed under colonial rule and occupation which ranks as one of the most sadistic, savage and bestial in modern history. Israel has total power over the Palestinians, occupies all of their country, continues to dispossess them, has a stated goal to exterminate or expel them and is committing genocide against the native people of the land it has stolen.
The Palestinians are powerless beyond their limited ability to fight their evil oppressors and to continue their resistance. Israel is massively armed and backed by the US and other Western nations and is the one responsible for all violence.
There would be no Hamas, no Palestinian Resistance, no October 7 if Israel had not been founded in genocidal ethnic cleansing, rape, theft and murder in 1947/48 and had then spent nearly 80 years subjecting the Palestinians to a level of sadistic cruelty which makes even the Nazis look benign.
So, in Ukraine we have a State which has formed a military alliance with others who wish to destroy Russia. Imagine how the Americans would act if Mexico or Canada entered into a military alliance with China? The Russians want a neutral Ukraine and do not want to annexe Ukraine.
And in Palestine, we have an occupying State, Israel with clearly articulated goals of extermination or expulsion of the native people and eradication of their country, their nationhood, culture, history and existence.
We have also seen Israel actively target civilians, nearly half of them children, resort to rape of men, women and children, torture, abuse and continued dispossession throughout all of Occupied Palestine not just Gaza.
The war in Ukraine is unfortunate and caused by Ukrainian, American and Nato stupidity and arrogance.
The war Israel wages against Palestine is nearly a century old and is a crime of enormous proportions, caused by arrogance, bigotry and Israeli, Zionist, American stupidity.
They have stupidity and arrogance in common but nothing else.
Your history attaches much more autonomy to Ukraine that it hasn’t had since 2014. Victoria Nuland and John McCain were on hand for the crime, and Nuland actually told the neo-Nazis who their next leader would be.
I was doing a comparison with Palestine against Israel. Yes, I agree with you that Ukraine is a US puppet being used to attempt to destroy Russia.
As Israel is a US puppet being used to attempt to destroy Iran and Taiwan is on the path to being used in the same way to destroy China.
Only a fool keeps doing the same things and expecting a different result. The Americans have been doing the same things and failing in bloody misery (for others mainly) for decades. When do they learn?
Palestine is a country crushed under colonial rule.....lIsrael occupies all of their country.....has a stated goal to exterminate or expel them and is committing genocide against the native people of the land it has stolen.”
Wrong on all counts. What you call Palestine is not a “country”, never has been or considered historically, culturally or politically. To say that Israel “occupies” it in any sense is nonsense. Even in Gaza. Israel completely left Gaza in 2005 after a brief period of military occupation and administration because of the ‘Palestinians’ then recent terroristic provocations in prior years. You have no proof for the statement that has a “stated goal” to “exterminate” them, though there are clear statements from Hamas’ ‘government’ (it’s in its own political charter) to exterminate both the nation of Israel and Jews in general. None of ‘its’ land is “stolen”. The Jews were present there before the Philistines (from which the word Palestinian derives) moved in. There were very few ‘native’ Palestinians in the lead up to 1947-48 events, as the folks who call themselves Palestinians now, were then, Jordanians, Lebanese, Syrians, and near surround itinerant Arabs. And you should ask yourself why so many of those itinerant Arabs in 1948 welcomed in the Arab armies to the newly minted nation of Israel to destroy it; and then consider why any of those Arabs should be ceded back any of that ancestral land. Many of the British nationals who welcomed King George’s military occupation of the colonies in colonial America lost “property” in the wake of the revolutionary war. We don’t now call them “dispossessed “, do we? Neither are those Arabs who welcomed in the Arab armies in 1948 before their defeat by the nascent Israel armed forces. Starting wars have serious consequences for the people who start them and catastrophic consequences for those who start and LOSE them. Much less 4-6 of them depending on how one accounts for them as “wars.” Mearsheimer is excellent on the history of NATO and Ukraine. His footing in the ME and Israel is far less sure.
I would love someone like you to explain to me how a military colonial ruler can subject the native people of the land it has taken by force, to a sadistic, savage and bestial rule for nearly 80 years and be surprised when they resist.
Yes, sure, I know Israelis think Palestinians are subhuman, some sort of weird cockroach animal, but that is deranged. The Palestinians are human beings who have suffered the longest holocaust in modern history and one of the most murderous and cruel military colonial occupations in all of history. They have no rights, no vote, no hope so why would they not fight the Israelis to the death, theirs or their oppressors?
Any understanding of history and human nature makes it clear that unless Israel exterminated 16 million Palestinians on planet earth, the resistance will never end, it will just become more determined, more violent, until Palestine and its people are free.
I mean, think about it, the French and Polish Resistance did that despite German atrocities in reprisal so why would not the Palestinians?
To correct more lies.
Israel DID NOT leave Gaza in 2005. It removed illegal Jewish settlers and planted them still illegally in other parts of Occupied Palestine. It removed illegal military bases and then surrounded Gaza with warships on the sea side and an electric fence on the land side and proceeded to shoot any man, woman, child, dog which came near the fence. IT IS A PRISON.
And as Amira Hass, Haaretz corrected the same lies from israelis recently, ISRAEL DID NOT LEAVE GAZA. It is the Israeli colonial rulers who issue ID cards to every single Palestinian including those in Gaza. They are handed to the stooge PA to distribute but every single Palestinian is recorded and ID's by their military colonial rulers, ISRAEL.
And if Israel did not control Gaza how could it, as it stated and did, cut off all power, water, food, medicine, internet, phones etc., in the Gaza concentration camp? I await your explanation with keen interst.
Israel was, is and always will be an illegal colonial enterprise in Palestine,.
https://countercurrents.org/2024/08/israel-kills-100-people-performing-the-dawn-prayers/
More than 100 Palestinians were killed and dozens injured, Saturday morning, after Israeli occupation forces bombed the “Al-Tabi’een” school, which houses displaced people in the Al-Daraj neighbourhood east of Gaza City.Local sources reported that the occupation warplanes bombed the school while Palestinians were performing the dawn prayer, and they were specifically targeted after the Takbeer of the dawn prayer. Eyewitness reports say limbs – arms, hands, feet and heads of those performing prayers were scattered around the school’s prayer hall in what is described as one of the worst massacres committed by the Israeli army yet.
For your education. Amira Hass, Haaretz, correcting Israelis repeating the same disinformation you have done.
Feb 12, 2024 5:37 pm IST
S., who lives in a Gaza border community, asked me several questions that I've heard from others, too. With his knowledge, I'm publishing an initial reply here to his letter. He wrote:
"I'm a regular reader of Haaretz and of your articles. As a resident of a Gaza border community, I'm trying to understand your take on what has happened in the Gaza Strip since the disengagement. Why, in your opinion, did the strongest resistance emerge from the place where Israel canceled the occupation?
PLEASE NOTE. The Israeli occupation was not canceled. Israel continued its highhanded control of the lives of the Gaza Strip's residents and Gaza's development options.
"For years, people have been shouting that all the major problems stem from the occupation. And here a small experiment to cancel the occupation was conducted. The Palestinians could have built themselves a model mini-state there. Instead, they preferred to invest the money in a war against Israel. Do you have an explanation for that?"
Shalom Reader S.,
PLEASE NOTE. First of all, the Israeli occupation was not canceled. Israel continued its highhanded control of the lives of the Gaza Strip's residents and Gaza's development options, well after Israel dismantled the settlements and army bases located there. Second, as per the Oslo Accords, to which Israel is a signatory, the Gaza Strip is not a separate entity but an integral part of the Palestinian territory occupied in 1967.
According to the Palestinians, and according to international opinion, this territory was supposed to become the Palestinian state. The facts that Israel severed the Gazan population from the West Bank's and that Israelis have continued to treat an isolated Gaza, which is 365 square kilometers in size and lacks resources, as a separate entity, are in themselves evidence of Israeli control over it – and of Israeli chutzpah to boot.
I can't quote what I've written in hundreds and perhaps thousands of articles. So I'll be brief: Prime Minister Ariel Sharon neither consulted with the leadership of the Palestinian Authority about the disengagement, nor did he coordinate its implementation with that limited self-rule government, which in 2005 was not split yet between Fatah and Hamas. Sharon followed a gradual track that Israel outlined from the early 1990s, while doing a good job of concealing its severity and significance during the Oslo process: creating a regime of prohibitions and restrictions on the Palestinians' freedom of movement, while creating Palestinian enclaves. On January 15, 1991 Israel began this comprehensive policy, and its immediate result, which worsened over the years, was cutting off the population of Gaza from the West Bank and from the world.
Sharon continued his predecessors' work. The draconian siege imposed by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on Gaza in 2007 was a quantitative change, but not a change in essence. This consistent policy indicates the forethought behind the action: not an experiment to cancel the occupation, but one of the ways to prevent the establishment of the Palestinian state based on the plan that the Palestine Liberation Organization and the international community saw before their eyes.
PLEASE NOTE. The continued Israeli domination over the Gaza Strip, up until October 7, was manifested in several ways.
The first is its total control of the Palestinian population registry, which includes Gaza's residents. It is Israel that decides who is permitted to carry the ID card of a resident of Gaza or the West Bank. Every detail – including place of residence – registered in the ID card, which the PA technically issues, requires Israeli approval. Even natives of Gaza, whose residency status Israel revoked before 1994, cannot renew it without Israel's approval.
The severance from the West Bank (and from Israel) critically damaged the capabilities for economic development in the Gaza Strip. In any case, Gaza has been in a state of economic deterioration or stagnation since 1967 due to deliberate steps that Israel adopted. Israel controls not only the border crossings but also Gaza's aerial and maritime space, which means it doesn't permit Gazans to exercise their right to freedom of movement via the sea and air.
Israel also uses this control to restrict the Palestinian fishing industry, prevent Palestinians from using the gas reserves discovered in Gazan waters and control the wireless frequencies necessary for technological development. By controlling imports and exports, it restricts the ability and feasibility of domestic production. Israel continues to control income from customs payments. Egypt – whether for fear that the Gazans will settle there, political opposition to severing Gaza from the West Bank or obedience to Israeli dictates – hasn't opened the Rafah border to free movement of Palestinians and foreigners.
Whether deliberately or inadvertently, Sharon's unilateral move weakened the PA, which adhered to the negotiations route. Thus, he awarded a prize to the Hamas movement, which claimed that only the "armed struggle" that it practiced during the Second Intifada, while improving its military capabilities – could force the Israeli army to withdraw, not negotiations and a signed agreement.
That's what many Palestinians thought and still think. It's no wonder that several months after the disengagement, in January 2006, Hamas won a majority of the seats in the election for the Palestinian parliament (but not a majority of the votes of the electorate).
First we have to answer the question as to why Israel did everything possible to thwart the establishment of the small Palestinian state in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. Then we can move on to trying to explain why the residents of the besieged and cut-off "mini-state" that it shaped in Gaza felt like lifetime prisoners, at a time when their brothers in the West Bank live under the violent rule of the expanding settlement enterprise. And afterwards, at the first opportunity, we'll talk about the illusion or about the delusion or about the armed struggle project.
God the ignorance and lies are so depressing.
The first mention we have of the country of Palestine and the people who were Palestinians comes from ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs more than 5000 years old. Palestine was ancient when Judaism was invented.
We then have thousands of years of records, reports, drawings, paintings, then photos of Palestine, the country and its people.
This deranged claim Palestine never existed is so childish it can only be ignored.
Name of the country which exported Jaffa oranges to the world in the 19th century. PALESTINE.
Name of the country Zionists and Jews invaded in 1947 in a genocidal slaughter. PALESTINE.
Name of the country the UN recommended with no legal validity, be partitioned in 1947. PALESTINE.
Name of the country where major battles were fought in WWI and WWII. PALESTINE.
Name of the country Zionists were advertising for Jewish colonists in 1890's. PALESTINE.
Name of the country Jews were planning to set up a colony in 1830. PALESTINE.
Name of the 6 million native people crushed under Israeli military colonial rule and denied all human and civil rights. PALESTINIANS.
I could you on but it is just too idiotic.
Equating Vladimir Putin with Benyamin Netanyahu is evidence that you are either a troll or profoundly void of information.
there is no equivalence between russia's actions in ukraine and israel's actions in gaza.
says who? i am sure netanyahu didn't criticize putin's invasion because he knew he was doing the same thing to the palestinians, constantly stealing their land, slowly but surely. putin did it very quickly and suddenly and now netanyahu is also doing it at a much quicker pace. but of course you can just claim there is no equivalence. the meershimers here are quite primed to agree with you
Those two conflicts are equivalent in death dealing? Is that your point as your expressed narrative is not clear to me.
not clear that his question is addressed to me. but if it is, yes putin and netanyahu are equivalent in their death dealing. they want the land of the other people. and they don't care how they get it.
Team Biden's blend of unwarranted aggression in Ukraine, and undue deference in Palestine, are united by thousands of preventable casualties. In both instances the policies were at best delusional, if not patently dishonest, and cruel. That is the objectively real and moral consistency driving Prof. M's critiques of US policy in both instances.
Mearsheimer is wrong on so-called Israeli genocide, but correct on the causes and reactions of Russia in Ukraine and the West’s (NATO’s) role in fomenting Russia’s reaction to its effort to bring Ukraine into NATO. Ukraine is quite different from some of the Baltic states coming into NATO. Different strategically, politically, culturally and economically. Ukraine is Russia’s Cuba. It’s that simple.
Mearsheimer and any sane human is right in saying Israel is committing colonial genocide, one of the most foul and barbaric in history.