is all well 'n' good except, of course, if you lose.

The Germans never thought that they would lose when they decided to "reclaim" their reputation for martial prowess by beating up on Poland in 1939.

It was, to their mind, the very definition of A Sure Thing.

Still, by the time 1945 rolled around things weren't looking quite so rosy for the jackboots and the goose-steppers........

Comparing Israel with Nazi Germany is a hallmark sign of a fruitcake.

Except, of course, when the comparison is apt.

Would it make you feel any better if I pointed out that exactly the same lesson was learnt by the USA when it took on North Vietnam?

As in .... Walk in the park blah blah blah Just gettin' into m' stride woof woof woof Gosh this is harder than I thought slog slog slog Somebody Get Me Outta Here! grind grind grind Dammit to Hell I'm outta here, sorry buddy, been nice knowin' ya' run run run.....

But I find it so laughable that you deny that **any** lesson can be learnt by looking at the trajectory of Nazi Germany.

Why, exactly, is that verboten?

After all, the Nazi's did a very good impersonation of a bell-shaped-curve in ww2; up like a rocket, and then flat in the middle before crashing back down to Earth.

Why, exactly, are there no lessons to be learnt by examining that trajectory?

Do you really mean this? What good will the army do there besides kill more innocent civilians, and cause this whole saga to last longer and longer. it's time the US and the united nations backed up their words with some real action to let Israel know that this senseless violence has to stop.

There is no reason to just invade southern Lebanon and only a little reason to invade Gaza.

Israel's strategy of containment has worked well enough for the time being. One doesn't need to crush HAMAS given the ongoing turmoil in the surrounding states.

Israel already proved that it can level Gaza anytime it wants, quickly and without much pain on the part of its military. If it needs to, to protect its citizens, it can and will.

Southern Lebanon presents its own problems given Hizballah's track record of resistence during Israel's previous 20 year occupation. No, there is no need to occupy Lebanon. As for a war between Israel and a Hizballah run Lebanon, burn that bridge when you come to it, not before. Hizballah may likely sink under its own weight of supporting its Syrian ally. Let that issue run its course.

Johnboy, for all his coarseness, makes an apt point in not biting off more than one can chew. The German war machine thought it was invincible, and, given the track record in the early part of WWII, that held true. Poland, and France fell rapidly, while the British were sent packing after Dunkirk. But rather than consolidate its gains, Germany turned its guns on the Soviet Union, while at the same time, trying to flatten the UK. It was a case of military over-reach, which, when combined with the entry of the US, led to its destruction.

The combatant on combatant part of the war is to a degree, seperate from the Nazi's attrocities towards a myriad of humanity, including Hitler's goal to exterminate the Jews.

But Mengele was not leading the Luftwaffe, Gobbels was not in charge of the tank corps, nor Eichman in charge of the U-boats. From a military perspective, there is much to learn from Germany's military success as well as its failure.

By doing what you suggest cometliner, Isreal would certainly reclaim its reputation as as thug and bully and a heartless state, but I don't think it needs to do anything more, since that is already known.
I'm sure you will get your wish anyway since that terrorist and former PM Begin has already stated in his autobiagraph "The Revolt" that he intended to grab southern lebanon up to the Latani river. Why do you think Isreal "bought" (with America's money) so many small bunker buster bombs? That why Isreal can steal the land and get rid of the people in one move. See, Isreal does learn from past crimes.

... is the hallmark of a fruit cake. Israel is a fascist state, why shouldn't it be compared to Nazi Germany?

WW2 was the defining event of the last two centuries, and as such the role of Germany in starting that war is a subject worthy of study.

That is, I would suggest, an irrefutable reason why the subject of Nazi Germany should not be verboten.

Q: Did I say that the Israelis are Nazis?
A: No, I did not.

Q: So what did I say?
A: I said that countries that were infinitely more ruthless and militaristic than Israel (e.g. Nazi Germany) made the mistake of starting "easy" wars, only to end it totally defeated.

The moral of the story therefore was not
"Israel = Nazis"
it was
"don't start wars simply because you think they'll be easy"
precisely because
"history is littered with regimes that thought that and lost"

yeah, after people gang on you for your either (1) poorly chosen words or (2) deliberate antisemitic words, you begin to backtrack.

You claimed just above that you thought comparing Israel to Nazi Germany was "apt"

You can believe whatever you want in your sick small brain. However, most people see the comparison as stupid and said only for inflammatory purposes.

My statements are all still there, ARAVAY, and they are there for all to see.

"You claimed just above that you thought comparing Israel to Nazi Germany was "apt""

No, I claimed no such thing i.e. I claimed that the example of
a) Germany attacking Poland in 1939
is, indeed, an apt comparison to
b) COMETLINEAR's desire that Israel should attack Gaza
in order to
c) "reclaim its reputation".

I still stand by that statement i.e. I still insist that there *is* a valid comparison to be made between Germany's desire in 1939 to wipe away the humiliations of Versaille with COMETLINEAR's 2011 desire to wipe away the humilations of Lebanon 2006 and Gaza 2009.

"You can believe whatever you want in your sick small brain. However, most people see the comparison as stupid and said only for inflammatory purposes."

Again, I will point out that I was *not* making the comparison that
Israel = Nazi Germany.

What I was comparing was this:
a) COMETLINEAR's blood-lust against Gaza
against
b) Germany's 1939 "slam-dunk" of Poland.

I will point out (again) that such a comparison is, indeed, "apt", and I have seen nothing in your post that suggests otherwise.

Annnnnnnnnd, back to the beginning.

You are claiming that all the subjects that surround Nazi Germany - e.g. how WW2 started, and why it started - are verboten.

Why, exactly?

Nazi Germany was a vile regime, sure, no question, but it existed and it followed a very obvious doctrine w.r.t. determining When Is The Right Time To Start A War.

COMETLINEAR has suggested a "solution" to Israel's woe's that would take Israel down that same path.

Pointing out that comparison is:
a) quite "apt"
b) in no way, shape, or form a claim by me that Israel = Nazi Germany.

It is what it is i.e. a warning to COMETLINEAR that his Very Cunning Plan has been tried before i.e. between 1939-1945, when Germany started an "easy war" that spiralled into a global armageddon that led to their utter devestation.

Learn from history, otherwise you risk repeating it.

... I agree that you can't compare to Israel to Nazi Germany. I don't know how anyone can make that argument. Kevin Gallo

The pre-Israel Jewish leadership was not united either, with Begin and Ben Gurion most definitely at odds with each other.

And the nascant Israeli state saw one side firing upon the other.

"However, the humpty dumpty analysis assumes the Palestinians were once "united and together." Which they never really were."

Well, gosh, neither were the Jews who moved into the Mandate Palestine before the declaration of Independence unless, of course, the word "diaspora" has more than one meaning.

There are many states are fractured. Israel is currently a split between right-wing Orthodox Jews who want to implement Mosaic law and secular Jews who embrace progressive values such as democracy. Belgium is divided between the Flanders and the Walloon regions, the US is split between north and south, and the middle-east is a mess thanks to the British. There are very few countries that don't have divisions. Will Palestinians be a united country or will it split between Gaza and the West Bank? Who knows. The world won't know until it actually happens. What comes first a nation or a state?

violence, worked together to fight the British and the Arabs. It's called historical analysis. Simply saying that Israel had factions and the Palestinians had factions does not get to what the real history was like. Only a moron makes such simplistic statements.

The Palestinians are culturally economically and religiously, and politically divided. Hamas and Fatah after 5 years or more can't agree to form a government. Almost immediately in 1948 Ben Gurion, Begin, and the rest agreed to work together and play within the system. The Palestinian factions have not after how many years? They can't come up with a unity government that lasts more than a month.

"Almost immediately in 1948 Ben Gurion, Begin, and the rest agreed to work together and play within the system."

Note the key phrase: "within the system" i.e. once the Israeli leadership had "a state" then they began to act - gosh! what a surprise! - much more "statesman-like" than they had done previously.

"The Palestinian factions have not after how many years?"

The flaw is obvious i.e. after all these years the Israelis are STILL hard at work to stymie the Palestinian's ability to "play within the system" by the simple expedient of "denying them that system to play in".

Or, put another way: contrasting a "Pre-state Palestine" against a "Post-Independence Israel", is an attempt at comparing apples with oranges.

A "pre-state Palestinian leadership" doesn't act like "the leadership of a state"?

Well, heck, then I would suggest that the answer to that conundrum is to give them a state and help them to rise to the occasion, rather than to use that "failure to measure up" as an excuse for denying them a state.

Because your argument looks an awful lot like a self-perpetuating justification for a never-ending occupation i.e. if we keep them stateless then we can argue that we *have* to deny them a state because - du'oh! - they don't measure up to the level of a state.

Well, du'oh, of course they don't measure up, you are keeping them stateless.

They were not under the belligerent occupation of the Arabs of Palestine.

Compare and contrast......

Aren't you the same person who said that Palestinians and Jordanians are the same people even though they have been apart since 1967, but somehow the people of Gaza and the West Bank are so different they can't have their own state because haven't been able to agree on their for five years? What about the PLO that has represented the Palestinian people since 1974?

Secondly, do you mean the Altalena incident that almost led to a civil war because Irgun didn't want to handover its weapons to the IDF? Palestinians are united in their fight with Israel, what to do from there is where they disagree. These disagreements will be solved within a political system when they get their own state.

The time to complain about the Palestinian leadership not acting like statesmen is after they have a state, for the blindingly obvious reason that in the "before" stage they are struggling for "national liberation", which is a very different thing to "running a state".

Let them have a state, and then you can complain that they aren't statesmen.

Note that "Palestinian statehood" should also change the priorities of the Israeli leadership i.e. once the Palestinians get that state then it is **clearly** in Israel's national interest to help those Palestinians to run that state successfully, precisely because nobody wants to live next door to a failed state.

So while the Israeli leadership might gleefully stick it to the Pals *before* they get their state, that behaviour should abruptly cease *after* they get that state.

Though looking at the cowboys now running Israel I think I'd better stress the "should" part of that last sentence.

"he nitpicks words, plays semantic games, and misses the overall points."

And that, of course, is NEOLEFTT's demand that we ignore what is being said, and ignore the manner is which it has been said, and instead all close our eyes and feel the vibe, man, the vibe.......

Sunshine, these articles in foreignpolicy are C.O.M.M.E.N.T.A.R.Y. and therefore they are not objective reporting but are, instead, the expression of an opinion.

As such you don't simply accept at face value That Which They Claim To Be Fact because, like it or not, what they claim to be "objective fact" is going to be coloured by their "opinion".

Q: So how to separate "that which is objective" from "that which is opinionated"?
A: Why, gosh!, you DON'T do it by closing your eyes and letting the vibe, man, the vibe, wash all over you.

You do it by..... parsing the words and poking a stick at the semantics.

You do it differently?

Well, Good For You.

Wow, there's a meaningless term if there ever was one, especially when related to the United Nations.

Yes, the Veto. Rightfully held, and rightfully wielded. Sorry, but the UN is not a Democracy, nor is it a world government.

Given that a wide swath of the "international community" is itself led by various dictators and one-party machines without true political freedoms, your claim that the US should listen to a variety of tin-pot dictators or masses of people involved in a conflict is hypocritical to say the least.

Of course, like any good bigot, you raise the conspiracy theory that it's really those sneaky Jews that are pulling the puppet strings of the world. While that ideology gives you plenty of company, it doesn't make you right or your cause correct.

@JACOB

Your implication that 'Jewish' is synonymous with 'Israeli', is objectionable and incorrect. Only 1 in 3 Jews live in Israel. The vast majority of us, 10 million, were born and live either in the US or Europe. We are not Zionists, we are Jewish.

Somebody who isn't reading from the liberal jew hating song book. Jacob, it is refreshing to hear from you.

Your argument was based on the so-called Israel lobby . . . in other words, JEWS, not Israelis, and their ability to manipulate the US into using its veto at the UN.

Indeed, to quote "It would be bad enough if the US government, in its use of the veto, actually represented the American electorate - but, in fact, it represents the American Israel lobby, a powerful minority political pressure group . . . .The result is that these 100,000 pro-Israel activists control the UN Security Council and the lives of billions..."

You're not talking about Israelis here AVS, but Jews. Sorry, but your claim doesn't pass the smell test.

Thanks to Isreali control of the media and Hollywood the American people can believe anything, even that Isreal is moral and not a rogue terrorist state intent on stealing land and forcing the true owners of the land to flee after being brutalized by Isreal. The difference between nazi Germany and Isreal is only a matter of degree, but just wait, Isreal is not finished. When Isreal is finished it will be more than equal.

As Israel haters are as contemptuous of facts as are fundamentalist right-wing Christians.

Let's also point out there there is no unique Palestinian religion, language, or even much of a unique culture. In fact, the term "Palestinian" didn't even exist until just a few decades ago.

You just want the Israel to keep all the land Palestinians used to live. You have no concern for their aspirations and ignore the fact that the Palestinians have been fighting to reclaim their land for the past 5 decades. Your idea of transporting all Palestinans to Jordan so that Israelis can legitimately own the land the Jews lost 2,000 years ago is as justified as that Native Americans should kick out all white, Asians and Afro-Ameriocans out of North American so that they can reclaim the land and way of life they lost 500 years ago.

The US has used its political muscle to defend an ally who has been ganged up on by the Arab and Muslim world. The use of the UN to conduct its hostilities against the Jewish state is found in the number and one-sidedness of these resolutions.

The Palestinians must be left with no solution but to win the land back by defeating Israel in a battlefield.

As arguments go that rather presupposes that "territory can be won in a defensive war".

Apparently int'l law does not agree with you.

I will point out that every UNSC resolution that has dealt with this seemingly-indefinite Israeli occupation has contained these words:
"Emphasizing the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war"

I will also point out that not once will you ever find this exemption:
"unless you claim that it was 'won defensively' "

The reason why that exemption doesn't exist should be obvious i.e. in *every* war the two protagonists *always* point the finger at each other and scream "But! But! But, HE started it, not me!"

Much better not to go there, and make do with this reply:
"I don't care who started it, I don't care who finished it. You can't acquire territory by war, Get Over It".

"determine that territory cannot be taken in a defensive war?"

Well, gosh!, where to start?

I would suggest that the first starting point would be the Hague Regulations 1907, which clearly states that the seizure of territory by force of arms results in "occupation", and contains within it no mechanism by which that occupation can be converted into an annexation.

Next would have to be the Kellog-Briand Pact of 1928, which outlawed the very concept of territorial self-aggrandizement by means of war. No exemption there for "defensive annexations", sorry.

In quick succession we would then have
a) the Nurenberg Tribunals of 1945, which clearly established that the Hague Regs were "declaratory of the laws and customs of war" i.e. if you seize territory then the Hague Regs say that you OCCUPY that territory, and that's the be-all and the end-all of what you can achieve by force of arms.
b) The UN Charter of 1945, whose Article 2(4) states very clearly that members must refrain from "the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations".

ALL that body of international law ALL say the same thing i.e. when you seize territory by war then you "occupy" that territory. Nothing more. No less.

So sorry, but what YOU have to do is to find some international law that says ".... unless you seize it in a 'defensive war', in which case that's A-OK to annex it".

Can you produce such a law, NEOLEFTT?

Because if you can't then there is no exemption or loophole in those laws that I have pointed to and, so sorry, your argument falls to the ground.

Seldom when trawling through the myriad of commentaries following an article dealing with such a subject do I come across such an impressive and almost singlehanded struggle against the mass of regurgitated propaganda, wilfully or otherwise, that masquerades as informed comment.

Your ability to not rise to the vituperative insults but persevere in the interests of rational discourse by outing poor logic with concise and instructive rebuttal is worthy of praise.

You are not alone. Keep up the good fight against the zombie hoards of ignorance mate.

It looks like the forces of diplomacy, quite than the forces of past, might dictate the outcome of the Israeli-Palestinian issue, potentially these various pieces of the Palestinian jigsaw might be worked out as well as addressed.