Less clear, of course, is why the Right Wing supports Israel, right or wrong. The evangelical movement has always supported Israel for a number of reasons, but for the rank-and-file conservative, the reasons are less clear.
Personally, and I say this as an open, unabashed lefty, I usually don't have a problem with Israel. They're a small country, literally surrounded by people who want them dead, and they're doing their best in the face of that. They have an army that is second to none, with a long history of coming out on top of any conflict.
But in their current conflict with Hamas, they are dead wrong.
Don't get me wrong: I'm not saying that Hamas is any better. They keep attacking Israeli targets, forcing the Israeli's to respond. And in their position, Israel can't afford to appear weak, so their response may appear unreasonable at times.
Both sides have equally-questionable claims to the area: the borders to the area called Palestine was set by the Franco-British boundary agreement of 1920, and the Transjordan memorandum of 1922; the Palestinians indigenous to that region were then displaced after World War II, to make room for the new state of Israel.
Both sides have killed thousands, even millions of people on the other side. The anger on both sides is tenacious and unending, and both sides have made promises that they have later broken. The only chance they have of ever ending the conflict is for the leaders of both sides to come together, and for both sides to give up part of what they want.
It isn't going to happen. And America needs to just stay out of it and let them work it out for themselves. The only outcome I can see from American involvement is a waste of money and American lives.
I say fuck 'em. Let them fend for themselves.
The question of who is "indigenous" and who is the invader is everywhere a bit difficult to answer. Everyone there came from elsewhere and it's probably been that way since before the Neanderthals lived there. Sadly everyone insists that God gave the place to them and to the exclusion of everyone else. To Me that's the root of the problem. It's a religious war and that doesn't allow for reasonableness much less for the kind of melting pot society the US used to be, to its credit. It should be a lesson in the benefits of a secular government, and in fact it is, but who is listening? What religion listens to heathens and infidels and heretics?
ReplyDeleteYes, I say it only in jest -- we should build a high wall around much of the Middle East and a wall without doors and maybe a steel roof on it too -- but I sort of mean it too.
Oh, and as to why witless dipshits like Rick Perry just love "Izhrul" so much is all about his religious idiocy. The failed revolutionary turned Prince of Peace needs certain pre-conditions for him to come back to the place he was executed in order to save Christian Souls and fry the world -- and one of those conditions requires "the Jews" to be in Izshrul so that Jeesus can destroy the people he died trying to save from Roman occupation. Makes sense, no?
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