.
I did a search in the blog archive to see how much I criticised Israel after all.
January 2009 Called Israel a source of alienation between NATO members and Arab countries
April 2009 Claimed that Israel alienated Western nations with its behaviour for decades
December 2008 Expressed doubts that Israel's self-defence against Hamas/Gaza was proportionate / implying it was excessive.
July 2009 Called Israel's behaviour unacceptable, singling out the bombing of other countries
July 2010 'tail wags the dog' graphic symbolising Israel-U.S. relationship
May 2011 Called Israel a "regional troublemaker"
September 2011 Claimed that Israel has a "usual" disrespect against Muslim nations
November 2011 "Expect a revolt if you run the largest prison on earth." [Gaza]
December 2012 Insisted that Israel is no ally to the U.S., using the concept of an "ally" that's dependent on a signed & ratified two-way alliance, not mere good relations. I repeated this briefly in April 2018.
July 2014 A blog post mentioning the lopsided casualty figures in a Israel-Gaza/Hamas conflict at the time. I also supposed that Israel&Egypt could be pressured into peace with Gaza becoming Egyptian.
July 2014 Criticism of Israel's grand strategy as stupid, drawing parallel to the Crusader states that were dependent on outside support, too.
May 2015 Israel as #5 threat future threat to Germany, but rated "utterly unrealistic"
July 2015 "Israel has earned a reputation for not necessarily letting refugees return"
April 2017 "Israel's attempt to hold on to occupied territories since 1967 in spite of repeated UN resolutions demanding its withdrawal"
August 2018 Claimed that Israel deviated from Western norms and "Apartheid light, routine disregard of international norms"
May 2019 Indirectly called Netanyahu corrupt
October 2020 Called Israel an illegal occupier of the West Bank
June 2021 Linked without comment to an article of HRW and another from The Intercept that were criticising Israel
October 2021 Mentioned Israel hacking, assassination and subversive actions without elaborating
January 2022 Mentioned without elaboration habitual Israeli occupation and bombing of foreign lands
February 2022 Linked to an article about allegations that Israeli police illegally wiretapped Israeli citizens
February 2022 Called Israel an aggressor and occupier since 1967
February 2022 One post that is all about Israel's offences and I called it "unacceptable behaviour"
July 2022 Called Israel 5th most important threat to Germany due to the range of its nuclear-tipped missiles (later quoted this part in July 2024)
October 2023 I wrote that peace in Near East should be pursued by forcing a solution on the regional countries, not by negotiating with them.
November 2023 I wrote "Israel has to leave the occupied territories and go back to its pre-1967 borders. The state of Israel is only legitimate within the pre-1967 borders." and that the naval (longtime) blockade of Gaza by Israel was illegitimate
April 2023 Mentioned that Israel habitually commits wars of aggression
January 2024 Mentioned that Israel demolitions buildings in Gaza outside of combat.Also claimed that Israel "played the victim card too brazenly" (overplayed it).
I did NOT count my comments in the comment sections for economy of effort reason.
Now put these 28 instances in perspective; about 2,500 blog posts were written in total!
Looking back, I think not one of those statements is indefensible.
The "habitual", the #5 threat ranking, the opinion that Near East parties should be dictated/forced into peace rather than negotiation partners are unusual opinions, for sure. Definitely outside of mainstream. Still, in hindsight I still think of them as reasonable.
S O
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I'm more pro-Israel, but I get your point that Israeli policies are from a point of view of reality that you don't share. Israel thinks long-term about the threats to their lives and less about international law.
ReplyDeleteIt may try to think so, but I'm convinced it's not acting in its own long-term best interest AT ALL.
DeleteIt should have sought a stable peace from the position of strength it had after Yom Kippur. It stopped halfway after making peace with Egypt.
Syria wasn't very cooperative, but fuelling the fire in Gaza and West Bank was stupid.
Israel's survival depends ultimately on the toleration and even support by the West. Its actions are undermining this support and its actions become intolerable.
Ten more years like the last two and Israel may not just face economic sanctions, but even a naval blockade run by other nuclear powers.
As Israel keeps descending into madness and doesn't care about showing it's true identity anymore, support from the west will keep diminishing fast. The masses in the west already didn't like Israel much, with only the elites supporting it, now supporting israel is not very sustainable for western elites. Even in usa people from both parties want to distance themselves from israel and the whole region. Israel survival also depended on having good relations with it's neighbors, but due to it's nature and culture it just can't. The whole country is like a beach resort with lot's of guns where people dont even try to come out and have any relationship with the locals and also see them as inferior. The result is endless conflict. Nobody knows the future but it does look good for israel.
Delete*does not look good good for israel
DeleteThing is, we all have to follow international laws and norms, problem here is that Israel isn't being heavily punished for it's many transgressions.
Delete@SO
Delete"It should have sought a stable peace from the position of strength it had after Yom Kippur"
That's kinda of the thing, Israel had no position of strength at least against Egypt during the Yom Kippur war.
As it's forces were effectively surrounded between two Egyptian armies.
So it was forced to do what Saddat had wanted which is return the Sinai and have peace.
Look up the situation at the end of the war.
DeleteLook up post '73; Egypt had given up trying a military solution.
"Look up the situation at the end of the war."
DeleteI did, the Israelis were effectively surrounded on all sides.
The third army east of the canal and the reserves West of the canal.
"Look up post '73; Egypt had given up trying a military solution"
That was already the case, prior to the war.
Saddat had already offered Israel a peace treaty, which Israel rejected, don't you ever wonder why Saddat ordered his army to stop advancing past the Sinai?
The Israelis had defeated/terribly reduced the Syrians at Golans and could have overrun all of Syria.
DeletePreviously, they had soundly defeated the Egyptian army, which had almost all of its field army trapped and encircled on Sinai. The Egyptian air defences were shattered, Egyptian and Syrian air forces had suffered horrible losses, while the Israelis had most of their air force left (the A-4 squadrons suffered the most).
The naval situation was such that Israel could impose total blockade by air while being able to get convoys in and out through the Med.
The Israelis were not surrounded because they had air & sea lanes open.
And the Egyptian army didn't advance very much because of difficult terrain, poor training level, poor staff planning (very few officers were involved to maintain secrecy) and SAM belt cohesion.
"The Israelis had defeated/terribly reduced the Syrians at Golans and could have overrun all of Syria."
DeleteLaughable, most certainly they would have done it if they could.
"Previously, they had soundly defeated the Egyptian army, which had almost all of its field army trapped and encircled on Sinai."
They were not not defeated.
A portion of it was surrounded, yes.
But same can be said for the forces advancing under Sharon.
Sharon tried to push further and was crushed by a rather small paratrooper brigade.
Sharon was incapable of moving any further, all Egypt had to do was move it's remaining forces from the West of the Canal and have them jointly crush the Israeli forces in between them.
"And the Egyptian army didn't advance very much because of difficult terrain,"
Sinai is relatively flat.
"poor training level, poor staff planning (very few officers were involved to maintain secrecy) and SAM belt cohesion."
If such was the case, they wouldn't have so quickly and utterly crushed the invincible bar liev line.
Anyhow, your entire argument is undermined by the fact that Al Saddat had already offered a peace treaty to Israel, long before the war ever started.
Much of the Sinai is very bad terrain.
Deletehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitla_Pass
The North is flat and much of the coastline is flat, but the mountainous area has very steep terrain despite not being very high.
The poorly manned Bar Lev line was overcome by surprise and deliberate actions planned long in advance.
You can argue all you want, the Yom Kippur War is universally understood in the West to have been a crushing defeat for Egypt and Syria.
The IDF was expanded very much between 1973-1980 and there's no credible case that Israel wasn't in a position of strength after the war.
"The North is flat and much of the coastline is flat, but the mountainous area has very steep terrain despite not being very high."
DeleteYes, some parts of it are mountainous, Egyptians could have still avoided them.
So, like I said, if they truly wanted to crush Israel, all they had to do was keep going and nothing short of the Samson option would stop them.
"The poorly manned Bar Lev line was overcome by surprise and deliberate actions planned long in advance."
It was adequately manned, it was just crushed.
"You can argue all you want, the Yom Kippur War is universally understood in the West to have been a crushing defeat for Egypt and Syria."
That is only a testament to the effectiveness of Israeli propganda and the West's willingness to reject reality.
Israel can only be forced into peace if it's Western backers start making credible threats of heavy handed sanctions, potential limited strikes and naval blockades.
ReplyDeleteSo far, the West has been nothing but slavish.
UNSC sanctions require that no American or British veto gets in the way.
DeleteSo feasible sanctions may involve to forbid overflights, port calls, imports and exports on national or EU level.
What we got so far are complete (France 1967) or partial (Germany 2025, at least announced) arms embargoes.
The thing is the West has installed various puppets all around Israel.
ReplyDeleteSo Israel is feeling safe.
The last holdout here is Iran.
Which is why I am against any strikes against Iran, even though I hate the mullahs.
International law is quite interesting from a purely darwinian evolutionary standpoint.
ReplyDeleteCertain population groups are permitted to engage in warfare under a set of rules that are beneficial to their genetic interests.
While other groups are either not permitted to pursue their genetic interests or are forced to do so under strict guidelines.
Overtime this will lead to the group that is permitted to pursue it's genetic interests dominating all other groups