From: Samantha Atkins (samantha@objectent.com)
Date: Sat Apr 06 2002 - 21:56:41 MST
Robert J. Bradbury wrote:
> Bill wrote:
>
>>The US is very reluctant to side with Israel "too much" so as to
>>have some Arab support in killing off Saddam Hussein and other
>>terrorists in Iraq/Iran.
>>
>
> Lets clearly separate Saddam from "other terrorists".
> Saddam is attempting to develop nuclear weapons -- that is very
> differerent from Palestinians attempting to develop rockets
> to knock out Israeli tanks or to hurl at Israeli cities.
Of course we won't mention Israel which is both currently a
majorly aggressive state and definitely has nukes and other
weapons of mass destruction - since we gave them to them.
>
> The similarity between Sadaam and the Palestinian leadership
> is that both seem to be very comfortable sacrificing the lives
> of their own people to achieve their goals.
>
As opposed to Israel which is more comfortable sacrificing the
lives of other people to acheive their goal?
> Lets also be clear that one can probably not "kill off"
> a large body of terrorists in Iraq/Iran. Our activities
> in Afghanistan clearly show that eliminating the people
> who choose terrorism as a means of attaining their goals
> is not easy. It would also be useful to separate the two
> countries. Terrorism supported by Iraq is coming in large
> part from Hussein himself by paying the families of suicide
> bombers. On the other hand in Iran, terrorism seems to be
> supported not by the elected administration but perhaps by
> the religious conservatives or other fringe groups. Two
> different cases entirely.
>
If I was Palestinian at this time I would do everything possible
to strike back at Israel. If I was Arab I would tend to support
any means the Palestinians used to fight back, generally
speaking. Making Saddam out to be a monster and justifying yet
more US involvement in the area on such a basis is ridiculous.
Again, what are you calling terrorism? Is what Israel is
currently doing terrorism?
> Finally, the population of Iraq is 23 million and Iran
> is 66 million. By taking any action against them,
> unless it is against very specific, unpopular leadership,
> you run a significant risk of creating more terrorists
> than you eliminate unless you intend to nuke the countries
> into oblivion.
>
I was wondering when that would be mentioned. Do you know how
much damage the US did to its reputation when it "leaked" that
it would consider using nukes in its "war on terror"? Drop
nukes anywhere right now and you won't have to wait for attack
from foreign terrorists. The people of the US would go ape.
>
>>Saudi financing of Palestinian and Iraqi terror is honestly enough
>>reason to attack the Saudi kingdom once we have enough economic
>>independence from them to do that.
>>
>
Are you out of your mind? You want to attack S.A. when they are
the lynchpin of our support in the area among Arab states?
> Saudi financing? Have you not read the papers that Saddam is paying
> the families of the suicide bombers or that organizations in the
> U.S. and Europe have channeled funds to mixed-use Palestinian
> causes?
>
> The only way out of this mess is to begin to educate Arabs and
> muslims (and Christans and Jews) in general to "think rationally".
> You have to free the press, then convert the educational systems
> and change the governments from monarchies to democracies.
>
Perhaps we could start by thinking more rationally, not to
mention a great deal more compassionately, ourselves. Much of
what we are doing is not, imho, either.
- samantha
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