In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
Yes, but these are not redrawn borders. Gaza and the West Bank are ""occupied Territories" neither part of Israel, nor independent states.
The people are not to be given equal rights with others by incorporating them into Israel, nor allowed to form a state. Hence no resolution.
Or are you arguing for the forced expulsion/extermination of all 2.2 million in Gaza and the 3.5 million in the West Bank?
They are redrawn borders - none of these borders existed previously. Show me Gaza as a strip on a map of the Ottoman Empire. Or the mandates drawn on the map post WWI?
Gaza is no different to other non-contiguous regions at the end of WWII which got redrawn. The question that needs to be asked isn't do we move 2.2m Gazans but do 2.2m Gazans want to stay there? Go and ask them - so many are not Gazan and do not see Gaza as any more than a refugee camp or prison.
Gaza does not work - for the Gazans, for the Isaraelis, for the Egyptians. Nobody. I suspect that a realistic outcome of this will be Israel washing its hands of the place - but who will take on authority of keeping the peace and supplying it with power and water - Egypt? They don't want it either.
The fighting will stop. And we are left with an over-populated strip of land with minimal resources reliant on outside support. Israel won't support it, Egypt won't support it, so who will? And if nobody will do we accept that we need to resettle the people there who want to be resettled, and work on a plan to do so?
It isn't forced resettlement when the people being resettled want to be resettled. Israel bombed a refugee camp - these are people who do not want to be in Gaza.
According to the best polling available the vast majority of Gazans want to stay in Gaza and West Bank.
"The vast majority of Gazans surveyed—69 percent—said they have never considered leaving their homeland. This is a higher proportion than residents of Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Sudan, and Tunisia who were asked the same question. (For all of these countries, the most recent available data comes from Arab Barometer’s 2021–22 survey wave.)"
So what you are proposing is ethnic cleansing against the express will of the people concerned.
You may be happy with that, but most of us are not.
"Gaza and the West Bank". Not Gaza. The people in Gaza have largely not settled in Gaza - that's why they claim to be refugees and congregate in camps. And similar in the West Bank but less extreme.
You say they have never considered leaving their homeland. No, they claim to have been expelled from their homeland. Someone in the Rafa camp doesn't think they want to stay in a refugee camp in Rafa. They want to reclaim Israel.
Like I said, it isn't forced cleansing when the people consider themselves refugees and demand their repatriation.
They dream of returning to a mythical olive grove in central Israel that their great-grandfather sold for a few pennies in 1948 and is now a small city worth billions. It's not a viable proposition. The 'restoration' of populations and boundaries is a dangerous illusion. They need a route to a better future, not a better past.
The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line, Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.
"that their great-grandfather sold for a few pennies in 1948": that's a bizarre fantasy. Some land was bought by Zionists, but generally from absentee landlords, not the families who worked the land. And land sales didn't lead to refugees. That was war, including deliberate ethnic cleansing by Israeli forces.
That said, yes, your broader point is right that a solution today has to reflect the last three quarters of a century.
And that is the gazillion dollar question - how to create a solution that reflects the status quo whilst giving something worth having to the people who don't accept the status quo.
We could have got there decades ago if the regional powers had supported this. But instead we just get demands via diplomacy and war to redraw the boundaries in favour of a previously redrawn set of boundaries. But even today I am told that redrawing boundaries is bad. And yet that is all there is on offer...
Redrawing boundaries through military conquest is bad. Redrawing boundaries through a negotiated settlement is OK.
Good! So we should discount the Green Line and all of the other redrawn boundaries that weren't negotiated. Which leaves us back at the start - a large chunk of the former Ottoman Empire which we need to do two things with. Neither Israel nor Palestine - or their allies - can redraw the map to remove the other. Any lines need to be negotiated and settled, so whilst Israeli settlements will need to be removed (again), any Palestinian state will be as much of a compromise as the revised Israeli state.
As apparently I need to keep restating the point - nobody wants Gaza. The PLO/PA don't want it as it is, they want it as a borderless part of greater Palestine. Not on offer. Israel wants it no longer a threat and no longer there. Not on offer. The millions stuck in Gaza want to "go home" to the parts of Israel their ancestors used to live in. Not on offer.
So we need to do something new. There is no viable acceptable Status Quo Ante.
We are going round in circles somewhat.
Yes, we want a negotiated settlement, which may involve re-drawing the map.
Yes, the status quo ante is not sustainable.
But, no, you are wrong about Gaza. Most Gazans want to stay in Gaza. The PLO/PA know they aren’t getting a greater Palestine and they do want a Palestine close to the ‘67 borders and including Gaza.
I'm a little puzzled by your last point. The Palestinian authorities do not say that 2.2m want to stay in Gaza or anything close to that. They say how beautiful Gaza is and can be more so with peace, but they are very clear that the people who see themselves as refugees in Gaza want to return to their former homes elsewhere.
They have these large multi-generational refugee camps. If the intention was permanent settlement why haven't they done so? Nobody is proposing to remove everyone from Gaza, so of course some people will stay. But sizeable numbers do not want to be there. That's the entire purpose in this stupid war, to allow them to leave.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
3,648 children killed by the IDF since the 7th 2,290 women killed by the IDF since the 7th
Those like Cyclefree who oppose an immediate ceasefire are supporting the ongoing slaughter of Palestinian women and children in huge numbers, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
Europe does need to start having difficult conversations about its own security. This is another reason why it is nigh on inevitable that the UK is going to get closer and closer to the EU’s orbit again in coming years. The strengthening of the common defence and security policy is going to happen, and the UK is going to have to play a part, in one way or another.
It’s why I think Macron’s proposals of associate EU membership and a two speed Europe are so interesting. I believe there is going to be a fundamental shift in the EU’s priorities and position in the next decade, and it’s going to pull everyone in Europe in, whether they are keen on the idea or not.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
Most negotiated solutions involve a leap of faith to be made, even while there are people saying terrible things. We started talking to the IRA while the IRA was still active and calling the abolition of Northern Ireland.
A united Ireland is not an equivalent political demand to the abolition of the state of Israel.
If you transposed the outline of the GFA as a solution to the Israel/Palestine question it would obviously be unacceptable.
The lot up here are no better: 70 tons of documents shredded by venal, corrupt Sturgeon SNP regime…. @covidinquiryuk 😳 twitter.com/dj_forrester/s…
I wouldn't take that too literally without more info, given the 'tons'. It's quite normal to shred documents no longer required. Indeed, it was very much required when I were in a SG agency, as part of keeping the filing system organised. I did a great deal myself as part of a departmental reorganization/handover to a successor. Mostd of them were duplicates, drafts and stuff like job applications which contained personal data and were no longer required.
There are plenty of cheap services that automate scanning documents into searchable PDFs. And why is paper still being used?
In my company, everything is electronic. Most documentation is done on Confluence, which keeps a complete history - you *may think* you have deleted a page, but all you have done is updated the database to say it's dead. Compliance loves that.
They have printer/scanners but they are barely used.
I was getting rid of most of the paper and setting aside the useful records for attention! Very much a transition era. This was quite some years back, but within the current FOI(S) Act legislation, more or less.
A relative uses one of these services - he found in the end, that it is cheaper to chuck it all through the digitisation, rather than spend time filleting it.
It's no wonder junior cops behave so badly if this is the kind of leadership they get.
The problem is that it is the senior cops who are often the ones behaving badly.
Also how in God's name can it take 3 years, 3 years! to go through a disciplinary process?
I understand that police - Met and GMP - have been taking down pictures of the hostages that have been posted across neighbourhoods. GMP now seem to have done a volte face after an understandably angry response from the 'Jewish community'. It does pose the question though. Would they have stopped doing so had the hostages been native white Britons? Or simply because they realised they were upsetting another minority group?
I understand a man has been arrested for posting a video of a street draped with Palestinian flags and him complaining about it. The christian march planned through north London in support of Jews seems to be blocked by the police. At some point we are going to have to decide. Do we keep free expression in this country? Or is the sole priority to pacify those groups most likely to cause the most trouble/violence?
I would trust almost anyone on almost anything more than I would trust Corbyn. I am really not sure what this proves other than the membership of the Labour party were seriously deluded in voting that man leader twice. Its up there with the Tory membership thinking Liz Truss, or indeed IDS, were an answer to anything useful.
A lot to be said for returning the selection of the Leader to MPs. For both main parties.
This will be Brady’s greatest and most enduring legacy to the Conservative Party, if he pushes it through. A seemingly small act that could genuinely save it from extinction.
I think leaders of political parties should be elected by their members, even if it does produce un-electable nutcases. It is then up to the electors to decide if they want to be governed by a party who selected an idiot for leader.
HOWEVER if a party changes leader while in Government then that leader (Prime Minister) should be elected by the MPs. This prevents the members of that party picking an idiot whom the electors have not had an opportunity of rejecting.
Honestly, a change in PM - which will always come with a change in legslative agenda - should always result in a GE.
The public voted in Boris Johnson, and his 2019 manifesto. They did not vote in Liz Truss and her lower-sixth quasi-libertarian economics proposal (C-).
I don't disagree with that, but we don't have that so I was going with what parties should do with what we have.
I would trust almost anyone on almost anything more than I would trust Corbyn. I am really not sure what this proves other than the membership of the Labour party were seriously deluded in voting that man leader twice. Its up there with the Tory membership thinking Liz Truss, or indeed IDS, were an answer to anything useful.
A lot to be said for returning the selection of the Leader to MPs. For both main parties.
This will be Brady’s greatest and most enduring legacy to the Conservative Party, if he pushes it through. A seemingly small act that could genuinely save it from extinction.
I think leaders of political parties should be elected by their members, even if it does produce un-electable nutcases. It is then up to the electors to decide if they want to be governed by a party who selected an idiot for leader.
HOWEVER if a party changes leader while in Government then that leader (Prime Minister) should be elected by the MPs. This prevents the members of that party picking an idiot whom the electors have not had an opportunity of rejecting.
I disagree. You risk creating the same problem that the Brexit referendum created where there is a split mandate.
The lot up here are no better: 70 tons of documents shredded by venal, corrupt Sturgeon SNP regime…. @covidinquiryuk 😳 twitter.com/dj_forrester/s…
I wouldn't take that too literally without more info, given the 'tons'. It's quite normal to shred documents no longer required. Indeed, it was very much required when I were in a SG agency, as part of keeping the filing system organised. I did a great deal myself as part of a departmental reorganization/handover to a successor. Mostd of them were duplicates, drafts and stuff like job applications which contained personal data and were no longer required.
Carnyx, possible but this bunch of crooks have been at it for years , with no minutes, shredded notebooks, missing this , redacted that , I do not recall my chicanery, dodgy crown office etc. Place is a cesspit at present.
Europe does need to start having difficult conversations about its own security. This is another reason why it is nigh on inevitable that the UK is going to get closer and closer to the EU’s orbit again in coming years. The strengthening of the common defence and security policy is going to happen, and the UK is going to have to play a part, in one way or another.
It’s why I think Macron’s proposals of associate EU membership and a two speed Europe are so interesting. I believe there is going to be a fundamental shift in the EU’s priorities and position in the next decade, and it’s going to pull everyone in Europe in, whether they are keen on the idea or not.
On the contrary, having a relatively massive military power outside of the EU orbit and sclerotic discussion groups, is exactly what a Europe prepared to defend itself needs to have.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
Most negotiated solutions involve a leap of faith to be made, even while there are people saying terrible things. We started talking to the IRA while the IRA was still active and calling the abolition of Northern Ireland.
There are a thousand reasons not to trust the other side, but there’s no way out without doing so. I, sitting in my comfortable home in London, am not going to tell Israelis scarred by 7 October that they have to make that leap of faith today, nor am I going to tell Gazans being bombed that they have to make a leap of faith today. Those decisions are not ours to take. But we know the path that follows if everyone keeps finding reasons not to find peace.
Bolton: "near certain Trump will withdraw from NATO in his second term"
Is it, though? Or is this "art of the deal" stuff?
I find it hard to believe he wouldn't replace it with some new UK/EU/Canada - US agreement, rather than cut everyone else loose, because that would be crazy and create more cost and risk for the USA, not less.
It might be rather like how he superseded NAFTA with USMCA.
You still believe Trump's "art of the deal" shtick? LOL.
He does. The point is he might want to withdraw *from NATO* but that doesn't mean he wouldn't replace NATO with something else.
My guess is he'd replace NATO with USCEDA, or something similar - one where European responsibilities and spend were higher but the US could still lead/call it as much as possible.
I still think it's an extremely bad idea, by the way, and he's highly unpredictable, but my guess is there's more to it than just cut the cord.
Trump was right that the American focus is going to be increasingly on China rather than Russia, and that the Europeans need to learn how to defend themselves, rather than relying on Uncle Sam to always step up.
Most of the right-wing objections to Ukraine in the US are based on costs of the support vs local priorities, which appear to be no better than Hollywood Accounting from the White House and DoD.
Europe is going to need to do more and I also Trump is oversimplifying the US position a the same time.
We're moving to a multipolar world, not a switch in the unipolar one. What I mean by that is: the US will have to think about Asia-Pac security *and* European/Middle-East security on top, in future, rather than it before just being Russia and in the future it's just going to be China.
Europe contains nearly 500 million wealthy consumers who are, essentially, wedded to liberal democracy. It's massively in the US's strategic and commercial interests to ensure that part of the world remains secure.
They just want them to pull their weight a little bit more. They won't totally pull out.
Bolton: "near certain Trump will withdraw from NATO in his second term"
Is it, though? Or is this "art of the deal" stuff?
I find it hard to believe he wouldn't replace it with some new UK/EU/Canada - US agreement, rather than cut everyone else loose, because that would be crazy and create more cost and risk for the USA, not less.
It might be rather like how he superseded NAFTA with USMCA.
You still believe Trump's "art of the deal" shtick? LOL.
He does. The point is he might want to withdraw *from NATO* but that doesn't mean he wouldn't replace NATO with something else.
My guess is he'd replace NATO with USCEDA, or something similar - one where European responsibilities and spend were higher but the US could still lead/call it as much as possible.
I still think it's an extremely bad idea, by the way, and he's highly unpredictable, but my guess is there's more to it than just cut the cord.
Trump was right that the American focus is going to be increasingly on China rather than Russia, and that the Europeans need to learn how to defend themselves, rather than relying on Uncle Sam to always step up.
Most of the right-wing objections to Ukraine in the US are based on costs of the support vs local priorities, which appear to be no better than Hollywood Accounting from the White House and DoD.
Europe is going to need to do more and I also Trump is oversimplifying the US position a the same time.
We're moving to a multipolar world, not a switch in the unipolar one. What I mean by that is: the US will have to think about Asia-Pac security *and* European/Middle-East security on top, in future, rather than it before just being Russia and in the future it's just going to be China.
Europe contains nearly 500 million wealthy consumers who are, essentially, wedded to liberal democracy. It's massively in the US's strategic and commercial interests to ensure that part of the world remains secure.
They just want them to pull their weight a little bit more. They won't totally pull out.
It is of course quite arguable that a liberal democratic Europe of 500 million, including two nuclear powers, is in the best position of anyone in the world to look after its own security, from the moment it realises that it isn't anyone else's permanent job. Trump and what follows in the USA makes it clear that moment is now.
To make up the difference, I would guess that EU defence spending would need to be 6% for many years - not just 2%. Just to close the gap on the capability.
Imagine tripling the UK defence budget. Politically.
Issue would eb that they would sqander it on crap projects , if they were only to do something efficient we might have some decent kit.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
3,648 children killed by the IDF since the 7th 2,290 women killed by the IDF since the 7th
Those like Cyclefree who oppose an immediate ceasefire are supporting the ongoing slaughter of Palestinian women and children in huge numbers, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
I'd be delighted if we had an immediate ceasefire. This needs to stop. But by "this" I don't just mean the current actions in Gaza. The question immediately after the ceasefire is "what happens now". We aren't going to allow the extreme scenarios of either side. Israel isn't going to drive 2.2m into Egypt, Hamas isn't going to abolish Israel.
The problem at every iteration of this previously has been that peace is harder than war. Someone who isn't directly involved will need to guarantee a peace and so far we have had no takers, nor interest in compromise.
So if the ceasefire only immediately flips into another medieval slaughter by Hamas and another retaliation by the IDF, what is the point? We save these lives now. At the price of other lives then.
Israel exists. The Palestinian diaspora exists. The neighbouring states - some created a century ago and successful - exist. Forget all of the previous lines drawn on the map and find something new.
It's no wonder junior cops behave so badly if this is the kind of leadership they get.
The problem is that it is the senior cops who are often the ones behaving badly.
Also how in God's name can it take 3 years, 3 years! to go through a disciplinary process?
I understand that police - Met and GMP - have been taking down pictures of the hostages that have been posted across neighbourhoods. GMP now seem to have done a volte face after an understandably angry response from the 'Jewish community'. It does pose the question though. Would they have stopped doing so had the hostages been native white Britons? Or simply because they realised they were upsetting another minority group?
I understand a man has been arrested for posting a video of a street draped with Palestinian flags and him complaining about it. The christian march planned through north London in support of Jews seems to be blocked by the police. At some point we are going to have to decide. Do we keep free expression in this country? Or is the sole priority to pacify those groups most likely to cause the most trouble/violence?
Further...
The EDL was started after Sikh extremists threatened the opening of a play about Sikh culture in the UK.
The police stated that the play would provoke the community and they wouldn't provide security. The play was cancelled.
According to people involved with the EDL, some far right scum realised that if you could threaten violence, you could get stuff shut down. "We'd like some of that".
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
Yes, but these are not redrawn borders. Gaza and the West Bank are ""occupied Territories" neither part of Israel, nor independent states.
The people are not to be given equal rights with others by incorporating them into Israel, nor allowed to form a state. Hence no resolution.
Or are you arguing for the forced expulsion/extermination of all 2.2 million in Gaza and the 3.5 million in the West Bank?
They are redrawn borders - none of these borders existed previously. Show me Gaza as a strip on a map of the Ottoman Empire. Or the mandates drawn on the map post WWI?
Gaza is no different to other non-contiguous regions at the end of WWII which got redrawn. The question that needs to be asked isn't do we move 2.2m Gazans but do 2.2m Gazans want to stay there? Go and ask them - so many are not Gazan and do not see Gaza as any more than a refugee camp or prison.
Gaza does not work - for the Gazans, for the Isaraelis, for the Egyptians. Nobody. I suspect that a realistic outcome of this will be Israel washing its hands of the place - but who will take on authority of keeping the peace and supplying it with power and water - Egypt? They don't want it either.
The fighting will stop. And we are left with an over-populated strip of land with minimal resources reliant on outside support. Israel won't support it, Egypt won't support it, so who will? And if nobody will do we accept that we need to resettle the people there who want to be resettled, and work on a plan to do so?
It isn't forced resettlement when the people being resettled want to be resettled. Israel bombed a refugee camp - these are people who do not want to be in Gaza.
Gaza could work. Gaza does not work under current arrangements, i.e. Hamas rule and Israeli blockade.
A bit like Afghanistan I wonder how much could be solved by pure hard cash if we thought out of the box a bit.
2 million people, create a UBI of $10k per person dependent on peace, needs $20bn per year. Get $5bn each from Saudi and US, maybe $2bn from Israel, EU, UAE and the rest from others like the Turkey, Qatar, and the remainder of the G20.
Raise living standards for the average Joe and their desire for war and terror declines dramatically.
Wouldn’t this just end up as a repeat of the effects of oil money on the Arab Peninsular? That the money is going to come anyway so our society doesn’t have to be pragmatic and evolve.
It’s notable that the Arab nations only became properly interested in normalised relations with Israel once it looked like the push to a post oil world was going to hold.
Most of the middle east the money is not spread evenly.
With my suggestion a family of five getting $50k a year dependent on peace, living in the same block as some wannabee terrorists, are going to be actively grassing up those they cant persuade. And safe to do so because of safety in numbers from those dependent on that UBI cash.
What do you mean by "dependent on peace'? What's the qualifying criteria? How do you stop groups like Hamas and Islamic Jihad from extorting the money?
The day after the Hamas outrages:
"For years, Netanyahu propped up Hamas. Now it’s blown up in our faces "The premier’s policy of treating the terror group as a partner, at the expense of Abbas and Palestinian statehood, has resulted in wounds that will take Israel years to heal from"
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
3,648 children killed by the IDF since the 7th 2,290 women killed by the IDF since the 7th
Those like Cyclefree who oppose an immediate ceasefire are supporting the ongoing slaughter of Palestinian women and children in huge numbers, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
Those who oppose the immediate surrender of Hamas likewise.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
I would trust almost anyone on almost anything more than I would trust Corbyn. I am really not sure what this proves other than the membership of the Labour party were seriously deluded in voting that man leader twice. Its up there with the Tory membership thinking Liz Truss, or indeed IDS, were an answer to anything useful.
A lot to be said for returning the selection of the Leader to MPs. For both main parties.
This will be Brady’s greatest and most enduring legacy to the Conservative Party, if he pushes it through. A seemingly small act that could genuinely save it from extinction.
I think leaders of political parties should be elected by their members, even if it does produce un-electable nutcases. It is then up to the electors to decide if they want to be governed by a party who selected an idiot for leader.
HOWEVER if a party changes leader while in Government then that leader (Prime Minister) should be elected by the MPs. This prevents the members of that party picking an idiot whom the electors have not had an opportunity of rejecting.
And in a two-Party system, what if both Parties pick a nutjob?
That could never happen could it? I mean we would never have a choice between say Corbyn and Boris.
I'm doing my best with what we have got. I'm trying to minimise electing the nutjob, but I can't exclude it entirely in a 2 party system. As you probably know I am all for getting rid of the 2 party system. Baby steps.
So bearing in mind what we are stuck with, members elect leaders, but they don't elect PMs. Only the electorate do that by looking at the leaders the parties have selected and deciding at the polling station by voting for that party or not.
Bolton: "near certain Trump will withdraw from NATO in his second term"
Is it, though? Or is this "art of the deal" stuff?
I find it hard to believe he wouldn't replace it with some new UK/EU/Canada - US agreement, rather than cut everyone else loose, because that would be crazy and create more cost and risk for the USA, not less.
It might be rather like how he superseded NAFTA with USMCA.
You still believe Trump's "art of the deal" shtick? LOL.
He does. The point is he might want to withdraw *from NATO* but that doesn't mean he wouldn't replace NATO with something else.
My guess is he'd replace NATO with USCEDA, or something similar - one where European responsibilities and spend were higher but the US could still lead/call it as much as possible.
I still think it's an extremely bad idea, by the way, and he's highly unpredictable, but my guess is there's more to it than just cut the cord.
Trump was right that the American focus is going to be increasingly on China rather than Russia, and that the Europeans need to learn how to defend themselves, rather than relying on Uncle Sam to always step up.
Most of the right-wing objections to Ukraine in the US are based on costs of the support vs local priorities, which appear to be no better than Hollywood Accounting from the White House and DoD.
Europe is going to need to do more and I also Trump is oversimplifying the US position a the same time.
We're moving to a multipolar world, not a switch in the unipolar one. What I mean by that is: the US will have to think about Asia-Pac security *and* European/Middle-East security on top, in future, rather than it before just being Russia and in the future it's just going to be China.
Europe contains nearly 500 million wealthy consumers who are, essentially, wedded to liberal democracy. It's massively in the US's strategic and commercial interests to ensure that part of the world remains secure.
They just want them to pull their weight a little bit more. They won't totally pull out.
Bolton: "near certain Trump will withdraw from NATO in his second term"
Is it, though? Or is this "art of the deal" stuff?
I find it hard to believe he wouldn't replace it with some new UK/EU/Canada - US agreement, rather than cut everyone else loose, because that would be crazy and create more cost and risk for the USA, not less.
It might be rather like how he superseded NAFTA with USMCA.
You still believe Trump's "art of the deal" shtick? LOL.
He does. The point is he might want to withdraw *from NATO* but that doesn't mean he wouldn't replace NATO with something else.
My guess is he'd replace NATO with USCEDA, or something similar - one where European responsibilities and spend were higher but the US could still lead/call it as much as possible.
I still think it's an extremely bad idea, by the way, and he's highly unpredictable, but my guess is there's more to it than just cut the cord.
Trump was right that the American focus is going to be increasingly on China rather than Russia, and that the Europeans need to learn how to defend themselves, rather than relying on Uncle Sam to always step up.
Most of the right-wing objections to Ukraine in the US are based on costs of the support vs local priorities, which appear to be no better than Hollywood Accounting from the White House and DoD.
Europe is going to need to do more and I also Trump is oversimplifying the US position a the same time.
We're moving to a multipolar world, not a switch in the unipolar one. What I mean by that is: the US will have to think about Asia-Pac security *and* European/Middle-East security on top, in future, rather than it before just being Russia and in the future it's just going to be China.
Europe contains nearly 500 million wealthy consumers who are, essentially, wedded to liberal democracy. It's massively in the US's strategic and commercial interests to ensure that part of the world remains secure.
They just want them to pull their weight a little bit more. They won't totally pull out.
It is of course quite arguable that a liberal democratic Europe of 500 million, including two nuclear powers, is in the best position of anyone in the world to look after its own security, from the moment it realises that it isn't anyone else's permanent job. Trump and what follows in the USA makes it clear that moment is now.
To make up the difference, I would guess that EU defence spending would need to be 6% for many years - not just 2%. Just to close the gap on the capability.
Imagine tripling the UK defence budget. Politically.
Quite. To govern is to choose. Just suppose the choice was (a) relying on Trump and the Republican party for your defence or (b) tripling the defence budget.
BTW a fatal flaw from the inception of the EU was, has been and still is, the fact that 'ever closer union' closed its eyes to the fact that member states had incompatible defence policies. Ukraine has opened some, but not all, eyes to this anomaly - one which places the 500,000,000 citizens of the EU in a strange position.
I hate to be that person, but the Covid enquiry is starting to make me feel sorry for people I really don’t want to feel sorry for.
I get it, Boris was a bit of a twat (who knew!!?), people used some slightly edgy language that perhaps they shouldn’t, some people felt awkward or uncomfortable (the poor dears).
I share the slight concern that we seem to be fixating on minutiae of people’s comms, rather than the actual results that were coming out of government, and how those could be bettered.
It has emerged that Boris was saying what almost everyone I know was saying at the time
I remember when Lombardy locked down. It was shocking. To see something like that happen, although neither myself nor many people I knew were sure what we ought to do. The 'mayor from Jaws' responded with jingoistic arrogance, after all we had a plan. Some people's attitude to life involves similar mindless optimism but I don't think they are the majority actually.
I’d say most people had an internal dialogue going, one side of which was thinking things like Boris was saying, while the other was terrified of the virus. Nobody knew what the right answer was, except for those with Dunning Kruger.
By mid 2021 things were different. I think most were broadly happy with the government’s phased approach to opening up and at that point I think the zero Covid crew really started letting slip their inner authoritarians.
I found the partisan divide on Covid difficult because I am naturally both centre-left and anti-authoritarian. It was a relief in 2021 when the Lib Dems started rediscovering their liberal roots on this and calling out state overreach.
Both extremes went off the rails. The zero covidians became passive aggressive doom-mongers and the 'Barrington Declaration' tendency morphed into antivax covid denial. Or some of them did.
I would trust almost anyone on almost anything more than I would trust Corbyn. I am really not sure what this proves other than the membership of the Labour party were seriously deluded in voting that man leader twice. Its up there with the Tory membership thinking Liz Truss, or indeed IDS, were an answer to anything useful.
A lot to be said for returning the selection of the Leader to MPs. For both main parties.
This will be Brady’s greatest and most enduring legacy to the Conservative Party, if he pushes it through. A seemingly small act that could genuinely save it from extinction.
I think leaders of political parties should be elected by their members, even if it does produce un-electable nutcases. It is then up to the electors to decide if they want to be governed by a party who selected an idiot for leader.
HOWEVER if a party changes leader while in Government then that leader (Prime Minister) should be elected by the MPs. This prevents the members of that party picking an idiot whom the electors have not had an opportunity of rejecting.
Honestly, a change in PM - which will always come with a change in legslative agenda - should always result in a GE.
The public voted in Boris Johnson, and his 2019 manifesto. They did not vote in Liz Truss and her lower-sixth quasi-libertarian economics proposal (C-).
Mr Johnson only called a GE because the Brexit deadlock under Mrs May continued. Mrs May waited 10 months before holding an election and that was based on the polling in April 2017 If she knew she was going to loos MPs there is no way she would have called an election. Callaghan, Major, Brown and now Sunak all waited until their hand was forced.
I can see both sides on the question should a new prime minister have to call a GE in the next few months. If there were such a rule, it might mean that bad or past their time PMs won't be ousted for fear of a GE in the next few months.
Which is why Liz Truss should have called an election rather than resigning.
By the end her polling was so bad the tories would not have even been the opposition. That doesn't seem a good time to call an election.
Mary Elizabeth is daub-the-walls-with-shit crackers but not quite crackers enough to have an election with polling like that.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
Most negotiated solutions involve a leap of faith to be made, even while there are people saying terrible things. We started talking to the IRA while the IRA was still active and calling the abolition of Northern Ireland.
A united Ireland is not an equivalent political demand to the abolition of the state of Israel.
If you transposed the outline of the GFA as a solution to the Israel/Palestine question it would obviously be unacceptable.
Sinn Fein settled for less than a united Ireland. Hamas wont get an abolition of the State of Israel nor should it
Its called negotiation and compromise
Something an Israel backed by the West and Hamas are currently entrenched against.
If I understand your position You are supporting Israels right to say no and the status quo
Only a position where all sides are forced to negotiate in good faith will bring about a lasting peace from the river to the sea
Bolton: "near certain Trump will withdraw from NATO in his second term"
Is it, though? Or is this "art of the deal" stuff?
I find it hard to believe he wouldn't replace it with some new UK/EU/Canada - US agreement, rather than cut everyone else loose, because that would be crazy and create more cost and risk for the USA, not less.
It might be rather like how he superseded NAFTA with USMCA.
You still believe Trump's "art of the deal" shtick? LOL.
He does. The point is he might want to withdraw *from NATO* but that doesn't mean he wouldn't replace NATO with something else.
My guess is he'd replace NATO with USCEDA, or something similar - one where European responsibilities and spend were higher but the US could still lead/call it as much as possible.
I still think it's an extremely bad idea, by the way, and he's highly unpredictable, but my guess is there's more to it than just cut the cord.
Trump was right that the American focus is going to be increasingly on China rather than Russia, and that the Europeans need to learn how to defend themselves, rather than relying on Uncle Sam to always step up.
Most of the right-wing objections to Ukraine in the US are based on costs of the support vs local priorities, which appear to be no better than Hollywood Accounting from the White House and DoD.
Europe is going to need to do more and I also Trump is oversimplifying the US position a the same time.
We're moving to a multipolar world, not a switch in the unipolar one. What I mean by that is: the US will have to think about Asia-Pac security *and* European/Middle-East security on top, in future, rather than it before just being Russia and in the future it's just going to be China.
Europe contains nearly 500 million wealthy consumers who are, essentially, wedded to liberal democracy. It's massively in the US's strategic and commercial interests to ensure that part of the world remains secure.
They just want them to pull their weight a little bit more. They won't totally pull out.
Bolton: "near certain Trump will withdraw from NATO in his second term"
Is it, though? Or is this "art of the deal" stuff?
I find it hard to believe he wouldn't replace it with some new UK/EU/Canada - US agreement, rather than cut everyone else loose, because that would be crazy and create more cost and risk for the USA, not less.
It might be rather like how he superseded NAFTA with USMCA.
You still believe Trump's "art of the deal" shtick? LOL.
He does. The point is he might want to withdraw *from NATO* but that doesn't mean he wouldn't replace NATO with something else.
My guess is he'd replace NATO with USCEDA, or something similar - one where European responsibilities and spend were higher but the US could still lead/call it as much as possible.
I still think it's an extremely bad idea, by the way, and he's highly unpredictable, but my guess is there's more to it than just cut the cord.
Trump was right that the American focus is going to be increasingly on China rather than Russia, and that the Europeans need to learn how to defend themselves, rather than relying on Uncle Sam to always step up.
Most of the right-wing objections to Ukraine in the US are based on costs of the support vs local priorities, which appear to be no better than Hollywood Accounting from the White House and DoD.
Europe is going to need to do more and I also Trump is oversimplifying the US position a the same time.
We're moving to a multipolar world, not a switch in the unipolar one. What I mean by that is: the US will have to think about Asia-Pac security *and* European/Middle-East security on top, in future, rather than it before just being Russia and in the future it's just going to be China.
Europe contains nearly 500 million wealthy consumers who are, essentially, wedded to liberal democracy. It's massively in the US's strategic and commercial interests to ensure that part of the world remains secure.
They just want them to pull their weight a little bit more. They won't totally pull out.
It is of course quite arguable that a liberal democratic Europe of 500 million, including two nuclear powers, is in the best position of anyone in the world to look after its own security, from the moment it realises that it isn't anyone else's permanent job. Trump and what follows in the USA makes it clear that moment is now.
To make up the difference, I would guess that EU defence spending would need to be 6% for many years - not just 2%. Just to close the gap on the capability.
Imagine tripling the UK defence budget. Politically.
Quite. To govern is to choose. Just suppose the choice was (a) relying on Trump and the Republican party for your defence or (b) tripling the defence budget.
BTW a fatal flaw from the inception of the EU was, has been and still is, the fact that 'ever closer union' closed its eyes to the fact that member states had incompatible defence policies. Ukraine has opened some, but not all, eyes to this anomaly - one which places the 500,000,000 citizens of the EU in a strange position.
We may not get a choice - apart from
1) Retreat to "Trip line at the Fulda Gap, then blow up the world" 2) Triple the defence budget.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
Most negotiated solutions involve a leap of faith to be made, even while there are people saying terrible things. We started talking to the IRA while the IRA was still active and calling the abolition of Northern Ireland.
A united Ireland is not an equivalent political demand to the abolition of the state of Israel.
If you transposed the outline of the GFA as a solution to the Israel/Palestine question it would obviously be unacceptable.
Sinn Fein settled for less than a united Ireland. Hamas wont get an abolition of the State of Israel nor should it
Its called negotiation and compromise
Something an Israel backed by the West and Hamas are currently entrenched against.
If I understand your position You are supporting Israels right to say no and the status quo
Only a position where all sides are forced to negotiate in good faith will bring about a lasting peace from the river to the sea
I would trust almost anyone on almost anything more than I would trust Corbyn. I am really not sure what this proves other than the membership of the Labour party were seriously deluded in voting that man leader twice. Its up there with the Tory membership thinking Liz Truss, or indeed IDS, were an answer to anything useful.
A lot to be said for returning the selection of the Leader to MPs. For both main parties.
This will be Brady’s greatest and most enduring legacy to the Conservative Party, if he pushes it through. A seemingly small act that could genuinely save it from extinction.
I think leaders of political parties should be elected by their members, even if it does produce un-electable nutcases. It is then up to the electors to decide if they want to be governed by a party who selected an idiot for leader.
HOWEVER if a party changes leader while in Government then that leader (Prime Minister) should be elected by the MPs. This prevents the members of that party picking an idiot whom the electors have not had an opportunity of rejecting.
Honestly, a change in PM - which will always come with a change in legslative agenda - should always result in a GE.
The public voted in Boris Johnson, and his 2019 manifesto. They did not vote in Liz Truss and her lower-sixth quasi-libertarian economics proposal (C-).
Mr Johnson only called a GE because the Brexit deadlock under Mrs May continued. Mrs May waited 10 months before holding an election and that was based on the polling in April 2017 If she knew she was going to loos MPs there is no way she would have called an election. Callaghan, Major, Brown and now Sunak all waited until their hand was forced.
I can see both sides on the question should a new prime minister have to call a GE in the next few months. If there were such a rule, it might mean that bad or past their time PMs won't be ousted for fear of a GE in the next few months.
Which is why Liz Truss should have called an election rather than resigning.
In times past there was always an election after a sovereign died.
Parts of inland Sicily look like Gaza. Before the bombing, admittedly, but still
That is no exaggeration. The urban decay, ugliness and squalor is off the dial. And what’s with the litter EVERYWHERE. Mile after mile of graffiti and litter
Has anyone ever written a thesis on the psychology of littering? They should. It’s interesting. Why make your own home look a tiny bit worse. I wonder if it’s a basic IQ test? Or something else? A fundamental detachment from where you live? A sense that no one cares so why should you?
Seeing litter does make me fizz with hatred. In this country I suspect a lot of it is dirty schoolkids trying to look hard in front of their mates as they amble about at lunchtime. Seeing McDonalds packaging that has obviously been chucked out of a car window by someone driving through is another bugbear.
Flytipping enrages me. Probably more than pretty much anything else.
Rename it for the late Shane Warne, for the next decade. That way they only need to remove one letter, and can change it back once the woke bollocks has disappeared.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
Most negotiated solutions involve a leap of faith to be made, even while there are people saying terrible things. We started talking to the IRA while the IRA was still active and calling the abolition of Northern Ireland.
A united Ireland is not an equivalent political demand to the abolition of the state of Israel.
If you transposed the outline of the GFA as a solution to the Israel/Palestine question it would obviously be unacceptable.
Sinn Fein settled for less than a united Ireland. Hamas wont get an abolition of the State of Israel nor should it
Its called negotiation and compromise
Something an Israel backed by the West and Hamas are currently entrenched against.
If I understand your position You are supporting Israels right to say no and the status quo
Only a position where all sides are forced to negotiate in good faith will bring about a lasting peace from the river to the sea
Sinn Fein absolutely did not settle for less than a united Ireland. They settled for a process whereby they could eventually achieve it peacefully.
Europe does need to start having difficult conversations about its own security. This is another reason why it is nigh on inevitable that the UK is going to get closer and closer to the EU’s orbit again in coming years. The strengthening of the common defence and security policy is going to happen, and the UK is going to have to play a part, in one way or another.
It’s why I think Macron’s proposals of associate EU membership and a two speed Europe are so interesting. I believe there is going to be a fundamental shift in the EU’s priorities and position in the next decade, and it’s going to pull everyone in Europe in, whether they are keen on the idea or not.
On the contrary, having a relatively massive military power outside of the EU orbit and sclerotic discussion groups, is exactly what a Europe prepared to defend itself needs to have.
That in itself is going to require some form of security guarantees/integration however.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
3,648 children killed by the IDF since the 7th 2,290 women killed by the IDF since the 7th
Those like Cyclefree who oppose an immediate ceasefire are supporting the ongoing slaughter of Palestinian women and children in huge numbers, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
Those who oppose the immediate surrender of Hamas likewise.
"No surrender to the IRA" types are usually right wing Nutters who were usurped by the GFA by more sensible voices
No surrender will solve nothing.
Negotiation is the only way to end this.
Would you expect Ukraine to surrender to stop the innocent killing of Ukrainians or Putin to surrender to stop the killings of Russians
Meanwhile the death of innocent Palestinians at ever increasing rates is blood on the hands of Western Israel appeasing leaders
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
It's no wonder junior cops behave so badly if this is the kind of leadership they get.
The problem is that it is the senior cops who are often the ones behaving badly.
Also how in God's name can it take 3 years, 3 years! to go through a disciplinary process?
I'm writing a header on this kind of thing - the reaction to issues is more process. No interest is shown if the process helps. Just longer documents that no-one reads.
Parts of inland Sicily look like Gaza. Before the bombing, admittedly, but still
That is no exaggeration. The urban decay, ugliness and squalor is off the dial. And what’s with the litter EVERYWHERE. Mile after mile of graffiti and litter
Has anyone ever written a thesis on the psychology of littering? They should. It’s interesting. Why make your own home look a tiny bit worse. I wonder if it’s a basic IQ test? Or something else? A fundamental detachment from where you live? A sense that no one cares so why should you?
Seeing litter does make me fizz with hatred. In this country I suspect a lot of it is dirty schoolkids trying to look hard in front of their mates as they amble about at lunchtime. Seeing McDonalds packaging that has obviously been chucked out of a car window by someone driving through is another bugbear.
Flytipping enrages me. Probably more than pretty much anything else.
It's no wonder junior cops behave so badly if this is the kind of leadership they get.
The problem is that it is the senior cops who are often the ones behaving badly.
Also how in God's name can it take 3 years, 3 years! to go through a disciplinary process?
I understand that police - Met and GMP - have been taking down pictures of the hostages that have been posted across neighbourhoods. GMP now seem to have done a volte face after an understandably angry response from the 'Jewish community'. It does pose the question though. Would they have stopped doing so had the hostages been native white Britons? Or simply because they realised they were upsetting another minority group?
I understand a man has been arrested for posting a video of a street draped with Palestinian flags and him complaining about it. The christian march planned through north London in support of Jews seems to be blocked by the police. At some point we are going to have to decide. Do we keep free expression in this country? Or is the sole priority to pacify those groups most likely to cause the most trouble/violence?
Further...
The EDL was started after Sikh extremists threatened the opening of a play about Sikh culture in the UK.
The police stated that the play would provoke the community and they wouldn't provide security. The play was cancelled.
According to people involved with the EDL, some far right scum realised that if you could threaten violence, you could get stuff shut down. "We'd like some of that".
I wonder how many of the luvvies who signed open letters in support of the play and the playwright would, these days, coume down on the side of cancel culture.
I thought the EDL came about after an Islamic protest in Luton as its leading lights like Tommeh were well known within the local soccer "firm" called "Men In Gear", their reputation was so good they were commonly knows and "Men in Running Gear" to those interested in that sort of macho crap.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
Yes, but these are not redrawn borders. Gaza and the West Bank are ""occupied Territories" neither part of Israel, nor independent states.
The people are not to be given equal rights with others by incorporating them into Israel, nor allowed to form a state. Hence no resolution.
Or are you arguing for the forced expulsion/extermination of all 2.2 million in Gaza and the 3.5 million in the West Bank?
They are redrawn borders - none of these borders existed previously. Show me Gaza as a strip on a map of the Ottoman Empire. Or the mandates drawn on the map post WWI?
Gaza is no different to other non-contiguous regions at the end of WWII which got redrawn. The question that needs to be asked isn't do we move 2.2m Gazans but do 2.2m Gazans want to stay there? Go and ask them - so many are not Gazan and do not see Gaza as any more than a refugee camp or prison.
Gaza does not work - for the Gazans, for the Isaraelis, for the Egyptians. Nobody. I suspect that a realistic outcome of this will be Israel washing its hands of the place - but who will take on authority of keeping the peace and supplying it with power and water - Egypt? They don't want it either.
The fighting will stop. And we are left with an over-populated strip of land with minimal resources reliant on outside support. Israel won't support it, Egypt won't support it, so who will? And if nobody will do we accept that we need to resettle the people there who want to be resettled, and work on a plan to do so?
It isn't forced resettlement when the people being resettled want to be resettled. Israel bombed a refugee camp - these are people who do not want to be in Gaza.
According to the best polling available the vast majority of Gazans want to stay in Gaza and West Bank.
"The vast majority of Gazans surveyed—69 percent—said they have never considered leaving their homeland. This is a higher proportion than residents of Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Sudan, and Tunisia who were asked the same question. (For all of these countries, the most recent available data comes from Arab Barometer’s 2021–22 survey wave.)"
So what you are proposing is ethnic cleansing against the express will of the people concerned.
You may be happy with that, but most of us are not.
"Gaza and the West Bank". Not Gaza. The people in Gaza have largely not settled in Gaza - that's why they claim to be refugees and congregate in camps. And similar in the West Bank but less extreme.
You say they have never considered leaving their homeland. No, they claim to have been expelled from their homeland. Someone in the Rafa camp doesn't think they want to stay in a refugee camp in Rafa. They want to reclaim Israel.
Like I said, it isn't forced cleansing when the people consider themselves refugees and demand their repatriation.
They dream of returning to a mythical olive grove in central Israel that their great-grandfather sold for a few pennies in 1948 and is now a small city worth billions. It's not a viable proposition. The 'restoration' of populations and boundaries is a dangerous illusion. They need a route to a better future, not a better past.
The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line, Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.
"that their great-grandfather sold for a few pennies in 1948": that's a bizarre fantasy. Some land was bought by Zionists, but generally from absentee landlords, not the families who worked the land. And land sales didn't lead to refugees. That was war, including deliberate ethnic cleansing by Israeli forces.
That said, yes, your broader point is right that a solution today has to reflect the last three quarters of a century.
And that is the gazillion dollar question - how to create a solution that reflects the status quo whilst giving something worth having to the people who don't accept the status quo.
We could have got there decades ago if the regional powers had supported this. But instead we just get demands via diplomacy and war to redraw the boundaries in favour of a previously redrawn set of boundaries. But even today I am told that redrawing boundaries is bad. And yet that is all there is on offer...
Redrawing boundaries through military conquest is bad. Redrawing boundaries through a negotiated settlement is OK.
Good! So we should discount the Green Line and all of the other redrawn boundaries that weren't negotiated. Which leaves us back at the start - a large chunk of the former Ottoman Empire which we need to do two things with. Neither Israel nor Palestine - or their allies - can redraw the map to remove the other. Any lines need to be negotiated and settled, so whilst Israeli settlements will need to be removed (again), any Palestinian state will be as much of a compromise as the revised Israeli state.
As apparently I need to keep restating the point - nobody wants Gaza. The PLO/PA don't want it as it is, they want it as a borderless part of greater Palestine. Not on offer. Israel wants it no longer a threat and no longer there. Not on offer. The millions stuck in Gaza want to "go home" to the parts of Israel their ancestors used to live in. Not on offer.
So we need to do something new. There is no viable acceptable Status Quo Ante.
We are going round in circles somewhat.
Yes, we want a negotiated settlement, which may involve re-drawing the map.
Yes, the status quo ante is not sustainable.
But, no, you are wrong about Gaza. Most Gazans want to stay in Gaza. The PLO/PA know they aren’t getting a greater Palestine and they do want a Palestine close to the ‘67 borders and including Gaza.
I'm a little puzzled by your last point. The Palestinian authorities do not say that 2.2m want to stay in Gaza or anything close to that. They say how beautiful Gaza is and can be more so with peace, but they are very clear that the people who see themselves as refugees in Gaza want to return to their former homes elsewhere.
They have these large multi-generational refugee camps. If the intention was permanent settlement why haven't they done so? Nobody is proposing to remove everyone from Gaza, so of course some people will stay. But sizeable numbers do not want to be there. That's the entire purpose in this stupid war, to allow them to leave.
The right of return for those expelled in the Nakba has long been a Palestinian demand and various governments have deliberately not integrated the refugees because of a hope of achieving that, or perhaps more cynically so as to use them as a pawn in the wider dispute. However, that’s not “the entire purpose in this stupid war”. The establishment of a viable Palestinian state, with the removal of Israeli military occupation and blockade, is a more significant demand. Indeed, were there a deal offering a Palestinian state on the ‘67 borders, with zero Israeli military, but no right of return, I suspect the Palestinians would jump at that.
The people actually in the refugee camps in Gaza, who have mostly grown up there, are pining more for peace and prosperity than to go back to where their grandparents were expelled from.
Parts of inland Sicily look like Gaza. Before the bombing, admittedly, but still
That is no exaggeration. The urban decay, ugliness and squalor is off the dial. And what’s with the litter EVERYWHERE. Mile after mile of graffiti and litter
Has anyone ever written a thesis on the psychology of littering? They should. It’s interesting. Why make your own home look a tiny bit worse. I wonder if it’s a basic IQ test? Or something else? A fundamental detachment from where you live? A sense that no one cares so why should you?
Seeing litter does make me fizz with hatred. In this country I suspect a lot of it is dirty schoolkids trying to look hard in front of their mates as they amble about at lunchtime. Seeing McDonalds packaging that has obviously been chucked out of a car window by someone driving through is another bugbear.
Flytipping enrages me. Probably more than pretty much anything else.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
3,648 children killed by the IDF since the 7th 2,290 women killed by the IDF since the 7th
Those like Cyclefree who oppose an immediate ceasefire are supporting the ongoing slaughter of Palestinian women and children in huge numbers, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
Those who oppose the immediate surrender of Hamas likewise.
"No surrender to the IRA" types are usually right wing Nutters who were usurped by the GFA by more sensible voices
No surrender will solve nothing.
Negotiation is the only way to end this.
Would you expect Ukraine to surrender to stop the innocent killing of Ukrainians or Putin to surrender to stop the killings of Russians
Meanwhile the death of innocent Palestinians at ever increasing rates is blood on the hands of Western Israel appeasing leaders
It used to be a chant associated with soccer games and England matches, along with "two world wars and 1 world cup".
They also used to chant "no surrender to the Taliban" too.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
Yes, but these are not redrawn borders. Gaza and the West Bank are ""occupied Territories" neither part of Israel, nor independent states.
The people are not to be given equal rights with others by incorporating them into Israel, nor allowed to form a state. Hence no resolution.
Or are you arguing for the forced expulsion/extermination of all 2.2 million in Gaza and the 3.5 million in the West Bank?
They are redrawn borders - none of these borders existed previously. Show me Gaza as a strip on a map of the Ottoman Empire. Or the mandates drawn on the map post WWI?
Gaza is no different to other non-contiguous regions at the end of WWII which got redrawn. The question that needs to be asked isn't do we move 2.2m Gazans but do 2.2m Gazans want to stay there? Go and ask them - so many are not Gazan and do not see Gaza as any more than a refugee camp or prison.
Gaza does not work - for the Gazans, for the Isaraelis, for the Egyptians. Nobody. I suspect that a realistic outcome of this will be Israel washing its hands of the place - but who will take on authority of keeping the peace and supplying it with power and water - Egypt? They don't want it either.
The fighting will stop. And we are left with an over-populated strip of land with minimal resources reliant on outside support. Israel won't support it, Egypt won't support it, so who will? And if nobody will do we accept that we need to resettle the people there who want to be resettled, and work on a plan to do so?
It isn't forced resettlement when the people being resettled want to be resettled. Israel bombed a refugee camp - these are people who do not want to be in Gaza.
According to the best polling available the vast majority of Gazans want to stay in Gaza and West Bank.
"The vast majority of Gazans surveyed—69 percent—said they have never considered leaving their homeland. This is a higher proportion than residents of Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Sudan, and Tunisia who were asked the same question. (For all of these countries, the most recent available data comes from Arab Barometer’s 2021–22 survey wave.)"
So what you are proposing is ethnic cleansing against the express will of the people concerned.
You may be happy with that, but most of us are not.
"Gaza and the West Bank". Not Gaza. The people in Gaza have largely not settled in Gaza - that's why they claim to be refugees and congregate in camps. And similar in the West Bank but less extreme.
You say they have never considered leaving their homeland. No, they claim to have been expelled from their homeland. Someone in the Rafa camp doesn't think they want to stay in a refugee camp in Rafa. They want to reclaim Israel.
Like I said, it isn't forced cleansing when the people consider themselves refugees and demand their repatriation.
They dream of returning to a mythical olive grove in central Israel that their great-grandfather sold for a few pennies in 1948 and is now a small city worth billions. It's not a viable proposition. The 'restoration' of populations and boundaries is a dangerous illusion. They need a route to a better future, not a better past.
The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line, Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.
You could have said the same of the Zionists a century ago.
Hamas and RP have essentially the same policy, albeit in the mirror. Forcible redrawing of boundaries and mass expulsions/extermination of a population at gunpoint.
That is pretty seriously defamatory of @RochdalePioneers. Hamas has explicitly said that they will continue to do massacres like the October 7 massacre until Israel is destroyed. Those massacres and the accompanying torture and rapes were depraved in their barbarity and sadism.
@Rochdale Pioneers has nowhere advocated anything remotely similar.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
I was struck by the phrase: We Are Victims - Everything We Do Is Justified.
That's both sides of every argument in Palestine since I can recall.
Every civil war, as well.
Historically, there is a tradition of
1) We are the Victims. 2) We are on the brink of defeat. 3) We need to do X just to survive.
Totalitarian regimes love this one - they are always fighting with their heels over a precipice, being pushed back by The Enemy. At least in their internal propaganda.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
Most negotiated solutions involve a leap of faith to be made, even while there are people saying terrible things. We started talking to the IRA while the IRA was still active and calling the abolition of Northern Ireland.
There are a thousand reasons not to trust the other side, but there’s no way out without doing so. I, sitting in my comfortable home in London, am not going to tell Israelis scarred by 7 October that they have to make that leap of faith today, nor am I going to tell Gazans being bombed that they have to make a leap of faith today. Those decisions are not ours to take. But we know the path that follows if everyone keeps finding reasons not to find peace.
Civilians killed / missing in Israel and Palestine (7th-31st October): Totals Palestine: 10,525 (91%) Israel: 1,073 (9%)
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
Most negotiated solutions involve a leap of faith to be made, even while there are people saying terrible things. We started talking to the IRA while the IRA was still active and calling the abolition of Northern Ireland.
A united Ireland is not an equivalent political demand to the abolition of the state of Israel.
If you transposed the outline of the GFA as a solution to the Israel/Palestine question it would obviously be unacceptable.
It’s not a perfect match, no.
I find all these calls for UK politicians and others to say this or that on what’s going on in Gaza rather pointless. As if Benjamin Netanyahu is going to decide what to do based on what Keir Starmer says, or what my local trade union branch says!
So, what can we do instead of these performative pronouncements? We can offer our experience, of how we resolved what was once the terrorism hotspot of Europe. It doesn’t match Israel/Palestine in every way possible. Of course it doesn’t. It’s a longer running dispute, but one that has seen fewer wars fought over it. But it is something we can offer.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
Yes, but these are not redrawn borders. Gaza and the West Bank are ""occupied Territories" neither part of Israel, nor independent states.
The people are not to be given equal rights with others by incorporating them into Israel, nor allowed to form a state. Hence no resolution.
Or are you arguing for the forced expulsion/extermination of all 2.2 million in Gaza and the 3.5 million in the West Bank?
They are redrawn borders - none of these borders existed previously. Show me Gaza as a strip on a map of the Ottoman Empire. Or the mandates drawn on the map post WWI?
Gaza is no different to other non-contiguous regions at the end of WWII which got redrawn. The question that needs to be asked isn't do we move 2.2m Gazans but do 2.2m Gazans want to stay there? Go and ask them - so many are not Gazan and do not see Gaza as any more than a refugee camp or prison.
Gaza does not work - for the Gazans, for the Isaraelis, for the Egyptians. Nobody. I suspect that a realistic outcome of this will be Israel washing its hands of the place - but who will take on authority of keeping the peace and supplying it with power and water - Egypt? They don't want it either.
The fighting will stop. And we are left with an over-populated strip of land with minimal resources reliant on outside support. Israel won't support it, Egypt won't support it, so who will? And if nobody will do we accept that we need to resettle the people there who want to be resettled, and work on a plan to do so?
It isn't forced resettlement when the people being resettled want to be resettled. Israel bombed a refugee camp - these are people who do not want to be in Gaza.
According to the best polling available the vast majority of Gazans want to stay in Gaza and West Bank.
"The vast majority of Gazans surveyed—69 percent—said they have never considered leaving their homeland. This is a higher proportion than residents of Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Sudan, and Tunisia who were asked the same question. (For all of these countries, the most recent available data comes from Arab Barometer’s 2021–22 survey wave.)"
So what you are proposing is ethnic cleansing against the express will of the people concerned.
You may be happy with that, but most of us are not.
"Gaza and the West Bank". Not Gaza. The people in Gaza have largely not settled in Gaza - that's why they claim to be refugees and congregate in camps. And similar in the West Bank but less extreme.
You say they have never considered leaving their homeland. No, they claim to have been expelled from their homeland. Someone in the Rafa camp doesn't think they want to stay in a refugee camp in Rafa. They want to reclaim Israel.
Like I said, it isn't forced cleansing when the people consider themselves refugees and demand their repatriation.
They dream of returning to a mythical olive grove in central Israel that their great-grandfather sold for a few pennies in 1948 and is now a small city worth billions. It's not a viable proposition. The 'restoration' of populations and boundaries is a dangerous illusion. They need a route to a better future, not a better past.
The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line, Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.
You could have said the same of the Zionists a century ago.
Hamas and RP have essentially the same policy, albeit in the mirror. Forcible redrawing of boundaries and mass expulsions/extermination of a population at gunpoint.
That is pretty seriously defamatory of @RochdalePioneers. Hamas has explicitly said that they will continue to do massacres like the October 7 massacre until Israel is destroyed. Those massacres and the accompanying torture and rapes were depraved in their barbarity and sadism.
@Rochdale Pioneers has nowhere advocated anything remotely similar.
Even if it is defamatory what would he be likely to benefit in any legal action ?
I doubt many people know who he is in real life aside from his work which seems to be involved in running a haulage outfit delivering fruit and veg to Supermarkets. Similar to what Gregg Wallace used to do.
Can something damage someones reputation if you do not know, or most of the audience does not know, who they are ?
It's no wonder junior cops behave so badly if this is the kind of leadership they get.
The problem is that it is the senior cops who are often the ones behaving badly.
Also how in God's name can it take 3 years, 3 years! to go through a disciplinary process?
I understand that police - Met and GMP - have been taking down pictures of the hostages that have been posted across neighbourhoods. GMP now seem to have done a volte face after an understandably angry response from the 'Jewish community'. It does pose the question though. Would they have stopped doing so had the hostages been native white Britons? Or simply because they realised they were upsetting another minority group?
I understand a man has been arrested for posting a video of a street draped with Palestinian flags and him complaining about it. The christian march planned through north London in support of Jews seems to be blocked by the police. At some point we are going to have to decide. Do we keep free expression in this country? Or is the sole priority to pacify those groups most likely to cause the most trouble/violence?
Choice has already been made when Parliament passed the most recent Policing Act that gave the police wide powers to stop protests.
A lot of people were fine about it when they thought the powers were necessary to stop protests that annoyed them - such as those by XR, or Just Stop Oil - but they were warned at the time that the powers would be used more widely than that.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
Yes, but these are not redrawn borders. Gaza and the West Bank are ""occupied Territories" neither part of Israel, nor independent states.
The people are not to be given equal rights with others by incorporating them into Israel, nor allowed to form a state. Hence no resolution.
Or are you arguing for the forced expulsion/extermination of all 2.2 million in Gaza and the 3.5 million in the West Bank?
They are redrawn borders - none of these borders existed previously. Show me Gaza as a strip on a map of the Ottoman Empire. Or the mandates drawn on the map post WWI?
Gaza is no different to other non-contiguous regions at the end of WWII which got redrawn. The question that needs to be asked isn't do we move 2.2m Gazans but do 2.2m Gazans want to stay there? Go and ask them - so many are not Gazan and do not see Gaza as any more than a refugee camp or prison.
Gaza does not work - for the Gazans, for the Isaraelis, for the Egyptians. Nobody. I suspect that a realistic outcome of this will be Israel washing its hands of the place - but who will take on authority of keeping the peace and supplying it with power and water - Egypt? They don't want it either.
The fighting will stop. And we are left with an over-populated strip of land with minimal resources reliant on outside support. Israel won't support it, Egypt won't support it, so who will? And if nobody will do we accept that we need to resettle the people there who want to be resettled, and work on a plan to do so?
It isn't forced resettlement when the people being resettled want to be resettled. Israel bombed a refugee camp - these are people who do not want to be in Gaza.
According to the best polling available the vast majority of Gazans want to stay in Gaza and West Bank.
"The vast majority of Gazans surveyed—69 percent—said they have never considered leaving their homeland. This is a higher proportion than residents of Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Sudan, and Tunisia who were asked the same question. (For all of these countries, the most recent available data comes from Arab Barometer’s 2021–22 survey wave.)"
So what you are proposing is ethnic cleansing against the express will of the people concerned.
You may be happy with that, but most of us are not.
"Gaza and the West Bank". Not Gaza. The people in Gaza have largely not settled in Gaza - that's why they claim to be refugees and congregate in camps. And similar in the West Bank but less extreme.
You say they have never considered leaving their homeland. No, they claim to have been expelled from their homeland. Someone in the Rafa camp doesn't think they want to stay in a refugee camp in Rafa. They want to reclaim Israel.
Like I said, it isn't forced cleansing when the people consider themselves refugees and demand their repatriation.
They dream of returning to a mythical olive grove in central Israel that their great-grandfather sold for a few pennies in 1948 and is now a small city worth billions. It's not a viable proposition. The 'restoration' of populations and boundaries is a dangerous illusion. They need a route to a better future, not a better past.
The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line, Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.
You could have said the same of the Zionists a century ago.
Hamas and RP have essentially the same policy, albeit in the mirror. Forcible redrawing of boundaries and mass expulsions/extermination of a population at gunpoint.
That is pretty seriously defamatory of @RochdalePioneers. Hamas has explicitly said that they will continue to do massacres like the October 7 massacre until Israel is destroyed. Those massacres and the accompanying torture and rapes were depraved in their barbarity and sadism.
@Rochdale Pioneers has nowhere advocated anything remotely similar.
Tangental - But can an anonymous internet username be defamed?
I would trust almost anyone on almost anything more than I would trust Corbyn. I am really not sure what this proves other than the membership of the Labour party were seriously deluded in voting that man leader twice. Its up there with the Tory membership thinking Liz Truss, or indeed IDS, were an answer to anything useful.
A lot to be said for returning the selection of the Leader to MPs. For both main parties.
This will be Brady’s greatest and most enduring legacy to the Conservative Party, if he pushes it through. A seemingly small act that could genuinely save it from extinction.
I think leaders of political parties should be elected by their members, even if it does produce un-electable nutcases. It is then up to the electors to decide if they want to be governed by a party who selected an idiot for leader.
HOWEVER if a party changes leader while in Government then that leader (Prime Minister) should be elected by the MPs. This prevents the members of that party picking an idiot whom the electors have not had an opportunity of rejecting.
I disagree. You risk creating the same problem that the Brexit referendum created where there is a split mandate.
Not following. What do you think should happen?
The MPs have to choose because the British constitution ultimately gives MPs the power to select the PM (and decide policy). Having a policy (like Brexit) imposed on MPs was incredibly problematic, as would having a PM imposed on MPs, contrary to their judgement.
So I think that having party memberships choose leaders, and by extension PMs, risks creating the same problems that holding a referendum for a change you don't want to implement did. A split mandate and therefore dysfunction.
It's no wonder junior cops behave so badly if this is the kind of leadership they get.
The problem is that it is the senior cops who are often the ones behaving badly.
Also how in God's name can it take 3 years, 3 years! to go through a disciplinary process?
I understand that police - Met and GMP - have been taking down pictures of the hostages that have been posted across neighbourhoods. GMP now seem to have done a volte face after an understandably angry response from the 'Jewish community'. It does pose the question though. Would they have stopped doing so had the hostages been native white Britons? Or simply because they realised they were upsetting another minority group?
I understand a man has been arrested for posting a video of a street draped with Palestinian flags and him complaining about it. The christian march planned through north London in support of Jews seems to be blocked by the police. At some point we are going to have to decide. Do we keep free expression in this country? Or is the sole priority to pacify those groups most likely to cause the most trouble/violence?
Further...
The EDL was started after Sikh extremists threatened the opening of a play about Sikh culture in the UK.
The police stated that the play would provoke the community and they wouldn't provide security. The play was cancelled.
According to people involved with the EDL, some far right scum realised that if you could threaten violence, you could get stuff shut down. "We'd like some of that".
I wonder how many of the luvvies who signed open letters in support of the play and the playwright would, these days, coume down on the side of cancel culture.
I thought the EDL came about after an Islamic protest in Luton as its leading lights like Tommeh were well known within the local soccer "firm" called "Men In Gear", their reputation was so good they were commonly knows and "Men in Running Gear" to those interested in that sort of macho crap.
Quite a few progressive types agreed with the cancelling of the play - Community Sensitivities etc.
The playwright was a lady from the Sikh community, incidentally.
Thomas Sowell made the point that we live, increasingly, in a world where people are held responsible for the actions of distant ancestors, but not for their own.
Lords is a target because it's seen to be posh and the home of Englishness, it's therefore a symbol that needs to be attacked.
Note the ECB commissioned report (they approached the usual suspects and shouldn't be surprised they got the usual answer) that said cricket was laced with prejudice from top to bottom, and honed in on the Eton v. Harrow match in particular - rather than the far bigger issue of grassroots cricket and playing fields.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
3,648 children killed by the IDF since the 7th 2,290 women killed by the IDF since the 7th
Those like Cyclefree who oppose an immediate ceasefire are supporting the ongoing slaughter of Palestinian women and children in huge numbers, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
Withdraw that remark. It is seriously defamatory. I have said from the start that (a) I am against a Gaza invasion; (b) civilians should be allowed to leave; (c) there should be a pause to allow humanitarian aid.
It's no wonder junior cops behave so badly if this is the kind of leadership they get.
The problem is that it is the senior cops who are often the ones behaving badly.
Also how in God's name can it take 3 years, 3 years! to go through a disciplinary process?
I understand that police - Met and GMP - have been taking down pictures of the hostages that have been posted across neighbourhoods. GMP now seem to have done a volte face after an understandably angry response from the 'Jewish community'. It does pose the question though. Would they have stopped doing so had the hostages been native white Britons? Or simply because they realised they were upsetting another minority group?
I understand a man has been arrested for posting a video of a street draped with Palestinian flags and him complaining about it. The christian march planned through north London in support of Jews seems to be blocked by the police. At some point we are going to have to decide. Do we keep free expression in this country? Or is the sole priority to pacify those groups most likely to cause the most trouble/violence?
Choice has already been made when Parliament passed the most recent Policing Act that gave the police wide powers to stop protests.
A lot of people were fine about it when they thought the powers were necessary to stop protests that annoyed them - such as those by XR, or Just Stop Oil - but they were warned at the time that the powers would be used more widely than that.
The leopards eating faces party always always ends up being pretty undiscriminating about whose faces it eats.
I do wish people who post ‘I understand’ and ‘seems to be’ about things they find outrageous would post links so it can be verified just how justified their outrage is.
It's no wonder junior cops behave so badly if this is the kind of leadership they get.
The problem is that it is the senior cops who are often the ones behaving badly.
Also how in God's name can it take 3 years, 3 years! to go through a disciplinary process?
I understand that police - Met and GMP - have been taking down pictures of the hostages that have been posted across neighbourhoods. GMP now seem to have done a volte face after an understandably angry response from the 'Jewish community'. It does pose the question though. Would they have stopped doing so had the hostages been native white Britons? Or simply because they realised they were upsetting another minority group?
I understand a man has been arrested for posting a video of a street draped with Palestinian flags and him complaining about it. The christian march planned through north London in support of Jews seems to be blocked by the police. At some point we are going to have to decide. Do we keep free expression in this country? Or is the sole priority to pacify those groups most likely to cause the most trouble/violence?
Choice has already been made when Parliament passed the most recent Policing Act that gave the police wide powers to stop protests.
A lot of people were fine about it when they thought the powers were necessary to stop protests that annoyed them - such as those by XR, or Just Stop Oil - but they were warned at the time that the powers would be used more widely than that.
Sorry but this is apples and pears. The point about XR and Just Stop Oil is that they cause widespread disruption. So whilst people have the right to protest, what if they are playing havoc with other peoples' lives as a result?
The police have not made any attempt to stop the pro Palestine marches but nonetheless won't allow Christians to march in support of Jews. Sadly we now seem to be in a position where the least tolerant don't have to put up with anything they don't like but the most tolerant do.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
3,648 children killed by the IDF since the 7th 2,290 women killed by the IDF since the 7th
Those like Cyclefree who oppose an immediate ceasefire are supporting the ongoing slaughter of Palestinian women and children in huge numbers, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
Those who oppose the immediate surrender of Hamas likewise.
That puts it perfectly. A ceasefire is entirely within Hamas's gift. All they have to do is to release the hostages and stop firing at Israel; the Israeli government would then be under intense immediate pressure from Western governments, and almost certainly would follow suit. Hamas has no interest in doing so, it seems, and the people of Gaza don't seem to be rising up in numbers against them to force them to do so.
That's a shame, as then attention could move on to how detrimental the Netanyahu government's policies are for long term peace, especially by supporting the nutter settlers in the West Bank.
Parts of inland Sicily look like Gaza. Before the bombing, admittedly, but still
That is no exaggeration. The urban decay, ugliness and squalor is off the dial. And what’s with the litter EVERYWHERE. Mile after mile of graffiti and litter
Has anyone ever written a thesis on the psychology of littering? They should. It’s interesting. Why make your own home look a tiny bit worse. I wonder if it’s a basic IQ test? Or something else? A fundamental detachment from where you live? A sense that no one cares so why should you?
Seeing litter does make me fizz with hatred. In this country I suspect a lot of it is dirty schoolkids trying to look hard in front of their mates as they amble about at lunchtime. Seeing McDonalds packaging that has obviously been chucked out of a car window by someone driving through is another bugbear.
Flytipping enrages me. Probably more than pretty much anything else.
Keep clear of the A13 then.
Chap my father knew made a fortune running a tip beside the A13. Long time ago, though.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
3,648 children killed by the IDF since the 7th 2,290 women killed by the IDF since the 7th
Those like Cyclefree who oppose an immediate ceasefire are supporting the ongoing slaughter of Palestinian women and children in huge numbers, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
Those who oppose the immediate surrender of Hamas likewise.
"No surrender to the IRA" types are usually right wing Nutters who were usurped by the GFA by more sensible voices
No surrender will solve nothing.
Negotiation is the only way to end this.
Would you expect Ukraine to surrender to stop the innocent killing of Ukrainians or Putin to surrender to stop the killings of Russians
Meanwhile the death of innocent Palestinians at ever increasing rates is blood on the hands of Western Israel appeasing leaders
Not any more than I would expect Israel to surrender to stop the killing of innocent Israelis.
Parts of inland Sicily look like Gaza. Before the bombing, admittedly, but still
That is no exaggeration. The urban decay, ugliness and squalor is off the dial. And what’s with the litter EVERYWHERE. Mile after mile of graffiti and litter
Has anyone ever written a thesis on the psychology of littering? They should. It’s interesting. Why make your own home look a tiny bit worse. I wonder if it’s a basic IQ test? Or something else? A fundamental detachment from where you live? A sense that no one cares so why should you?
Seeing litter does make me fizz with hatred. In this country I suspect a lot of it is dirty schoolkids trying to look hard in front of their mates as they amble about at lunchtime. Seeing McDonalds packaging that has obviously been chucked out of a car window by someone driving through is another bugbear.
Flytipping enrages me. Probably more than pretty much anything else.
Keep clear of the A13 then.
Ha ha I used to literally live on the A13.
I've walked the full length of the A13 from Aldgate to Shoeburyness.
Parts of inland Sicily look like Gaza. Before the bombing, admittedly, but still
That is no exaggeration. The urban decay, ugliness and squalor is off the dial. And what’s with the litter EVERYWHERE. Mile after mile of graffiti and litter
Has anyone ever written a thesis on the psychology of littering? They should. It’s interesting. Why make your own home look a tiny bit worse. I wonder if it’s a basic IQ test? Or something else? A fundamental detachment from where you live? A sense that no one cares so why should you?
Seeing litter does make me fizz with hatred. In this country I suspect a lot of it is dirty schoolkids trying to look hard in front of their mates as they amble about at lunchtime. Seeing McDonalds packaging that has obviously been chucked out of a car window by someone driving through is another bugbear.
Flytipping enrages me. Probably more than pretty much anything else.
Keep clear of the A13 then.
Chap my father knew made a fortune running a tip beside the A13. Long time ago, though.
It's no wonder junior cops behave so badly if this is the kind of leadership they get.
The problem is that it is the senior cops who are often the ones behaving badly.
Also how in God's name can it take 3 years, 3 years! to go through a disciplinary process?
I understand that police - Met and GMP - have been taking down pictures of the hostages that have been posted across neighbourhoods. GMP now seem to have done a volte face after an understandably angry response from the 'Jewish community'. It does pose the question though. Would they have stopped doing so had the hostages been native white Britons? Or simply because they realised they were upsetting another minority group?
I understand a man has been arrested for posting a video of a street draped with Palestinian flags and him complaining about it. The christian march planned through north London in support of Jews seems to be blocked by the police. At some point we are going to have to decide. Do we keep free expression in this country? Or is the sole priority to pacify those groups most likely to cause the most trouble/violence?
Choice has already been made when Parliament passed the most recent Policing Act that gave the police wide powers to stop protests.
A lot of people were fine about it when they thought the powers were necessary to stop protests that annoyed them - such as those by XR, or Just Stop Oil - but they were warned at the time that the powers would be used more widely than that.
The leopards eating faces party always always ends up being pretty undiscriminating about whose faces it eats. .
The "recycling tired cliches" party is alive and kicking here.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
Yes, but these are not redrawn borders. Gaza and the West Bank are ""occupied Territories" neither part of Israel, nor independent states.
The people are not to be given equal rights with others by incorporating them into Israel, nor allowed to form a state. Hence no resolution.
Or are you arguing for the forced expulsion/extermination of all 2.2 million in Gaza and the 3.5 million in the West Bank?
They are redrawn borders - none of these borders existed previously. Show me Gaza as a strip on a map of the Ottoman Empire. Or the mandates drawn on the map post WWI?
Gaza is no different to other non-contiguous regions at the end of WWII which got redrawn. The question that needs to be asked isn't do we move 2.2m Gazans but do 2.2m Gazans want to stay there? Go and ask them - so many are not Gazan and do not see Gaza as any more than a refugee camp or prison.
Gaza does not work - for the Gazans, for the Isaraelis, for the Egyptians. Nobody. I suspect that a realistic outcome of this will be Israel washing its hands of the place - but who will take on authority of keeping the peace and supplying it with power and water - Egypt? They don't want it either.
The fighting will stop. And we are left with an over-populated strip of land with minimal resources reliant on outside support. Israel won't support it, Egypt won't support it, so who will? And if nobody will do we accept that we need to resettle the people there who want to be resettled, and work on a plan to do so?
It isn't forced resettlement when the people being resettled want to be resettled. Israel bombed a refugee camp - these are people who do not want to be in Gaza.
According to the best polling available the vast majority of Gazans want to stay in Gaza and West Bank.
"The vast majority of Gazans surveyed—69 percent—said they have never considered leaving their homeland. This is a higher proportion than residents of Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Sudan, and Tunisia who were asked the same question. (For all of these countries, the most recent available data comes from Arab Barometer’s 2021–22 survey wave.)"
So what you are proposing is ethnic cleansing against the express will of the people concerned.
You may be happy with that, but most of us are not.
"Gaza and the West Bank". Not Gaza. The people in Gaza have largely not settled in Gaza - that's why they claim to be refugees and congregate in camps. And similar in the West Bank but less extreme.
You say they have never considered leaving their homeland. No, they claim to have been expelled from their homeland. Someone in the Rafa camp doesn't think they want to stay in a refugee camp in Rafa. They want to reclaim Israel.
Like I said, it isn't forced cleansing when the people consider themselves refugees and demand their repatriation.
They dream of returning to a mythical olive grove in central Israel that their great-grandfather sold for a few pennies in 1948 and is now a small city worth billions. It's not a viable proposition. The 'restoration' of populations and boundaries is a dangerous illusion. They need a route to a better future, not a better past.
The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line, Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.
"that their great-grandfather sold for a few pennies in 1948": that's a bizarre fantasy. Some land was bought by Zionists, but generally from absentee landlords, not the families who worked the land. And land sales didn't lead to refugees. That was war, including deliberate ethnic cleansing by Israeli forces.
That said, yes, your broader point is right that a solution today has to reflect the last three quarters of a century.
And that is the gazillion dollar question - how to create a solution that reflects the status quo whilst giving something worth having to the people who don't accept the status quo.
We could have got there decades ago if the regional powers had supported this. But instead we just get demands via diplomacy and war to redraw the boundaries in favour of a previously redrawn set of boundaries. But even today I am told that redrawing boundaries is bad. And yet that is all there is on offer...
Redrawing boundaries through military conquest is bad. Redrawing boundaries through a negotiated settlement is OK.
Good! So we should discount the Green Line and all of the other redrawn boundaries that weren't negotiated. Which leaves us back at the start - a large chunk of the former Ottoman Empire which we need to do two things with. Neither Israel nor Palestine - or their allies - can redraw the map to remove the other. Any lines need to be negotiated and settled, so whilst Israeli settlements will need to be removed (again), any Palestinian state will be as much of a compromise as the revised Israeli state.
As apparently I need to keep restating the point - nobody wants Gaza. The PLO/PA don't want it as it is, they want it as a borderless part of greater Palestine. Not on offer. Israel wants it no longer a threat and no longer there. Not on offer. The millions stuck in Gaza want to "go home" to the parts of Israel their ancestors used to live in. Not on offer.
So we need to do something new. There is no viable acceptable Status Quo Ante.
We are going round in circles somewhat.
Yes, we want a negotiated settlement, which may involve re-drawing the map.
Yes, the status quo ante is not sustainable.
But, no, you are wrong about Gaza. Most Gazans want to stay in Gaza. The PLO/PA know they aren’t getting a greater Palestine and they do want a Palestine close to the ‘67 borders and including Gaza.
I'm a little puzzled by your last point. The Palestinian authorities do not say that 2.2m want to stay in Gaza or anything close to that. They say how beautiful Gaza is and can be more so with peace, but they are very clear that the people who see themselves as refugees in Gaza want to return to their former homes elsewhere.
They have these large multi-generational refugee camps. If the intention was permanent settlement why haven't they done so? Nobody is proposing to remove everyone from Gaza, so of course some people will stay. But sizeable numbers do not want to be there. That's the entire purpose in this stupid war, to allow them to leave.
The right of return for those expelled in the Nakba has long been a Palestinian demand and various governments have deliberately not integrated the refugees because of a hope of achieving that, or perhaps more cynically so as to use them as a pawn in the wider dispute. However, that’s not “the entire purpose in this stupid war”. The establishment of a viable Palestinian state, with the removal of Israeli military occupation and blockade, is a more significant demand. Indeed, were there a deal offering a Palestinian state on the ‘67 borders, with zero Israeli military, but no right of return, I suspect the Palestinians would jump at that.
The people actually in the refugee camps in Gaza, who have mostly grown up there, are pining more for peace and prosperity than to go back to where their grandparents were expelled from.
Hang on - are we talking about the same war? This war was initiated by Hamas. You suggest that the war is more broadly about the establishment of a viable Palestinian state. Hamas do not want that. The PA do, but not Hamas.
I take your point about people in the camps growing up there. So perhaps the latest generation haven't yet had the chance to build homes. But their parents and grandparents did. Who choses to live in a refugee camp for generation after generation if what you actually want is to build a house next door?
Parts of inland Sicily look like Gaza. Before the bombing, admittedly, but still
That is no exaggeration. The urban decay, ugliness and squalor is off the dial. And what’s with the litter EVERYWHERE. Mile after mile of graffiti and litter
Has anyone ever written a thesis on the psychology of littering? They should. It’s interesting. Why make your own home look a tiny bit worse. I wonder if it’s a basic IQ test? Or something else? A fundamental detachment from where you live? A sense that no one cares so why should you?
Seeing litter does make me fizz with hatred. In this country I suspect a lot of it is dirty schoolkids trying to look hard in front of their mates as they amble about at lunchtime. Seeing McDonalds packaging that has obviously been chucked out of a car window by someone driving through is another bugbear.
Flytipping enrages me. Probably more than pretty much anything else.
Keep clear of the A13 then.
Ha ha I used to literally live on the A13.
I've walked the full length of the A13 from Aldgate to Shoeburyness.
I would trust almost anyone on almost anything more than I would trust Corbyn. I am really not sure what this proves other than the membership of the Labour party were seriously deluded in voting that man leader twice. Its up there with the Tory membership thinking Liz Truss, or indeed IDS, were an answer to anything useful.
A lot to be said for returning the selection of the Leader to MPs. For both main parties.
This will be Brady’s greatest and most enduring legacy to the Conservative Party, if he pushes it through. A seemingly small act that could genuinely save it from extinction.
I think leaders of political parties should be elected by their members, even if it does produce un-electable nutcases. It is then up to the electors to decide if they want to be governed by a party who selected an idiot for leader.
HOWEVER if a party changes leader while in Government then that leader (Prime Minister) should be elected by the MPs. This prevents the members of that party picking an idiot whom the electors have not had an opportunity of rejecting.
I disagree. You risk creating the same problem that the Brexit referendum created where there is a split mandate.
Not following. What do you think should happen?
The MPs have to choose because the British constitution ultimately gives MPs the power to select the PM (and decide policy). Having a policy (like Brexit) imposed on MPs was incredibly problematic, as would having a PM imposed on MPs, contrary to their judgement.
So I think that having party memberships choose leaders, and by extension PMs, risks creating the same problems that holding a referendum for a change you don't want to implement did. A split mandate and therefore dysfunction.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
3,648 children killed by the IDF since the 7th 2,290 women killed by the IDF since the 7th
Those like Cyclefree who oppose an immediate ceasefire are supporting the ongoing slaughter of Palestinian women and children in huge numbers, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
Withdraw that remark. It is seriously defamatory. I have said from the start that (a) I am against a Gaza invasion; (b) civilians should be allowed to leave; (c) there should be a pause to allow humanitarian aid.
You accuse other people of defamation after saying that anyone calling for a ceasefire is supporting genocidal terrorism?
You should stop, and take a look at yourself for a while.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
Yes, but these are not redrawn borders. Gaza and the West Bank are ""occupied Territories" neither part of Israel, nor independent states.
The people are not to be given equal rights with others by incorporating them into Israel, nor allowed to form a state. Hence no resolution.
Or are you arguing for the forced expulsion/extermination of all 2.2 million in Gaza and the 3.5 million in the West Bank?
They are redrawn borders - none of these borders existed previously. Show me Gaza as a strip on a map of the Ottoman Empire. Or the mandates drawn on the map post WWI?
Gaza is no different to other non-contiguous regions at the end of WWII which got redrawn. The question that needs to be asked isn't do we move 2.2m Gazans but do 2.2m Gazans want to stay there? Go and ask them - so many are not Gazan and do not see Gaza as any more than a refugee camp or prison.
Gaza does not work - for the Gazans, for the Isaraelis, for the Egyptians. Nobody. I suspect that a realistic outcome of this will be Israel washing its hands of the place - but who will take on authority of keeping the peace and supplying it with power and water - Egypt? They don't want it either.
The fighting will stop. And we are left with an over-populated strip of land with minimal resources reliant on outside support. Israel won't support it, Egypt won't support it, so who will? And if nobody will do we accept that we need to resettle the people there who want to be resettled, and work on a plan to do so?
It isn't forced resettlement when the people being resettled want to be resettled. Israel bombed a refugee camp - these are people who do not want to be in Gaza.
According to the best polling available the vast majority of Gazans want to stay in Gaza and West Bank.
"The vast majority of Gazans surveyed—69 percent—said they have never considered leaving their homeland. This is a higher proportion than residents of Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Sudan, and Tunisia who were asked the same question. (For all of these countries, the most recent available data comes from Arab Barometer’s 2021–22 survey wave.)"
So what you are proposing is ethnic cleansing against the express will of the people concerned.
You may be happy with that, but most of us are not.
"Gaza and the West Bank". Not Gaza. The people in Gaza have largely not settled in Gaza - that's why they claim to be refugees and congregate in camps. And similar in the West Bank but less extreme.
You say they have never considered leaving their homeland. No, they claim to have been expelled from their homeland. Someone in the Rafa camp doesn't think they want to stay in a refugee camp in Rafa. They want to reclaim Israel.
Like I said, it isn't forced cleansing when the people consider themselves refugees and demand their repatriation.
They dream of returning to a mythical olive grove in central Israel that their great-grandfather sold for a few pennies in 1948 and is now a small city worth billions. It's not a viable proposition. The 'restoration' of populations and boundaries is a dangerous illusion. They need a route to a better future, not a better past.
The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line, Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.
You could have said the same of the Zionists a century ago.
Hamas and RP have essentially the same policy, albeit in the mirror. Forcible redrawing of boundaries and mass expulsions/extermination of a population at gunpoint.
That is pretty seriously defamatory of @RochdalePioneers. Hamas has explicitly said that they will continue to do massacres like the October 7 massacre until Israel is destroyed. Those massacres and the accompanying torture and rapes were depraved in their barbarity and sadism.
@Rochdale Pioneers has nowhere advocated anything remotely similar.
Tangental - But can an anonymous internet username be defamed?
I think so. But whether they would have a legal case for libel, though, is a very different matter. I doubt it, personally.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
Most negotiated solutions involve a leap of faith to be made, even while there are people saying terrible things. We started talking to the IRA while the IRA was still active and calling the abolition of Northern Ireland.
There are a thousand reasons not to trust the other side, but there’s no way out without doing so. I, sitting in my comfortable home in London, am not going to tell Israelis scarred by 7 October that they have to make that leap of faith today, nor am I going to tell Gazans being bombed that they have to make a leap of faith today. Those decisions are not ours to take. But we know the path that follows if everyone keeps finding reasons not to find peace.
Civilians killed / missing in Israel and Palestine (7th-31st October): Totals Palestine: 10,525 (91%) Israel: 1,073 (9%)
Children Palestine: 3,542 (99%) Israel: 30 (1%)
I'd like to know how the Palestinian figures are being verified. No I'm not being heartless but evidence is required. Save The Children have backed it up but the days of me trusting the word of international aid agencies are long gone.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
3,648 children killed by the IDF since the 7th 2,290 women killed by the IDF since the 7th
Those like Cyclefree who oppose an immediate ceasefire are supporting the ongoing slaughter of Palestinian women and children in huge numbers, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
Withdraw that remark. It is seriously defamatory. I have said from the start that (a) I am against a Gaza invasion; (b) civilians should be allowed to leave; (c) there should be a pause to allow humanitarian aid.
Why withdraw it? What he said isn't true, but what does truth matter on this subject? I'm still entertained by the denouncement yesterday of Baddiel as a zionist. And Foxy has practically been calling me genocidal this morning. Its just words.
What truly boggles the mind are the mental gymnastics required to make absolutism work. Jewish / Palestinian lives good, Palestinian / Jewish lives bad. Can't redraw boundaries, have to go back to the redrawn boundary. Must have a ceasefire now but only an Israeli one.
I almost do hope the Saudis do intervene. Threaten both sides with head chopping and see if that calms them down.
Parts of inland Sicily look like Gaza. Before the bombing, admittedly, but still
That is no exaggeration. The urban decay, ugliness and squalor is off the dial. And what’s with the litter EVERYWHERE. Mile after mile of graffiti and litter
Has anyone ever written a thesis on the psychology of littering? They should. It’s interesting. Why make your own home look a tiny bit worse. I wonder if it’s a basic IQ test? Or something else? A fundamental detachment from where you live? A sense that no one cares so why should you?
Seeing litter does make me fizz with hatred. In this country I suspect a lot of it is dirty schoolkids trying to look hard in front of their mates as they amble about at lunchtime. Seeing McDonalds packaging that has obviously been chucked out of a car window by someone driving through is another bugbear.
Flytipping enrages me. Probably more than pretty much anything else.
Keep clear of the A13 then.
Ha ha I used to literally live on the A13.
I've walked the full length of the A13 from Aldgate to Shoeburyness.
Counting second-hand car dealers? Used to be said that if you wanted such a car, walked the last 10 or so miles into Southend and couldn’t find what you wanted, then you were incredibly picky.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
Most negotiated solutions involve a leap of faith to be made, even while there are people saying terrible things. We started talking to the IRA while the IRA was still active and calling the abolition of Northern Ireland.
There are a thousand reasons not to trust the other side, but there’s no way out without doing so. I, sitting in my comfortable home in London, am not going to tell Israelis scarred by 7 October that they have to make that leap of faith today, nor am I going to tell Gazans being bombed that they have to make a leap of faith today. Those decisions are not ours to take. But we know the path that follows if everyone keeps finding reasons not to find peace.
Civilians killed / missing in Israel and Palestine (7th-31st October): Totals Palestine: 10,525 (91%) Israel: 1,073 (9%)
Children Palestine: 3,542 (99%) Israel: 30 (1%)
I'd like to know how the Palestinian figures are being verified. No I'm not being heartless but evidence is required. Save The Children have backed it up but the days of me trusting the word of international aid agencies are long gone.
Sure the numbers could be wrong and are a source of propoganda. But its pretty pointless to say evidence is required but I won't trust anyone who has any chance of providing numbers anyway. Just say you don't/can't trust the numbers.
This is all performative politics. The views of the Opposition on a cease-fire carry no weight and butter no parsnips. So most people are paying zero attention to this. It amazes me that more 2019 Lab voters trust Starmer on this than trust Corbyn. Those are surely the most friendly group to Corbynite simplicity. I suspect Starmer has found the line that promises least damage to Lab - he also has a reasonable argument in support of that line and I suspect it is actually the line he personally believes to be most just to both sides.
Lab will lose votes but the very early signs suggest that the Cons will lose just as many. The LDs, Greens and Ref will pick up some support - perhaps because people can fit their own beliefs and wishes onto the blank slate of their choice
The whole problem with the ceasefire argument is 'what next?' Few seem to be asking this. And how many are thinking of the both sides aspect of a ceasefire?
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
3,648 children killed by the IDF since the 7th 2,290 women killed by the IDF since the 7th
Those like Cyclefree who oppose an immediate ceasefire are supporting the ongoing slaughter of Palestinian women and children in huge numbers, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
Withdraw that remark. It is seriously defamatory. I have said from the start that (a) I am against a Gaza invasion; (b) civilians should be allowed to leave; (c) there should be a pause to allow humanitarian aid.
Why withdraw it? What he said isn't true, but what does truth matter on this subject? I'm still entertained by the denouncement yesterday of Baddiel as a zionist. And Foxy has practically been calling me genocidal this morning. Its just words.
What truly boggles the mind are the mental gymnastics required to make absolutism work. Jewish / Palestinian lives good, Palestinian / Jewish lives bad. Can't redraw boundaries, have to go back to the redrawn boundary. Must have a ceasefire now but only an Israeli one.
I almost do hope the Saudis do intervene. Threaten both sides with head chopping and see if that calms them down.
Go to Northern Ireland. They've been practising this stuff for years.
Don't get caught short, though. Some pubs have 87 member of the Shinners permanently in residence in the bogs.
I've just emailed a complaint to Lloyds. They changed my merchant account email address to an email address they haven't been given by me. Are insisting that has always been the email address on the account despite the emails they sent to the correct account used prior, and that a change of email address request must be made via a hand written letter which wasn't sent. They insist no error or data breech.
I also had Co-op bank screw up my mum's account. She had a joint account, then dad died and we converted it to a personal account. At which point they stopped sending statements. Turns out that when the address was changed (after they moved to Scotland) they only changed the address for dad and not for mum. But as all correspondence went to the new address with both names on it, nobody knew. So mum's bank statements have been sent to somewhere she doesn't live for months and they were very reluctant to change it back as we needed to fill in the form they sent to the old address. They insist no error or data breech...
It's no wonder junior cops behave so badly if this is the kind of leadership they get.
The problem is that it is the senior cops who are often the ones behaving badly.
Also how in God's name can it take 3 years, 3 years! to go through a disciplinary process?
I understand that police - Met and GMP - have been taking down pictures of the hostages that have been posted across neighbourhoods. GMP now seem to have done a volte face after an understandably angry response from the 'Jewish community'. It does pose the question though. Would they have stopped doing so had the hostages been native white Britons? Or simply because they realised they were upsetting another minority group?
I understand a man has been arrested for posting a video of a street draped with Palestinian flags and him complaining about it. The christian march planned through north London in support of Jews seems to be blocked by the police. At some point we are going to have to decide. Do we keep free expression in this country? Or is the sole priority to pacify those groups most likely to cause the most trouble/violence?
Choice has already been made when Parliament passed the most recent Policing Act that gave the police wide powers to stop protests.
A lot of people were fine about it when they thought the powers were necessary to stop protests that annoyed them - such as those by XR, or Just Stop Oil - but they were warned at the time that the powers would be used more widely than that.
Sorry but this is apples and pears. The point about XR and Just Stop Oil is that they cause widespread disruption. So whilst people have the right to protest, what if they are playing havoc with other peoples' lives as a result?
The police have not made any attempt to stop the pro Palestine marches but nonetheless won't allow Christians to march in support of Jews. Sadly we now seem to be in a position where the least tolerant don't have to put up with anything they don't like but the most tolerant do.
The tolerance paradox - that being tolerant of those with different views, always ends up with being subject to the views of the intolerant.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
Most negotiated solutions involve a leap of faith to be made, even while there are people saying terrible things. We started talking to the IRA while the IRA was still active and calling the abolition of Northern Ireland.
There are a thousand reasons not to trust the other side, but there’s no way out without doing so. I, sitting in my comfortable home in London, am not going to tell Israelis scarred by 7 October that they have to make that leap of faith today, nor am I going to tell Gazans being bombed that they have to make a leap of faith today. Those decisions are not ours to take. But we know the path that follows if everyone keeps finding reasons not to find peace.
Civilians killed / missing in Israel and Palestine (7th-31st October): Totals Palestine: 10,525 (91%) Israel: 1,073 (9%)
Children Palestine: 3,542 (99%) Israel: 30 (1%)
I'd like to know how the Palestinian figures are being verified. No I'm not being heartless but evidence is required. Save The Children have backed it up but the days of me trusting the word of international aid agencies are long gone.
How was the 1,400 Israeli figure obtained? How many were actually IDF or Bet Shin? And no, I'm not being heartless either!
I see a lot of people of undoubtedly goodwill and good faith calling for a ceasefire. But I just do not see how one is feasible. The Israelis absolutely value Israeli lives more highly than Palestinian ones, of course they do. Every government of every country in the world values the lives of its citizens over those of all other states.
So, for as long as Hamas makes clear it wants to kill Israelis, and it did exactly that on 7th October, Israel will do what it judges is best to stop it happening. A ceasefire only happens once Israel believes the Hamas threat is no longer there. For me, it is entirely, though depressingly, understandable.
Of course, the quickest way to a ceasefire is for Hamas to lay down its arms. But no-one seems to be calling for that.
It's no wonder junior cops behave so badly if this is the kind of leadership they get.
The problem is that it is the senior cops who are often the ones behaving badly.
Also how in God's name can it take 3 years, 3 years! to go through a disciplinary process?
I understand that police - Met and GMP - have been taking down pictures of the hostages that have been posted across neighbourhoods. GMP now seem to have done a volte face after an understandably angry response from the 'Jewish community'. It does pose the question though. Would they have stopped doing so had the hostages been native white Britons? Or simply because they realised they were upsetting another minority group?
I understand a man has been arrested for posting a video of a street draped with Palestinian flags and him complaining about it. The christian march planned through north London in support of Jews seems to be blocked by the police. At some point we are going to have to decide. Do we keep free expression in this country? Or is the sole priority to pacify those groups most likely to cause the most trouble/violence?
Choice has already been made when Parliament passed the most recent Policing Act that gave the police wide powers to stop protests.
A lot of people were fine about it when they thought the powers were necessary to stop protests that annoyed them - such as those by XR, or Just Stop Oil - but they were warned at the time that the powers would be used more widely than that.
Sorry but this is apples and pears. The point about XR and Just Stop Oil is that they cause widespread disruption. So whilst people have the right to protest, what if they are playing havoc with other peoples' lives as a result?
The police have not made any attempt to stop the pro Palestine marches but nonetheless won't allow Christians to march in support of Jews. Sadly we now seem to be in a position where the least tolerant don't have to put up with anything they don't like but the most tolerant do.
The law as written and passed by Parliament didn't make that distinction. People did try to warn you.
Bolton: "near certain Trump will withdraw from NATO in his second term"
Is it, though? Or is this "art of the deal" stuff?
I find it hard to believe he wouldn't replace it with some new UK/EU/Canada - US agreement, rather than cut everyone else loose, because that would be crazy and create more cost and risk for the USA, not less.
It might be rather like how he superseded NAFTA with USMCA.
You still believe Trump's "art of the deal" shtick? LOL.
He does. The point is he might want to withdraw *from NATO* but that doesn't mean he wouldn't replace NATO with something else.
My guess is he'd replace NATO with USCEDA, or something similar - one where European responsibilities and spend were higher but the US could still lead/call it as much as possible.
I still think it's an extremely bad idea, by the way, and he's highly unpredictable, but my guess is there's more to it than just cut the cord.
Trump was right that the American focus is going to be increasingly on China rather than Russia, and that the Europeans need to learn how to defend themselves, rather than relying on Uncle Sam to always step up.
Most of the right-wing objections to Ukraine in the US are based on costs of the support vs local priorities, which appear to be no better than Hollywood Accounting from the White House and DoD.
Europe is going to need to do more and I also Trump is oversimplifying the US position a the same time.
We're moving to a multipolar world, not a switch in the unipolar one. What I mean by that is: the US will have to think about Asia-Pac security *and* European/Middle-East security on top, in future, rather than it before just being Russia and in the future it's just going to be China.
Europe contains nearly 500 million wealthy consumers who are, essentially, wedded to liberal democracy. It's massively in the US's strategic and commercial interests to ensure that part of the world remains secure.
They just want them to pull their weight a little bit more. They won't totally pull out.
Indeed. Trump's first term on foreign relations and treaties was entirely utilitarian and transactional, renegotiating treaties and resetting relationships based purely on the advantage to him/America. If it is in US interest to have a defence treaty in Europe then he will ensure one exists but enact as big a price as he can. If we don't pay, all the nice US armed forces will fuck off back to the States and we can glow in the dark for all he cares. We will need a proper cold-hearted bastard to "negotiate" with him
I see a lot of people of undoubtedly goodwill and good faith calling for a ceasefire. But I just do not see how one is feasible. The Israelis absolutely value Israeli lives more highly than Palestinian ones, of course they do. Every government of every country in the world values the lives of its citizens over those of all other states.
So, for as long as Hamas makes clear it wants to kill Israelis, and it did exactly that on 7th October, Israel will do what it judges is best to stop it happening. A ceasefire only happens once Israel believes the Hamas threat is no longer there. For me, it is entirely, though depressingly, understandable.
Of course, the quickest way to a ceasefire is for Hamas to lay down its arms. But no-one seems to be calling for that.
Not entirely sure Hamas laying down its arms would lead to a ceasefire tbh. I think we've gone past that stage sadly.
It's no wonder junior cops behave so badly if this is the kind of leadership they get.
The problem is that it is the senior cops who are often the ones behaving badly.
Also how in God's name can it take 3 years, 3 years! to go through a disciplinary process?
I understand that police - Met and GMP - have been taking down pictures of the hostages that have been posted across neighbourhoods. GMP now seem to have done a volte face after an understandably angry response from the 'Jewish community'. It does pose the question though. Would they have stopped doing so had the hostages been native white Britons? Or simply because they realised they were upsetting another minority group?
I understand a man has been arrested for posting a video of a street draped with Palestinian flags and him complaining about it. The christian march planned through north London in support of Jews seems to be blocked by the police. At some point we are going to have to decide. Do we keep free expression in this country? Or is the sole priority to pacify those groups most likely to cause the most trouble/violence?
Choice has already been made when Parliament passed the most recent Policing Act that gave the police wide powers to stop protests.
A lot of people were fine about it when they thought the powers were necessary to stop protests that annoyed them - such as those by XR, or Just Stop Oil - but they were warned at the time that the powers would be used more widely than that.
Sorry but this is apples and pears. The point about XR and Just Stop Oil is that they cause widespread disruption. So whilst people have the right to protest, what if they are playing havoc with other peoples' lives as a result?
The police have not made any attempt to stop the pro Palestine marches but nonetheless won't allow Christians to march in support of Jews. Sadly we now seem to be in a position where the least tolerant don't have to put up with anything they don't like but the most tolerant do.
The tolerance paradox - that being tolerant of those with different views, always ends up with being subject to the views of the intolerant.
It's no wonder junior cops behave so badly if this is the kind of leadership they get.
The problem is that it is the senior cops who are often the ones behaving badly.
Also how in God's name can it take 3 years, 3 years! to go through a disciplinary process?
I understand that police - Met and GMP - have been taking down pictures of the hostages that have been posted across neighbourhoods. GMP now seem to have done a volte face after an understandably angry response from the 'Jewish community'. It does pose the question though. Would they have stopped doing so had the hostages been native white Britons? Or simply because they realised they were upsetting another minority group?
I understand a man has been arrested for posting a video of a street draped with Palestinian flags and him complaining about it. The christian march planned through north London in support of Jews seems to be blocked by the police. At some point we are going to have to decide. Do we keep free expression in this country? Or is the sole priority to pacify those groups most likely to cause the most trouble/violence?
Choice has already been made when Parliament passed the most recent Policing Act that gave the police wide powers to stop protests.
A lot of people were fine about it when they thought the powers were necessary to stop protests that annoyed them - such as those by XR, or Just Stop Oil - but they were warned at the time that the powers would be used more widely than that.
Sorry but this is apples and pears. The point about XR and Just Stop Oil is that they cause widespread disruption. So whilst people have the right to protest, what if they are playing havoc with other peoples' lives as a result?
The police have not made any attempt to stop the pro Palestine marches but nonetheless won't allow Christians to march in support of Jews. Sadly we now seem to be in a position where the least tolerant don't have to put up with anything they don't like but the most tolerant do.
The tolerance paradox - that being tolerant of those with different views, always ends up with being subject to the views of the intolerant.
I don't really have any problem if the pro Palestine marchers want to stand in Trafalgar Square or whatever every weekend. They've got a right to protest, though I question their right to call for the extermination of Jewish people with dog whistle phrases like "from the river to the sea".
What happened at Liverpool Street Station last night though was a different matter. Imagine being Jewish and just wanting to get home from work, to be met with a gigantic mob of people chanting "from the river to the sea". Given what we saw in Dagestan this weekend, I would be positively shitting bricks.
Everyone identifiable who blockaded Liverpool Street Station last night should be charged under Section 7 of the Public Order Act 2023, which criminalises deliberate disruption to national infrastructure.
Go protest in Trafalgar Square etc if you must. But blockading a national rail station with antisemitic chants a couple of days after a mob ran riot in Dagestan's airport should require sentences to be handed out as deterrents to prevent it happening again.
The lot up here are no better: 70 tons of documents shredded by venal, corrupt Sturgeon SNP regime…. @covidinquiryuk 😳 twitter.com/dj_forrester/s…
I wouldn't take that too literally without more info, given the 'tons'. It's quite normal to shred documents no longer required. Indeed, it was very much required when I were in a SG agency, as part of keeping the filing system organised. I did a great deal myself as part of a departmental reorganization/handover to a successor. Mostd of them were duplicates, drafts and stuff like job applications which contained personal data and were no longer required.
There are plenty of cheap services that automate scanning documents into searchable PDFs. And why is paper still being used?
In my company, everything is electronic. Most documentation is done on Confluence, which keeps a complete history - you *may think* you have deleted a page, but all you have done is updated the database to say it's dead. Compliance loves that.
They have printer/scanners but they are barely used.
I was getting rid of most of the paper and setting aside the useful records for attention! Very much a transition era. This was quite some years back, but within the current FOI(S) Act legislation, more or less.
A relative uses one of these services - he found in the end, that it is cheaper to chuck it all through the digitisation, rather than spend time filleting it.
Trouble is you end up with huge amounts of stuff still, only scanned. With the hassle of finding it in the digitisation, even with OCR.
As it happens, though, in my dept etc, there was lots of low grade stuff of no value anyway that could be recycled, or chucked on the to-shred heap where personal data were involved.
So it made sense to do it with that first stage, with the remainder roughly sorted. I expect it has been scanned now.
How was the 1,400 Israeli figure obtained? How many were actually IDF or Bet Shin? And no, I'm not being heartless either!
On the news on R4 at some point last night it said 300 of the 1400 killed by Hamas were IDF which seems surprisingly high. Dunno how many of them were off duty or were actually involved in fire fights with Hamas.
I see a lot of people of undoubtedly goodwill and good faith calling for a ceasefire. But I just do not see how one is feasible. The Israelis absolutely value Israeli lives more highly than Palestinian ones, of course they do. Every government of every country in the world values the lives of its citizens over those of all other states.
So, for as long as Hamas makes clear it wants to kill Israelis, and it did exactly that on 7th October, Israel will do what it judges is best to stop it happening. A ceasefire only happens once Israel believes the Hamas threat is no longer there. For me, it is entirely, though depressingly, understandable.
Of course, the quickest way to a ceasefire is for Hamas to lay down its arms. But no-one seems to be calling for that.
I don't think the fact that one side doesn't want a ceasefire is a compelling case against the principle of a ceasefire. I mean, if both sides wanted a ceasefire then nobody would need to call for one.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
Most negotiated solutions involve a leap of faith to be made, even while there are people saying terrible things. We started talking to the IRA while the IRA was still active and calling the abolition of Northern Ireland.
There are a thousand reasons not to trust the other side, but there’s no way out without doing so. I, sitting in my comfortable home in London, am not going to tell Israelis scarred by 7 October that they have to make that leap of faith today, nor am I going to tell Gazans being bombed that they have to make a leap of faith today. Those decisions are not ours to take. But we know the path that follows if everyone keeps finding reasons not to find peace.
Civilians killed / missing in Israel and Palestine (7th-31st October): Totals Palestine: 10,525 (91%) Israel: 1,073 (9%)
Children Palestine: 3,542 (99%) Israel: 30 (1%)
I'd like to know how the Palestinian figures are being verified. No I'm not being heartless but evidence is required. Save The Children have backed it up but the days of me trusting the word of international aid agencies are long gone.
How was the 1,400 Israeli figure obtained? How many were actually IDF or Bet Shin? And no, I'm not being heartless either!
It's a fair question but remember that Israel is a pretty open society in which authority can be criticised and lies of the government at least countered. A huge amount of the world's media has descended there and been shown an enormous amount of evidence. Helped of course by the fact that the perpetrators were so keen to 'share' the evidence of what they were doing. So I don't think it is as much of an issue as what is or isn't unfolding in Gaza.
Unfortunately the desire for 'balance' (among those media who aren't nakedly partisan in this conflict) means they tend to give equal weight to claims made by both sides. Which is stupid. If Israel claimed that 500 people had been killed as the result of a Hamas attack on a hospital it would very quickly be exposed as bunk and they'd never hear the end of it.
I see a lot of people of undoubtedly goodwill and good faith calling for a ceasefire. But I just do not see how one is feasible. The Israelis absolutely value Israeli lives more highly than Palestinian ones, of course they do. Every government of every country in the world values the lives of its citizens over those of all other states.
So, for as long as Hamas makes clear it wants to kill Israelis, and it did exactly that on 7th October, Israel will do what it judges is best to stop it happening. A ceasefire only happens once Israel believes the Hamas threat is no longer there. For me, it is entirely, though depressingly, understandable.
Of course, the quickest way to a ceasefire is for Hamas to lay down its arms. But no-one seems to be calling for that.
All perfectly reasonable until the last sentence which is simply bonkers. No-one?
RECENTLY, AN AUSTRALIAN-PALESTINIAN friend of mine was invited to appear on Australia’s national television network to discuss the situation in and around Gaza. His white interviewers posed all the usual questions: Can you defend what we’ve seen from Hamas militants? How has the Palestinian cause been helped by this violence? How can anyone defend the slaughter of young music lovers at a music festival? Do you defend Hamas? They probably expected a defensive reaction from him, but calmly, in his smooth Australian-accented English, my friend had already turned the interview on its head. “I want to know why I’m here today, and why I haven’t been here for the past year,” he said gently.
Apologies if it has already been shared - I've had a busy few days at work so far this week, and so have been more absent then straight after October 7th
How was the 1,400 Israeli figure obtained? How many were actually IDF or Bet Shin? And no, I'm not being heartless either!
On the news on R4 at some point last night it said 300 of the 1400 killed by Hamas were IDF which seems surprisingly high. Dunno how many of them were off duty or were actually involved in fire fights with Hamas.
Hamas assaulted the border forts to pass through the wall. There were videos of fighters entering seemingly undermanned military bases.
It's no wonder junior cops behave so badly if this is the kind of leadership they get.
The problem is that it is the senior cops who are often the ones behaving badly.
Also how in God's name can it take 3 years, 3 years! to go through a disciplinary process?
I understand that police - Met and GMP - have been taking down pictures of the hostages that have been posted across neighbourhoods. GMP now seem to have done a volte face after an understandably angry response from the 'Jewish community'. It does pose the question though. Would they have stopped doing so had the hostages been native white Britons? Or simply because they realised they were upsetting another minority group?
I understand a man has been arrested for posting a video of a street draped with Palestinian flags and him complaining about it. The christian march planned through north London in support of Jews seems to be blocked by the police. At some point we are going to have to decide. Do we keep free expression in this country? Or is the sole priority to pacify those groups most likely to cause the most trouble/violence?
Choice has already been made when Parliament passed the most recent Policing Act that gave the police wide powers to stop protests.
A lot of people were fine about it when they thought the powers were necessary to stop protests that annoyed them - such as those by XR, or Just Stop Oil - but they were warned at the time that the powers would be used more widely than that.
Sorry but this is apples and pears. The point about XR and Just Stop Oil is that they cause widespread disruption. So whilst people have the right to protest, what if they are playing havoc with other peoples' lives as a result?
The police have not made any attempt to stop the pro Palestine marches but nonetheless won't allow Christians to march in support of Jews. Sadly we now seem to be in a position where the least tolerant don't have to put up with anything they don't like but the most tolerant do.
The law as written and passed by Parliament didn't make that distinction. People did try to warn you.
I don't remember being in favour of the particular bill. Although after the Supreme Court's ruling on 'reasonable disruption' it was obvious the government would do something. I've never expressed faith in Braverman.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
Most negotiated solutions involve a leap of faith to be made, even while there are people saying terrible things. We started talking to the IRA while the IRA was still active and calling the abolition of Northern Ireland.
There are a thousand reasons not to trust the other side, but there’s no way out without doing so. I, sitting in my comfortable home in London, am not going to tell Israelis scarred by 7 October that they have to make that leap of faith today, nor am I going to tell Gazans being bombed that they have to make a leap of faith today. Those decisions are not ours to take. But we know the path that follows if everyone keeps finding reasons not to find peace.
Civilians killed / missing in Israel and Palestine (7th-31st October): Totals Palestine: 10,525 (91%) Israel: 1,073 (9%)
Children Palestine: 3,542 (99%) Israel: 30 (1%)
I'd like to know how the Palestinian figures are being verified. No I'm not being heartless but evidence is required. Save The Children have backed it up but the days of me trusting the word of international aid agencies are long gone.
How was the 1,400 Israeli figure obtained? How many were actually IDF or Bet Shin? And no, I'm not being heartless either!
It's a fair question but remember that Israel is a pretty open society in which authority can be criticised and lies of the government at least countered. A huge amount of the world's media has descended there and been shown an enormous amount of evidence. Helped of course by the fact that the perpetrators were so keen to 'share' the evidence of what they were doing. So I don't think it is as much of an issue as what is or isn't unfolding in Gaza.
Unfortunately the desire for 'balance' (among those media who aren't nakedly partisan in this conflict) means they tend to give equal weight to claims made by both sides. Which is stupid. If Israel claimed that 500 people had been killed as the result of a Hamas attack on a hospital it would very quickly be exposed as bunk and they'd never hear the end of it.
Israel has claimed plenty of bunk over the years. Having a democratic society doesn't seem to stop institutional lying.
In the modern world, borders get redrawn and people get moved. For all that we have declared the forcible moving of people to be a war crime, doing so has been the way to peace in Europe.
I mentioned at the end of the last thread the absurdity that we have these so-called refugee camps in the first place. Full of third and fourth generation descendents of people who could have been classed as refugees.
We saw a massive slaughter in Europe. Lines on maps drawn and redrawn. Countries created and empires removed, borders shifted and peoples relocated. For peace.
The root cause of the continuing barbarity in the middle east is that a similar process did not happen. Instead of adjusting to the new boundaries, waves of war were unleashed to make even more displaced people and yet more redrawn borders.
The poor sods being used by Hamas are not refugees. They are political pawns, where the defeated combatants of the 48, 67 and 73 wars refuse to accept their defeat and bleat on at the international community to push the magic reset button and remove the Jew from their lands.
We do not have generational camps of displaced people from the Memeland. Or any other former place. Poland does not burn a torch for its lost territories. It needs to stop in the middle east, because regardless of what happens over the next few weeks, if we end up with an eventual ceasefire where we have all these people left as pawns by the arab world then the next round of bloodshed won't be far away.
In the modern world, borders do not get redrawn and people moved. That was true maybe 70 years ago, but the rules-based international order has largely stopped the annexation of land by military force. We went into Iraq to stop them annexing Kuwait. We are supporting Ukraine against Russia’s attempted annexation. I think the West regrets not doing more over Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Yet borders being redrawn and people moved (or killed...) is exactly what Hamas want. And, in reality, anybody who chants 'from the river to the sea'.
Here is a Hamas leader saying very clearly that they will repeat the October 7 massacres for as long as it takes to destroy and remove Israel completely. Their aim is genocidal. And a ceasefire will be used by them to prepare for the next massacre.
Those who support a ceasefire (other than a temporary pause for the provision of humanitarian aid / to allow the children, sick and vulnerable etc.,) are supporting this, even if they try to fool themselves otherwise.
Most negotiated solutions involve a leap of faith to be made, even while there are people saying terrible things. We started talking to the IRA while the IRA was still active and calling the abolition of Northern Ireland.
There are a thousand reasons not to trust the other side, but there’s no way out without doing so. I, sitting in my comfortable home in London, am not going to tell Israelis scarred by 7 October that they have to make that leap of faith today, nor am I going to tell Gazans being bombed that they have to make a leap of faith today. Those decisions are not ours to take. But we know the path that follows if everyone keeps finding reasons not to find peace.
Civilians killed / missing in Israel and Palestine (7th-31st October): Totals Palestine: 10,525 (91%) Israel: 1,073 (9%)
Children Palestine: 3,542 (99%) Israel: 30 (1%)
I'd like to know how the Palestinian figures are being verified. No I'm not being heartless but evidence is required. Save The Children have backed it up but the days of me trusting the word of international aid agencies are long gone.
How was the 1,400 Israeli figure obtained? How many were actually IDF or Bet Shin? And no, I'm not being heartless either!
All Israelis are reservists so I suppose you could say all but the foreigners and Ultra Orthodox who are not obliged to fight.
Comments
They have these large multi-generational refugee camps. If the intention was permanent settlement why haven't they done so? Nobody is proposing to remove everyone from Gaza, so of course some people will stay. But sizeable numbers do not want to be there. That's the entire purpose in this stupid war, to allow them to leave.
It’s why I think Macron’s proposals of associate EU membership and a two speed Europe are so interesting. I believe there is going to be a fundamental shift in the EU’s priorities and position in the next decade, and it’s going to pull everyone in Europe in, whether they are keen on the idea or not.
If you transposed the outline of the GFA as a solution to the Israel/Palestine question it would obviously be unacceptable.
I understand a man has been arrested for posting a video of a street draped with Palestinian flags and him complaining about it. The christian march planned through north London in support of Jews seems to be blocked by the police. At some point we are going to have to decide. Do we keep free expression in this country? Or is the sole priority to pacify those groups most likely to cause the most trouble/violence?
The problem at every iteration of this previously has been that peace is harder than war. Someone who isn't directly involved will need to guarantee a peace and so far we have had no takers, nor interest in compromise.
So if the ceasefire only immediately flips into another medieval slaughter by Hamas and another retaliation by the IDF, what is the point? We save these lives now. At the price of other lives then.
Israel exists. The Palestinian diaspora exists. The neighbouring states - some created a century ago and successful - exist. Forget all of the previous lines drawn on the map and find something new.
The EDL was started after Sikh extremists threatened the opening of a play about Sikh culture in the UK.
The police stated that the play would provoke the community and they wouldn't provide security. The play was cancelled.
According to people involved with the EDL, some far right scum realised that if you could threaten violence, you could get stuff shut down. "We'd like some of that".
I'm doing my best with what we have got. I'm trying to minimise electing the nutjob, but I can't exclude it entirely in a 2 party system. As you probably know I am all for getting rid of the 2 party system. Baby steps.
So bearing in mind what we are stuck with, members elect leaders, but they don't elect PMs. Only the electorate do that by looking at the leaders the parties have selected and deciding at the polling station by voting for that party or not.
BTW a fatal flaw from the inception of the EU was, has been and still is, the fact that 'ever closer union' closed its eyes to the fact that member states had incompatible defence policies. Ukraine has opened some, but not all, eyes to this anomaly - one which places the 500,000,000 citizens of the EU in a strange position.
Mary Elizabeth is daub-the-walls-with-shit crackers but not quite crackers enough to have an election with polling like that.
Its called negotiation and compromise
Something an Israel backed by the West and Hamas are currently entrenched against.
If I understand your position You are supporting Israels right to say no and the status quo
Only a position where all sides are forced to negotiate in good faith will bring about a lasting peace from the river to the sea
1) Retreat to "Trip line at the Fulda Gap, then blow up the world"
2) Triple the defence budget.
No surrender will solve nothing.
Negotiation is the only way to end this.
Would you expect Ukraine to surrender to stop the innocent killing of Ukrainians or Putin to surrender to stop the killings of Russians
Meanwhile the death of innocent Palestinians at ever increasing rates is blood on the hands of Western Israel appeasing leaders
That's both sides of every argument in Palestine since I can recall.
I thought the EDL came about after an Islamic protest in Luton as its leading lights like Tommeh were well known within the local soccer "firm" called "Men In Gear", their reputation was so good they were commonly knows and "Men in Running Gear" to those interested in that sort of macho crap.
The people actually in the refugee camps in Gaza, who have mostly grown up there, are pining more for peace and prosperity than to go back to where their grandparents were expelled from.
They also used to chant "no surrender to the Taliban" too.
Ironic how that ended, as well as the IRA one.
@Rochdale Pioneers has nowhere advocated anything remotely similar.
Historically, there is a tradition of
1) We are the Victims.
2) We are on the brink of defeat.
3) We need to do X just to survive.
Totalitarian regimes love this one - they are always fighting with their heels over a precipice, being pushed back by The Enemy. At least in their internal propaganda.
Totals
Palestine: 10,525 (91%)
Israel: 1,073 (9%)
Children
Palestine: 3,542 (99%)
Israel: 30 (1%)
I find all these calls for UK politicians and others to say this or that on what’s going on in Gaza rather pointless. As if Benjamin Netanyahu is going to decide what to do based on what Keir Starmer says, or what my local trade union branch says!
So, what can we do instead of these performative pronouncements? We can offer our experience, of how we resolved what was once the terrorism hotspot of Europe. It doesn’t match Israel/Palestine in every way possible. Of course it doesn’t. It’s a longer running dispute, but one that has seen fewer wars fought over it. But it is something we can offer.
I doubt many people know who he is in real life aside from his work which seems to be involved in running a haulage outfit delivering fruit and veg to Supermarkets. Similar to what Gregg Wallace used to do.
Can something damage someones reputation if you do not know, or most of the audience does not know, who they are ?
I ask out of genuine interest in this.
A lot of people were fine about it when they thought the powers were necessary to stop protests that annoyed them - such as those by XR, or Just Stop Oil - but they were warned at the time that the powers would be used more widely than that.
So I think that having party memberships choose leaders, and by extension PMs, risks creating the same problems that holding a referendum for a change you don't want to implement did. A split mandate and therefore dysfunction.
The playwright was a lady from the Sikh community, incidentally.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2004/dec/20/arts.religion1#:~:text=Gurpreet Kaur Bhatti's drama Behzti,of pounds worth of damage.
also
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2010/apr/09/ban-moonfleece-censorious-attitude
Note the ECB commissioned report (they approached the usual suspects and shouldn't be surprised they got the usual answer) that said cricket was laced with prejudice from top to bottom, and honed in on the Eton v. Harrow match in particular - rather than the far bigger issue of grassroots cricket and playing fields.
I do wish people who post ‘I understand’ and ‘seems to be’ about things they find outrageous would post links so it can be verified just how justified their outrage is.
The police have not made any attempt to stop the pro Palestine marches but nonetheless won't allow Christians to march in support of Jews. Sadly we now seem to be in a position where the least tolerant don't have to put up with anything they don't like but the most tolerant do.
That's a shame, as then attention could move on to how detrimental the Netanyahu government's policies are for long term peace, especially by supporting the nutter settlers in the West Bank.
Long time ago, though.
How can a malicious actor amend the names of the directors of a company at Companies House.
Surely there have to be check and balances.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/money/other/vertu-motors-seeks-injunction-as-companies-house-records-falsely-amended/ar-AA1jcWDi?ocid=entnewsntp&cvid=f71c31d3618e4f20816aa84fcec0849a&ei=11
(Putin could stop of course as the invader).
I take your point about people in the camps growing up there. So perhaps the latest generation haven't yet had the chance to build homes. But their parents and grandparents did. Who choses to live in a refugee camp for generation after generation if what you actually want is to build a house next door?
You should stop, and take a look at yourself for a while.
What truly boggles the mind are the mental gymnastics required to make absolutism work. Jewish / Palestinian lives good, Palestinian / Jewish lives bad. Can't redraw boundaries, have to go back to the redrawn boundary. Must have a ceasefire now but only an Israeli one.
I almost do hope the Saudis do intervene. Threaten both sides with head chopping and see if that calms them down.
Don’t be so hard on yourself, you’re not the most original thinker here but your hardly alone.
Thanks for your continuing attention though.
Lab will lose votes but the very early signs suggest that the Cons will lose just as many. The LDs, Greens and Ref will pick up some support - perhaps because people can fit their own beliefs and wishes onto the blank slate of their choice
Don't get caught short, though. Some pubs have 87 member of the Shinners permanently in residence in the bogs.
I also had Co-op bank screw up my mum's account. She had a joint account, then dad died and we converted it to a personal account. At which point they stopped sending statements. Turns out that when the address was changed (after they moved to Scotland) they only changed the address for dad and not for mum. But as all correspondence went to the new address with both names on it, nobody knew. So mum's bank statements have been sent to somewhere she doesn't live for months and they were very reluctant to change it back as we needed to fill in the form they sent to the old address. They insist no error or data breech...
So, for as long as Hamas makes clear it wants to kill Israelis, and it did exactly that on 7th October, Israel will do what it judges is best to stop it happening. A ceasefire only happens once Israel believes the Hamas threat is no longer there. For me, it is entirely, though depressingly, understandable.
Of course, the quickest way to a ceasefire is for Hamas to lay down its arms. But no-one seems to be calling for that.
It has The Arrival sculpture outside - commemorating the 10,000 Jewish children who escaped Nazi persecution.
Very much at the heart of The City too of course.
I think we've gone past that stage sadly.
What happened at Liverpool Street Station last night though was a different matter. Imagine being Jewish and just wanting to get home from work, to be met with a gigantic mob of people chanting "from the river to the sea". Given what we saw in Dagestan this weekend, I would be positively shitting bricks.
Everyone identifiable who blockaded Liverpool Street Station last night should be charged under Section 7 of the Public Order Act 2023, which criminalises deliberate disruption to national infrastructure.
Go protest in Trafalgar Square etc if you must. But blockading a national rail station with antisemitic chants a couple of days after a mob ran riot in Dagestan's airport should require sentences to be handed out as deterrents to prevent it happening again.
As it happens, though, in my dept etc, there was lots of low grade stuff of no value anyway that could be recycled, or chucked on the to-shred heap where personal data were involved.
So it made sense to do it with that first stage, with the remainder roughly sorted. I expect it has been scanned now.
Unfortunately the desire for 'balance' (among those media who aren't nakedly partisan in this conflict) means they tend to give equal weight to claims made by both sides. Which is stupid. If Israel claimed that 500 people had been killed as the result of a Hamas attack on a hospital it would very quickly be exposed as bunk and they'd never hear the end of it.
https://www.nplusonemag.com/online-only/online-only/no-human-being-can-exist/
SAREE MAKDISI: No Human Being Can Exist
RECENTLY, AN AUSTRALIAN-PALESTINIAN friend of mine was invited to appear on Australia’s national television network to discuss the situation in and around Gaza. His white interviewers posed all the usual questions: Can you defend what we’ve seen from Hamas militants? How has the Palestinian cause been helped by this violence? How can anyone defend the slaughter of young music lovers at a music festival? Do you defend Hamas? They probably expected a defensive reaction from him, but calmly, in his smooth Australian-accented English, my friend had already turned the interview on its head. “I want to know why I’m here today, and why I haven’t been here for the past year,” he said gently.
Apologies if it has already been shared - I've had a busy few days at work so far this week, and so have been more absent then straight after October 7th