FromEurope comments

JackBerstein : The peopl like VOR or YuriOtani don't know the real facts and can't see what is happening in front of them. They are blind although their eyes are wide opened.

Unfortunately, we all know that Israel or Palestinians will never make the conciliation move by themselves, someone else must intervene. But we also know that Israel will never listen to anyone, especially the UN resolutions, that Israel always ignored, I wonder who can end this conflict effectively. My personal point of view is that the Russians, Chinese and European need to get united to stop this madness by force since we can't count on the UN resolution. (USA will put a veto)

Sailwind : you have an interesting point of view, we can always advise the others "you should do this, you should do that" but most of the time, they don't listen to you. It's a nice ideological solution, however, I think it will never happen, knowing the history of this conflict...

Take it as you want. That's what I think.

I think the US ME policy won't change alot under Obama. He had the support of Jewish lobby to get elected. He can't do anything against Israel. As Sharon said "America belongs to us(Israel)"

"One of the main claims in Gaza at the moment is the serious situation for the population. Having reported from Gaza many times over the years, I know how crowded parts of it are and how dependent the people are on food aid from the UN. This means they have no other source of supply but equally, if the system is working, they should be getting enough to get by on. The problem is that foreign correspondents cannot get in to establish the exact situation for themselves. "

This doesn't mean that Palestinians are actually getting the food.

Israel has tried to take the initiative in the propaganda war over Gaza but, in one important instance, its version has been seriously challenged.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7809371.stm

SuperLib -

So you're OK if the retaliation includes firing rockets into kindergartens?

You don't have an accurate information about Palestinian's rocket. French News call it as "Roulette russe". Once they fire the rocket, they have no control and they don't even know where it will land. It's not like the rockets used by Israeli military that are guided and can hit a pin point target.

toonagi: Learn a little bit more about Israel. Here,listen to the rational Israeli people's voce.

http://december18th.org/

To start with, we shouldn’t forget that the victim is the Palestinians who lost their territory, not only because of the creation of the state of Israel, but also by the illegal occupation of their land by the expansionism of the Israeli Zionist government.

Palestinians have all the right to retaliate the invaders. As long as Israel doesn’t withdraws from all of the occupied territory and stop their politic of expansionism, this conflict will never end.

You should expect to be attacked when you go into neighbour’s house and stay by force. You need to stop the provocation first.

The story lists them as ICBM's (Intercontinental Ballistic Missile) and not ABMs (anti ballistic missiles) they have a range of 10000 miles, fixed or mobile base and multiple warheads. This is from the story and not my "biased".

I said your opinion is biased,, because no matter the number of the missiles, America or Russia can attack if they wish. America is not better than Russia. You must admit that you are pro-America. But objectively,both of them are not trustworthy in this issue.

My last post on this subject but think what could be done with this money and effort if used on their space programs?

I understand your wish. But they prefer to invest in the weaponry. Do you know that it's one of the biggest business in the world?

My opinion is that you shouldn't blame only Russia, but also the US. For me, no one is better than the other.

Yuri Otani

The American policy is to prevent the attack.

It's the same thing for the Rusians or other countries. Why The others can't prevent the attack from the hostile enemies?

These weapons do not pose a danger to the Russians.

As I said, the US is the potential danger, as it's the only nation that actually used the WMD. Bush & Co actually threatened Iran to use the small nuclear bomb if Iran doesn't stop the Pultonium enrichment.

Again the American defensive missiles require action by the other side, offensive ones do not. Like the tv ad says, its 3am and the phone rings. Countless people will live or die with that decision.

What makes you think that Russian's missiles are not defensive but offensive? Your opinion is very biased.

YuriOtani

You have a kind of dangerous thought. You presume that those missiles are eventually to be used to attack the other countries. Fortunately, for decades, the US, USSR, China, UK or France developed the nuclear weapons just to prevent the first attack from an enemy. Since Hiroshima and Nagasaki, no nation used the nuclear bomb. And I think it will be so another decades. It’s like two persons standing face to face with revolver in their hands.

I hope the leaders of those nations don’t have the same way of thinking as you. They put those missiles for the prevention and not attack. Of course there can be a possibility, even if it’s very slight, that one of the leader use the missile first without attacked. And precisely that’s why those nations want to have more weapons than the others.

There is no feelings of the inferiority complex from Russia or any other countries that possess the nuclear missiles. Because they have the same technology. Only difference is the number of the missile. Believe me, not only Russia, but also China is developing more and more WMD. It’s not the question of the advantage to attack but to prevent the attack.

It seems to me that you have an irrational hatred against Russia. I don’t support Putin’s policy, not more than Bush’s. What Americans do is not better than what Russians do.

Don’t forget, the only nation that actually had and used the atomic bomb was America. Since there were many countries that got it, many war and conflict happened, but no country used it for more than 60 years. I hope that it will stay in this way.

I think, and I hope that the humans are not that stupid like you presume to be.

Since President Reagan, the US and the USSR started to abandon the nuclear heads. But Bush reversed the situation. Why do you think that the US foreign policy is better than the one of Russia?

YuriOtani

"why does Russia want to return to the Cold War days? "

Because they don't want the US to dictate what Russia has to do. Russia wants to be the equal adversary. Or even more, Russia is trying to tie up with China to be a bigger power than the US. You were saying that the Russians were just looking for an excuse. Yes indeed, but GWB gave this opportunity to Russia.

Yes, Putin is gathering the power to become the next Stalin. (but more secretly) Bush & Co make the journalist silent by private or social pressure, Putin makes them silent by eliminating.

I don't say that Bush made Putin as he became now, but Bush gave the good opportunities for Putin to control the Russian people's opinion. And I'm not sure if Obama can change the Putin's politics...

I'm conscious that the Iranian issue seems calmed down since several months. It's a good thing. At certain moment, I was convinced that Bush would hit Iran ! But with Russia, I'm not so optimistic as you know, Putin is not a saint and he took the opportunity to reverse the internal politics to the USSR period. I hope Obama will act to make the US/Russia relation(and the world) better.

Betzee:

Truman created a framework to deal with the Cold War, GWB isn't leaving anything remotely similar for his successors.

Don’t you think that GWB started to freeze the US/Russia relation again with the missile base in Poland and the conflict in Georgia? I think he reversed the trust relationship between US and Russia. Also, he made many relationships worse than before. (With Europe, ME, South America)

Betzee, Thank you for your information. It's always interesting to read your post.

Betzee, I understand very well.

BTW, I travelled to Cambodia twice last year for a business. I was surprised to see an Internet café in the middle of nothing, in a very poor village. ( No paved road) There were 3 young boys sitting in front of the computers. I was curious to see how they type on the keyboad.(as you may know, they have their own alphabet) but all they were doing was to play with the game on computer. I thought about the importance of the education for the children. They can have the sophisticated tool in their hands, but as long as they don't know how to expoloit it, it's nothing but a toy...

Betzee : Good article. But the posters here will understand better if it says...

"It would be like having a central government in Washington that didn’t care anything about what was going on in New York or Boston . . ."

SuperLib :

Is there some reason why she doesn't just send them an email? I can go to websites today and read bloggers in Iraq right now.

You presume that all the Iraqi people have the access facility to the Internet, while even in Europe or in America, there are many people who are not connected to the Internet. I actually don’t know if her relatives have the Internet access, but if she says she contact only by phone, I believe that she can’t send the e-mail. You dream too much.

Nippon 5 :

Bottom line is under Saddam many Iraq people died from him for Goverment/religious reasons. No matter how you try to change the facts.

You are the one who are trying to change the fact. You said « a goverment (and religious sects) killing people before the US invaded and they are still doing it today. » But now you changed the term « religious sect » to « religious reason », which doesn’t mean the same thing at all.

I just don't believe you.

Under Saddam, the religions were tolerated, but controlled at the same time. A French Nun who was in Baghdad for many years told that they were quite safe until Bush started to provoked Saddam about WMD. Then, not Saddam, but the Islamic extremist sect started to attack them as the symbol of the west. They decided to leave when Bush started to invade, before the troops arrive to Baghdad. They were more afraid of the arrival of US troops than the Muslim neighbours.

Saddam didn’t really care about the minority religions, such as Christians or Jews. He persecuted more the rival Chiit than those religions.

So you mean the Christians in Iraq killed the people under Saddam ?

You are dodging my question. I was not asking what were the religious sects existed in Iraq.

You said:

a goverment (and religious sects) killing people before the US invaded and they are still doing it today.

And I asked which religious sect killed the people under Saddam.

Then you wrote:

Saddam killed many of there family members because of the religion they had,

So I asked which religion this family had.

You didn’t answer any of my questions.

Please give us the proof or link that we can check what you say. Thank you.

Anyway, US invasion is killing the people without distinction.

Saddam killed many of there family members because of the religion they had,

So, which religion was it???

Nippon5

a goverment (and religious sects) killing people before the US invaded and they are still doing it today.

Do you have any proof of what you quote? Which religious sect killed the people under Saddam ???

Saddam didn’t kill the people randomly like in this US invasion did. Saddam killed the people who were against him. I know a girl who lived in Iraq when Saddam was still in power in Iraq, she said there was a freedom in Iraq, as long as you don’t criticize Saddam. People had almost everything, except the embargo period, but still then, they could have many things from the black market. She said it was like a freedom in a cage, but you could live decently if you know how to manage. But since the invasion, US destroyed the infra structure and the life in Iraq became impossible. She left Iraq just before the US invasion, but her relatives are still in Iraq and she can communicate with them only by the phone. As you can imagine she and her relatives hate Bush and US troops.

But she says clearly that the ordinary citizen's life was better under Saddam. (she hates Saddam as much as Bush,though)

What would have happened to the same reporter if he would have thrown his shoes at Saddam Hussein while he was in power ?????

I understand that you want to compare Saddam and Bush as they are the same kind. But we don’t know if this reporter hated Saddam as much as Bush, so this question makes no sense.

The only thing we need to see here is that Bush received the ultimate insult (even more than to spit on the face) in the Islamic world. If you remember the scene when the Saddam’s statue was pulled down, the people were beating it with their shoes, because it’s the worst expression to despise a person. Bush deserved it as well as Saddam did.