http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/12/un-security-council-gaza-ceasefire-call?guni=Keyword:news-grid%20main-1%20Main%20trailblock:Editable%20trailblock%20-%20news:Position5
There is a war going on in Palestine.The has been an an army of occupation in Palestine sine 1967 or as many would argue, since 1948. Although to judge by the words and actions of the western powers, the observer would be excused for thinking that no one has really noticed.
Over the course of the last 7 days, more than 120 civilians have been killed in Gaza as a result of airstrike or naval bombardment from ships blockading the area. The latest killings and military attacks are but the most recent events in an almost endless stream of "tit for tat" reprisal and counter reprisal which have been going on for nearly 50 years, littered with a few full scale military invasions of both Palestinian lands in the form of the Gaza strip and Palestine's neighbour and ally Lebanon.
Civilians have been killed in Gaza in their homes, in their mosques and their hospitals, in their care homes and in numerous other places in a strip of land with an area of some 139 square miles (360 square kilometers) and a population of some 1.9 million people. That equates to some 13,500 per square mile. Not much room to run away or to take cover. The justification for this latest aggression against the Palestinians living in this "prison camp" is that "rockets are raining down" on the people in Ashdod, Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and other "targets" injuring a few civilians, one seriously but killing no one. Home made rockets with small warheads and no guidance system, launched from improvised sites by what is in effect, little more that a "Home guard" militia, against a country armed with many thousands of personnel and reservists, sophisticated weaponry and technology including the latest tanks, aircraft, smart missiles, ships, anti missile systems and of course nuclear weapons. It seems a very one sided fight.
There is a very simple reason for this continuing situation, both now in Gaza and on the wider historic question of Palestine. The one great and over ridding fact, is that in the eyes of successive western governments, Israel can do no wrong. It has been the case since the end of World War 2 and the liberation of the camps in central Europe. The world developed a collective guilty conscience and the Palestinians have been paying for it ever since 1948. Any criticism of Israeli expansion, the collective punishment of populations, the continuing occupation of Arab lands, the flagrant disregard of United Nations resolutions, even those that manage to get past the American veto, is essentially ignored by the west and treated as more anti Semitic outpourings by the "Jew haters".
The "Holocaust card" is frequently used as a defence to justify Tel Aviv aggression against its neighbour's in the name of "a right to self defence".
The concept of a "right to self defence" for the people of Palestine is always lost in Washington, London and the other capitals of Europe.
The European Union, the United States of America and the United Kingdom, provide the worlds media with much rhetoric and hand wringing "sympathy" for civilians caught in the carnage, but fail to provide any leadership for the resolution of the underlying problem. They may each provide many reasons, none of them good and mostly based on expediency, ignorance or guilty conscience, for their failure to act. At the end of the day, the Israeli's continue to bomb, shell, arrest, detain, occupy and blockade the people of Palestine and the west does nothing.
The United Nations is a toothless caricature what of it was intended to be. Powerless in the face of "the veto" from one or other of the permanent member nations of the Security Council, the UN is rendered impotent and reduced to "humanitarian" activities, incredibly valuable to the people reliant on them, but of little relevance in achieving a solution.
The government of Israel in Tel Aviv continue their policies of aggression, occupation and expansion because they are fully aware that no other nation or nations can or will, do anything to stop them.
Surely the time must soon come when people around the world say to their respective governments that "enough is enough" and the excesses from the Israeli government must be stopped.
UN security council calls for Israeli-Palestinian ceasefire
There is a war going on in Palestine.The has been an an army of occupation in Palestine sine 1967 or as many would argue, since 1948. Although to judge by the words and actions of the western powers, the observer would be excused for thinking that no one has really noticed.
Over the course of the last 7 days, more than 120 civilians have been killed in Gaza as a result of airstrike or naval bombardment from ships blockading the area. The latest killings and military attacks are but the most recent events in an almost endless stream of "tit for tat" reprisal and counter reprisal which have been going on for nearly 50 years, littered with a few full scale military invasions of both Palestinian lands in the form of the Gaza strip and Palestine's neighbour and ally Lebanon.
Civilians have been killed in Gaza in their homes, in their mosques and their hospitals, in their care homes and in numerous other places in a strip of land with an area of some 139 square miles (360 square kilometers) and a population of some 1.9 million people. That equates to some 13,500 per square mile. Not much room to run away or to take cover. The justification for this latest aggression against the Palestinians living in this "prison camp" is that "rockets are raining down" on the people in Ashdod, Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and other "targets" injuring a few civilians, one seriously but killing no one. Home made rockets with small warheads and no guidance system, launched from improvised sites by what is in effect, little more that a "Home guard" militia, against a country armed with many thousands of personnel and reservists, sophisticated weaponry and technology including the latest tanks, aircraft, smart missiles, ships, anti missile systems and of course nuclear weapons. It seems a very one sided fight.
There is a very simple reason for this continuing situation, both now in Gaza and on the wider historic question of Palestine. The one great and over ridding fact, is that in the eyes of successive western governments, Israel can do no wrong. It has been the case since the end of World War 2 and the liberation of the camps in central Europe. The world developed a collective guilty conscience and the Palestinians have been paying for it ever since 1948. Any criticism of Israeli expansion, the collective punishment of populations, the continuing occupation of Arab lands, the flagrant disregard of United Nations resolutions, even those that manage to get past the American veto, is essentially ignored by the west and treated as more anti Semitic outpourings by the "Jew haters".
The "Holocaust card" is frequently used as a defence to justify Tel Aviv aggression against its neighbour's in the name of "a right to self defence".
The concept of a "right to self defence" for the people of Palestine is always lost in Washington, London and the other capitals of Europe.
The European Union, the United States of America and the United Kingdom, provide the worlds media with much rhetoric and hand wringing "sympathy" for civilians caught in the carnage, but fail to provide any leadership for the resolution of the underlying problem. They may each provide many reasons, none of them good and mostly based on expediency, ignorance or guilty conscience, for their failure to act. At the end of the day, the Israeli's continue to bomb, shell, arrest, detain, occupy and blockade the people of Palestine and the west does nothing.
The United Nations is a toothless caricature what of it was intended to be. Powerless in the face of "the veto" from one or other of the permanent member nations of the Security Council, the UN is rendered impotent and reduced to "humanitarian" activities, incredibly valuable to the people reliant on them, but of little relevance in achieving a solution.
The government of Israel in Tel Aviv continue their policies of aggression, occupation and expansion because they are fully aware that no other nation or nations can or will, do anything to stop them.
Surely the time must soon come when people around the world say to their respective governments that "enough is enough" and the excesses from the Israeli government must be stopped.
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