<p>Well, then let’s get to Iran’s true intent, since we know it isn’t the welfare of the Palestinians.</p>
<p>mini–are you saying that India has the second largest population of muslims? Still, living with a 90% majority, they don’t have the political weight of their numbers, do they?</p>
<p>Do you really believe that 1948 India is an event of hope for Israelis? Sacrifice and deport your people for peace? Is that your message?</p>
<p>And our true intent? Please enlighten me</p>
<p>It ain’t peace…that is for sure</p>
<p>CGM, I am quite clear on the US intent in the ME, and have stated it numerous times before.</p>
<p>I am curious as to Mini’s (or anyone else’s) take on the Iranian intent in the I/P crisis.</p>
<p>Ah yes…the intent, hidden or otherwise. I am also interested.</p>
<p>Which country benefits most from a destabilized Lebanon? Which countries need a diversion of Arab resources in the Middle East at the moment? Which countries benefit from intensifed conflict in any part of the Middle East? Is Israel merely defending itself–or is it participating in a larger agenda at the behest of other nations? </p>
<p>Asmini says, shake up the usual supects. Is Russia backing Iran? Where are the interests of Russia–and Chinese oil consumers–in this conflict?</p>
<p>I believe the answers are multi-varied and layered beyond belief–certainly beyond distant observers.</p>
<p>"mini–are you saying that India has the second largest population of muslims? Still, living with a 90% majority, they don’t have the political weight of their numbers, do they?</p>
<p>Do you really believe that 1948 India is an event of hope for Israelis? Sacrifice and deport your people for peace? Is that your message?"</p>
<p>Yup. Partition of the country. Bloody. Million people dead. Impossible for minority and majoriity population to get along. Totally hopeless. (Be clear - no country, on either side, deported anyone - the British imposed a partition.)</p>
<p>Well, the first President of India was a Muslim. Mulana Asad. The Muslim minority, the second largest Muslim population in the world, has flourished. Current President of the country is a Muslim. They have huge political weight, and have controlled state governments in Kerala (where they are only 8% of the population), Andra Pradesh (where they are 12%), and Bengal (14%). One-state solution, within India, worked out rather well. Would have worked even better if it wasn’t for the British splitting the country apart.</p>
<p>Iranian intent? By funding Hezbollah they get to take a crack at a U.S. surrogate, and preach pan-Muslim unity, increasing Shiite influence. No great mystery. It mirrors pretty well U.S. intent in backing Israel, the so-called democratic force without a constitution. And just as the war takes attention away from the catastrophic U.S. occupation in Iraq, so it diverts attention from Iran’s nuclear troubles. War is good for everyone!</p>
<p>If you’re looking for good guys among governments, you’re likely looking in the wrong places.</p>
<p>
Yea ok maybe in your world. Rajendra Prasad was the first Indian president. Azad was a freedom fighter and then a minister.</p>
<p>Apologies. You are correct. He was President of the Indian National Congress when the deal for Independence was reached. </p>
<p>His words are worth taking note of:</p>
<p> Not only is our national freedom impossible without Hindu-Muslim unity, we also can not create without it, the primary principles of humanity. If an angel were to tell me: Discard Hindu-Muslim unity and within 24 hours I will give freedom to India; I would prefer Hindu-Muslim unity. For the delay in the attainment of freedom will be a loss to India alone, but if the Hindu-Muslim unity disappears, that will be a loss to the whole humanity.</p>
<p> It was Indias historic destiny that many human races, cultures, and religions should flow to her, and that many a caravan should find rest here … One of the last of these caravans was that of the followers of Islam. This came here and settled for good. In India everything bears the stamp of the joint endeavors of the Hindus and Muslims. Our languages were different, but we grew to use a common language. Our manners and customs were dissimilar, but they produced a new synthesis. No fantasy or artificial scheming to separate and divide us can break this unity.</p>
<p>The way he saw it was relatively simple: a confederation of autonomous provinces with their own constitutions, but with a common defense and economy. In other words, a “one-state” solution. I would have thought that possible 5-7 years ago in Israel-Palestine, and the time may come again. But there will be a need for people like Azad, on both sides, to step up to the plate, and if (for whatever reason) such potential folks on the Palestinian side keep fleeing, the Israeli governments keep thinking in short-term increments, the U.S. continues to alienate Muslims worldwide, and the Iranians continue to stir the pot (there are other parties as well), the odds get longer and longer.</p>
<p>Yes Azad was an educated man but I think his beliefs are too idealistic. Its too much to hope for that Hindus and Muslims will live in peace in India…If people continue to take religion so seriously and be motivated by faith and not by facts and reason. Its nice to think about, and of course I wish for it, but lets get realistic, eh?</p>
<p>The status quo in Israel-Palestine is not realistic, for either side.</p>
<p>In the end, the Israelis will have to do a prisoner exchange with Hezbollah and Hamas, as they’ve done with Hezbollah previously. Otherwise, despite all the sound and fury, they simply won’t get their soliders back. </p>
<p>My concerns are two-fold:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Hezbollah is demonstrating that its quite capable militarily. The attack on an Israeli gunboat by a drone aircraft, Katusha rockets reaching Haifa, the ability to cross the border to attack Israeli troops and the significant number of Israeli army and navy casualties challenge the myth of Israeli invincibility and thrill the Arab and Moslem Street. This may force Israel (particularly with a young and inexperienced new government with one eye warily fixed on the Likud) to take imprudent risks that may widen the conflict.</p></li>
<li><p>A wider conflict potentially drags the US into a fight that it is ill-prepared for (being bogged down in Iraq) but that the neo-cons desperately want, will take us to $100/barrel oil and a global recession, and ratchet up global terror. </p></li>
</ol>
<p>I’m shorting my stocks; its going to be a bumpy ride.</p>
<p>swbutterfly has a point. For a mere political party, Hezbolla has themselves quite an arsenal. An arsenal that would normally need the treasury of a nation-state for funding. These arn’t getting this kind of cash from bake sales and offerings from local mosques. These guys have to have billionare individuals along with trillionare countries funneling in cash.</p>
<p>At least the israelis, if their intentions are to get back their soldiers and finally crush a terrorist agressor and not religiously motivated, have realized a crutial fact that Hezbolla has not: Religion may be worth dying for, but it’s not worth killing for.</p>
<p>So to stop these terrorists, we need to destroy the regimes and or the states that sponsor them. Syria, Iran, and Saudi Arabia comes to mind first.</p>
<p>maybe you need to distinguish Saudi Royals from OTHERS</p>
<p>destroy? what do you mean///kill everyone there?</p>
<p>wow…destroy…a whole civilization…destroy…</p>
<p>It was relatively quiet and one perosn is snatched, and Israel starts WW3 perhaps</p>
<p>I hardly see how hardcore Islamism fits into the definition of ‘civilisation’. Terrorists are sub humans and should be dealth with as such. IMO, drop bombs on Tehran, Qom, Isfahan, Damascus to start off…</p>
<p>Oh ya, a couple quotes by your civilised friends in Iran</p>
<p>“Anybody who recognizes Israel will burn in the fire of the Islamic nation’s fury.”</p>
<p>“Israel is a rotten, dried tree that will be annihilated in one storm.”</p>
<p>“They have invented a myth that Jews were massacred and place this above God, religions and the prophets.”</p>
<p>“Thanks be to God, despite its criminal and savage nature, the Zionist regime and its supporters in the West do not have the power to look in the same way towards Iran.”</p>
<p>"In the near future we will witness the rapid collapse of the Zionist regime</p>
<p>Wow, you would destroy people…mom and grandmas, and babies, and kids, wow and they call us liberals paranoid</p>
<p>It’s not so much the soldier, citygirlsmom, as the fact that Hezbolla has been killing Israles for decades with suicide bombers and rockets.</p>
<p>Imagine the US allowing a bordering country to do that.</p>
<p>“Imagine the US allowing a bordering country to do that.”</p>
<p>Imagine if THESE children from Southern Lebanon had been your babies.</p>
<p><a href=“http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/2871/232/1600/20060408-180512-5.30.jp[/url]”>http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/2871/232/1600/20060408-180512-5.30.jp</a></p>
<p>The people who are supporting this, these childrens’ blood are on your hands. Wait several days before this hits international news media:</p>
<p><a href=“http://angryarab.blogspot.com/2006/07/i-have-just-received-these-pictures.html[/url]”>http://angryarab.blogspot.com/2006/07/i-have-just-received-these-pictures.html</a></p>
<p>Upwards of 100 confirmed (places say numbers could be as high as 300-- with jorunalists reporting seeing people in dozens killed in cars…) innocent Palestanian/Lebanese civilians (and 4 Israeli civilians) have died in the raids of the past few days by Israel. I know many people whose family’s are in danger, and you guys are sitting here trying to argue that this is right and justified. I know Jews, Muslims, Christians and others who with the the slightest sense of decency who are protesting and condeming these border-line genocidal acts of terrorism, and injustice against humanity by Israel. </p>
<p>My god! Are you THAT out of touch with reality? Are you people INSANE? No I am curious, first Iraq now this. How much blood needs to be shed before you are satisfied?</p>
<p>The Israeli did not start this. The Arabs did…In a war, you don’t have the luxury of saving ‘innocents’. If you do, you lengthen the war (Iraq, for example), and you get your own people killed. The Arabs should realize that when it rains, you get wet…Calling Israel inhumane? How about condemning the hordes of suicide bombers? Out of touch with reality indeed.</p>