On Thu, Jul 17, 2014 at 2:43 PM, LRS Scout <lrssc...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Saying that both states are relatively new Is somewhat misleading. I think the point of Sam's article is that most of the "history" in the Vox article is either misleading or wrong. Actually, Sam's link is talking about a different article with 11 points (found at http://www.vox.com/2014/7/16/5904691/hamas-israel-gaza-11-things). The first one states, "there's a bridge between Gaza and the West Bank that Israel limits traffic on." (here's a hint, no such bridge exits) followed by the statement that "Gaza city is the most densely populated city on earth" (as of 2008 that would be a no as well, that's Calcutta with 24.7k per sq. m and Gaza's was at 4.6k). When a site that touts itself as a "news explainer" starts off with two bits of fiction it sets a bad tone on the rest of the inanity. As far as the article originally posted, which is also in the Washington Post, here are a few things to consider: 1. "All together, Israel and the Palestinian territories are about as populous as Illinois and about half its size." Didn't sound right to me, and it isn't... Israel: 22,072 Sq Miles, 8,146,300 people, pop density would be around 369/sq mile. Illinois: 57,914 Sq Miles, 12,882,135 people, pop density of 222/sq mile. (numbers pulled from respective entity Wikipedia pages) Illinois is 2.6 times larger than Israel and has a population that is 1.5 times larger. It's an odd comparison anyway. Now I'll give the author some lee-way on the population number because some places say the 8.1m number doesn't include the Gaza strip & West Bank but when I looked at the Israel's Central Bureau of Statistics their monthly bulletin says their figures only exclude, "foreign workers, who were 202,000 people at the end of 2012... In addition, the population estimates do not include those who entered the country without a visa and did no[t] arrive through recognized border checkpoints." IMO: Not enough research was done and a "x is to y" comparison had to be oddly wedged in. False 2. "This is not, despite what you may have heard, primarily about religion." Here the author tries to explain that it's about land control, about autonomy, about borders, about a two-state system. He mentions, "managing the very unpleasant Israeli-Palestinian coexistence, in which Israel has put the Palestinians under suffocating military occupation and Palestinian militant groups terrorize Israelis." Last I knew the Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank were electing their own leaders. There is such a thing as the Palestinian Authority and from what I understand they're not puppets of the Knesset. Hell, they even elected Hamas and Israel's "suffocating military occupation" didn't stop them from taking power. This paragraph is the most telling of the author's bias: "Something you often hear is that "both sides" are to blame for perpetuating the conflict, and there's plenty of truth to that. There has always been and remains plenty of culpability to go around, plenty of individuals and groups on both sides that squandered peace and perpetuated conflict many times over. Still, perhaps the most essential truth of the Israel-Palestine conflict today is that the conflict predominantly matters for the human suffering it causes. And while Israelis certainly suffer deeply and in great numbers, the vast majority of the conflict's toll is incurred by Palestinian civilians." What he doesn't mention is that the same Palestinian militants that are terrorizing Israelis are doing so from populated areas and using their neighbors as de-facto human shields. IMO: While the author attempts to explain the reason for tension on both sides he does a poor job of it and paints the Palestinians as just having had the chains hidden for the picture. False 3. This is an interesting, if inaccurate, depiction of the founding of Israel and the military conflicts that followed. The author says the 1948 Arab-Israeli war was started because, "Arab leaders in the region saw it as European colonial theft." My history (granted, it came from public schools) told the tale that the Arab League did not recognize the creation of a Jewish state and launched an offensive after 6 months of "civil war" (some say funded and spurred on by those same state) with statements like "we will drive them to the sea," and "this will be a war of extermination." IMO: Jaded and shaded, sets the scene for the rest of the article, which I'm not going to dig into. The premise presented is false. The rest of the "explanation" then degrades into a pity party for the Palestinian peoples. I didn't see anything regarding the repeated attacks by Arab League members that are listed at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wars_involving_Israel and only mentions "dozens of rockets" being fired into Israel. From what I've read elsewhere, that might be a slow day in this round. The point of the article that Sam linked to was pointing out that Vox is not much more than an editorial site without any oversight. This is confirmed by the following disclaimer on their Terms of Use: "All content and materials provided on the Services are intended for general information, general discussion, education, and entertainment purposes only. Do not construe that such content is either endorsed or verified by us. THE CONTENT IS PROVIDED âAS IS,â AND YOUR USE OR RELIANCE ON SUCH MATERIALS ARE SOLELY AT YOUR OWN RISK." Now for my disclaimer: This email is my opinion formed by a brief amount of research while also drawing on history lessons I've learned in the past. I've tried to cite sources but my personal opinions are probably tied in at points. Like it, don't like it, that's up to you. Until Later! C. Hatton Humphrey http://www.eastcoastconservative.com Every cloud does have a silver lining. Sometimes you just have to do some smelting to find it. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Order the Adobe Coldfusion Anthology now! http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Coldfusion-Anthology/dp/1430272155/?tag=houseoffusion Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:371730 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/unsubscribe.cfm
