know thine enemy...

[Hortlund]

These are the guys you anti-Israel characters are supporting...realize that.

From TIME magazine:

On Tuesday, April 16, it will be nine years--ages, it seems--since the first suicide bomb in the history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict ripped through the parking lot of a roadside West Bank cafe. That day Sahar Tamam Nabulsi, 22, filled a white Mitsubishi van with cooking-gas canisters, placed a copy of the Koran on the passenger seat and, acting on behalf of the militant group Hamas, barreled into two buses, killing himself and another Palestinian and wounding eight Israelis. Days later, the Jerusalem Post was still, almost quaintly, calling the attack an "apparent suicide," noting that the investigation was ongoing.
These days, of course, there would be no such head scratching. But back then no one could imagine that 105 more suicide bombers would go on to claim 339 more lives.

The Palestinian suicide bomber has evolved since Nabulsi made his debut in the role. Today he is deadlier and requires less coercion. He used to be easy to describe: male, 17 to 22 years of age, unmarried, unformed, facing a bleak future, fanatically religious and thus susceptible to Islam's promise of a martyr's place in paradise, complete with the affections of heaven's black-eyed virgins. Today's bomber no longer fits the profile.

Today he is Izzadin Masri, the 23-year-old son of a prosperous restaurant owner, who killed himself and 15 people at a Jerusalem Sbarro pizzeria last August. He is Daoud Abu Sway, 47, a father of eight not known to be unusually political or religious, who detonated a bomb outside a luxury hotel in Jerusalem in December, killing himself and injuring two others. He is even a she. Ayat Akhras, 18, was a straight-A student, just months away from graduation and then marriage. On March 29, she killed herself and two others outside a Jerusalem supermarket. Volunteers such as these are coming forward faster than militant leaders can strap an explosive belt around their waist and send them off to kill and die.

Among Palestinians, it has become normal--noble, even--for promising men and women to slaughter themselves in pursuit of revenge and the dignity it is thought to bring. "What was once more of an individual decision by a small group is becoming much more mainstream," says Jerrold Post, an American psychiatrist who has studied suicide bombings in the West Bank. The suicide-homicides have come to be seen by most Palestinians as their last, best hope. In June a poll taken in the Gaza Strip found that 78% of the population approved of suicide bombings, considerably more than supported peace talks (60%).

These days Palestinians celebrate the suicides in newspaper announcements that read, perversely, like wedding invitations. "The Abdel Jawad and Assad families and their relatives inside the West Bank and in the Diaspora declare the martyrdom of their son, the martyr Ahmen Hafez Sa'adat," reads a March 30 notice for the 22-year-old killer of four Israelis in a shooting attack. Palestinian children play a game called "Being a Martyr," in which the "martyr" buries himself in a shallow grave. And the job of bomber comes with established cash bonuses and health benefits for the surviving family. How else could the Palestinian boy or girl next door hope to be pictured on key chains and T shirts? "The suicide factory is in full tilt now," says Daniel Pipes, director of the Middle East Forum, based in Philadelphia. "These are the rewards of having built an infrastructure."

Once upon a time, in the years immediately following that first bombing in 1993, it was a challenge to recruit suicide bombers. Field leaders for Hamas and Islamic Jihad, the radical groups that until lately monopolized the bombings, would seek out promising young men from the mosques or the crowds of rioters at Israeli checkpoints. The leaders would then submit the candidates to intense spiritual indoctrination and terrorist training, watching all the time for signs of fear or doubt. Those who wavered would be quickly dropped.

With the breakdown of the peace process in the summer of 2000 and the start of the latest intifadeh that September, the martyr wannabes started coming to Hamas--and they didn't require persuading. "We don't need to make a big effort, as we used to do in the past," Abdel Aziz Rantisi, one of Hamas' senior leaders, told TIME last week. The TV news does that work for them. "When you see the funerals, the killing of Palestinian civilians, the feelings inside the Palestinians become very strong," he explained.

And not just among fundamentalists. Last December the mainstream Fatah movement of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, the nationalist group that forms the backbone of the Palestine Liberation Organization, entered the suicide-bombing business. Since then, the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, a Fatah offshoot, has taken part in at least 10 such attacks, some of them in collaboration with Hamas or Islamic Jihad. The Brigades activists are generally not religious fanatics. "Within Palestinian society, in the past year, a very broad mechanism of social approval has been created that makes it possible for even less religious people to commit suicide," says Ehud Sprinzak, a political scientist at the Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya, Israel. "There's enormous despair. There's no meaning to life."

Officially, at least, members of al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades part from the fundamentalists in their goals: they support the idea of a free Palestine living in peace beside Israel and say they want only to force Israel to allow that state to rise up. But for now, nationalists and fundamentalists are united in their strategy, which is to kill and maim as many Israelis as possible and to horrify and demoralize those who go unscathed.

Executing a successful attack has grown easier in the past 1 1/2 years. Since bomber candidates are now volunteering, they are self-selected for commitment and do not require indoctrination. Each mission involves five or six layers of support and planning operatives--who do not commit suicide--including scouts, guards, drivers, explosives technicians, electricians and metalsmiths. Arafat's Palestinian Authority has at times worked to keep the militants in check, sporadically shutting down bombing networks to appease the Israelis. But during the recent violence, Arafat has got out of the way, so cells have greater freedom to operate.
 
Most bombs are currently made out of triacetone-triperoxide (a substance also found in shoe-bomber suspect Richard Reid's sneakers). The explosive is simple to produce, although volatile. Several dozen Palestinians have died preparing the bombs. Hamas, which sometimes builds devices for the other groups, has four or five master bombmakers who prepare the explosives, according to Israeli estimates, and about 25 additional activists who make other parts of the bombs--often tinkering in rented apartments and garages to avoid capture. The total cost of each explosive belt is $1,500 to $4,300 depending on quality, according to Hamas activists.

The 22-year-old who detonated a bomb outside the Dolphinarium disco in Tel Aviv last June lifted his hands as he blew himself up, eyewitnesses reported, apparently so that his arms wouldn't obstruct shrapnel flying off the belt around his waist. One bombmaker on Israel's wanted list has started lacing bombs with rat poison, presumably to multiply the number of casualties, although the technique has yet to succeed, according to Israeli intelligence officials.

After a bombing, the sponsoring organization usually distributes to the media a video documenting the bomber's last, triumphant words. The organization pays for the funeral, which includes a tent outside the family's home where neighbors can come to offer condolences and drink coffee. Hamas pays its bombers' survivors a permanent pension of $300 to $600 a month in addition to bankrolling the family's health care and the education of the bomber's children. Iraqi President Saddam Hussein also funds a one-time $20,000 payment for the families--increased from $10,000 about six months ago in a show of solidarity.

[Hortlund]

the article continued

The Middle East did not invent the suicide attack. "Any ideology can spur this action," says Pipes of the Middle East Forum. In 1987 Iranian teenagers were dispatched by the thousands to act as human minesweepers during the Iran-Iraq war. They wore keys around their necks that were said to open the doors of paradise. This probably inspired the first suicide bombings in the Middle East--in Lebanon by the Hizballah militia during the early 1980s.

But the Palestinian practice is alarming for its sheer momentum. Says Bruce Hoffman, terrorism specialist at the Rand Corp.: "Groups there succeeded in what terrorist organizations have rarely been able to do, and that's transform their campaigns into almost mass movements, not dependent on a hard-core cadre of fighters but rather with people from the population readily stepping forward to replenish the terrorist ranks." In the Middle East the notion of the suicide bomber has a particularly toxic appeal. Other regions struggle with warfare and rage, but Islam offers potent rationales and rewards for "martyrdom." In Islam martyrdom washes away all past sins and guarantees the bomber places for 70 relatives in heaven.

Hamas, especially, has bolstered popular acceptance of the suicide killing by crafting justifications for both parts of the act. Some moderate Islamic clerics insist that the bombings are contrary to the teachings of the Prophet Muhammad, who condemned suicide. But if death comes through an act of self-defense, others argue, that is another matter. "The person who commits suicide is a person fleeing life. This is prohibited by Islam," Mousa Abu Marzouk, the Damascus-based No. 2 leader of Hamas, told TIME. "The martyr is not running away from life. He is making the future for his children."

Killing Israelis, goes this argument, is an act of national self-defense, since the Israelis occupy Palestinian territory, deny the Palestinians their national rights and, in enforcing their rule, frequently kill Palestinian civilians. This logic was sufficiently compelling for the 57 Islamic countries at this month's Organization of the Islamic Conference in Kuala Lumpur to exempt Palestinian bombers from their definition of terrorism. Says Marzouk: "The term terrorism should not be applied to people whose land is occupied." And if the victims of those fighting occupation are civilians? "There shouldn't be any distinction between an occupier in uniform or civilian dress," Marzouk argues. "If a man dressed as a civilian carried a gun and took my house, my land and my right, how can I say that he is a civilian and has nothing to do with it?"

To Palestinians, perhaps the most persuasive defense of suicide bombings today is that they are working. If the goal is to empower the powerless and shake the foundation of Israeli society, the bombings have proved highly effective. Presumably the Palestinians would be happy to fight the Israelis conventionally, army against army, but they have no real military. They have no tanks, no air force, no artillery--just a bunch of militias armed with machine guns and, if you count Hamas' illicit arsenal, some mortars and rockets. Israel, on the other hand, has one of the most powerful and modern militaries in the world. The asymmetry produces a lopsided body count. Since the fighting began in September 2000, some 1,200 Palestinians have been killed, compared with some 400 Israelis. That disparity feeds the drive to frighten and punish the enemy with bombings. "As they have war jets and missiles, we have human bombs that can inflict losses on the enemy and achieve some balance," says Marzouk.

Certainly, the bombing networks have learned that their actions, together with Israel's retaliatory measures, bring enormous attention to the Palestinian cause. "You have heard the U.N.--after these operations began--speaking about a Palestinian state, Israeli withdrawal and the right of repatriation for refugees," says Marzouk. The value of suicide bombings is reinforced by the seeming futility of every other option.

There is disagreement over how to stanch suicide bombings: Should one remove the infrastructure that supports them or give the volunteers more reasons for living than for dying? For now, Israel is targeting the supply side of the attacks--the militant leaders and weapons makers who organize the missions. But as the pool of suicide bombers grows, the need for infrastructure diminishes. Recruiters are not much needed when volunteers are abundant. And bomb builders have proved to be replaceable. For example, Israeli forces managed to assassinate a Hamas master bombmaker on Jan. 22. The disruption led to a slight dip in attacks. But the organization's bombmaking expertise bounced back within a couple of months, Israeli security officials concede. "These operations cannot, absolutely cannot, be stopped," says Marzouk. "Nothing, neither policies nor military barricades, can prevent a person who chooses to be a martyr from carrying out his action." That has certainly been the experience with crackdowns by the Israelis.

Meanwhile, Israelis will continue to live in perpetual fear of bodily harm and grievous loss from bombers while Palestinians suffer the consequences of Israel's vengeful reprisals. And mothers like Ibtisam Daragmeh will stare at images of children they thought they knew. Children who, in their "martyrdom videos," hold Kalashnikovs and wear fatigues. Ibtisam's son Mohammed, 19, blew himself up in Jerusalem on March 2, after positioning himself next to a group of women with baby carriages waiting for their husbands to leave a bar mitzvah ceremony. He killed nine other people and injured more than 50 in the name of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades. Two weeks ago, a neighbor came by to pay a condolence call. She mentioned that she wished she were Mohammed's mother so her son could be a martyr.

[SageFIN]

Originally posted by Hortlund
These are the guys you anti-Israel characters are supporting...realize that.

One can be against the policies of Israel and the palestines at the same time.

[straffo]

Originally posted by SageFIN


One can be against the policies of Israel and the palestines at the same time.

Sure and it doesn't imply that we hate both side of this conflict.

[Ripsnort]

Just a reminder, its not the first time that Muslim nations have sent their own little children to death in the name of Jihad, during the Iraq/Iran war, Iran used to line up kids between ages of 6 and 12 line abreast, and clear out mine fields as well.

[Eagler]

the upside is they (the bombers) can only strike once - per bomber

nutbags - the lot of them

[midnight Target]

Did you actually read the article Hortlund? That was not a condemnation of suicide bombers, it was an explanation of why they exist. Think for 1 minute on how bad it would have to be in a society to create a supply of young people willing to die, willing to kill babies! Life on the west bank must be horrible! Do you honestly think these idiots are lining up to die because of good PR?

Now please don't construe this as support for the terrorists, it is not. There are, however, 2 sides to this story and I think some of us are ignoring one of those sides.

[Hortlund]

Originally posted by midnight Target
Did you actually read the article Hortlund? That was not a condemnation of suicide bombers, it was an explanation of why they exist. Think for 1 minute on how bad it would have to be in a society to create a supply of young people willing to die, willing to kill babies! Life on the west bank must be horrible! Do you honestly think these idiots are lining up to die because of good PR?

Now please don't construe this as support for the terrorists, it is not. There are, however, 2 sides to this story and I think some of us are ignoring one of those sides.

I dont think you are supporting the terrorists midnight. In fact, I think you would have to be pretty f¤cked in the head to support those guys.

HOWEVER

Can we agree that:
1) These are the bad guys: (example) Ibtisam's son Mohammed, 19, blew himself up in Jerusalem on March 2, after positioning himself next to a group of women with baby carriages waiting for their husbands to leave a bar mitzvah ceremony.

2) Anyone who harbors terrorists or supports terrorist activity is just as guilty as the terrorist. (exact quote from POTUS..I agree with him here).

3) Something is seriously wrong with this picture: "In June a poll taken in the Gaza Strip found that 78% of the population approved of suicide bombings, considerably more than supported peace talks (60%)."

4) What do you get if we combine 2 and 3?

[midnight Target]

You get a sick sad situation.....but it has been fostered and fed by the environment. That environment has to change and the Israelis have the power to affect significant change.

The real question is, do we want Israel to kill 78% of the Palestinians, or to make every effort to improve the quality of life of those Palestinians.

Remember the Marshal plan....many in Western Europe had sympathy for the communist system after WW2, and a huge influx of money (food) from the US changed enough minds to maintain a peaceful transition to democratic systems. (I know this is simplified but the point is the same)

If the Palestinians had sufficient food, shelter, and security the bombings would probably stop. Now wouldn't providing those items make more sense than trying to kill the 78% that support suicides?

[Hortlund]

Originally posted by midnight Target
You get a sick sad situation.....but it has been fostered and fed by the environment. That environment has to change and the Israelis have the power to affect significant change.

The real question is, do we want Israel to kill 78% of the Palestinians, or to make every effort to improve the quality of life of those Palestinians.

Remember the Marshal plan....many in Western Europe had sympathy for the communist system after WW2, and a huge influx of money (food) from the US changed enough minds to maintain a peaceful transition to democratic systems. (I know this is simplified but the point is the same)

If the Palestinians had sufficient food, shelter, and security the bombings would probably stop. Now wouldn't providing those items make more sense than trying to kill the 78% that support suicides?

What you are talking about here, is getting at the root causes of terrorism. Why do people f¤ck up so bad that they want to blow them selves up. To this I agree. We need to "win" the future generations. This can be achieved with Marshal plan-type aid, it can also be achieved by graning the Palestinians their own country etc etc. There are a million ways to win their hearts and minds.

HOWEVER

this only apply to the future generations. Basically any Palestinian older than 7 years old is screwed already. They are locked in that hate box. Trapped. You simply cannot win the hearts and minds of these suicide bombers...it is too late for that. You have litterary tens of thousands of palestinians in various ages who want nothing else but to blow themselves up together with as many Israelis as possible.

You cannot change that by giving them food, shelter, a country of their own...heck, not even a free AH account and a cable connection would be enough to win these guys over. The hatred is too deep, it has gone too far.

So what to do then? We need to win the hearts and minds of the future generations of palestinians, but at the same time, we have got to keep the choke-hold we hold the present generations in.

My guess is that there will be a war in the region. After that war we can start with the society building for the pals. I'm sure the Israelis will grant them autonomy in some part of the West bank.

[miko2d]

Originally posted by midnight Target
Life on the west bank must be horrible! Do you honestly think these idiots are lining up to die because of good PR?

 People's definitions of "horrible" differ a lot, so compared to my life in Soviet Union it does not seem horrible at all to warrant dying or killing. You personally can always buy a ticket to Israel and visit the territories personally to see how horrible it is firsthand.
 History knows many examples where people sacrificed their lives regardless of their living conditions.

 Anyway, the life of palestinians would be much less horrible if there was not a war with Israel over the last 50 years. Hundreds of thousands of palestinians work in Israel even now.
 If there was not open warfare, many more would be working productively in Israel and on the palestinian territories themselves. Their level of economic development would be much higher. Israel would not need those territories as a buffer against attack and palestinians would have much better chance to achieve their statehood peacefully.

 In fact, many palestinians would want that and would many would even now prefer to live in a territory controlled by democratic Israel then in an independent fundamental autocracy like most arab states. Many of palestinian casualties are such people lynched by radicals.
 But there are few people in palestine and many outside that are interested in continuation of the struggle - mainly to distract their own serfs from thinking of overturning their governments.

 miko

[Dowding]

I dont think you are supporting the terrorists midnight. In fact, I think you would have to be pretty f¤cked in the head to support those guys.

Err... I don't think anyone around here supports the Palestinian suicide bombers or the Palestinian gunmen or Hamas or Islamic Jihad or even the PLO.

Come on Mr. Magistrate, surely you can understand there are two sides to this rather complicated case - with blame attributed to both groups of protagonists. You seem to be very ready to pigeonhole people. I wouldn't have expected that.

[Tac]

"Life on the west bank must be horrible! Do you honestly think these idiots are lining up to die because of good PR? "


Actually, YES.

Look at the profiles of the suicide bombers. They are middle-high class people, people that are attending college, own bakeries, come from wealthy families. They are not uneducated, hopeless "starvin' marvins" jumping at the chance to end their suffering and take their oppressors down with them.

PR is everything. Nazi's used it to make the german people do their will and kept them under control with it, Japanese PR was so strong some of their people  believed Japan had won the war, PR in the US pushed the common man and woman to go above and beyond their limits in order to mass produce.. churchill mastered it by giving hope to the british people and sustaining their will to resist.

I find this quote from Dune to fit this quite well:

Baron Harkonnen: "The way to control and direct a mentat is through his information. False information -- false results."

Add to that the fact that their religion in itself provides them with an excellent way to support these suicide martyr attacks.. and you get... good "ratings".

[Hortlund]

Originally posted by Dowding


Err... I don't think anyone around here supports the Palestinian suicide bombers or the Palestinian gunmen or Hamas or Islamic Jihad or even the PLO.

Come on Mr. Magistrate, surely you can understand there are two sides to this rather complicated case - with blame attributed to both groups of protagonists. You seem to be very ready to pigeonhole people. I wouldn't have expected that.

I'm sorry if I have disapointed you. I have real problems to conjure up any sympathy for the pals however.

Rule of thumb when dealing with Steve Hortlund:
The side using suicide bombers who target women and children start at a disadvantage on Steves list of good & bad guys.

[Nashwan]

this only apply to the future generations. Basically any Palestinian older than 7 years old is screwed already. They are locked in that hate box. Trapped. You simply cannot win the hearts and minds of these suicide bombers...it is too late for that. You have litterary tens of thousands of palestinians in various ages who want nothing else but to blow themselves up together with as many Israelis as possible.

You cannot change that by giving them food, shelter, a country of their own...heck, not even a free AH account and a cable connection would be enough to win these guys over. The hatred is too deep, it has gone too far.

So what to do then? We need to win the hearts and minds of the future generations of palestinians, but at the same time, we have got to keep the choke-hold we hold the present generations in.

Nobody over the age of 7 can ever forgive?

After the war, Jewish groups in Europe wanted revenge on the Germans for the Holocaust. They planned acts of mass murder, poisoning of resevoirs etc. Understandable, even if reprehensible.

However, with the Holocaust over, most Jews wanted to get on with their lives, not take revenge on the Germans.  Many went to Israel and concentrated on building a new country for themselves. The plans for revenge died out because most wouldn't support the extremists who wanted to carry them out.

The Jews hated the Germans, but overcame that hatred. The Palestinians hate the Jews, but give them freedom from Israeli occupation and the extremists will be marginalised their too.

The last paragraph is particulary strange. How can you raise a new generation not to hate whilst keeping a "choke-hold" over their parents?