Much of the Israeli psych is due to the shoah; "a fate unequaled".....

Much of the Israeli psych is due to the shoah; "a fate unequaled".....

Much of the Israeli psych is due to the shoah. They consider it the greatest tragedy to befall a people, ever. About half the Jewish population in the world was killed, a fate unequaled. Aside from the appropriateness of this conclusion, it is one deeply embedded in Jewish Israelis. What, you might ask, does this have to do with WP? I have relatives in both the IDF and IAF and there is an attitude prevalent that anything we do to the Palestinians is not anywhere near as bad as was done to us. Consequently, bombing the civilian apartment blocks in South Beirut, far from any military action, was acceptable. Killing only 1500 Palestinians in Gaza is a drop in the bucket compared with what was done to us.

Consequently, whatever brutality we visit upon the Palestinians is acceptably minor in comparison. I have a nephew who is a Golani captain and his orders in Gaza City during Cast Lead was under NO CIRCUMSTANCES let one of his men be captured, either dead or alive. Anything else is okay. He ordered tank fire on apartments if he saw any movement in windows with no consideration if that movement was civilian. His men would take over housing to place snipers on the top floor and keep the civilians inside to deter counter fire from Hamas. Its ironic that it was felt that Hamas would be reluctant to fire on civilian buildings, the IDF was not so deterred. Vaclav Linek - my current thinking is that the IDF launched another Cast Lead, Egypt would stay out of any direct action but the flow of weapons through the tunnels would increase. I suspect some Egyptian soldiers would defect and bring themselves and equipment to the fight. Another Cast Lead will cause Egypt to annul the treaty with Israel. JD Ledell

I believe that the ghetto thinking of Israel will be it's downfall. It's becoming more and more insulated from the world. In addition to the wall they are building on the Egyptian border they are going to start building a wall in the Jordanian border. They have already talked about starting a wall on Lebanese border. It won't be long before Israel is surrounded by walls and the sea and this physical manifestation of blocking out the world will continue to change the Israeli culture to it's ultimate detriment.

This review is by Joshua Hammer and is of Gershom Goren's new book "The Unmaking of Israel". In the review, Hammer highlights and explores Goren's thesis that the tension that has marked Israel since its founding, tension that was exemplified in the different visions of Ben-Gurion and Begin, has now reached a point where Ben-Gurion's has lost so much ground that Begin's violent maximalist view, fused with ultra-nationalist and ultra-devout religion among the settlers and cross-pollinated into the IDF, has brought Israel to a breaking point. The review is very well done...:

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/november_december_2011/on_political_books/they_shall_reap_the_whirlwind032999.php

What has always struck me about: "Killing only 1500 Palestinians in Gaza, or about 40.000 in Lebanon over the years between 1969 and 2000, and again more than 1400 in 2006, is a drop in the bucket compared with what was done to us."

The Palestinians didn't do that to the Jews. The Nazis did, and their collaborators, and if Palestinians had any part in it all, were really the least among the culprits. I have never understood the logic of this.

It's like a crime victim claiming absolute privilege to harm others because of what was done to him - lest it happens again! - from the time of the crime onwards, and towards anyone, responsible or not.

The holocaust isn't a blank cheque, a license to do whatever Israel sees fit....by stealing land from Lebanon, Syria and the Palestinians with untold wars and miseries over 7 decades.... Without the holocaust looming, much of Israel's conduct would probably be unpalatable to even many of the Israelis themselves....

In the end, the one thing they have achieved is to empower themselves from victim to victimizer. However, they have never 'gotten over it'.

Ironically, getting over having lost is precisely what they expect the Palestinians to do, and to their chagrin, these stubborn people refuse it, even after having been beaten down time and time again. Clearly the only way to make them understand is to beat them some more....

I'm sorry but using the Shoa as a reason, I find as nothing more than 'excuse making', and history shows no matter what culture/religion/race/etc. that has used 'excuse making' for their abhorrent behavior, has never and will never work in the eyes of humanity.

Israel by its actions is a modern day Nazi state complete with Nazi 'sub-human' dealings with others around them. Shoa is no reason, and cannot be used as their psyche reason excuse-making. Israel is a barbaric state run by barbarians who only value their lives and the rest of us humans are dust to be swept under their rugs as far as they are concerned. When and only when the Israelis and their supporters start owning up and calling a spade a spade, that they are acting like blood-thirsty Nazis like what they are doing is on par/identical with what the SS and Gestapo did, then and only then when they become adult and own up for their crimes and stop their criminal behavior, then the rest of us humans will be willing to listen and work with them. Until then, Israel needs to be dealt with for their Nazi-like behavior, smacked down hard for it with no pity afforded them.

Israel wants pity, then they need to start acting like caring humans again, instead of like Nazi SS boots....

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/02/world/middleeast/holocaust-images-in-ultra-orthodox-protest-anger-israeli-leaders.html?hp