Mechanical Dershowitz

I was tipped off to this article by a rather odd blogger, by the name of Mechanical Crowds, who's taken an instant dislike to me, for some reason. I can't see why seeing as I'm such a delightful fellow.

He's a rather odd, defensive individual who clearly feels that the conflict that is currently raging in the Middle East is a product of the Arabs' ignorant and duplicitous policies, over the past 60 years. While I can't dispute ignorance and duplicity in a lot of Arabs I've met (myself included), I also can't dispute ignorance and duplicity in a lot of people I've met. It's simply a fact about humanity.

The article was penned by Harvard Professor, Alan M. Dershowitz, a staunch defender of the Israeli cause and well known as a celebrity legal adviser, for people like Mike Tyson and Klaus Von Bulow. He knows his shit. In this case, I suspect he also knows his shit IS shit.

The flaws in his 'continuum of civilianity' proposal, is that if you start judging the Arabs that way, you also have to start judging the Israelis that way. Which would make Arab suicide attacks on Israeli civilians, a more acceptable form of resistance, because, as you know, most Israeli citizens are on military standby. And I don't believe it suicide bombing is acceptable (more importantly, it's not effective, either). What makes Dershowitz' theory palatable to supporters of Israel is that they always work with the assumption that there can never be a moral equivalency between Israeli soldiers and Arab terrorists. And yet the FACTS are undeniable, even by someone as blatantly biased as Herr Dershowitz, who earlier in his career, based a lot of his assumptions on the since-discredited and publicly dishonored Joan Peters, who tried to maintain that 19th century Palestine was a barren and unpopulated wasteland. Here are the facts:

FACT: Israel is a nation founded in 1948 with defined borders which DID NOT INCLUDE the Gaza strip, the West Bank nor did it include Jerusalem. Israel acquired these territories after the 1967 War and Israel has no legal right to these occupied territories.

FACT: Due to the 1948 War some 700,000 Palestinian civilians were forced to leave their property and these refugees have never been allowed to return to their property. Refugees from war are entitled by international law to return to their land of origin.

FACT: LAND ACQUIRED BY WAR IS INADMISSIABLE ACCORDING TO INTERNATIONAL LAW. All settlements built on these occupied lands are illegal according to international law. These settlements must be dismantled, vacated or returned.

FACT: Israel has never offered to return to pre existing 1967 borders in exchange for peace in any negotiations with the Palestinians.