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Total number of comments: 12 (since 2013-11-28 16:33:10)

Matt

Showing comments 12 - 1
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  • Has a European Boycott of Israeli Colonies in the Palestinian West Bank Begun?
    • Matt 12/12/2013 at 7:12 pm with 1 replies

      Why don't you boycott the United States too, since all of Israel's crimes are aided and abetted by Washington?

  • United States, Israel opposed Mandela, supported Apartheid
    • Matt 12/11/2013 at 2:07 am

      He kept them at 91% and he resisted efforts to cut them further. The point is that if Obama were an Eisenhower Republican, he would have raised taxes on the rich to Eisenhower's preferred rate of 91%.

      But yes, you caught me on a technicality. Well done.

    • Matt 12/07/2013 at 12:39 am with 3 replies

      Obama is an Eisenhower Republican? I guess I must have missed the part where Obama raised taxes on the rich to 91%.

  • The Middle East warmly welcomes Iran Deal, sees it as Step toward Denuclearizing Israel
    • Matt 11/26/2013 at 11:07 pm

      All this Israeli talk about "suitcase nukes" is a classic case of projection. In the late 1960's, Moshe Dayan tried to threaten the Soviet Union with exactly that:

      "In Dayan's scenario, Israeli intelligence agents would secretly inform their Soviet counterparts as soon as Dimona's assembly line went into full production. And when Israel developed its first bomb in a suitcase, Moscow also would be told - and reminded - that there was no way to stop Mossad from smuggling a nuclear weapon across the border by automobile or into a Soviet port by boat." - Seymour Hersh, The Samson Option, pp. 98-99.

  • Does the Road to Mideast Peace Run through Tehran?
    • Matt 11/25/2013 at 4:47 pm

      Both Iran and Hezbollah, while expressing their disapproval of the existence of the "Zionist regime", have said that they would not obstruct any deal that the Palestinians agree to.

      Even Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has said "Whatever decision they [the Palestinians] take is fine with us. We are not going to determine anything. Whatever decision they take, we will support that."

      link to telegraph.co.uk

      Hassan Nasrallah agrees: “At the end, this is primarily a Palestinian matter. I, like any other person, may consider what is happening to be right or wrong. . . . I may have a different assessment, but at the end of the road no one can go to war on behalf of the Palestinians, even if that one is not in agreement with what the Palestinians agreed on. Of course, it would bother us that Jerusalem goes to Israel.... [But l]et it happen. I would not say O.K. I would say nothing."

      link to newyorker.com

      Hezbollah did not obstruct the Israeli-Palestinian talks in 2000-2001, or 2007-2008, and they are not obstructing the current ongoing talks either. There is little danger that Iran or Hezbollah would obstruct any deal the Israelis and Palestinians make with each other. There is very little that Iran or Hezbollah can do to promote peace between Israel and the Palestinians. That task is mainly up to Israel and the United States, who are the main obstructors of such a peace.

      That isn't to say that an Iranian-American rapprochement wouldn't indirectly promote Israeli-Palestinian peace. It may lessen the fear many Israelis have of Iran, which is one of Bibi's greatest assets, and cause them to vote for a more moderate candidate.

  • Syrian Civil War Spreads to Lebanon: Beirut Shaken by Iran Embassy Blast, kills 23, wounds 150
    • Matt 11/21/2013 at 3:44 pm with 1 replies

      Are the Franjiehs the Maronites that Hafez Assad supported when he invaded Lebanon in 1976?

  • Egypt: Youth Remember Martyrs, Reject both Army and Muslim Brotherhood
    • Matt 11/19/2013 at 4:44 pm with 1 replies

      So what should happen to the Muslim Brotherhood? Like it or not, they represent a substantial portion of the population. If there's going to be anything resembling a democratic process, they will have to be included in it.

      Of course, you don't have to have a democratic process. The Brotherhood and it's supporters can just be repressed, tortured and murdered like they have been for the last 60 years.

    • Matt 11/19/2013 at 12:38 pm with 4 replies

      @Bill
      "Given the choice, it is better that Egypt have a secular authoritarian government than an Islamic one."

      It isn't your, or my, choice. It's the Egyptians'.

    • Matt 11/19/2013 at 12:37 pm with 2 replies

      @Joe from Lowell

      You must have been calling for a coup in the United States following the 2000 election and the subsequent Bush presidency.

    • Matt 11/19/2013 at 12:23 pm with 1 replies

      @Juan Cole

      I think it would have been wrong if the army overthrew Nixon and started shooting Republicans in the streets. I would have called for Nixon's return to office, and then for impeachment proceedings to be filed against him immediately afterward.

    • Matt 11/19/2013 at 4:49 am with 13 replies

      If these protesters are serious about democracy, they should be calling for the restoration of the Morsi Presidency, regardless of their disagreements with his politics. Declaring yourself to be "against the Brotherhood and the military" is a cop-out. The proper alternative to military rule is the return of the elected government.

  • Obama's Limited Options: Bombing Syria unlikely to be Effective
    • Matt 08/26/2013 at 2:31 am

      The Syrians have 21st century Russian air-defense systems, with with Russian technicians manning them in many cases. After the 2007 Israeli strike on Syria's alleged nuclear reactor, the Russians learned all about US air technology, which allowed them to beef up their technology and supply it to Syria, just like in 1982 when the the Israelis revealed US plane technology by bombing Lebanon.

      The first thing we'd have to if we intervene would be to take out these sophisticated air-defense systems, and we don't even know what they're like yet, or even if we can do it at all.

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