David Sketchley
Recent Activity
David Sketchley commented on The Preventative State on January 29, 2008, 8:22 AM
What this extremist fails to explain is that his idea of what he calls the %u201Cpreventive state%u201D, is fascism. He tries to dress it up in fancy Orwellian language but he's a fascist and he's talking about bringing in fascism. He defends torture, collective pnishment, and would prefer there was no free speech (except for him and his chums of course & as is demonstrated in his so far successful attempts to control scholars in the US, specifically if anyone dares breach the truth about the crimes of the Israeli state). He's also a plagiarist as Norman Finkelstein has so ably demonstrated in Beyond Chutzpah %u201CHe not only plagiarized, but he plagiarized from a certifiable hoax,%u201D said Finkelstein.http://www.normanfinkelstein.com/article.php?pg=11&ar=3He's also a liar according to The Jewish daily The Forward's Kathleen Peratis, partner in the New York law firm Outten & Golden and trustee of Human Rights Watch: "In a 2004 speech at the University of California, Berkeley, Alan Dershowitz said: "I support Israel because I support gay rights. Recently, a progressive congressman, Barney Frank from Massachusetts, worked with me and Israel to grant asylum for 40 Palestinian gays." Alas, not a word of this is true...So what exactly was Dershowitz talking about? His email reply to my email query was, %u201CThe reference to working with Barney Frank is incorrect. Barney Frank told [me] the story.%u201D"http://www.forward.com/articles/for-gay-palestinians-tel-aviv-is-mecca/The only reason he gets away with what he says? His Harvard pedigree gives his dishonest ramblings academic and mainstream credibility.
David Sketchley commented on Re: Is the threat to Israel different today? on January 29, 2008, 4:50 AM
Meridor's reasoning is seriously flawed, as is all Likudnick discourse. He starts his reply that the 'threat' is indeed different due to 'religious fanaticism' which he says is turning 'national conflicts into...religious wars'. This is a straw man. Nothing has changed since 1948, as the problem was started by religious fanaticism in the first place - the religious belief that one can reclaim territory 2,000 years on because your God 'gave' that territory to you, and then actually taking the land by force and imposing your own religion as the only means to citizenship. He then cites his second reason: 'the phenomena of non-state actors' such as Hamas and Hizbollah. He says they%u2019re %u2018just organisations%u2019 that %u2018only make trouble%u2019. This argument is ludicrous. Is any political party in any country a state-actor? Presumably when they have won elections and become the governing party. So, in this definiton, Hamas is a state actor. It won democratic elections in Palestine in 2006 which Edward McMillan-Scott, the British Conservative head of the European Parliament's monitoring team described as "extremely professional, in line with international standards, free, transparent and without violence". His colleague, Italian Communist MEP Luisa Morgantini said there was "a very professional attitude, competence and respect for the rules." (1) It then formed a legitimate government which was finally ousted illegally by the Quartet who withheld funds to the PA and along with Israel and the US. The NYT on 14 Feb 2006 reported that %u201CThe United States and Israel are discussing ways to destabilize the Palestinian government so that newly elected Hamas officials will fail and elections will be called again, according to Israeli officials and Western diplomats.The intention is to starve the Palestinian Authority of money and international connections to the point where, some months from now, its president, Mahmoud Abbas, is compelled to call a new election. The hope is that Palestinians will be so unhappy with life under Hamas that they will return to office a reformed and chastened Fatah movement.%u201D (2) This is a perfect description of collective punshment. The third reason cited by Meridor is that the threat to Israel is different because of suicide bombers. He says the overwhelming majority of bombers have been motivated by the ideology of Islamist martyrdom %u2018looking for a life after life%u2019 and %u2018are not taking their own lives for a cause%u2019. However, suicide attacks are nothing new. In fact, the very first recorded suicide attack on civilians was undertaken by a Jew, Samson. In all wars, citizens are and have been deliberately targeted by all sides. The US targeted the civilians of Hiroshima and Nadasaki, the British targeted the civilians of Dresden, and the Israelis have continuously targeted Palestinian civilians since 1948. Further, Robert A. Pape, Professor of political science at the University of Chicago, has studied %u201Cevery suicide terrorist attack around the world from 1980 to early 2004. More than half of all suicide attacks were carried out by secular groups and individuals. In fact, the world's leader in suicide terrorism was the Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka, a Marxist group that is completely secular and that recruits from Hindus. More than a third of all suicide attacks by Muslims were also carried out by secular groups, such as the Kurdish PKK in Turkey and the Communist Party in Lebanon. What more than 95 per cent of all suicide terrorist attacks around the world have in common is not religion, but a specific political goal to compel modern democracies to withdraw military forces from the territory that the terrorists view as their homeland or prize greatly. From Lebanon to Sri Lanka to Chechnya to Kashmir to the West Bank, the central objective of every suicide terrorist campaign since 1980 has been to compel a democratic state with military forces on territory that the terrorists prize to take those forces out.%u201D (3) Once the Israelis rid themselves of this false narrative, they will realise that until they renounce their attempts to conquer territory by war there will always be resistance. Links: (1) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_legislative_election,_2006 (2) http://tinyurl.com/28pw8w (3) http://tinyurl.com/23vdh9
David Sketchley commented on The Preventative State on January 29, 2008, 3:22 AM
What this extremist fails to explain is that his idea of what he calls the %u201Cpreventive state%u201D, is fascism. He tries to dress it up in fancy Orwellian language but he's a fascist and he's talking about bringing in fascism. He defends torture, collective pnishment, and would prefer there was no free speech (except for him and his chums of course & as is demonstrated in his so far successful attempts to control scholars in the US, specifically if anyone dares breach the truth about the crimes of the Israeli state). He's also a plagiarist as Norman Finkelstein has so ably demonstrated in Beyond Chutzpah %u201CHe not only plagiarized, but he plagiarized from a certifiable hoax,%u201D said Finkelstein. http://www.normanfinkelstein.com/article.php?pg=11&ar=3 He's also a liar according to The Jewish daily The Forward's Kathleen Peratis, partner in the New York law firm Outten & Golden and trustee of Human Rights Watch: "In a 2004 speech at the University of California, Berkeley, Alan Dershowitz said: "I support Israel because I support gay rights. Recently, a progressive congressman, Barney Frank from Massachusetts, worked with me and Israel to grant asylum for 40 Palestinian gays." Alas, not a word of this is true...So what exactly was Dershowitz talking about? His email reply to my email query was, %u201CThe reference to working with Barney Frank is incorrect. Barney Frank told [me] the story.%u201D" http://www.forward.com/articles/for-gay-palestinians-tel-aviv-is-mecca/ The only reason he gets away with what he says? His Harvard pedigree gives his dishonest ramblings academic and mainstream credibility.
David Sketchley commented on Re: Is the threat to Israel different today? on January 29, 2008, 9:50 AM
Meridor's reasoning is seriously flawed, as is all Likudnick discourse.He starts his reply that the 'threat' is indeed different due to 'religious fanaticism' which he says is turning 'national conflicts into...religious wars'. This is a straw man. Nothing has changed since 1948, as the problem was started by religious fanaticism in the first place - the religious belief that one can reclaim territory 2,000 years on because your God 'gave' that territory to you, and then actually taking the land by force and imposing your own religion as the only means to citizenship.He then cites his second reason: 'the phenomena of non-state actors' such as Hamas and Hizbollah. He says they%u2019re %u2018just organisations%u2019 that %u2018only make trouble%u2019. This argument is ludicrous. Is any political party in any country a state-actor? Presumably when they have won elections and become the governing party. So, in this definiton, Hamas is a state actor. It won democratic elections in Palestine in 2006 which Edward McMillan-Scott, the British Conservative head of the European Parliament's monitoring team described as "extremely professional, in line with international standards, free, transparent and without violence". His colleague, Italian Communist MEP Luisa Morgantini said there was "a very professional attitude, competence and respect for the rules." (1) It then formed a legitimate government which was finally ousted illegally by the Quartet who withheld funds to the PA and along with Israel and the US.The NYT on 14 Feb 2006 reported that %u201CThe United States and Israel are discussing ways to destabilize the Palestinian government so that newly elected Hamas officials will fail and elections will be called again, according to Israeli officials and Western diplomats.The intention is to starve the Palestinian Authority of money and international connections to the point where, some months from now, its president, Mahmoud Abbas, is compelled to call a new election. The hope is that Palestinians will be so unhappy with life under Hamas that they will return to office a reformed and chastened Fatah movement.%u201D (2)This is a perfect description of collective punshment.The third reason cited by Meridor is that the threat to Israel is different because of suicide bombers. He says the overwhelming majority of bombers have been motivated by the ideology of Islamist martyrdom %u2018looking for a life after life%u2019 and %u2018are not taking their own lives for a cause%u2019. However, suicide attacks are nothing new. In fact, the very first recorded suicide attack on civilians was undertaken by a Jew, Samson. In all wars, citizens are and have been deliberately targeted by all sides. The US targeted the civilians of Hiroshima and Nadasaki, the British targeted the civilians of Dresden, and the Israelis have continuously targeted Palestinian civilians since 1948.Further, Robert A. Pape, Professor of political science at the University of Chicago, has studied %u201Cevery suicide terrorist attack around the world from 1980 to early 2004. More than half of all suicide attacks were carried out by secular groups and individuals. In fact, the world's leader in suicide terrorism was the Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka, a Marxist group that is completely secular and that recruits from Hindus. More than a third of all suicide attacks by Muslims were also carried out by secular groups, such as the Kurdish PKK in Turkey and the Communist Party in Lebanon.What more than 95 per cent of all suicide terrorist attacks around the world have in common is not religion, but a specific political goal to compel modern democracies to withdraw military forces from the territory that the terrorists view as their homeland or prize greatly. From Lebanon to Sri Lanka to Chechnya to Kashmir to the West Bank, the central objective of every suicide terrorist campaign since 1980 has been to compel a democratic state with military forces on territory that the terrorists prize to take those forces out.%u201D (3)Once the Israelis rid themselves of this false narrative, they will realise that until they renounce their attempts to conquer territory by war there will always be resistance.Links:(1) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_legislative_election,_2006(2) http://tinyurl.com/28pw8w(3) http://tinyurl.com/23vdh9