[Liam-]

Yep

[Livia]

Originally Posted by Liam-

Yep

I'm surprised.

[Liam-]

Originally Posted by Livia

I'm surprised.

That I read?

[Marsh.]

Originally Posted by Liam-

That I read?

The expert on Israel is here, didn't you know?

[Livia]

Originally Posted by Marsh.

The expert on Israel is here, didn't you know?

Well, if having spent a lot of my working time there in the last few years, have visited because I have family there... and the fact that the reason I work there is because I am qualified in International Law.

Oh.... and I'm a Jew. That doesn't got down too well with people who shout and holler about Israel and Palestine but have been to neither, and have only read what suits their own agenda.

[Tom4784]

Saying you've been somewhere isn't an argument (Especially when it's so easy to lie online, saying you have done something is never a compelling argument in of itself) and you don't need to have been to a place to have a view on it's politics.

Israel is a country and one that regularly violates human rights and it's been investigated for committing war crimes. To try to paint anyone who criticises Israel as anti-semitic is just plain gross, especially in defense of a country that has comitted such serious attrocities. The Jewish people have suffered more than most under cruel regimes so to use accusations of anti-semitism as a shield to defend a country that's widely known to commit atrocities is quite unpalateable to say the least. I'm not jewish and it's not the same but I'd personally hate it if someone used bigotry towards the LGBT as a shield from accusations of violence. In both cases it undermines the crimes committed against the minority in question.

Now Palestine isn't innocent either but, at the end of the day, when you compare the citizen loss of life between Israel and Palestine, Palestine's civilians have been murdered in much greater numbers than Israel's in the same conflicts. I cannot defend a country that thinks it's justified to regularly murder civilians en masse. It's a simple scale to balance it on and I think both countries should face consequences for their actions but the civilian loss of life makes Israel's offences far more egregious.

[Niamh.]

[The Slim Reaper]