Skeptic Project

Here are my opinions:

>> Do you think the constant criticism of Israel's policy is unreasonably strong?

Not really.

>> Some CTs tend to say that Israel is 'just as evil' as former oppressors of the Jews - insinuating Nazi Germany.

Typically these are the same type of people who will also side with tyrannical theocracies governments like Iran and Hamas in Gaza, believing every single thing they say about Israel. It shows severe critical judgement problems.

>> Of course, if this were true, the Palestinians would have been exterminated in the 5 years following 1948. Actually, it is because Israel did not kill or fully expel these Arabs, and acted much more soft-handedly, that they now have an unending conflict, it seems.

Exactly, while there is a docrine of alarmism in Israel which leads them to do pretty fucked up things to the Palestinians, there's no program for extermination, all claims I've seen thus far regarding that are baseless and just as alarmist, if not more alarmist, than the minority of Israelis who think all Palestians want to be suicide bombers.

>> I'd agree that the Palestinian people are held a fashion perhaps similar to a large outdoor jail, but how would most nations respond to suicide bombings and attacks from hospitals and schools?

That's the question, how would you respond? I don't have an answer, and I don't think Israel does either. The solution from outsiders seems to be "Israel should just go away" but it's not that simple.

>> Is it just the long history of this unending conflict, as I've mentioned, that has built up such strong criticism over the years, or is there something else to it?

The region has been rife with conflict for at least 5,000 years, but to me that isn't an excuse to continue violence, though the religious importance of the region, circling around three religions, is likely always going to cause at least some sort of conflict, violent or not.

>> I don't know how many years of conflict you'd have to look at to add up 10,000 Palestinians killed by Israel. In comparison, it seems King Hussein of Jordan killed 10,000 in 1 month in Black September of 1970 when Palestinians tried to go to Jordan. Why is there not much talk about that attrocity by Jordan?

I've talked about this before, but I'm not sure if it was in an email with you. There's a sort of hypocracy in the arab media, where if an arab kills other arabs (such as with Saddam Hussein) it isn't as big of a deal (or it's not mentioned at all) than if Israel does something not nearly as violent. Israel's often used as a way to destract the local population from problems and also a way to drum up support for various things. You likely won't hear much from the far-left in the US about the PLO contributing heavily to starting a civil war in Lebanon that lasted over a decade killing upwards of 250,000 people, leading to an invasion by Syria. But if Israel killed 250 people, for argument's sake, it'd basically be front page news on every liberal and far-left newspaper in the West as well as in the Arab world. That's the hypocracy I'm talking about. If killing and violence are wrong, they're wrong period, it doesn't matter if it's the IDF, Hamas, PLO, FATAH, etc. doing it; it's simply wrong.

>> Is it because Israel is at the forefront of critics of the US 'empire', often a focus for CTs?

Likely so. Consider that during the cold war the Soviet/Eastern Bloc allied with Palestine and the Western/NATO countries allied with Israel, so it's not surprising that belief system as carried over. I've often wondered -- and would bet on -- that if it were reversed and the USSR and so forth allied with Israel and the US allied with and funded the PLO, you'd hear more about Hamas shooting up school busses, than Israel doing the same thing.

>> Is it because European political discourse caters to its Islamic populations and to the oil producing Middle East?

Maybe.

>> If so, are we non CTs being swayed, too?

I'm sure we are, it's almost impossible to find a pure objective view on the Palestine/Israel debate