Revenge @ MindSay 
love
“Mr- President -
The problem isn’t settlements, it’s Arab rejection. We all support peace in the Middle East. But pressuring Israel is not the right approach. The obstacle to peace is not Israel. The settlements are not the impediment. The issue is simple: the Arab and Palestinian rejection of Israel’s right to exist, including through violence and terrorism, for over 60 years. Israel’s right to exist is undeniable and is based on its right to self-determination in its historic homeland. The path to peace is clear. With recognition, Israel has said again and again that everything is on the table without preconditions. Mr. President, it’s time to stop pressuring our vital friend and ally. It’s now time to direct your attention to the rejectionists who refuse to recognize Israel and negotiate an end to the conflict. With your leadership, yes, we can have peace. But the path begins with the recognition of Israel.”
You can see the ad and the formatting here
I really wish this organization would stop espousing it's over-simplified statements on behalf of Israel, because I truly believe they are ultimately to its detriment, and to the detriment of the entire peace process.There are many things I find irritating, and, beyond that, disturbing about this ad. For one thing, it’s this stolid, bull-headed view that the problem is one thing and not the other, that “the issue is simple”: but the issue is ANYTHING but simple! Is it at all possible that both the illegal, aggressive settlements and Arab rejection of the legitimacy of the state of Israel might both be parts of a much larger and much more complex problem, one that, in its complex enormity, has been brewing for many generations, into which people have been born and died, because of which directly people have been born and died?
It’s reflective of a general tendency of the extreme wings on both sides of this conflict to paint it simple, to pretend that it’s an issue of black and white, good guy and bad guy, evil side versus saintly side, when the actual case is, both sides have “good guys” and “bad guys”, and those “good guys” and “bad guys” do not emerge from a vacuum: they emerge from reactions to complex cultures of crisis. As part of this absolutist tendency, there is this cry to absolve Israel of all blame, as if in its entire history, especially its recent history, it has never had a single action that was in any way impeding the process of peace in the Middle East. That statement itself is impeding the process! It only fuels absolutist groupthink on both sides that has so far absolutely failed to solve anything (for proof, see the current state of the Middle East).
There is also this voice involved that exemplifies its own narrative as the only narrative of the situation, in complete denial of the other narratives of the same situation that exist in tandem to it, which themselves are essential to approach and consider if there is going to be any peace at all. The assumed simplicity of all Arab peoples accepting a narrative of the events in Israel’s history foreign to their own--and that all Arab people have one narrative, at that--is not only arrogant: it’s unrealistic. The acceptance of the validity of the state of Israel is more than just a symbolic action, as this ad seems to assume: it’s the acceptance of a point of view of the situation which denies the dispossession and the suffering that people have accumulated in their national memory. It is a complex and difficult struggle, one which I myself have fought with, to announce the legitimacy of the state (and to therefore imply that one condones the actions that occurred in order to establish/maintain/expand that state.) I do believe that, at this point, because there are Israelis who have been born multiple generations in Israel, that at this point the state has a right to exist (noting of course that this is not a simple thing for me, and that it is something which I struggle with daily, and that I do not feel comfortable with condoning the aformentioned things that went into the state and that continue to occur in the state. However, I am not a dispossessed Palestinian. It is much easier for me to come to that conclusion. Especially considering Israel’s past refusal to even consider the Palestinian people a people at all, let alone giving them the right to their own lands (a very, very recent development, one which even to this day has not fully come to fruition), how could it be considered so simple for them to do the same for Israel?
Perhaps the most disturbing aspect of this ad is its condoning and alleviation from all blame of the Israeli settlements. The settlements are, in my own opinion and in the opinion of many others, a very pointed and continued obstacle to the path of peace in the region. Spurned by the biblical imagining of the land of Israel as including the West Bank and Gaza and the right of the Jewish people to that land, these settlements are aggressively moving into areas outside of the “Green Line” into areas in the West Bank (mostly ceased in Gaza since תוכנית ההתנתקות, the Unilateral Disengagement Plan in August, 2005), much of which is occurring on lands privately owned by Palestinian citizens, and all of which occurs with the intention to “claim” all of Biblically imagined land of Israel for the Jews, devoid of Palestinians. The development of the settlements were unfortunately at various points encouraged and even developed by the Israeli government (therefore making even that issue complex, as there have been people who settled in that land without religious motive, albeit those are not the people who move out to the settlements today),but at this point many of them occur illegally (again, unfortunately, with support from the current right-wing Prime Minister, Netanyahu), but are actively dismantled by the Israeli Army and police---however, to this end, many of the settlers have taken on an anti-government attitude, saying that they will just keep re-building and re-building. If that is not a “problem” in terms of Israel and Palestine developing peaceful relations, I honestly do not know what is. Terrorist activities, suicide bombings and violence against citizens are absolutely awful and cannot be condoned, but neither can actively colonialist, disenfranchising structures and complexes, white phosphorus bombs and aerial fire-strikes on civilian homes and disproportionate military force, or blockades on basic goods. Extremism on both sides must be accounted for and called to end.
This ad is misleading and over-simplistic at best. Of course, to this argument, I have heard the counter-point "But look at what other people say about Israel!", and honestly, I absolutely do not buy that. I for one am sick of the "they did this so we can therefore do that" game. It is obvious to me that the pattern of that attitude will only form the shape of a snake biting its own tail, granting eternal life to and obliterating all hope for an end to a conflict that is creating hostility, unsafe environments, death and destruction for millions of people. The history of this conflict is long and complex, with shades of gray all over the damn place. If anyone truly wants peace, on either side of the conflict, there needs to be a removal of the albeit attractive, appealing goggles of black-and-white visions of righteous anger and the absolutely good nation and the absolutely bad nation, and there needs to be a move to start seeing the conflict for what it is: complex, with good things and bad things being done from both sides. There needs to be an acceptance (which, of course, I realize is a difficult one, and one which will take time and effort to reach) of the multiple narratives involved in the situation. Only once we switch our focus from Us vs. Them to Us and Them (if we can't get it down to just "All of Us") can peace even begin to grow.
SANTIAGO, Chile – Madonna is causing "crazy enthusiasm" and "impure thoughts" on her first concert visit to Chile, a prominent retired cardinal complained on Wednesday, as he paused in a tribute to a late dictator to denounce the pop star.
Roman Catholic Cardinal Jorge Medina criticized the flamboyant singer during his homily at a Mass in honor of the late dictator Augusto Pinochet, who oversaw the deaths of some 3,200 dissidents during his 1973-1990 rule.
"This woman comes here and in an incredibly shameless manner, she provokes a crazy enthusiasm, an enthusiasm of lust, lustful thoughts, impure thoughts," said Medina, the cardinal who was chosen to announce the election of Pope Benedict XVI.
Hundreds of fans spent three days camping outside the National Stadium in Santiago to get good spots for Wednesday's concert, the first of two. About 60,000 people were expected at each performance.
One of those waiting in line, Roberto Lopez, told local reporters that he had quit his job in the southern city of Punta Arenas because his boss hadn't given him time off to attend the concert.
Pinochet died Dec. 10, 2006, at age 91.
Medina said that some of those who claim to seek justice for violations of human rights under the dictator are actually seeking revenge.
Copyright © 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
That when you plan to get even with someone, you are only letting that person continue to hurt you.
Okay so that person has hurt you or robbed you of what you think is rightfully yours. If I told you that that does not count, it does not count for a reason to strike back at the other person – that wanting to get even may hurt him yes and which will make you in turn very happy bout it too yes again. But truth of the matter is – you’re the one who’ll be hurting most by it. Why? --Because you are making yourself quite open or vulnerable for a counter-strike again and again. You are giving him permission to hurt you repeatedly because apparently he won’t just sit there taking your punches too but will punch you right back in – cause he is the type who would. And you know what, in always thinking about your rage it would only serve to enrage you some more. That’s even hurting you more than you ever know. Your own rage will destroy you. So you see the other guy is winning over you without even trying hard enough.
But think about this --- can he be so sure that what he has stolen from you is the thing for him that it would work well for him too? You see, wanting something just because it looks good on the other person does not guarantee that the same thing would look good or will work well for you too. Nope, that’s not how it works. One man’s medicine may be poison for another.
So what to do? Well, leave! Your leaving will douse cold water over his fiery temper and greed. How can he be continually angry too when there’s nobody around to be angry with or at? There’s nobody or nothing that would add coal to the fire in the furnace…his furnace.
And what have you lost? If you think about it, not much really because you can always get it back in your life just the way you are. That’s how you succeeded in the first place.
I mean how stupid can you get? It was well after sunrise and those two animals I adopted were still dead asleep under all those fluffers. first I tried the cover near the yellow tree and all calico did was get up open it a little and climb back with greybeard. so I switched to greybeard's side. They had put a tray with water under that window but today the tray was dry- it made a good drink last night- and so I started chewing on that window cover. it makes a great crunchy sound, better than the white paper calico sometimes gives me to tear.
calico tried her "No, Abi" thing again. I ignored her. does she actually think my name is Abi? My friends call me abigailsmithadams but that might be too hard for her to remember or pronounce. Well she sat up and I knew we were making progress. I went back to crunching and sure enough she stumbled over to the white box I sit on and brought out the dry bird bits, sprinkled some on the bed near her hips and dove under the covers again.
I was happy. I love to prevail but I fear it's another day in the fire box room. Maybe she will move that weird smelling tree in here for me to climb. maybe if i go sit on her lap and purr........... her fur is fuzzy pink today. and her hind legs are covered in dots. animals. I wish someone would write a book so I could know what she is thinking.
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