And with that I hope you’ll allow me to do so 🙂

No problem. Thanks for an interesting exchange of views.

I don’t think that comparison is completely valid, as Germany and Japan had stable, functional governments at the time…

I’m just trying to follow your reasoning here.

Your basis for not criticizing Lebanon and the Palestinians was that these entities were dysfunctional and therefore any attempt to reason with them was not likely to have much success.

The same was true of Hitler’s Germany and Tojo’s Japan. I doubt that you or anyone else would try to argue that reasoning was going to get anywhere with these two since history has more than shown that to be false.

Who represents the Palestinians, who actually wields real power to enforce decisions on their side?

We know those answers…the PLO, headed up by Mahmoud Abbas and the PA. How much “real power” each holds is debatable.

What seems fairly certain, however, is that these two organizations seem relatively immune from criticism…few give it, and seldom is it ever well received.

If your point is that a forum discussion has no chance of influencing real events, and that therefore my arguments go out of the window, I would have to accept that though.

C’mon, now…I never said that. I think I have shown that I am more than willing to listen to your points. Some I agree with. and some I don’t. When I don’t, I try to present a rational reason why, as I have tried to do here.

I generally stay away from political forum debates on any topic for that reason.

With regard to your first point about these debates not influencing real events, I wholeheartedly agree. I believe it to be equally true that such discussions have a near-zero chance of influencing any poster.

For that reason, I try to only address the basis of an argument and leave the merits of it for another day. If a poster wants to make a point, he should be capable of doing this without resorting to hyperbole, factual distortion, or unsubstantiated claims. These I think are fair game…the actual politics of the matter, not so much.

Instead, the Palestinians and Lebanon are the real issues today, in my view. However, what use is it to criticise them? …Also, the societies and political systems of both these entities are hopelessly dysfunctional, so it seems futile in the extreme to expect any results whatsoever from criticising them.

Israeli detractors aren’t trying to fix things…they are trying to assign blame…and they only point fingers in one direction.

Your point seems to be that critics of the situation can really only expect that situation to improve when criticizing Israel. It would make interesting dinner conversation to extend that argument to a discussion of WW2 where war critics only dog the Allies on the basis that doing so to Germany and Japan would not improve the chances of peace.

You ever thought about facing them in battle (I suppose the relations turned sour before you retired)

Not really. I’ve wondered how many of them avoided being stood up along a wall and then shot by Khomeini’s fanatics.

To sum up the middle east issue shows, how Europeans and their cousins across the Atlantic create problems and then shifts the blame, now Germany is Israel’s best buddy while the Arabs & Muslims who offered them support during the tragedy of the 40s their sworn enemies.

Regarding that support, here is an interesting link:

http://www.projetaladin.org/holocaust/en/muslims-and-jews/the-holocaust-and-muslims.html

Does the poster believe that the Israeli citizens living in Israel who just happen to be Arab or Muslim are “sworn enemies”?

Where and when did Israel classify “Arabs and Muslims” as “sworn enemies”?

So…if Arabs and Muslims are “sworn enemies” as this posters alleges, then what about the info here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab_citizens_of_Israel#Legal_and_political_status

Wasn’t the US invasion of Iraq an unilateral action

No, it wasn’t.

Before you say things like this, just how hard is it to Google the question?

🙂
Nice try.. going back to the only point you got.. getting desperate?

Sorry…did you want me to help you out with what ‘populism’ means?