Michael J. Totten Commentary of Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

Michael has a done a very good job of reporting issues from the Middle East and digging into them to find the core of the problem. His latest read is no different. He digs into the heart of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and describes it in small enough words that I can even comprehend what he's saying.

Here is a paragraph that sums up his article nicely:

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The “occupation” doesn’t refer to the West Bank and Gaza, and it never has. The “occupation” refers to Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. A kibbutz in the center of Israel is “occupied Palestine” according to most. “It makes no sense to a Palestinian to think about a Palestinian state alongside Israel,” Martin Kramer from the Shalem Center in Jerusalem said to me a few days ago. “From the Palestinian perspective, Israel will always exist inside Palestine.”
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Read the rest of Michael's thoughts here:
http://www.commentarymagazine.com/viewarticle.cfm/the-mother-of-all-quagmires-14423


I couldn't agree with this thought more. Palestinians, and to some extent many Arab countries, do not recognize Israel's creation in 1948; thus the war in 1948 after Israel's declaration of independence. That is the heart of the problem with the Paestinian resistance movements (i.e., Hamas, etc.). They want Jerusalem. They want Tel Aviv. They want it all from the River to the Sea. The Jewish state has no right or authority to be in Palestine and must be ejected immediately.

All of the issues that Israel constantly brings up during their negotiations for peace, are meaningless to Hamas. They shouldn't be on the table at all in their opinion.

Because of this, I find it interesting that Israel has been so civil with Palestinians at all. All of the restraint showed prior to the last Gaza op, letting humanitarian aid in the strip, phoning civilians in Gaza to warn them of attacks, allowing Palestinians to work in Israel, and allowing arab-Israelis to hold political office in Israel to represent people, etc. These very same people want Isreal destroyed, but yet Israel acts with a moral conscience and tries to be friendly and even overly helpful sometimes. I find that refreshing and actually very uplifting. In the face of almost consistent violence, Isreal still takes the higher ground against a determined enemy bent on its destruction.

I'll be the first to admit Israel has made mistakes and does inflame this situation at times. Expanding settlements in the West Bank, the wall around cities, check-points and road-blocks in the West Bank, etc., etc. These all have reasons, but do tend to incite the locals to commit a violent act against Israel.

I see the coming election in Israel as a huge indicator of what the general Israeli population wants the army to do against Palestinians. If Bibi wins (Benjamin Netanyahu), I predict a much more aggressive posture from the IDF even over what Olmert has done in the last 2 months. Make no mistake, Israeli people know that Bibi will be aggressive if chosen. If they put him in the driver's seat, it will be very interesting to see what happens in the next few months.

Calculators -- a Collecting Hobby

I don't know what it is, or what bug I've caught, but I have a thing for calculators, especially programmable calculators.

In High School I had a couple of calculators (from Sharp), one was the El-5500II that was programmable with BASIC. That was cool. I wrote a root solver and would challenge the guys that had an HP 15c to a race (time based), and my stupid, simple little root solver won. I also wrote a lunar lander game that I would play during english or whatever other boring class I was in.

In 1985, I used my EL-5500II calculator's statistical capabilities to predict the score of the BYU v Utah St. football game using previous games and linear regression. The calculator said the score would be 44-7. The actual score was 44-0. I was rooting for USU to score a touchdown really bad. They got down to the BYU 7 yard line, but couldn't punch it in. Dang! Off by a single touchdown.

In short, calculators were fun to work with, and I was hooked.

My collecting officially started when a person I work with handed me an HP-45, and said I could keep it. It had a hard plastic case, the calculator (of course), charger, manual, and leather cover. It was in fantastic condition, and still is. I pulled it out, plugged it in, and started pushing numbers around. What a cool machine! Old HP calculators just have a feel about them hard to describe if you're not a calculator lover.

From that time on I was on the lookout for older programmable-like calculators. The model in the picture above is an HP 41-cv. It is very similar to the one I own, a 41-cx. Back in the day, the 41 (c, cv, and cx) were the "cat's meow" for engineers, teachers, scientists, etc. It has expansion ports to allow for more memory, programs to plug in (games, math, statistics, budget, stocks, etc.), and external device handling. It could do it all. There are literally hundreds upon hundreds of programs written for this machine.

Ebay, pawn shops, and friends from High School all became sources for enhancing my collection. I'll admit that the most I've paid for a calculator was the HP 42s on Ebay ($165). Actually that's not too bad of a price even today. I've seen that machine go for a whole lot more. The calculator was in absolutely perfect condition (everyone calls it 'mint' on Ebay), which was very cool.

Some people are scared off by HP's RPN (Reverse Polish Notation), but it's no big deal. Once you learn it, it's a piece of cake to use. HP's newer graphing/scientific calculators now offer users the ability to choose either algebraic or RPN entry (nice feature for those uncomfortable with RPN).

I've taken out all my calculators and counted them a few times, but I don't remember the tally. It is definitely over 100, but I can't remember the exact number. By and large, the vast majority of them are programmable. I have Casio, HP, Sharp, Canon, and a TI or two.

I'm always on the lookout for a good calculator. Even if my family thinks I'm a geek, they like it when my calculator can convert from liters to gallons in "one fell swoop."

I only wish they made them like they use to. HP still makes calculators, but they are not as good of quality as before. I like the new business one they have, the 20B, and their scientific/graphing calculators are nice, but not wonderful. The TI-89 Platinum is a good machine, HP needs to get its act together to compete against it. I would be hard pressed to choose against the TI model unless HP really fixes its off-shore calculator crap they're selling now.

Bush Bashing

Ex-President Bush flew home to Texas to a crowd of 20,000 well wishers. He worked the rope lines, gave a speech and then left for his ranch. There was a boy in the crowd that had a sign that read, "President Bush, thank you for keeping me safe." He has gone home, and the people that know him, still love him and thank him for his service to America.

However, flip on over to ABCNews or any of a number of other news outlets and read the blog response. I can sum it up in one phrase: "Glad you're home, now stay there," and that is a mild comment. I was on the CBS news site, and every single comment following the story was negative. There wasn't one positive response about him. I was actually shocked. Was GWB that bad? Is GWB responsible for all of this nation's ills and troubles?

Is ex-Presidential bashing now the hip thing to do?

Maybe I grew up in a simpler time and learned a different set of morality rules than these people bashing Bush. Maybe I know that it is better to respectfully disagree than to pass yourself off as a moron by screaming out a profanity-laced argument that my Grandmother could win just by washing your mouth out with soap. Maybe people don't really respect others and just want to get their 15 minutes of fame by shouting from the rooftops hoping they'll be heard. As I said before, I was shocked and frankly, disappointed that we as a nation had sunk to this level.

Whatever it is, it's disgraceful. President Bush did his best, that's all anyone needs to say. If you disagree with that, fine. If you don't like the wars, fine. If you dislike the way the economy is performing, fine, get in line behind me. If you have problems with a myriad of other things that you believe are the direct cause of one man (the former President), then you have that right. However, form an intelligent, coherant and respectful argument and present it without prejudice or profanity, and then we'll talk.

I do feel however, that it is a disgrace when we as a nation don't let the man sail off into the sunset, so to speak, but rather continue to tear him down as he gracefully exits the White House and turns the keys over to the new occupant.

I hope we can be a better group of citizens when Barack Obama leaves the White House and not turn into a group of thugs intent of holding him accountable for all of our ills.

In short, I hope we can grow up.

Obama Sworn In

Okay, I admit it, I watched.

I'm at work and flipped on my Slingbox connection at home to see the inaguration. One of my co-workers was watching it streamed on MSNBC, so I figured I'd watch as well. Beyond JFK's famous "ask not what your country can do for you" speech, I haven't seen a single second of an inaguration -- until now. After watching pieces of this one, I think I'll avoid the next one too. How can so many people like standing in the cold for this type of event? It boggles the mind.

If I could sum up the proceedings in one word, I would choose boring. I actually found myself yawning a couple of times.

Luckily with my Slingbox, I could fast-forward through the slow parts to the good parts (admistration of the oaths of office, and a few sound bites from the acceptance speech). With my attention span being so low, "cut to the chase" is a good idea to keep me interested.

Okay, game on. Let's get 'em Barack.

Cease Fire Realized

Israel has self-called a unilateral cease fire in the Gaza Strip. Hamas, has decided to join with Israel's call for a cease fire and they give the "Zionist occupiers" 7 days to withdraw all troops from Gaza, or else.

Israel has decided not to open any border crossings (except for medical and other humanitarian supplies) and in my opinion will most likely keep the troops in Gaza and blockade on it until it is sure no military action will take place against its citizens.

Hamas welcomes the cease fire. They have been beat up pretty badly and need time to regroup. They will never admit defeat, and don't have to in this case. Israel didn't boot them from power, and couldn't completely stop rockets from firing.

I'm curious to see how long this lasts. Say, 7 days?

IDF vs. Hamas

This round goes to the IDF. Although it is never funny when someone dies or is injured, I found myself laughing after reading this.

http://mypetjawa.mu.nu/archives/195865.php

My favorite quote:

"[A] Hamas guy throws a grenade. He must have thrown it like a girl, because it's way off. "

Digging Your own Graves

Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal rejected Israel's conditions for a Gaza cease-fire.

Apparently he wants a timed cease-fire (1 year, 2 years, whatever) that they could choose to renew or not. That sounds a little too convenient to me. He doesn't want a cease-fire to last forever. Because Israel wants a lasting peace, Hamas has refused this opportunity for peace.

All of this could be over, if they promised to never fire rockets and infiltrate Israel. I guess they're showing their true colors. If they cannot exist with resistance, than they don't exist at all. The IDF will take care of that last part for them (they'll be run into the ground and cease to exist soon).

They're digging their own graves and the graves of their children. Very sad.

Meanwhile the UN and a group of Arab nations are condeming Israel. Oh, no, not that ... anything but that. They can sign papers and point fingers and say bad things (complete sarcasm intended). I don't think Israel cares much about the UN when it wouldn't protect them to start with. They will continue to defend themselves at the risk of upsetting the UN.

Possible Cease Fire in Gaza

I've been reading 3 english Israeli newspapers (jpost, ynet, and Haaretz) checking out the Israeli point of view on this conflict. I also read the english version of AlJazeera, but it is completely negative towards Israel and so not a favorite read of mine. Apparently the Egyptians have talked a little sense into the leaders of Hamas (both in Gaza and Lebannon). I think the phrases, "They're kicking your butts," and "They won't stop until you are completely eradicated" were central to this conversation. It appears to have worked. Hamas is now publicly saying they want a cease-fire, whereas before this was only in private.

Just a few days ago Hamas publicly said they would never agree to a cease-fire unless "their" goals were met. They just knew that their superior Palestinian resolve would see them through this conflict (Allah willing). News Flash: Israel is not a push-over, even for a real army. Although Hamas knew this, they hoped that the lessons of their big brothers to the north (Hezbollah) from the summer of 2006 fight would see them to a similar victory. It didn't. Little brother in the south still cannot do it. Israel learned from its mistakes, and adjusted their tactics and is doing very well despite what the MSM (Main Stream Media) is reporting.

The cease-fire should go something like this (if everyone gets only what they need):

1. Israeli troops completely withdraw from Gaza and return home.
2. Israel lifts the blockade of Gaza and allows goods to flow freely into/out of the territory.
3. Israel continues to monitor Gaza and not allow weapons to flow into the territory.
4. Egypt controls the Rafah crossing and will not allow weapons to be smuggled across.
5. Hamas (and all other militant groups in Gaza) agree to not fire rockets into Israel.
6. Hamas (and all other militant groups in Gaza) agree to not infilitrate Israel for "resistance" operations (like sucide bombings, murders, etc.).

There is a possibility for Turkish troops to help monitor the cease-fire, but Israel won't allow them to watch from their soil, and Hamas won't want them in Gaza; that leaves Egypt to keep them. This is a tough sell all the way around. I don't see how it will happen.

If Hamas signs off on this type of cease-fire and actually keeps it, it will be a good thing. However, as history in this area of the world has taught us, I don't believe it will hold. Rockets will be fired (eventually, breaking the cease-fire -- surprise, surprise), and Israel will respond disproportionately (as it should to ensure the safety of its citizens), and in a few years we'll be right back in this same situation where another cease-fire is attempted.

Summarizing from "The Incredibles":

No matter how many times you stop the Palestinian terrorists, they always manage to break a cease-fire or find a way to "resist" again.

Israel feels like the maid, they just cleaned up this mess! Can we keep it clean for ... for a whole year?

Obama's Presidency

I'll admit it, I didn't vote for Obama nor did I want him as President. However, I'm not stupid enough to wish him bad luck. In fact, it's just the opposite: I hope he is wildly successful. If President Obama is successful, than my little corner of the world will be better off. For instance, if the economy recovers, then we all do good. These are all good things for the greater good that I support.

I am worried about how he'll handle things. A relative newcomer to politics and he's going to be thrown into the fire immediately. He has the economy to try and help (no one person can mess it up and no one person can fix it up ... good luck on that one), the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, countries that hate the US (Venezuela, N. Korea, Iran, et al), the Middle East where nothing ever works for very long, and then a group of retarded killers that want every American dead. Wow. I really do wish him luck.

I'm not a registered Republican or Democrat. I probably lean a little more right than left, but only because of what I preceive as moral stances embraced by the right that the left feels are draconian. I'm fine with that.

Here's to a good next four years with Obama at the head.

FYI: I don't care what anyone says, having Hillary as Sec. of State still frightens me. I can't see her talking sense into anyone from the Middle East.

Cartoons -- ah the simple life

Cartoons remind me of a simpler life, a life without problems, a life that is fun and full of happiness. I thought I'd detail out some of my favorite cartoons, just for old times sake.

Speed Racer: I know the movie just came out a few months ago and there was an updated cartoon series with Speed, but it doesn't come close to comparing to the original. The corny Japanimation cartoon just hooked me when I was young. There was just something about the Mach 5. That was a cool car!

Tom and Jerry: Without a doubt this was my favorite and still is. Something about the underdog mouse kicking the crap out of the cat just had me laughing. It was David vs. Goliath played out on the TV. I think the cartoon about Jerry's strong cousin and the Piano Concerto were my favorites. Of course, the tennis, golf, cowboy, billiards, and ice skating ones were good as well. Any T&J Produced by Fred Quimby was awesome! Anything Produced by Chuck Jones was mind-numbingly crappy.

Chip and Dale: No, not the dancers, the chipmunks. A very long time ago the Wonderful World of Disney was broadcast every Sunday night. It was a special treat when they decided to air the Chip and Dale cartoons. They never did this enough and I was always disappointed when there was a stupid movie showing instead of a cartoon. These rascals always figured out some way to make me laugh.

I watched Bugs Bunney, Elmer Fudd, Daffy Duck and all the other cartoons that Mel Blanc voiced (his Yosemite Sam was pretty good), but I always thought they were a step below. Good, but not something I needed. The most frustrating cartoon on Saturdays was the Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote. I actually hated that one. I don't know why, but I couldn't stand to watch it.

Cartoons remind me of a simple, less complex life. A life worth living, for sure, but one that is full of life and fun and happiness.

Israel and the Gaza Conflict

Let's get one thing straight here, I am pro-Israel. I support the Israeli operation in Gaza and what they're trying to do. I am against what the Palestinian militant Islamic group (Hamas) is trying to do. I'm not so sure that Mahmoud Abbas is much better with his PA group, Fatah. However, for now he seems to just be watching.

That being said, war sucks. I truely wish there was a way to avoid this type of armed struggle. War is just an extension of politics by other means -- that is the truth. It is tragic when one innocent life is lost on either side of a conflict. Unfortuantely there have been far too many losses from both sides to keep an accurate count.

I grow tired of the whimpy European and Arab countries and their calls for peace. Why didn't they work on something BEFORE Israel started this escalation? This is not news. It has been boiling over for months. Why wait until now when there really is a problem (read: war)? If they were truely interested in peace in this area, they would have been all over Arab countries getting them to talk with Hamas to stop the rocket attacks against Israel and the arms smuggling. They would have been meetings with the UNSC to see if the blockade of the Gaza strip could be lifted. But, no. They wait until it is too late, and then hope against hope that they can step in to stop this.

Word to all of the wusses who would do nothing before: It is too late! Israel cannot trust their fate and security to your never-ending committee meetings, high-minded simpleton solutions, and holier-than-thou cease fires.

Israel has every right to defend themselves from an entity that is bent on destroying them and will never stop resisting what they believe is Israeli occupation of their land (from the sea to the river).

Everyone who has any type of interest in this conflict will know these simple truths:

1. Hamas wants Israel destroyed. Whatever else happens (ceasefires, lulls in the resistance, etc.), this main fact will forever remain.
2. Hamas is resisting Israeli occupation. All the land of Israel belongs to Palestinians, not Israelis; therefore, resistance is justified. Because Israel occupies this land (not just the West Bank and Gaza Strip, but Palestine -- from Galilee to the Dead Sea, from the Med Sea to the Jordan River) they need to be destroyed. Resistance is a noble pursuit to Hamas (and others) and all forms of it (suicide bombing, qassams/grads/katyusha rockets, attacks on Jewish settlers and Kibbutzim, etc.) are not war crimes, but glorifiable duties of Palestinians.
3. Israel evacuated the Gaza Strip of all Jewish settlers in late 2005. Israel hoped that giving up all of this land would help Palestinians see that they (Israel) were willing to work with them. It resulted in around 6,000 rockets fired into Israel. Nice response Hamas (ungrateful gift recipients).
4. Hamas rested power from Fatah in June 2007 in a bloody battle.
5. Since June 2007, Israel has tried to restrict the military gains of Hamas by blockading the Gaza Strip and controlling entry to it. It hasn't worked. Hamas has armed itself with weapons and rockets (you can thank Hezbollah and Iran for this) and continued firing them even during the blockade saying that the blockade was the reason they resisted. Um, no that's not correct. You resist because that's what you do.
6. A 6 month "cease-fire" between Hamas and Israel -- yeah right -- ended Dec. 19, 2008. Because Hamas was tired of what they believed were Israeli lies, they did not renew the cease-fire (they didn't like the blockade of the Strip). They began ratcheting up the rocket fire into southern Israeli cities.
7. December 28, 2008: Israel attacks the Gaza Strip with the stated goal of trying to limit the rocket fire and provide security for its citizens.
8. Israel, having learned its lessons from the 2006 summer conflict in Lebannon against Hezbollah (which was a victory, but felt like a defeat), has decided to defend itself. Hamas threw the first punch (set of them -- rockets), and now Israel is striking back.

A word about war crimes and proportionality:

What other country engaged in a war notifies people in the war zone BEFORE dropping bombs? That's crazy, but Israel does it.

What other country would suspend a war to let humanitarian supplies in that will certainly find their way to the enemy? That's crazy, but Israel does it.

If there are any war crimes, Israel isn't committing them. People die in war, that's the cold hard truth. Civilians, soldiers, and children. Like I said before: War sucks. After waiting 3+ years, Israel has finally responded with force (that's restraint).

What is one Qassam rocket worth? Is it worth one Israeli guided missile or one JDAM dropped from an F-16? If one Israeli is killed, should only one Palestinian be killed? If this proportionality equation is followed, the conflict will never end. Although I hate to say it, the bombs dropped in Japan saved more lives than they took. I'm not advocating dropping the bomb here, but the point is sometimes it's better to beat the crap out of your enemy so that they surrender and lives are saved. Hamas only understands force: Well, Israel is giving it to them -- in spades! They are showing Hamas that each rocket fired has a severe response. Stop the rockets, and the violent response will stop. It's that easy.

I'll close this post with a favorite saying:

If Israel lays down its weapons and stops fighting, it will be destroyed.
If the Palestinians (and Arab militants) lay down their weapons and stop fighting, there will be peace.

Here's to hoping for a long and lasting peace in the Middle East!