Survey: Religion not the source of tension between Arabs and West

[TastesLikeChicken]

Originally posted by: Stunt
Because this is the exact thread you really want to bust out the Arab stereotypes; :thumbsup: on the thread crap.

You were the one making the assumption of a generaliztion in some weak attempt to malign me, pal.

Don't make such idiotic assumptions about me and there would be no thread-crap in the first place, K?

 

[Stunt]

What are you talking about?, you made a generalization, ie. your attempt at a joke...didn't you see the winky?

 

[TastesLikeChicken]

Originally posted by: Proletariat
God you are misinformed.

Really? Well let's see who is uninformed here.

Ba'ath party - CIA

The Baath party was brought together by a Frenchman, Michel Aflaq. It spread from Syria to various countries in the ME.

http://www.damascus-online.com/se/bio/aflaq_michel.htm

Mossadeq - elected. As soon as he tried to nationalize Iranian oil fields. Out.

Wow, how superficial and wrong on the timeline as well. Why don't you do some more reading about Mossadeq and the Shah, then get back to me. Here, let me get you started:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mossadeq

ISI IS MEANINGLESS? Ouch respect just went down a lot - the ISI was the biggest supporter of the Taliban and Osama Bin laden

The ISI had some infiltration from Taliban and OBL supporters. Other than that, meaningless.

I guess the cold war is an excuse for everything, you have very little humanity I suspect.

I guess you understand very little in the way of political reality or dealing with the fact that one often has to deal with the lesser of two evils in this world?

You deal with their tyranny for oil? The huge civil rights problems? I guess thats why you deal with Turkey. They've killed more minorities than Iraq ever has, and nothing was done about them.

I don't deal with anyone. As much as I'd like to be idealistic and make the hugely idiotic assumption that everything could be perfect, I realize life and politics are not that way and never have been.

The Western part of Europe = old Imperialism, wisened up and moved to a new intellectual plane.
America = new Imperialism

:roll:

Such statements make you look foolish and fringe-ish.

And I am sorry but I have been around the world, and I can say that people in certain countries are nicer/friendlier/more charming than others. I don't like being treated badly and charged more because I am a westerner in Japan. I would much rather go to a country where people are welcoming.

You would be a radical as well if the West was imperialized by a Middle Eastern power.

When will people learn that simply making a claim does not make it true?

The ME is not imperialized, not matter how many times you repeat such claptrap. If they were things would be radically differnet than now and 9/11 would not have happened because we'd have smacked the Islamic fundy BS down faster than you could say Osama.

 

[TastesLikeChicken]

Originally posted by: Stunt
What are you talking about?, you made a generalization, ie. your attempt at a joke...didn't you see the winky?

You assumed I was talking aboiut 450 million Arabs.

Stupid assumption.

 

[Stunt]

Originally posted by: TastesLikeChicken

Originally posted by: Stunt
What are you talking about?, you made a generalization, ie. your attempt at a joke...didn't you see the winky?

You assumed I was talking aboiut 450 million Arabs.

Stupid assumption.

Actually you assumed that an Arab in the ME is more extreme than yourelf saying the exact same statement, that sir is a generalization.

 

[TastesLikeChicken]

Originally posted by: Stunt

Originally posted by: TastesLikeChicken

Originally posted by: Stunt
What are you talking about?, you made a generalization, ie. your attempt at a joke...didn't you see the winky?

You assumed I was talking aboiut 450 million Arabs.

Stupid assumption.

Actually you assumed that an Arab in the ME is more extreme than yourelf saying the exact same statement, that sir is a generalization.

No, the difference is that I don't see protests in the US consisting of thousands or tens of thousands chanting "Death to Arabia" and there have been protests in the ME with Arabs chanting or holding signs saying "Death to America" and burning effigies of our Presidents from Carter on through the present. So my statement holds some water, whether you want to admit it or not.

 

[Stunt]

Americans don't need to chant that...the US is already there killing innocent Arabs
There is a disgust with foreign policy, you will see the same distaste in Europe, Asia, Americas, Africa.
Welcome to unilateral warfare

You aren't at the bottom of the barrel, but you are striving for it

 

[raildogg]

Don't even try to equate America to the hate culture of the Mid East. People there openly call for Holy War and death to the Infidels, primarily USA and Israel and less so, Europe. There are many protests where people hold up signs like "Death to America". Do you see the same in America or any other civilized region of the world?

Killing terrorists is not the same thing as killing innocent Arabs. Innocent Arabs are killed by their fellow Arab terrorists. Also, its not just America who is in Iraq alone. We do have the largest presence there by far, but other countries are contributing. Jordan is helping to train the Iraqi security forces and even providing equipment to arm them. We should thank King Abdullah of Jordan for standing up and doing what is right.

Look on the bright side for once, Saddam is gone, the thousands of Iraqis who were imprisoned are now free. Democracy is taking a hold on the nation and people are actually participating. The Iraqi election was a great success.

Europe had dealings with Saddam, especially Germany, France and Russia. Also, Saddam owed them debt. They wanted to protect their interests, nothing wrong with that. That was one of their major reasons for opposing this war.

Russia has even admitted that Iraq and al qaeda cooperated and Iraq may have had a hand in the World Trade Center attacks.

 

[Stunt]

Ohhh, so iraq had 100,000 terrorists...nice try :roll:
I'm not going to touch the iraq front, but i'll tell you one thing, if i had invested hundreds of billions into a country, I'd expect a hell of a lot out of the nation.
The average european doesn't give a rats a$$ about saddam's debt to their gov't, they are against the war because of false pretenses. Unlike the US, the rest of the world understands there are no WMD in iraq.
Russia claim i have never heard of, but they talk a big game to benifit their own.

 

[raildogg]

Originally posted by: Stunt
Ohhh, so iraq had 100,000 terrorists...nice try :roll:
I'm not going to touch the iraq front, but i'll tell you one thing, if i had invested hundreds of billions into a country, I'd expect a hell of a lot out of the nation.
The average european doesn't give a rats a$$ about saddam's debt to their gov't, they are against the war because of false pretenses. Unlike the US, the rest of the world understands there are no WMD in iraq.
Russia claim i have never heard of, but they talk a big game to benifit their own.

Who said Iraq had 100,000 terrorists?

Do you actually mean we killed 100,000 innocent civilians? Nice try, but you're totally wrong. The death count in Iraq is less than 20,000. The other reports that claimed 100,000 have been proven wrong.

Terrorists are now pouring in the country from Syria and Iran. Iran is increasingly pumping its aid to the terrorists in Iraq and actually coordinating some of the attacks in conjunction with its pupper state, Syria.

Maybe you missed out on the secret dealings between the UN, Germany, France and Russia.

Ha, even Clinton had said there were WMD's in Iraq. Many other Democrats have said in the past that there were WMD's in Iraq and other regimes said the same thing. Otherwise why would the UN have a program dedicated solely to disarm Saddam of the WMD's?

And no, not all of his WMD's were destroyed, or why would the Iraqis block access to key sites and delay the inspections? Kadir Hamza, the father of the Iraqi nuclear program said Saddam was keen on getting nukes and was pursuing them with help from N Korea and Lybia.

Read his book.

 

[Stunt]

I disagree with the death count of less than 20,000. And i'll be the first to say if the number is true, that it's pretty sad that the most advanced military in the world using 138,000 troops and hundreds of billions of dollars were needed for such a small force: ~1000. (one can assume that 19/20 were actually civilans), unless you are going to say that ppl living in the houses bombed were terrorist kids

I don't give a crap what clinton said, fact is, even with the same info...he didnt invade, therefore there was no theat.
Since there are no WMDs in iraq i can safely say that CLINTON was WRONG, BUSH was WRONG.
Oh no!...look at me...i didnt support Clinton either!

Way to look like a partisan hack bringing up the 'clinton was no better act'

 

[raildogg]

So all the experts who studied this are wrong about the death count and you know for a fact that more Iraqis died. Good one.

Not all civilian deaths are at the hands of US. Are you missing out on the news? The civilians who are being killed daily are being killed by terrorists, not Americans.

138,000 troops was not enough even! We needed more to secure. Taking out Saddam's rag tag military was the easy part and could have been done with half the number of troops, but maintaining the peace required 250,000 or so, like General Shinseki recommended. He was ignored and he later resigned.

And not all terrorists are Iraqis, btw. There are foreign elements inside Iraq. Zarqawi is a foreigner, a al qaeda operative who found refuge in Iraq with the blessings of Saddam. There are many other foreign terrorists.

A little thing called 9/11 didn't happen during Clinton, although Saddam did violate the conditions by which he was supposed to conduct business.

Bush felt that regimes like Saddam should be taken out in light of 9/11. Wrong or right, he acted on it and didn't care what the French had to say.

Now, Iraq is a democracy and Saddam is gone.

To be honest, I was not for the Iraq war initially. But now I have no other choice but to support it and our troops. We cannot leave Iraq until the Iraqis can manage the country on their own and provide safety for the Iraqis. And I also realize that we have taken out one of Iran's foes.

Just think for a second, we have taken out Iran's enemies to the east and to the west. Who's smart now?

The Iranian mullahs, thats who.

 

[Stunt]

What the hell does 9/11 have to do with Iraq's lack of WMDs?
I don't care how many iraqi's died vs. americans. I'm addressing that many innocent civilians have died, those who were not terrorists.
Bush's adventure in the ME has not reduced terrorism in the least, has not disarmed anyone, has not helped the iraqi people.
I hope my final point can change over time, but i have my reservations.
Definately not worth hundreds of billions.
As a conservative, i can see that money far better spent on tax cuts, education, homeland security, anything, even a 100m statue of GWB would have been more helpful to americans than iraq was.

 

[TastesLikeChicken]

Originally posted by: Stunt
Americans don't need to chant that...the US is already there killing innocent Arabs
There is a disgust with foreign policy, you will see the same distaste in Europe, Asia, Americas, Africa.
Welcome to unilateral warfare

You aren't at the bottom of the barrel, but you are striving for it

Well welcome to the world. Did anyone ever bother to inform you that the US policies are not the only ones that breed disgust on this planet?

But there's a difference in policies. Yakov Smirnoff used to tell a joke that elucidated that difference:

"In America you talk about your political freedom all the time like it's something special. You can have a protest and say "Reagan sucks!"

We in Russia have the same political freedoms. We can also have a protest and say "Reagan sucks!"

 

[Proletariat]

CIA put Ba'ath party in power who the f*** cares who founded it

http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/51/217.html

Taliban-ISI link vital

http://www.afsa.org/fsj/Dec01/schiff.cfm

Mossadeq - I read the link, did you?

The Americans ousted him after he instituted Socialist reforms and nationalized Iranian oil fields for Iran instead of foreigners. What part of this do you not or do you not want to understand?

The more you argue the more you sound like a nationalist. I don't see an American nationalist adding anything of value to this.

Also when will you learn that in Asia - White man not welcome.

There was a story about a Indo-European civilization in China in the National Geographic. The archeologists wanted to bring back artifacts. The military looked at them and asked the man, "Will this prove that the white man was in China/Asia?". He said maybe and they confiscated the artifacts. Lop Nur is now a nuclear testing site.

 

[Proletariat]

Originally posted by: raildogg
Russia has even admitted that Iraq and al qaeda cooperated and Iraq may have had a hand in the World Trade Center attacks.

WTF? A radical Jew liking Russia? You do know how Jews are treated in Russia to this day right? Ever seen "Fiddler on the Roof"?

Good move. You should check it out.

 

[raildogg]

Originally posted by: Proletariat

Originally posted by: raildogg
Russia has even admitted that Iraq and al qaeda cooperated and Iraq may have had a hand in the World Trade Center attacks.

WTF? A radical Jew liking Russia? You do know how Jews are treated in Russia to this day right? Ever seen "Fiddler on the Roof"?

Good move. You should check it out.

WTF? I'm a Jew now? Thanks for telling me something that even I never knew. ROFL

And a radical Jew at that? WOOHOO.

So I guess all these Palestinian supporters are all Arabs then.:laugh:

How am I radical, by the way?

Good one.

 

[MegaWorks]

Originally posted by: raildogg

Originally posted by: Proletariat

Originally posted by: raildogg
Russia has even admitted that Iraq and al qaeda cooperated and Iraq may have had a hand in the World Trade Center attacks.

WTF? A radical Jew liking Russia? You do know how Jews are treated in Russia to this day right? Ever seen "Fiddler on the Roof"?

Good move. You should check it out.

WTF? I'm a Jew now? ROFL

And a radical Jew at that? WOOHOO.

Good one.

<sarcasm>Raildogg is not radical Jew! Hurray!!!<sarcasm>

Sorry Raildogg I had to.

 

[Proletariat]

Originally posted by: raildogg

Originally posted by: Proletariat

Originally posted by: raildogg
Russia has even admitted that Iraq and al qaeda cooperated and Iraq may have had a hand in the World Trade Center attacks.

WTF? A radical Jew liking Russia? You do know how Jews are treated in Russia to this day right? Ever seen "Fiddler on the Roof"?

Good move. You should check it out.

WTF? I'm a Jew now? Thanks for telling me something that even I never knew. ROFL

And a radical Jew at that? WOOHOO.

Good one.

Oh, terribly sorry. I was assuming. I mean you support Israel a whole lot.

Don't trust anything Russia says though. Ex-KGB agents should be watched carefully.

 

[Gaard]

Originally posted by: raildogg
The other reports that claimed 100,000 have been proven wrong.

They have? How?

Originally posted by: raildogg
And no, not all of his WMD's were destroyed

Link? Oh wait, was this just another opinion of yours that you're trying to pass off as fact?

 

[mordantmonkey]

TLC, perhaps you would like to do some reading as well on the Shah and his SAVAK police.
New York Times 1-7-79
Can you blame iranians being pissed after suffering under a force trained in nazi.. *ahem* i mean german wwii torture techniques.

Mr. Leaf also said in the interview that he and his colleagues knew of the torture of Iranian dissenters by Savak, the Iranian secret police set up during the late 1950's by the Shah with help from the CIA. Furthermore, Mr. Leaf said, a senior CIA official was involved in instructing officials in the Savak on torture techniques, although Mr. Leaf said that to his knowledge no americans did any of the torturing. The CIA's torture seminars, Mr. Leaf said, "were based on German torture techniques from World War II."

 

[umbrella39]

Originally posted by: TastesLikeChicken
If they'd take care of their own problems with their fundy terrorists, radical religious death cults, and megalomanical dictators then we wouldn't have to do it for them.

Are you talking about the good old US of A? We are doing our best of get rid of the magalomanical dictator in charge, give us a break.

 

[piasabird]

So what do you make of that? You are suppose to offer some discussion.

Arafat claimed to be the leader of a people but he stockpiled millions in banks controlled by his wife. Where was his leadership. He did not really seem to care enough about the palestinians to share what he had with them.

A true leader is a builder not a destroyer.

 

[mordantmonkey]

This and many other examples of US interfence resulting directly or inderectly in the suffering of people in other countries is widely known in the arab world. Here it may be a scandal but there it means dead family members

Years of worrying about secret police (SAVAK) informants, who were smartly, but ruthlessly, trained by the best of the US's CIA and Israeli's Mossad; years of witnessing our friends and acquaintances being taken to jail, some never heard from again; years of passing by buildings in which, we were told, people were being tormented; years of hearing about people dying under torture or quietly executed; years of being exiled in a foreign country, which ironically was the belly of the beast, the metropolis, the center which masterminded much of our misfortune in the first place; years of spending our precious youth to free or save thousands of political prisoners by marching in the streets of the metropolis, wearing masks to hide our identities and looking bizarre to those who knew nothing about our story; and, finally, years of trying to prove to the American people that the 1953 CIA coup was not a fig-leaf of our imagination or a conspiracy theory, that it indeed happened and that they, whether they like it or not, have a certain culpability in what their government does around the world.

My freinds from the Middle East say that they do not hate the american people. They harbor more hatred for the american government. They see a country of people not in control of their own government's actions.
is it so hard to understand their viewpoint considering the anger felt here after september 11th?

 

[MegaWorks]

Originally posted by: mordantmonkey
This and many other examples of US interfence resulting directly or inderectly in the suffering of people in other countries is widely known in the arab world. Here it may be a scandal but there it means dead family members

Years of worrying about secret police (SAVAK) informants, who were smartly, but ruthlessly, trained by the best of the US's CIA and Israeli's Mossad; years of witnessing our friends and acquaintances being taken to jail, some never heard from again; years of passing by buildings in which, we were told, people were being tormented; years of hearing about people dying under torture or quietly executed; years of being exiled in a foreign country, which ironically was the belly of the beast, the metropolis, the center which masterminded much of our misfortune in the first place; years of spending our precious youth to free or save thousands of political prisoners by marching in the streets of the metropolis, wearing masks to hide our identities and looking bizarre to those who knew nothing about our story; and, finally, years of trying to prove to the American people that the 1953 CIA coup was not a fig-leaf of our imagination or a conspiracy theory, that it indeed happened and that they, whether they like it or not, have a certain culpability in what their government does around the world.

My freinds from the Middle East say that they do not hate the american people. They harbor more hatred for the american government. They see a country of people not in control of their own government's actions.
is it so hard to understand their viewpoint considering the anger felt here after september 11th?

How can two democracies do this to another Democracy in 1953 Iran? It's disgusting!