[lbo-talk] Hizbollah rockets put Israel's Arabs under fire

[ravi]

At around 24/7/06 4:13 pm, Doug Henwood wrote:
> 
> On Jul 24, 2006, at 2:17 PM, ravi wrote:
> 
>> This stuff about Israeli Arabs being harmed by Hezbollah rockets seems
>> at best a fruitless diversion. This is not to whitewash Hezbollah as
>> entirely legitimate freedom-fighters. Rather, attempts to examine the
>> details of Hezbollah action is a distraction from the real atrocities
>> committed and being committed by Israel.
> 
> I'm not sure your second sentence follows from the first; it does look
> like a bit of a whitewash. There's no question that Israel is doing far
> more damage, human and infrastructural. Almost all of the stuff I've
> posted to this list has been critical of Israel, and there's not much
> danger of a Fox-ish "balance" taking hold. But what I wrote was
> specifically in response to "We're all Hezbollah now," which strikes me
> as an ugly, false, and alienating slogan.
> 

I have no comments to offer on the "We are all Hezbollah" matter. And of
course I am not questioning your attitude on the Israel-Hezbollah
affair. What I mean is:

I am criticizing the story on how Israeli Arabs are being harmed by
Hezbollah rockets and the motives behind the reporting of the story (the
Fox analogy is to the attitude of the author of the story, not to
yours). I am criticizing it not because I think Hezbollah does not harm
Arabs in any way, but because irrespective of what Hezbollah does, to
bring that to the discussion (in the media) serves as a distraction.

IOW:

Yes, the Hizbollah are lobbing stuff in retaliation, indiscriminately.
Israeli Arabs are getting killed as a result. If Hezbollah says they
target only military they are clearly wrong, empirically speaking. Does
all of this matter, at this juncture? I claim: no, not much. Israel is
murdering civilians in the 100s in Lebanon. Looking at the side effects
of Hezbollah's weak retaliation is akin to looking at the effects of
Palestinian boys throwing rocks.

	--ravi

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