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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: michael97123 who wrote (157978)	2/11/2005 11:04:51 AM
From: GST	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

"You are with us or you are with the terrorists" the rallying cry of both Israel and the US. It is disheartening to see people called "anti-zionist" for failing to be uncritically and fanatically pro-Israel. When you are prepared to see it from both sides, and when you are prepared to be civil to people who are striving to see it from both sides, then you will have my ear. Until then, you are just another guy advocating for Israel and insulting people who don't fall into line.

To: michael97123 who wrote (157978)	2/11/2005 3:27:00 PM
From: Bilow	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Hi michael97123; Re: "Putting it into context today, one might want to look at Nazi Germany where totalitarian control was so great that few were able to mount resistance to their slaughter. If the Jewish people knew the fate awaiting them at the hands of the nazis, and knew that world would stand idly by, what might they have done then? Maybe the Kool Aid ala Jim Jones?" The comparison is somewhat strained for the simple reason that the vast majority of the Jewish people (more or less) peacefully submitted to the authority of the Romans. That was not an option for Jews in occupied Europe. Re: "In Masada, as i understand it, there was no hope." There were 7 survivors of the self-massacre (two women and five children). *They survived by hiding from Jews, not by hiding from the Romans. They stayed in hiding until the Romans arrived and were apparently not harmed much, given that our history of the event comes from them. Re: "Of course the Jews didnt know for sure what their fate was to be. ..." What you're doing here is coming up with excuses for people killing their families. I understand the reasoning, it is, in fact, identical to the reasoning behind many other cult suicides. I am not saying that the actions by the Masada people were somehow different from what normal humans do (when led by fanatical religious leaders). What I am saying is that Masada was in no way unique or surprising, as far as religious cult activity. The Jewish history of the place agrees with my analysis, not yours. It was not exactly a place of pride, in fact they forgot where it was and it was only found by American travellers in 1838. It is only recently that Masada has become a revered place to worship heroes. Since the people at Masada were killers of Jews, they were not considered heroes at the time. Furthermore, if the evidence of the 7 survivors is to be taken at face value, it is clear that not all the people at Masada wished to die. Even the myth admits that at least 7 of them did not want to die. The same thing happened at Jonestown, in that there were many people who did not want to die but were forced to by their friends. The survivors survived by hiding from the fanatics. Re: "... i have not thought about Masada much at all." That's why I am bringing the subject up, to make you think about it. If you understand that your initial reaction to the story was wrong, maybe you will begin to understand the pervasive human tendency to conclude that anything "our" guys do is heroic, while anything the "other" guys do is criminal. My complaint about many American's perception of the situation in the Middle East is that they have a "convenient" notion as to the difference between right and wrong. Masada is a great example of this. Was it right or wrong to kill innocent women and children? Innocent women and children who hid from the knives? Was it right or was it wrong? This shouldn't be a complicated question for you to answer. Is it right or wrong to kill innocent women and children, innocents who are hiding from your sharp steel? Is it wrong or right? You see people daily arguing over whether its right or wrong to torture prisoners, how about killing innocent women and children? Perhaps you should know that the people who were encamped at Masada already had the blood of Jews on their hands before they killed each other. They were the "Sicarii", and they were widely disliked in ancient Israel for doing stuff like massacring the 700 (Jewish) inhabitants of the city of En Gedi. Here's a source from an Israeli sociology department: ... Nor did Yadin own up to the dark side of Masada's defenders. According to Josephus, the rebels belonged to a Jewish sect known as the Sicarii, from the Greek word for dagger. During the battle for Jerusalem, they had gained notoriety for killing not just Romans but also moderate Jews--whom they viewed as collaborators. Josephus also wrote that Masada's Sicarii massacred over 700 women and children in the nearby town of Ein Gedi*. Yet Yadin described the rebels as defenders or patriots. ... sociology.huji.ac.il -- Carl P.S. Here's the English translation of Josephus, which contains the only account we have of Masada: earlychristianwritings.com Masada is covered by Chapter 8-10: earlychristianwritings.com Also see: jafi.org.il

To: michael97123 who wrote (157978)	2/11/2005 3:43:28 PM
From: Bilow	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Hi michael97123; Early religious terrorism, the rest of the story: Sicarii ... At the beginning of the Jewish Revolt (66), the Sicarii, with the help of other Zealots, gained access to Jerusalem and committed a series of atrocities, in order to force the population to war. In one account, given in the Talmud, they destroyed the city's food supply, so that the people would be forced to fight against the Roman siege instead of negotiating peace. Their leaders, including Menahem ben Jair, Eleazar ben Jair, and Bar Giora, were important figures in the war, and Eleazar ben Jair eventually succeeded in escaping the Roman onslaught. Together with a small group of followers, he made his way to the abandoned fortress of Masada, where he continued his resistance to the Romans until 73, when the Romans took the fortress and found that all of its defenders had committed suicide rather than surrender. ... Based on a 1903 Jewish Encyclopedia, with some additions and editing. en.wikipedia.org Kind of reminds you of all those Iraqis running around stirring up trouble for the modern equivalent of the Roman army. Or the Palestinian terrorists who kill Palestinians who want peace with Israel. -- Carl P.S. Also see, from an Israeli website, the relationship between the Sicarii and modern terrorism: Suicide terrorism, like the slippery concept of terrorism in general, is harder to define than it may appear. For instance, are the suicide bombings in Israel really so different from previous incidents in which Palestinian gunmen and knifemen (and the occasional Israeli) launched assaults that they had little hope of surviving? They were scarcely the first to sacrifice their own lives in order to take others. In the first century AD, the Zealots and Sicarii, two Jewish sects, attacked the Roman occupiers of Judaea and their allies in public places. The Assassins, a cult active in modern Iran and Syria from the 11th to the 13th centuries, killed their targets (mainly Muslim rulers whom they considered apostates) at close range and with no escape routes. Their name comes from the Arabic hashishiyya; the drug's powers were thought to explain the Assassins' oblivious bravery. tau.ac.il